Boo_ep007

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:00:00]:
What follows may not be suitable for all audiences. Listener discretion is advised.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:00:06]:
The world is full of stories. Stories of mysteries, of curiosities, of oddities. Join Cat and Jethro Gilligan Toth for the strange, the bizarre, the unexpected, as they lift the lid and cautiously peer ins the box of oddities.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:00:35]:
Okay. Hi.

Kat [00:00:37]:
Are we doing this?

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:00:38]:
Yes. Okay.

Kat [00:00:40]:
I just got out of the shower. I don't have any pants on.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:00:43]:
Stop it.

Kat [00:00:44]:
Let's do a pantless podcast.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:00:47]:
Pantsless.

Kat [00:00:48]:
Pantsless. Pantless. Pants. Listen, if I'm gonna do the show without my pants, you should do the show without your pants.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:00:55]:
I don't think that you get to make the rules for me as far as pants wearing goes.

Kat [00:00:59]:
Take your pants off.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:01:00]:
Don't. Don't be gross.

Kat [00:01:02]:
Well, I'm not putting any on.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:01:04]:
You don't have to.

Kat [00:01:05]:
Okay.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:01:09]:
So we've had a little bit of time off, and so we're getting back into the groove of things, and it always feels weird.

Kat [00:01:19]:
We went on vacation. We travel a lot.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:01:21]:
Yeah, well, we try to.

Kat [00:01:22]:
We try to. We like to. We like to travel, and so we try to get out as much as possible. And we just got back from a bit of a vacation and.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:01:30]:
And also the flu.

Kat [00:01:32]:
Yeah. We brought the FL back with us, so if you'd like some, you can send us a request. We'll spit in an envelope and send it to you.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:01:39]:
Don't be gross. That's twice in the. In the course of two minutes, I've had to tell you not to be gross.

Kat [00:01:44]:
I'm on a roll. I'm a little uncomfortable because I'm not wearing pants and I'm sitting on a vinyl seat.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:01:49]:
Yeah, that's gonna get weird.

Kat [00:01:52]:
It already is, don't you think? Box of Oddities. The Box of Oddities. That's the name of the podcast. Of course you know that because you looked it up and downloaded it. And by the way, thank you for that.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:02:03]:
Yeah, we love you.

Kat [00:02:04]:
We do. Is there anything we can do for you besides spitting an envelope?

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:02:09]:
I have a great recipe for a kale and white bean soup if you're interested.

Kat [00:02:13]:
That's nice.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:02:14]:
Speaking of which, a friend of ours was cooking with her crock pot the other day, and I thought this was great. She has a baby monitor, and she set it up in the kitchen facing the crock pot, so when she went to work, she could check in on her crock pot. I just think that's genius.

Kat [00:02:31]:
That is genius.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:02:31]:
That's a great use of technology.

Kat [00:02:33]:
Technology is our friend. Let's Embrace it, shall we? The Box of Oddities is podcast about the bizarre, the odd, the strange, the unbelievable, the unusual. The unusual.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:02:45]:
And this is what we do. We tell each other stories about stuff that we found and we thought, hey, we'll share it with you too. And that's how the Box of Oddities became a thing.

Kat [00:02:55]:
Our website is the boxofoddities.com. there you can find all of our social media contacts.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:03:00]:
Oh, yeah, we're all over the soc.

Kat [00:03:03]:
Kids call it these days. I don't think they do, the youngsters.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:03:06]:
So far, our biggest issue with this, I think besides the squeaky chairs, has been figuring out who goes first.

Kat [00:03:13]:
Well, I'm gonna solve that this week because I'd like to go first, if that's okay with you.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:03:17]:
I suppose you can.

Kat [00:03:18]:
Can we do that?

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:03:19]:
I did get the jelly eyeballs ready though, in case you wanted to roll them like dice. Yeah. If the green one comes out, then you go first. And if the blue one comes out, then I go first.

Kat [00:03:30]:
Okay, let's do that.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:03:31]:
I thought ahead this time.

Kat [00:03:32]:
That sounds like fun.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:03:33]:
Okay, go ahead. Ah, well, you go first.

Kat [00:03:37]:
Okay, good.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:03:38]:
Green.

Kat [00:03:38]:
Green. Jelly eyeball.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:03:40]:
It's a beautiful eye.

