00:00:00:26 – 00:00:21:27
Dan LeFebvre
Let’s kick this off by getting an overall look at the Manhattan Project. Because if I were to try to summarize the movie’s depiction, basically it seems like a top secret program by the US military at the end of World War two to create an atomic bomb. Can you give us an overall explanation of what the Manhattan Project actually was?

00:00:21:29 – 00:00:55:27
Alice Lovejoy
Yeah, it was a project, as you say, during World War Two, to build an atomic bomb. And this is work that, played out mostly in the United States, but it involves scientists from Britain and from Canada as well. As well as is this is something we see really clearly in Oppenheimer, many, many European scientists in exile in the United States who are working on the project, who had been, you know, involved in, nuclear physics, who were bassists or chemists, you know, before they fled the United States and who were involved in the project, you know, working at places like University of Chicago, working at Los Alamos, etc..

00:00:55:29 – 00:01:23:02
Alice Lovejoy
And the basic idea behind the bomb is something that Oppenheimer details well, which is the idea, the discovery, really, that if you could split the nucleus of an atom of uranium atom, nuclear fission, you could create a chain reaction, a great amount of energy that would create a chain reaction that would split other atoms. And so this could be the basis for an extremely powerful weapon, really more powerful than any weapon that existed before.

00:01:23:04 – 00:01:51:26
Alice Lovejoy
So that’s the kind of science behind it. But the, the actual project itself, was huge for the size of atoms. Atoms are really, really small. And on a scale large enough to make enough fissionable material for a bomb, you needed, government and scientific cooperation and investment across multiple factories and multiple places. And so in Oppenheimer, we are focused on Los Alamos for the most part in New Mexico, which is where, our Oppenheimer worked.

00:01:51:28 – 00:02:22:04
Alice Lovejoy
It’s where a lot of the physicists were. But there was a huge amount of production work happening in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, in Hanford, Washington, which were cities that were built for the Manhattan Project. But they didn’t exist before, as well as in Washington and then in university centers like Berkeley, which we do see in the film, and the University of Chicago, which we see briefly as well, underneath the football field, and in New York, places like Columbia and here at places like the University of Minnesota, it really was really across the, across the country and, universities.

00:02:22:04 – 00:02:24:19
Alice Lovejoy
But there were some that were more involved than others.

00:02:24:21 – 00:02:41:20
Dan LeFebvre
Yeah, it definitely in the movie, it definitely focuses on Los Alamos, which is, I mean, it’s Oppenheimer, so it’s mostly focus on him. There is a scene in the movie, I think it’s a madman’s version of General Leslie Groves. He talks about buying like 1200 tons of uranium and how it’s being processed in a facility in Oak Ridge, Tennessee.

00:02:41:27 – 00:03:00:21
Dan LeFebvre
But we don’t ever see Oak Ridge in the movie. It just kind of shows like two glass bowls. One of them is supposed to be Oak Ridge. One of them, I think, is Hanford. And one of them is the uranium in Oak Ridge. And then the other one is plutonium in Hanford. So they’re talking about making a fission bomb and a hydrogen bomb.

00:03:00:23 – 00:03:10:27
Dan LeFebvre
And so the impression I got from the movie, it sounds like not only are they doing something that’s never been done before and building an atomic bomb, but they’re trying two different ways to do it. Is that true?

00:03:10:29 – 00:03:35:12
Alice Lovejoy
So yes, I think there’s some nuance there. I think the the film gets that scene in the film is great because it gets at not just the scale. Right? How small the this the amount of materials that Hanford and Oak Ridge are able to breathe are so small. And yet they’re so hard to make. Yeah. And the scene gets at the fact that the Manhattan Project was working on two different kinds of fissionable materials for the bomb, so uranium and plutonium.

00:03:35:19 – 00:03:51:29
Alice Lovejoy
And this is all for the same kind of bomb, which is efficient bomb, and Oak Ridge, and Hanford were the places where this was happening. But because this was a project that was happening at such speed, because the war was ongoing, they were afraid the Germans would get the bomb, which is something that the film shows very well.

00:03:52:01 – 00:04:15:06
Alice Lovejoy
There was there were numerous ways of creating this material that were happening at the same time. So in Oak Ridge there were three plants. One of them was using the electromagnetic separation process, to separate fissionable uranium 2005 from uranium 2008. And then there was a gaseous diffusion process at another plant at Oak Ridge and at Oak Ridge.

00:04:15:06 – 00:04:38:03
Alice Lovejoy
There was also another plant that was transforming, spent uranium fuel slugs into plutonium. And then Hanford was working fully on plutonium. So we see a little bit of the electromagnetic separation process in Berkeley and an early scene in the film where, Josh Hartnett, who is playing Ernest Lawrence, shows us that machine. And that is what was operating a large scale at Oak Ridge.