Kat [00:03:41]:
I came across this headline not too long ago, just a few weeks ago. It's a recent story. First human frozen by cryonics will be brought back to life in just 10 years.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:03:52]:
Why 10 years? I need to understand this.

Kat [00:03:55]:
The first human frozen after death could be brought back to life in as little as 10 years, according to a cryogenic expert. People have been. If you're not familiar with cryonics or cryogenics, it's the science of freezing bodies, flash freezing bodies, so that they could be brought back to life in the future with the hope that whatever disease killed them, there would be, you know, a cure for it.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:04:22]:
Right. Because I guess with. With freezing at the speed that they do, there's not damage to the. The skin and the muscle tissue and such, because it happens.

Kat [00:04:32]:
So the theory, I guess it's the ice crystals that form in the cells that rupture the cells and cause problems. So in flash freezing, or the way that they do it, it minimizes cellular structure damage, but it doesn't completely take it away. So one of the things that they need to do, science needs to progress to the point where they can repair that cellular damage as well as revive the person.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:05:00]:
Got it.

Kat [00:05:01]:
And then cure the disease that they have.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:05:04]:
Okay, so there's a lot that goes into this.

Kat [00:05:07]:
Yes.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:05:07]:
Okay.

Kat [00:05:08]:
This is an article that I found. Let me see this is. Oh, this is the Daily Star. Okay. So it's, you know, I got you.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:05:15]:
I know what you're saying.

Kat [00:05:16]:
But I also found this article, several other sites that are maybe, perhaps. Perhaps a little more credible. But this had the best breakdown of it. The announcement came from a guy named Dennis Kowalski. He's the president of the US Based Cryonics Institute. It's an organization that spearheads the whole human freezing process.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:05:37]:
Are they hiring?

Kat [00:05:38]:
Would you like a job there?

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:05:40]:
Yes, please.

Kat [00:05:40]:
Really?

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:05:41]:
Yeah, I'm Googling it right now.

Kat [00:05:42]:
Turning people into a frozen entree.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:05:45]:
Cryonics Institute. Are they hiring careers? I'm sorry, Please continue.

Kat [00:05:53]:
That's okay. Dennis said that the technology is advancing so fast that he personally, at his location, can't keep up with the demand. He said, quote, if you take something like CPR, that would have seemed unbelievable 100 years ago. You know, we're taking technology for granted.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:06:11]:
I see. Sure.

Kat [00:06:12]:
So 100 years ago, the idea of doing CPR and bringing people back or resuscitating people was a fantasy.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:06:19]:
Yeah.

Kat [00:06:19]:
In fact, sometimes they thought people were dead and they weren't, and they just buried them alive.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:06:24]:
Right. That's a whole other podcast that is Coffin Bells.

Kat [00:06:28]:
Yeah. This guy used to work as a paramedic, which inspired him to get into the field of cryonics. And he was also inspired by a book by J. Robert Freitas, which is called Engines of Creation, which focuses on nanotechnology. And I guess that's how they're going to repair the frozen cells. With nanotechnology. Little robots. This is so weird, isn't it?

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:06:54]:
It is.

Kat [00:06:54]:
Freeze a body, and then they're gonna bring you back to life in 100 years or whatever.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:06:59]:
10.

Kat [00:07:00]:
Well, according to him, 10. And then they're gonna use little microscopic robots to repair your cells.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:07:07]:
Right. Do you remember that movie about the guy that got shrunk down and then put into the body?

Kat [00:07:12]:
Yeah, I know what you're talking about. What was it? Dennis?

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:07:15]:
Yeah, like Dennis Quaid.

Kat [00:07:17]:
Dennis Quaid, yeah.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:07:18]:
What was that called? Small. Tiny. Tiny fixings. Small, Small parts.

Kat [00:07:25]:
Can you Google that, too? Tiny fixings. Sounds like a bird's eye entree.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:07:33]:
Shrinking movie. Sounds like a bird. Inner space.

Kat [00:07:41]:
Inner space, yes.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:07:42]:
Okay. Sorry, what were you saying? Yes, nanotechnology.

Kat [00:07:46]:
So this guy says it really depends on how much technology like stem cells advance. That's a big part of it, too, the stem cells. He went on to say that cryonically, bringing someone back to life should definitely be doable in 100 years, but it could happen as soon as 10. And this was a statement he made in 2018.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:08:06]:
Okay.

Kat [00:08:07]:
What they do at his place, the Cryonics Institute in Michigan, they've got almost. Jeez, I didn't realize this. 2000 people signed up to be frozen after they die. 160 patients are already flash frozen in tanks of liquid nitrogen, the process to bring them back from the dead. There are, as we mentioned before, some major problems. Now, the first human ever frozen by cryonics was a guy named Dr. James Bedford. And he died in 1967. So he was. He was really very much on the forefront of this, for sure. He was on the forefront. He was the forefront.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:08:47]:
Yeah. He was so advanced in his plans and thoughts about this that he was just that crazy guy.

Kat [00:08:57]:
Yeah, he was the crazy guy. But they actually did. They froze him. He planned the procedure long before he got sick, and both his body and brain were frozen. Sometimes to save money, they'll just cut the head off and freeze that.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:09:09]:
Sure. Didn't you tell me about something to do with how you balance heads?

Kat [00:09:14]:
Yeah, we'll get to that.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:09:14]:
Okay.

Kat [00:09:15]:
Experts have speculated that he should be the first one thawed out. Yeah, sure, that makes sense. He was the first one to take the plunge in 1967 when technology was kind of, you know, as far as freezing people and bringing them back to life. Dennis says that he's been attacked by people who accuse him of playing God, especially after he took out a life insurance policy to have his wife and three kids frozen when they die. That's a little weird, no?

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:09:44]:
I don't understand.

Kat [00:09:45]:
Well, what they do, what they do in order to pay for this procedure. The people that want to be cryogenically frozen, they take out a life insurance policy and they name the Cryonics Institute, or Alcor or one of those companies that do this as the beneficiary. That's what pays for it. So he did that. He took out life insurance policies on his wife and three kids so they could be frozen when. When they die. And people think that that might be a little bit over the line. Some people do.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:10:13]:
Well, I mean, did they have a say in it? I. I think that matters.

Kat [00:10:17]:
I think probably they. Well, I don't know. Children, you know, they're underage. Should they. Who knows? Anyway, he's spending about $100,000 to have his family frozen for the future.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:10:28]:
Okay.

Kat [00:10:29]:
But he insists that what he's doing isn't science fiction. It's. It's about creating a better world. Now this. This has been something that has Been wr in science fiction for years. Heinlein wrote what was it? The Door and the Door to Summer, the Door into Summer, which deals with, among other things, suspended animation to get to the future, that sort of thing.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:10:50]:
Right.

Kat [00:10:51]:
So Anyway, this guy, Dr. James Bedford, who was flash frozen in 1967 is being cared for by Alcor in Scottsdale, Arizona. He's been in suspensions since 67. So how many years is that? 67, 77, 80, 50 some odd years. 51 years at this point because we're doing this podcast in 2018. In fact, this podcast is going to be frozen and thought out in the future. This is from alcor's website. So Dr. James Bedford was frozen on January 12, 1967. In the intervening years he was stored in various places. Ultimately Alcor in Scottsdale took possession of Dr. Bedford.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:11:38]:
See, I'm pro all of this, but the idea of it being moved like your body being moved around, like it's, you know, in storage, that's weird to me.

Kat [00:11:49]:
Yep. In May of 1991 they took him out of the original capsule that they froze him in. They call it a dewar and wanted to inspect the body and put him in a more state of the art container.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:12:04]:
Sure.

Kat [00:12:04]:
According to the Alcor website, removal from the door took place at 9:30 on May 25th. This is from their website. This is the notes from what happened. The end of the door containing the patient was elevated on concrete blocks, effectively submerging the patient's head and Torso. Beginning at 10am an abrasive cutting wheel was used to open the outer shell. So they got him out and everything and then they laid him out and he was in an old sleeping bag that they had originally froze him in. They just put him in a cheap sleeping bag like you know, from, well, 1967, probably Woolworths. The external visual examination discloses, according to the report, a well developed, well nourished male who appears younger than his 73 years. The skin on the upper thorax and neck appear discolored. The area of discoloration is fairly sharply demarcated on the thorax. And this is a lot of technical.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:13:01]:
Stuff that doesn't really, I don't understand most of that.

Kat [00:13:03]:
There were puncture marks where they put in the freezing. The antifreeze stuff looked all beat up. Yep, got it. Skin on the left side of the neck distended, blah, blah, blah. Eyes were partially open. The corneas were chalk white from ice. The nares are flattened out against the face and I had to look that up. What nares were nostrils. So his nose and nostrils were flattened against his face. Apparently the result of being compressed by a slab of dry ice during the initial freezing process.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:13:32]:
That'll do it.