00:04:38:03 – 00:04:57:25
Alice Lovejoy
And the electron and the white, all the electromagnetic separation plant. But the hydrogen bomb is something different. And this is a thermonuclear weapon. This is something that comes up in the film because, Edward Teller, the, physicist who kind of is at odds with Oppenheimer, throughout their time. And Los Alamos is really invested in this.

00:04:57:25 – 00:05:18:24
Alice Lovejoy
And hydrogen bombs work through, through fusion and not through fission. So thermonuclear bombs, hydrogen bombs, where something that became a reality in the 50s, and they were very, very dangerous. They’re much more powerful. They are much more powerful than the kinds of bombs that were being worked on at Los Alamos. And so I think this is part of the moral story.

00:05:18:27 – 00:05:37:00
Alice Lovejoy
Right, that’s operating in Oppenheimer at the same time as sort of scientific and industrial story, which is about what are the costs of working on a bomb this powerful. And so Teller’s character is there and to sort of, show what he would do later, which is accurate, right. Working on the hydrogen bomb really being responsible for a lot of that science.

00:05:37:02 – 00:05:54:18
Alice Lovejoy
But also to, to set up the, the, the ways in which this project would evolve and in, unforeseeable ways, right in the future that these bombs that they were making in Los Alamos and Oak Ridge, and Hanford would lead the way for things that couldn’t be seen at that point.

00:05:54:20 – 00:06:15:00
Dan LeFebvre
So because, yeah, they kind of they kind of talk a little bit about that. You know, I think the concept of the bomb just becoming a never ending explosion and that sort of thing is, is that kind of what you were referring to is, you know, some of the, the moral elements of it more than just, you know, World War Two, we want to end the war.

00:06:15:02 – 00:06:18:15
Dan LeFebvre
But what’s going to happen after that and that, that whole concept.

00:06:18:18 – 00:06:43:25
Alice Lovejoy
Yeah, I think that’s part of it. One of the the key parts of this film for me is that, is Oppenheimer is grappling with the the intersection between the scientific work he’s doing and the politics of this work and the real world consequences of this work. And we see that, as something that’s shared with the scientists as well, when they have a meeting, at Los Alamos and they say, hey, Germany has capitulated, why are we still making this bomb?

00:06:43:27 – 00:07:03:25
Alice Lovejoy
Right? You know how many people are going to be killed? And what does this mean for the future of humanity? That’s something that Niels Bohr, the, who the physicist who comes in earlier in a later in the film says, like who? What is going to happen with this? Are you going to destroy humanity with this? So it’s not just about the possibility that the film deals with, which is an uncontrolled chain reaction which could really destroy the world.

00:07:04:00 – 00:07:21:13
Alice Lovejoy
It’s also about, thinking forward to the arms race and to whether this would be used. And this is sort of one of the key debates of the Cold War, whether the existence of nuclear weapons would prevent countries from going to war or whether they would just create, more and more danger for the world.

00:07:21:16 – 00:07:50:00
Dan LeFebvre
You mentioned with Germany, the other the possibility of Germany doing it, too. And this is outside the scope of anything that we see in Oppenheimer. But it would they have the thought of, well, if somebody is going to do it, it might as well be us first, right? I mean, I know that’s a simplification, perhaps, but, you know, if they were afraid that Nazi Germany is going to be building this, then I could see how they’d be like, well, we want to do it first.

00:07:50:03 – 00:08:11:14
Alice Lovejoy
Yeah. And that is the logic right in there. And there was a logic behind this too, that, you know, there were people that this could end the war, it could end all war. And that we don’t want the Nazis to have, to be the ones to get there first, because it could be quite dangerous. And as we learn in the film and this is accurate, they were the Germans were not as advanced as people had feared, even though they had their Heisenberg.

00:08:11:14 – 00:08:30:09
Alice Lovejoy
And they had these, you know, great scientific minds working on the project. The allies were much more advanced with it. So it wasn’t, as much of a threat as had been feared. But there was a breakdown in scientific communication at this moment, too. Right. So people weren’t publishing in these international journals, as much there wasn’t as much circulation of knowledge.

00:08:30:09 – 00:08:48:18
Alice Lovejoy
And this is a real question, you know, in the history of 20th century weapons, it goes back to poison gas, right? Then the question of whether in poison gas for World War One was really the most destructive weapon. It was the thing that raised the most moral, qualms as well. Right? Because it’s a weapon of mass destruction.

00:08:48:20 – 00:09:05:25
Alice Lovejoy
And so there were discussions about whether this is, a weapon whose, development and circulation should be known about widely, so nobody else would develop it. Right, so the world could be protected. But those kinds of networks of scientific communication, which built up after World War One and after poison gas had really broken down by this point.