Kat [00:13:32]:
Yep. Head is fringed with short cropped, uniformly gray hair. All in all, they said, considering the primitive nature of the 1967 freezing process, he's in pretty good shape. Hey, he's in pretty good shape, so well done, guys. There's an argument now that Woolworths makes.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:13:51]:
The best sleeping bags.

Kat [00:13:53]:
Yeah, well, I don't think that was ever an argument, but, yeah, that he should be the first one to be unfrozen. And, you know, I say first come, first serve.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:14:02]:
Absolutely.

Kat [00:14:03]:
Oh, this is interesting. His genitals were not visible due to the presence of unmelted ice, which anchored the plastic film around him so they couldn't see his frozen dong.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:14:13]:
And they didn't investigate further. I mean, ice melts, babe.

Kat [00:14:18]:
Yeah, they didn't want it to melt the thing. The conclusion was, overall, this examination indicates that the patient has at least not been warmed above zero centigrade. Further, the presence of undenatured hemoglobin, as evidenced by the presence of bright red blood and the appearance of water ice remaining on the patient, including what appeared to be loose condensed frost. Overall, he's in good shape, so he's still a candidate to be thought out.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:14:46]:
Great.

Kat [00:14:47]:
Alcor faced a great deal of controversy a number of years ago, mostly due to a book written by a guy named Larry Johnson. And I read this book.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:14:56]:
Is this the one that you were telling me about?

Kat [00:14:58]:
Yeah, 2009. And I should say that Alcor, of course, disputed all of this and they took him to court over it. But Larry's book was called My Journey into the World of Deception and Death. He worked at Alcor for a while, and some of the things that he said he saw horrified him. And when he wrote this book, he claimed that people that worked with Alcor were threatening him, that people were coming to his house and calling him all hours of the night and, you know, that sort of thing. Of course, they deny all that.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:15:33]:
Of course.

Kat [00:15:33]:
But in his book, he said he watched an Alcor official. Now Ted Williams is frozen there. You've heard the story about Ted Williams, the battle with his family, but it's just his head. They froze Ted Williams head and preserved it at Alcor. And he said he watched an Alcor official, while they were preparing William's head, swing a monkey wrench at William's frozen severed head to try to remove a tuna can that had Stuck to it. Apparently there was a cat or is a cat that lives at Alcor that is like the office mascot and they feed it tuna fish. And so they have all these empty tuna fish cans, and they use the tuna fish cans, according to Larry Johnson's book, to balance the head on upside down while the initial freezing process is taking place.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:16:23]:
Now, I can't. I've been in a lot of businesses that can't. They're like, no, you can't bring your dog in here, even though you know you're gonna carry him or whatever. I can't imagine that place like that is cool with an office cat.

Kat [00:16:39]:
It does make one wonder. So they're trying to get this frozen tuna fish can off the frozen severed head of Ted Williams, as you do. Yeah, all the time. So he decides the best way to do it is to knock it off with a monkey wrench. So the first swing accidentally struck the head, Johnson contends, and the second swing knocked the tuna can loosen. They, of course, deny that. I said that's absolutely not true.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:17:04]:
Yeah, well, that sounds insane.

Kat [00:17:05]:
Yep, they deny. We. We deny all allegations reported in the press, Blah, blah, blah. Alcor is going to be litigating, which they did. Johnson said that. And this is a. I found this quote from an ESPN article. Johnson said he worked for Alcor for eight months in 2003, first as a clinical director, then as a chief operating officer. He included several photographs in the book, including one of an upside down severed head, not Ted Williams, that had just a head. Just a upside down, frozen head, apparently on a tuna fish can. William's head was being transferred from one container to another when the monkey wrench incident allegedly took place. When the head was removed from the container. Johnson described it this way. The disembodied face said in that awful frozen scream looked nothing like any picture of Ted Williams I've ever seen. Well, he's dead, right?

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:17:58]:
He wouldn't.

Kat [00:17:59]:
He's upside down frozen on a tuna can.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:18:01]:
He's not all like, hey, check out my batting average. He's all like, hey, been dead for a few.