00:09:05:28 – 00:09:25:07
Dan LeFebvre
When you’re talking about how much goes into creating, you know, going back to the glass bowls and those being filled up, can you fill a little bit more? I mean, I, I don’t know much about what actually goes into creating those, but, I mean, it’s one thing that we see in the movie I it’s called Oppenheimer. Right?

00:09:25:07 – 00:09:45:09
Dan LeFebvre
So he’s he’s the main character, but it does kind of talk a little bit about what you’re, talking about before with what it takes to create these materials. You know, even at Los Alamos, which the movie focuses on, they talk about building a town, churches and schools and building this whole thing. You talked about, you know, Oakridge and Hanford being towns that they built in other areas.

00:09:45:09 – 00:09:50:18
Dan LeFebvre
So can you share some more historical context around the size of the Manhattan Project?

00:09:50:21 – 00:10:12:28
Alice Lovejoy
Yeah, it’s a great question because it was huge. And we see this, early in the film when I think, it’s a scene between when Leslie, our Groves, meets Oppenheimer for the first time, and Oppenheimer says, well, if we’re going to do this, we need to have these four spaces, and they need to be coordinated. And the the difference in scale between the number of marbles, you know, these tiny little marbles that you need to make enough charge material for a bomb.

00:10:12:28 – 00:10:36:09
Alice Lovejoy
And the the scope of the project across the United States is really a good way to look at it. So let’s just think about Y-12, the Y-12 plant in Oak Ridge, which is the one that I know the most about my my recent book, deals and in in detail with the history of Y-12. And it was run by the Tennessee Eastman Company, which was the main chemical subsidiary of the Eastman Kodak Company, the photographic and film company.

00:10:36:11 – 00:11:07:07
Alice Lovejoy
And at its height, there were 22,000 employees working for Y-12, 22,000, and this plant was only one of three at Oak Ridge. The plant itself was, at the time, I think, around 800 acres in size, which is, if we’re going to go by a football field, around 600 football fields, I think. And so there were multiple buildings within it, multiple calutrons, which are these, machines that separate, uranium 235 from uranium 238.

00:11:07:09 – 00:11:33:29
Alice Lovejoy
And all of these huge factories were what was needed to make this very small amounts of fissionable material. But that’s only part of it. Right? So it’s an engineering project. It’s a factory project. It’s a chemical engineering project. And you have major U.S. companies and, and, Canadian companies involved in this. Right? So not just Eastman Kodak, but DuPont, Stone and Webster Engineering for many, many other well known companies.

00:11:34:01 – 00:11:57:03
Alice Lovejoy
And, so this is a good example of the big science of World War two. And, and you bring up towns and that’s part of it too, right? Because big science and big industry is, something that, as they say, we can’t attract top scientists without bringing their families. So we need to make whole cities, that kind of company that can accommodate, these families, you know, these, civilians, really.

00:11:57:09 – 00:12:17:15
Alice Lovejoy
And so overnight, these cities are built and, since this is a podcast about movies, I can give you a statistic that at Oak Ridge there were seven cinemas plus a film society that were built to accommodate the 75,000 people who lived there at the town’s peak. And so the film society was showing all sorts of things.

00:12:17:15 – 00:12:48:02
Alice Lovejoy
They were showing 39 stops. They were showing Sergei Eisenstein’s Alexander Nevsky, there. And this is just part of the leisure offerings that the town, offered at the time. So bowling alleys, baseball leagues, etc. people were working 24 hour, the factories were working 24 hours a day. There was a patchwork of shifts. So you see these towns built very, very quickly out of nowhere, really, to accommodate these massive industrial projects, which is where I think Oppenheimer doesn’t quite get this right.

00:12:48:02 – 00:12:54:21
Alice Lovejoy
It doesn’t quite get at the massive industrial scale of what’s happening because it it really is a film about, about Oppenheimer himself.

00:12:54:24 – 00:12:57:24
Dan LeFebvre
Yeah. It’s it’s not called Manhattan Project. Right, exactly.

00:12:58:01 – 00:12:59:10
Alice Lovejoy
Yeah.

00:12:59:12 – 00:13:31:00
Dan LeFebvre
I mean, that’s it’s mind boggling the amount of work and effort to create, like you said, just this tiny little that you splitting atoms literally, like, and and the amount of effort. And then on top of that, being top secret, I mean, I can’t imagine you have you said there’s 22,000 people working and then 75,000 overall. So all these, all these families, were they essentially locked in?

00:13:31:00 – 00:13:44:28
Dan LeFebvre
They’re like locked it. I’m thinking of like a military base. You know, there’s there’s housing on base. But, I used to work in a military base and you could go in and out. You had to have credentials, obviously, but you can go in and out. It’s not like you’re you’re stuck in there. But base wasn’t top secret.

00:13:44:28 – 00:13:54:26
Dan LeFebvre
And dealing with this top secret things in the middle of a world war. And so what was it? I mean, again, this is way outside the scope of acting either, but it’s just fascinating how much goes into it.

00:13:54:28 – 00:14:14:01
Alice Lovejoy
Yeah. And I think they were closed me people came to work from outside Oak Ridge as well. And, you know, there were busses that went long distances and, and, you know, labor was a huge issue because you have to remember, this is the draft is happening. They’re relying primarily on to a large degree on female labor because that’s what’s available.

00:14:14:03 – 00:14:31:03
Alice Lovejoy
And so, people are, you know, coming in and out, the secrecy works in part through something that comes up a lot in the film, which is called compartmentalization. Right? The idea that one area doesn’t know what the other area is doing and very, very few people have a sense of what the whole is of the project.

00:14:31:10 – 00:14:40:03
Alice Lovejoy
And so, that was really important. And, you know, many, many people who worked at places like Oak Ridge didn’t know what they were involved with until the bomb was dropped.

00:14:40:06 – 00:14:49:14
Dan LeFebvre
Oh, okay. Okay. Would that be why they had Los Alamos and Oak Ridge and Hanford? I mean, they’re not close to each other geographically at all.

00:14:49:16 – 00:15:07:19
Alice Lovejoy
Yeah, that’s a great question. I don’t know the answer to that. I think part of it was about available space and proximity to and really remote spaces, right? Was what they were looking for. And so, in Oppenheimer and I don’t know exactly the story behind this, he, he has a personal relationship to this area near Los Alamos.

00:15:07:19 – 00:15:13:17
Alice Lovejoy
And so they they put the project there. In the case of Oak Ridge, it was, through farmland and towns.

00:15:13:19 – 00:15:28:00
Dan LeFebvre
One of the other famous people that we see in the movie is Albert Einstein. And from the movie’s depiction, it doesn’t really seem like Einstein is involved in the Manhattan Project itself. But he does help Oppenheimer with some calculations. When we were talking about earlier, you know, the thought of triggering a chain reaction that destroys the world.

00:15:28:03 – 00:15:37:24
Dan LeFebvre
But in the movie, it almost seems like Einstein is just someone that everybody’s going to know. And so they just kind of throw him in there. Was Einstein involved in the Manhattan Project at all?

00:15:37:26 – 00:15:56:07
Alice Lovejoy
Yeah, I agree with you that it seems like he’s put in there just because, you know, we know his face, we know his hair, we know what it looks like. But he didn’t play a direct role in the Manhattan Project. But he did, however, and this comes up in the film, he famously signed a letter written to President Roosevelt by the physicist, Leo Szilard.

00:15:56:07 – 00:16:13:16
Alice Lovejoy
Edward Teller, who we see in the film and at Zealand as well, we see in the film, and Eugene and Victor, who are all, Hungarian scientists, I believe, in exile, warning Roosevelt that it was possible that the Germans would create an atomic bomb and explaining what that kind of a weapon might be and what its dangers were.

00:16:13:18 – 00:16:41:23
Alice Lovejoy
I think as a film scholar, my reading of Einstein’s role in the film, goes beyond the fact that he is so well known. I think, you know, in my reading, Oppenheimer is a great man film great. It’s not a Tatian of the biography. American Prometheus, about Robert Oppenheimer, and one of the key dramatic arcs in the film, beyond this kind of story of the bomb and how it’s created, is the tension between Louis Strouse and Robin Robert Robert Oppenheimer.

00:16:41:25 – 00:17:04:20
Alice Lovejoy
Right. And so to give some background here, for those who might not have seen the film recently, the film cuts back and forth between the story of Oppenheimer’s education, how he comes to the Manhattan Project, the process of creating the bomb, and then, what happens afterwards when the Atomic Energy Commission chairman Lewis Strauss, attempts to discredit Oppenheimer?

00:17:04:23 – 00:17:27:26
Alice Lovejoy
Who has since the bomb was dropped, develops very strong moral qualms about, the potential of this weapon and what and what it represents. And so, you know, Oppenheimer wrote this for this point has developed cloud. He’s developed a certain amount of power. And Strauss, I think, finds this threatening. And Strauss also has different political, you know, idea of what bombs can do than Oppenheimer.

00:17:27:26 – 00:18:05:00
Alice Lovejoy
Right? He’s he’s more conservative. He’s a Republican. And again, party, the party questions don’t work exactly like they do now. But, that he was, somebody who advocated for, building up the U.S. nuclear arsenal and for using weapons like the hydrogen bomb, which were quite destructive. So the film intercuts between these two stories, and it ends at the end of the film when Strauss loses his bid to become secretary of commerce, and Congress, because it comes out that he has orchestrated this, essentially a closed door show trial against Oppenheimer that’s designed to discredit him and show to prove that he was a communist.