Kat [00:18:07]:
Johnson said that an Alcor employee tried in vain to remove the tuna can. He grabbed a monkey wrench, heaved a mighty swing, missed the tuna can completely, but hit the head dead center. Johnson wrote. Tiny pieces of frozen Ted Williams had sprayed around the room. The next swing, Johnson wrote, knocked the can loose. Johnson contends that there was a significant crack in Williams head. And he also reported an allegation that he had made earlier that samples of Williams DNA are Missing from the facility.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:18:41]:
Oh, no.

Kat [00:18:42]:
Yeah. So somebody's out there trying to clone a new Ted Williams.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:18:45]:
Sure.

Kat [00:18:45]:
Apparently so. Alcor, they said, you know what? You can't talk about us like that. So we're gonna sue. The lawsuits against Larry Johnson, according to Wikipedia, were ended by his bankruptcy. In various concessions in 2009, they filed a lawsuit and part of his concession was this statement. When I wrote the book, I believed my conclusions to be correct. However, information unknown to me and a more complete understanding of the facts furnished by Alcor contradict part of my account and some of my concessions. In light of this new information from Alcor, some parts of this book are questioned as to veracity. And he goes on to mention the Ted Williams thing. He said, for example, my Ted Williams. My account of Ted Williams cryopreservation, which was not based upon firsthand observation as noted in my book. Apparently somebody told him about it.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:19:40]:
Got it.

Kat [00:19:40]:
And anyway, he said, if I said anything that was erroneous or any of my recollections had errors and caused some harm, I apologize. The suit was dropped once he filed for bankruptcy. So what do you think? Would you be willing to freeze yourself with the hope of being regenerated in the future? No, I have no interest in that.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:20:03]:
Nope.

Kat [00:20:03]:
I don't.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:20:04]:
You know, I don't. Listen, we've discussed this on many occasions. I don't mind the idea of dying. It doesn't weird me out. I'm not like, no, please don't bring that curtain down. I don't care. And I certainly won't care after I'm dead. So I have no interest in that at all. No, thank you.

Kat [00:20:24]:
You know, there's enough unanswered questions about death already.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:20:28]:
Yeah.

Kat [00:20:28]:
Without adding a whole other layer of.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:20:31]:
Right. Pet sematary bullshit in there.

Kat [00:20:33]:
Yeah. Who hates pet cemetery bullshit? I don't. And, you know, so what if they do? Okay, let's say. Because, again, so many unanswered questions. Let's say that there is an afterlife and there is a soul.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:20:45]:
Right.

Kat [00:20:46]:
And I personally believe that. But what happens if that's the case and they freeze the body? Is you just going to, like, sit around and wait for them to thaw out? Do you move on? Do you stay frozen in the body? And what happens when they bring you back? Are you going to be pissed?

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:21:02]:
Right. Or is it just the body being brought back and not the soul?

Kat [00:21:05]:
Right. And then some evil demon occupies the body? We don't know.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:21:11]:
I mean, I feel like I know, but I.

Kat [00:21:13]:
We don't know yet.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:21:14]:
Okay.

Kat [00:21:16]:
But imagine Ted Williams. There was some concern when they froze him that he even wanted it. He signed a thing. But they say he was, he was old and his son, John Henry Williams was really pushing him to do it.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:21:29]:
Oh.

Kat [00:21:30]:
And so there was a lawsuit amongst the siblings, which ultimately his son John Henry won because they froze his head.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:21:38]:
Yeah, I feel like that has to be a really a clear thing, you know, if you're going to be frozen with the intention of eventually thawing out and all that. I think that should be something that you're real clear on.

Kat [00:21:53]:
I would think so.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:21:54]:
Yeah.

Kat [00:21:54]:
But imagine if he didn't want it or wasn't clear on what was going on and they do manage to revive him sometime in the future and he's just a frozen chipped up head on a tuna can. He'd be pissed. Yeah, he's the greatest hitter that ever lived.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:22:10]:
It's true. And I mean, even if you like it, tuna smells awful.

Kat [00:22:14]:
Yeah. Even if it's well rinsed out, that can, it's like, this is not what I signed up for anyway. I'm not going to get frozen. And apparently you aren't either. So. Good.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:22:24]:
No, thanks.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:22:26]:
The Box of Oddities with Cat and Jethro Gilligan Toth.

Kat [00:22:31]:
Here are five weird facts really quick today. Famous last words from famous people.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:22:37]:
I think this is gonna be a really fun thing that we do. In the middle, number five, Surprise me said by Bob Hope after his wife Dolores asked him where he wanted to be buried.

Kat [00:22:47]:
Drummer Buddy Rich died after surgery in 1987. As he was being prepared for surgery, a nurse asked him, is there anything you can't take? And Buddy Rich replied, country music. Those are his last words.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:23:02]:
Dylan Thomas, as he returned to the Chelsea Hotel in New York at the age of 39, succumbed to pneumonia. His last words were, I've had 18 straight whiskeys. I think that's a record.

Kat [00:23:17]:
Number two, let me see if I can get this name correctly. Luis Marie Teresa de Saint Maurice Comtesse Diversi let one rip when she was dying and she said, quote, good. A woman who can fart is not dead.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:23:32]:
That's awesome.

Kat [00:23:33]:
And she did die. And probably people in the room did too.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:23:36]:
Oh, this. You remember that parrot that I used to follow on YouTube? Alex, who was so smart and he could add, and he said all kinds of cool things right before he died. He said, you be good. I'll see you tomorrow. I love you.

Kat [00:23:51]:
Really? A parrot said that? And then the parrot died.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:23:55]:
Yeah, I love him.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:23:57]:
The Box of Oddities. It's not for everyone.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:24:01]:
Oh, now I'm so sad.

Kat [00:24:03]:
Don't be sad. He's in a better place with Ted Williams head.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:24:07]:
Stop.

Kat [00:24:08]:
All right, so what is your topic today? All right.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:24:12]:
Okay, okay, okay.

Kat [00:24:15]:
Wait a second. I want to put some pants on. I'm cold. You go ahead.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:24:19]:
I'll take a quick break.

Kat [00:24:20]:
No, go ahead.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:24:26]:
Pants break.

Kat [00:24:27]:
All right. I'm not gonna button them, though.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:24:29]:
All right, so on December 13, 1799, George Washington rode his horse through icy rain, snow and hail. He rushed home for dinner and didn't change out of his damp clothes because he hated to be late. And he, for that, paid the price. That night, Washington woke up clutching his chest, almost unable to breathe, and his wife Martha frantically called for help. Today we are going to talk about. And I think this is interesting that you talked about cryogenics, because I am going to talk about how close we came to a Washington zombie.

Kat [00:25:08]:
What? So speak more of this.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:25:12]:
Two men, James Craik, who had treated Washington for over four decades, he was a doctor, and George Rawlins, an expert in the art of bloodletting, treated the ailing president throughout the night. I should note that I've got almost all of this from Weird History. Um, and I did go to other sites and I checked it out and this was just from where I pulled most of the information. So big thanks. Weird History. I love it. Colonel Lear gave Washington a tonic made from molasses, butter and vinegar, which actually nearly choked the President. Uh, but they thought for some reason that that would help with his vot viral chest issue that he was dealing.

Kat [00:25:52]:
With, or it just make a delicious topping for pancakes.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:25:56]:
So every few hours, Rollins removed blood to, quote, cool the President's fever. Which, you know, bloodletting is something that they did for years. And unfortunately, by dusk on December 14, he had taken out nearly 40% of George Washington's blood. You just can't keep doing that. That doesn't help. So George Washington died just after 10 o'clock on December 14, 1799, from a combination of a viral infection of his throat and the bloodletting treatments. Dr. William Thornton rushed to Mount Vernon to try and save the President's life after he heard about what was going on. He was a specialist in performing tracheotomies, which were really new and dangerous, but he was confident that he could relieve Washington of his suffering. But unfortunately, by the time he got to the house, Washington was already dead. He, though, was not deterred. He still believed that he could help by bringing the man's corpse back to Life.

Kat [00:27:01]:
How have I never heard about this?

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:27:03]:
So Dr. William Thornton was not just an expert in tracheotomies. He had also read about the history of blood transfusions in the 17th century. These experiments were deemed so dangerous that the procedure was banned in France. But thought Thornton believed that it still might work. So he had done all this research. And I'm going to try to catch you up a little bit. So the very first attempt at a blood transfusion occurred in 1492. Can you imagine that? Pope Innocent the seventh eighth, fell into a coma, and his physician recommended blood and hired three young boys to donate blood to the po Pope. So the technology to inject blood intravenously didn't exist. So according to one account, the position the physician poured the blood into the Pope's mouth. No, that did not work, by the way. The Pope died, and so did all three boys. That's not how you do a blood transfusion. No, no, no. That's just a basic understanding of where your throat goes.