00:18:05:00 – 00:18:30:10
Alice Lovejoy
And remember, this is McCarthy, and this is the moment of McCarthyism. It’s a second red scare, etc.. So this brings us back to Einstein, because there’s a key moment in the film at the very beginning where Oppenheimer and Einstein have a conversation on the grounds of the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton. Strauss is working there at the time, and Strauss has invited Oppenheimer to consider coming to work as well, which he eventually does.

00:18:30:12 – 00:18:56:03
Alice Lovejoy
So Strauss doesn’t hear what the two physicists say to one another. But, as we learn at the end of the film, he’s paranoid that they’re talking about him. And, it turns out they’re not talking about him. They’re talking about something entirely different. And what they’re talking about is that Eisenstein. I like Eisenstein to me, Einstein, is offering Oppenheimer a warning about what happens when you reach such achievement as he has.

00:18:56:03 – 00:19:23:06
Alice Lovejoy
Right. He says that this kind of achievement is followed by great punishment, public punishment, which we’ve just seen him endure in the film. And so there’s a frame right at the end of film where we see the three men, Strauss and Einstein, and often hammer together right in against the same background. And we can see how much this is a story about power, about the costs of ambition and about the idea of the great man, which is something that this film was playing with a lot.

00:19:23:09 – 00:19:43:18
Alice Lovejoy
And how it’s sort of, created in contexts that are complicated, right, that do have to do with power and other people’s ambition. And so Einstein, I think, is kind of a foil to these two men, Strauss and, Oppenheimer, who has relationships to what we might think of as greatness are very different. Right. Oppenheimer is a very ambivalent.

00:19:43:18 – 00:19:54:03
Alice Lovejoy
At least the film shows it to the idea of being kind of a great man, whereas Strauss, wants that, right? He wants power. He he is very, very ambitious. And ultimately it’s not about him.

00:19:54:05 – 00:20:06:15
Dan LeFebvre
It’s the mere fact that he thought that they were talking about him when I, when I when he said that in the movie, I was like, oh, this is one of those guys that thinks the world revolves around him. Everything is about him. So they must be talking about him.

00:20:06:18 – 00:20:20:12
Alice Lovejoy
Yeah. And so I think that’s I think that’s one of the, the key points of why Einstein is there. Because he is a great man, right? He is sort of somebody that everybody recognizes and knows. And it’s sort of yeah, puts that into relief and interesting ways.

00:20:20:14 – 00:20:42:20
Dan LeFebvre
Well, if you have back to the movie’s timeline, there is immense pressure to use an atomic bomb to end World War two. And in the movie, we see that the movie, their military has a list of like, love and Japanese cities. They want to drop bombs on two of those cities. And there’s a tight deadline. So first, they need to detonate an atomic bomb for the first time ever to make sure it works one and then gather data about it.

00:20:42:20 – 00:20:52:01
Dan LeFebvre
And that’s how we get in the movie. The Trinity test. And quite in the movie, at least, it seems to be a massive success. How well do you think the movie did depicting the Trinity test?

00:20:52:04 – 00:21:13:09
Alice Lovejoy
Yeah, I think what is effective about the way Oppenheimer depicts the Trinity test is that it really drills down on two things. The first, that no one there knew what they were doing or if it would work. Right. So this is a scientific experiment, much like a laboratory experiment. But but it’s operating on a huge scale with huge consequences.

00:21:13:12 – 00:21:49:28
Alice Lovejoy
And so that’s the second thing really, that perhaps somewhat unusually for these kinds of laboratory experiments, this lack of knowledge meant a lot. Right? So the film has already shown us again, that at this point, Germany has already capitulated. So there’s this question of whether it makes sense to use the weapon. And then, and I don’t know the accuracy of this timeline right before the test, General Leslie R Groves, played by Matt Damon, speaks with Oppenheimer about the non-zero chance that this explosion is will set off a chain reaction that will destroy the world and, I think that’s a moment where it’s a little too late, right, for those consequences

00:21:49:28 – 00:22:13:11
Alice Lovejoy
to become clear. And so, in a cinematic sense, it really makes sense to shoot this scene in a very stark, dark way, right? Because it’s, it’s all shot in at night. I mean, it was happening very early in the morning. The sound, is taken away. There’s no sound or very little sound. In the moments around the explosion, it goes into slow motion.

00:22:13:11 – 00:22:37:22
Alice Lovejoy
So it’s really telescoping. The moments around the explosion into a longer period. There’s low contrast until we get to the explosion, which is very, very bright. So I think what the film so that the film shows us a depiction of the Trinity test that is about Oppenheimer and his own experience of it and these sort of like these moral accompaniments to the scientific questions.