Kat [00:28:07]:
Let's just. Let's just pour some blood down his throat, and maybe it'll make its way in there somehow. It'll just leak into the veins.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:28:14]:
There was some groundbreaking medical work of William Harvey in the 1620s that brought blood back into the spotlight. So Harvey demonstrated that blood circulated through the body, meaning that it was possible to insert new blood into someone's veins. So by the 17th century, scientists also designed metal tools that could inject blood into the veins. And this combination of technology and scientific theory set off a wave of blood experiments. And this was when in the 17th century.

Kat [00:28:44]:
Okay.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:28:45]:
Most of these experiments, though, were on animals. And it's pretty upsetting, so I'm actually gonna skip most of that.

Kat [00:28:53]:
You're more upset about them experimenting blood transfusions on animals in the 17th century than Ted Williams severed frozen head.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:29:02]:
So scientists also wondered if it was even safe to give a human a blood transfusion. If the blood and the soul were connected, they wondered, would a blood transfusion threaten your soul? So the concern was that maybe who you are is contained in your blood.

Kat [00:29:22]:
I think it says in the Bible, life is in the blood.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:29:26]:
Does it?

Kat [00:29:26]:
Yeah.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:29:27]:
Well, there you go. It actually became a problem, though, later on, and we'll get to that. There was a successful human blood transfusion on a French doctor called Jean Baptiste Denise. And that happened in 1667. This doctor was an expert in animal transfusions, and he performed public transfusions out in public. It was like he did it to show, hey, look what I can do. And so he would just bring his stuff, like his medical stuff, out onto the street.

Kat [00:30:04]:
Like a street juggler?

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:30:05]:
Yes, yes, yes, exactly like that.

Kat [00:30:08]:
Wow.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:30:09]:
Yeah, it was gross. And he thought it was barbarian to shorten the life of one man to extend the life of another because they didn't understand how blood worked. And so they thought if you were taking blood out of one person to give it to another one, that that means that he would just inevitably live less. So he used animal blood, and in 1667, he gave Lamb's blood to a 16 year old who suffered from fevers.

Kat [00:30:40]:
How did that go?

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:30:41]:
They said it worked. No, the guy lived. Whether or not it was because of that transfusion, I'm not saying. But what I'm saying is the boy didn't die.

Kat [00:30:53]:
Wow.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:30:54]:
In November of 1667, there was another plan for a human animal transfusion. And. And physicians said that this guy whose last name was Koga, his brain was too warm, which is what caused mental illness. So they needed a regular temperature blooded person, or, I'm sorry, a regular temperature blood to put into his body to cool his brain so he wouldn't be mentally ill anymore. And so they did that. They pumped a bunch of lamb's blood into this man, and he did. Oh, he did okay. He didn't die. He actually came back a couple weeks later for a second transfusion, again. Did okay.

Kat [00:31:43]:
How is this possible?

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:31:45]:
Not long after that, though, they wanted to do a third transfusion, and he said no because it was turning him into a sheep. And that would be my favorite. He began writing letters to people and signing it with Koga the sheep and said that he had turned into another species. So that didn't work out well for that guy named Koga. The biggest setback, though, in blood transfusions came. And you could call it a setback, or you could call it, whoa, just calm the hell down. Stop doing what you're doing. It came in 1667 when they tried to cure a man with calf's blood and he began having seizures and died. And so. So they said, yeah, you can't do that. William was actually charged. The doctor in that case was actually charged with murder in that case. He wasn't. He didn't end up going to jail for it, though. So now that you know a little bit about that business, let's go back to December 15, 1799, when William Thornton looked at the frozen corpse of George Washington. And he believed that he could bring Washington back, even after rigor mortis had set in by combining heat, air, and Blood.

Kat [00:33:02]:
So when you say frozen, you mean just from rigor mortis?