00:22:37:24 – 00:22:53:28
Alice Lovejoy
But, you know, in fact, this this test had been planned for over a year. The planning was meticulous. You know, the film shows us, a moment where they say, oh, we have to hurry. We have to get this thing tested in time for the Potsdam Conference. But in fact, it’s been in the works for for a while.

00:22:54:00 – 00:23:18:29
Alice Lovejoy
And so part of the goal here was not just to see if it worked, but also to document its effects and to study it. Right. This is a scientific, feat as well as a military, endeavor. And so part of this documentation involved cameras. There were 55 cameras, at the tests. Most of them motion picture cameras, which were designed to be started by the same mechanism that trip the bomb.

00:23:19:01 – 00:23:47:01
Alice Lovejoy
And so they were recording what happened. And so we don’t see a lot of that right in the scene. It really you just go into the, the, the, the moral, ethical, psychological questions that surround it. And I think it does a very good job of that. And I think this is also why we get that quote from the Bhagavad which, Bhagavad Gita coming up at the end, that Oppenheimer first encounters with Jean Tatlock earlier in the film.

00:23:47:03 – 00:24:01:03
Alice Lovejoy
Now I am become death. The destroyer of worlds. Right. So in reality, this is a much more planned, you know, carefully documented event. Even if it does have all this moral significance.

00:24:01:06 – 00:24:24:11
Dan LeFebvre
It sounds like, again, I mean, kind of what we were talking about with the Manhattan Project. There’s a lot more than what we see in the movie. But again, the movie is called Oppenheimer. It’s also not called Trinity Test, you know? So, you know, it’s showing it. But, from, I’m gonna say from his perspective, but more from his perspective than from anybody else’s or from, you know, the test itself or any of that.

00:24:24:13 – 00:24:44:29
Dan LeFebvre
Yeah. Well, during the Trinity test, the movie does show everyone’s watching the explosion using glasses to shield their eyes. Some of them take their glasses off, watch huge ball of flame. A moment later, the shockwave hits. And as I was watching this in the movie, I was thinking, what about the radiation? The movie doesn’t really talk about that that much.

00:24:44:29 – 00:25:04:03
Dan LeFebvre
And, you know, we think of the knowledge that we have now, you know, knowing that the bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, more recently, like Chernobyl or Fukushima, you know, these disasters on nuclear scale that, you know, the radiation is a huge thing. Was radiation a concern for the scientists working on the Manhattan Project?

00:25:04:06 – 00:25:27:09
Alice Lovejoy
Yeah, the radiation, dangers of radiation were known. There was something that the Manhattan Project had studied. The historian Kate Brown has written about this in her work on Hanford, showing that the project studied, what radiation could do to animals, even in a very small doses. But there was a prevailing sense that there was a level under which radiation was essentially harmless.

00:25:27:09 – 00:25:48:02
Alice Lovejoy
And this is known as the tolerance dose, at the time. So, you know, we do see them talking about the dangers of radiation earlier in the film where the scientist Lilli Hornick, who is, a woman working on Oppenheimer’s team, is sort of told you shouldn’t be working on this. It’s dangerous to your reproductive system. And she says to one of the men most equally dangerous to yours.

00:25:48:04 – 00:26:05:26
Alice Lovejoy
Which is true. And, and this might be why, in the scene of the Trinity test, we see most of the project scientists just lying out in the open, right? That there was the idea that there was a tolerance dose might explain this. You know, they’re lying down, so they’re not knocked over by the shockwave.

00:26:05:29 – 00:26:30:00
Alice Lovejoy
And they have welder’s glass to hold up against, the the explosion, which is the same thing that we used to look at eclipses now, but, and then there’s one person, I think it’s Edward Teller who puts on what looks like sunscreen against the explosion. But, you know, this also gives a sense of just how little was known about, they knew it was dangerous, but but they didn’t have a sense of what the explosion would bring.

00:26:30:02 – 00:26:49:20
Alice Lovejoy
But there’s something else here. Which is the scene ends as the sun comes up. The sun comes up, it’s in the desert. They’re all celebrating, or most of them are celebrating, and, the wind is coming up. All right. So, this is something that’s, crucial here, but it’s not discussed, because even though the wind just seems like atmosphere at this moment.

00:26:49:20 – 00:27:22:25
Alice Lovejoy
Right? It’s the desert. There’s wind. That wind is really crucial because, as the project would find out later, the same wind was carrying radioactive fallout from the test site across the country. So the effects of this, were, of course, particularly stark near the test site. And this is something that, especially as testing moves in about in a desert, we know the really horrible cases of who were called the people called the Downwinders, who developed really terrible cancers and other health issues from being, in proximity to radioactive fallout.

00:27:22:27 – 00:27:44:02
Alice Lovejoy
But one of the things that I talk about in my book is that the radiation from these tests and from Trinity tests, the Trinity test as well, the radiation traveled much farther than the test sites themselves, even though the AEC and the Manhattan Project thought that they couldn’t. Right. So they were found, in Indiana. They were eventually found in the East Coast and beyond.

00:27:44:04 – 00:27:58:19
Alice Lovejoy
And it was traveling the fall. It was traveling on the same wind that we see start up there. So I see that as a really important kind of moment in showing the the effects of these weapons that went well beyond what anybody had imagined just from the explosion.

00:27:58:22 – 00:28:06:07
Dan LeFebvre
Wow. Yeah. You don’t really think about I mean, that’s one of those things. It’s a.

00:28:06:09 – 00:28:42:09
Dan LeFebvre
You don’t see it. So you don’t think that it’s something that will that will do. And I could see how, you know, back then this is one of those moments in the movie where it’s, it’s difficult to put myself back in the historical context of what it was like then, because we know so much. I don’t know a lot about the nuclear world, but, you know, things like Chernobyl and Fukushima, you know, hearing about that and learning about those, you hear about things like, I think with Chernobyl, if I remember right, you know, one of the reasons they learned about it was because other countries in Europe were detecting these things from the radiation

00:28:42:09 – 00:28:57:17
Dan LeFebvre
on the wind, you know, stuff like that, that obviously they knew more about then. But we’re talking, you know, in the 1940s, first, first time, I can’t imagine how much there was that. They weren’t they weren’t tracking it. So they would know basically. Right.

00:28:57:19 – 00:29:21:26
Alice Lovejoy
Yeah, exactly. And this is where Kodak comes in an interesting ways because, in after the Trinity test, Kodak realizes that there are spots of black spots or spots of radiation that are showing up on unexposed film. So film that’s been sitting packaged for a while, and they trace it back to, microscopic particles of radiation in the packaging material that’s containing the film.

00:29:22:02 – 00:29:38:05
Alice Lovejoy
And they realize that that material is from Indiana, and that it must have been harvested, it was made of straw, or it’s kind of straw bore that they had turn to after, cardboard waste paper during the war ended up having a lot of radium in it. Right. So they couldn’t use that either because it would expose the film.

00:29:38:05 – 00:30:01:08
Alice Lovejoy
So they started making the straw board and then the straw has radiation in it. And that is coming. They trace it back to the Trinity test. So that happens, in the late 1940s and then and the early 1950s, Kodak becomes really the first industrial site to alert the Atomic Energy Commission to just how far radiation is traveling, because our film factories are so attentive to radiation to begin with.

00:30:01:10 – 00:30:11:20
Dan LeFebvre
Wow. I mean, so that wasn’t even the you just mentioned. There were a lot of cameras there at Los Alamos. That wasn’t even the film that was there that was filmed. That was thousands of miles away anyway.

00:30:11:22 – 00:30:29:03
Alice Lovejoy
That’s right. Yeah. The film that was there was singed. It was burned. And so it definitely was affected by it. And they were doing everything they could to protect the film, you know, whether that was through glass or led led, cases for cameras. But this is something different where it shows up, really, as you say, invisibly.

00:30:29:05 – 00:30:33:01
Alice Lovejoy
And film becomes a way to, to track it that they didn’t, they weren’t expecting.

00:30:33:03 – 00:30:51:03
Dan LeFebvre
In the movie, the very next scene, after the successful military test, we see some military guys, saying with respect, Doctor Oppenheimer will take it from here. And then with that, they just pack up a bombs and drive away. It happened. So quickly in the movie. It’s almost as if, okay, we had this successful test and now Manhattan Project is over.

00:30:51:06 – 00:31:05:13
Dan LeFebvre
We don’t really see what happens to the town. Of course, we didn’t really see a lot of the town anyway, so we don’t really see what happens. We don’t see anything about what happened with Oak Ridge or Hanford. So can you fill in some more history around how the Manhattan Project actually came to an end?

00:31:05:15 – 00:31:20:08
Alice Lovejoy
Yeah, I think that’s I think you’re right that this is a moment that seems abrupt because it I think that’s what it feels like to Oppenheimer. Right. He’s all of a sudden this is a political thing. It’s a government thing. It’s no longer a scientific thing. And that’s really one of the tensions in the film, right, between Strauss and Oppenheimer as well.

00:31:20:11 – 00:31:46:01
Alice Lovejoy
But the, you know, all of the moral and scientific complexity that goes into this is kind of flattened by politics, right? You know, you have Germans saying, this is my weapon. You know, it’s my it’s mine now. And, and, you know, one of the thought things that film does, I think very well is to show us all of the sophistication of Oppenheimer’s thinking and how he was working within a context that had to do with modernist art, and that had to do with reading in multiple languages.