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:33:05]:
Yes, okay. Exactly. No, they didn't have the cryogenics lab up and running or tuna cans in 1799, so. Excuse me. Thornton called for cold water to slowly be warmed over the President's body. He said by degrees and by friction, give him warmth. This will revive the President's cold blood vessels. And the blood vessels needed to be warmed in order to perform the tracheotomy. He wanted to open up George Washington's throat so he could get air into him, which. There was nothing blocking his throat, by the way. You can just put your mouth on his mouth. Anyway, so they wanted to artificially inflate his lungs with air and then use the lamb's blood to provide all the vital energy to, quote, spark the President's life force. In the end, though, Thornton's plan to resurrect the President was overruled by the Washington family. They were not so much concerned with whether or not it could be done, but if it should be done, they were like, okay, so George Washington has lived this amazing life. He's. He's. What's that word? You know, with the straight back. And he's all like, I do good things. And they were like, we can't just play around with your zombie lamb's blood and mess with him. So, in short, death was better than a Frankenstein President resurrected with lamb's blood. William Thornton, by the way, was very upset by this. Two decades later, he wrote, there was no doubt in my mind that his restoration was possible. And unfortunately, it was squashed by those dang Washingtons. Just wouldn't let him do what he wanted to do with the lamb's blood.

Kat [00:34:57]:
That's.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:34:57]:
Yep. And that's the story of how we almost had a zombie Washington.

Kat [00:35:00]:
That's incredible. I had never heard that story before.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:35:04]:
Yeah.

Kat [00:35:05]:
And I dive deep. You are on weird stuff, especially weird historical facts.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:35:12]:
Yeah. You're a rabbit hole kind of guy.

Kat [00:35:13]:
I am a rabbit hole kind of guy.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:35:15]:
Yeah. As soon as I started reading about this, I was like, ugh, I need more.

Kat [00:35:20]:
So did they say how long he'd been dead by the time they got there with the lamb's blood?

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:35:24]:
It was the next day.

Kat [00:35:25]:
It was a day. It was an entire day. It's kind of like their version of cryonics, isn't it?

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:35:32]:
Yeah. I think that's really interesting that you and I both came to the table with topics of bringing people back to life. Did we give each other signals by way of our brainwaves Maybe some kind.

Kat [00:35:44]:
Of ethereal connection, mentally. Let me ask you this.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:35:50]:
Go.

Kat [00:35:51]:
Let's say that all these frozen bodies are never revived. And civilization, our civilization, is destroyed, or almost entirely destroyed. Thousands of years from now, civilization rises again. Archaeologists find these guys that are frozen in tubes. Let's just theoretically, hypothetically, think that the power stayed on so that they. There's some sort of a way to keep them frozen. Would they look at it as some sort of a religious ceremony, a rite of passage type of thing? Or would they understand what it was really for? And I ask this because maybe the ancient Egyptians were doing that, not freezing, but mummifying, with the idea that, hey, maybe in the future someone can bring these guys back to life.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:36:48]:
Mmm. It's an interesting thought. I mean, if you. Who knows? There were some really wacko ideas out there back in the day. So, you know, maybe. Maybe that's the case. I just don't see how filling their bellies with flowers and jewels and removing the brain through the nose would have helped them later on in life. I mean, I know some people who would really benefit from that. But.

Kat [00:37:19]:
Yeah, this thing in general, most of them are in Congress, it seems. No, but I mean, theoretically. Theoretically.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:37:28]:
No, I mean, I get what you're saying. I get what you're saying.

Kat [00:37:30]:
Egyptian mummies with DNA and cloning and that sort of thing. Isn't it at least possible.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:37:36]:
Sure.

Kat [00:37:36]:
That that could happen.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:37:38]:
I see your points.

Kat [00:37:41]:
I think I'd rather be mummified than frozen.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:37:44]:
It seems more dignified, doesn't it?

Kat [00:37:45]:
It does. Flowers in the belly as opposed to a head on a tuna can.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:37:49]:
You know how sensitive I am about being cold.

Kat [00:37:52]:
That's right.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:37:53]:
I don't like it at all.

Kat [00:37:54]:
I'm gonna look into that George Washington thing a little bit more. That was fascinating. Good stuff.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:37:58]:
I'm glad you liked it.

Kat [00:38:00]:
The boxofodddities.com is our website. Check it out, we'd appreciate it. And if you have an idea for a topic or some subject matter you would like explored, you can send us an email.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:38:13]:
Curator. The boxofoddities.com.

Kat [00:38:17]:
That is correct.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:38:18]:
Or you can find us on the social medias. The ig, the fb, the Twitter.

Kat [00:38:27]:
Yeah, it doesn't sound quite as. Quite as cool, but you get the idea. All that stuff's on our website. The boxofoddities.com. the box of Oddities. We'll see you next time.

Jethro Gilligan Toth [00:38:39]:
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