00:31:46:01 – 00:32:04:11
Alice Lovejoy
That had to do with poetry. That was really drawing on, multiple ways of thinking about the world. Whereas the world of politics is much more about power. Right. And Oppenheimer is not part of that world. So, we see that moment. I really think that’s a great scene because it just the weapon goes away and all of a sudden, it’s out of his hands.

00:32:04:11 – 00:32:23:16
Alice Lovejoy
It’s not his anymore. So the successor to the Manhattan Project was the Atomic Energy Commission, which Strauss was the commissioner of between 53 and 58. And the impression that we get from the film is that the AC was more directly politicized in the Manhattan Project, and I think that was true. Right. This is, again, the context of the Cold War.

00:32:23:16 – 00:32:43:22
Alice Lovejoy
The early 50s is the moment when, you know, the Soviets have the bomb. And so there’s the arms race. There is the anti-communist hysteria with McCarthyism in the US. And this really, changed, the context, right, for the kind of work that the Manhattan Project had been doing, which wasn’t about the Soviet Union, really at the time.

00:32:43:24 – 00:33:05:26
Alice Lovejoy
And so at the end of the film, we see this kind of abrupt ending, but it isn’t quite it wasn’t quite that abrupt. The Manhattan Project continue to work, continue to exist for a while. The AEC was founded on August 1st, 1946 with the Atomic Energy Act, and by 1947, the Manhattan Project’s work had been fully absorbed by the AEC.

00:33:05:29 – 00:33:30:29
Alice Lovejoy
But the Manhattan Project, was involved, for instance, with the atomic test Bikini Atoll in 1946, the operations crossroads tests, and eventually all of the infrastructure that the Manhattan Project had built. So at Oak Ridge, at Hanford, at Los Alamos was transferred to the AEC. And those installations still exist. And they’re a really important legacy of World War Two’s big science.

00:33:31:01 – 00:33:52:11
Dan LeFebvre
So it’s not like the the Manhattan Project name went away, mostly. But the technology or obviously the technology still exists. But, you know, a lot of even the facilities and things like that were just essentially transferred to, oh, now we had this new technology. Would it make sense? They wouldn’t have an EEC. There’s no Atomic Energy Commission prior to atomic energy not even being a thing.

00:33:52:11 – 00:33:56:10
Dan LeFebvre
So having that set up, I guess that makes sense. It just transitioned into that.

00:33:56:16 – 00:34:19:16
Alice Lovejoy
Yeah. So it’s really a governmental I mean, it’s it’s a it’s a movement from a wartime exigency. And an agency that is built really swiftly during the war by the Army Corps of Engineers, among others. And that’s coordinating things through this question of how do we institutionalize this now that we know we have this technology that’s both for weapons and for energy, and that’s the other part of the story that, you know, is crucial to how the AEC evolves.

00:34:19:18 – 00:34:48:06
Dan LeFebvre
Obviously, my audience is made up of a bunch of film lovers, and as I’m sure film lovers are aware, Christopher Nolan used Kodak’s 65 millimeter large format film to shoot Oppenheimer, and it was released and various other Kodak film formats for Imax in theaters around the world. So from a historical perspective, though, I found that kind of ironic that they used Kodak film to tell the story of how America entered the atomic age using technology from a company that was so closely tied to it all, Kodak.

00:34:48:13 – 00:34:58:24
Dan LeFebvre
And that’s something that you talk about in your book. Is it true that the actual Kodak film company was involved in the chemical production of weapons grade uranium back in the 1940s?

00:34:58:26 – 00:35:18:08
Alice Lovejoy
Yeah, yeah. And this is really at the heart of, of my my new book, Tales of Mines and Chemistry, which talks about how Kodak and specifically the Tennessee Eastman Company, which was its main chemical subsidiary. So how those two companies really one company, but two branches of one company came to run the Whitehall plant at Oak Ridge.

00:35:18:10 – 00:35:35:19
Alice Lovejoy
So again, Y-12 is a huge part of Oak Ridge. It has many, many buildings. It’s running the electromagnetic separation process. So why this Kodak, which is a company that we know for its film and for its cameras, is really the key figure in the history of photography, maybe globally. How does this come to play such a crucial role?

00:35:35:19 – 00:36:00:09
Alice Lovejoy
And the Manhattan Project and what’s interesting is that the answer to this stretches back to, the history of safety film. So the less flammable cellulose acetate film that has been basically universally used since the early 1950s and as a successor to cellulose nitrate film, which is, basically the same thing as nitrocellulose and was used in the first part of the 20th century, to make film based.

00:36:00:09 – 00:36:24:26
Alice Lovejoy
So the plastic that goes under film emulsion and what I point to in the book is that, so again, as you say, Oppenheimer, which is a story about one of the men behind the Manhattan Project, was shot on 65 millimeter, which is the Kodak format, on cellulose acetate that’s used, do one up to 70 millimeter production prints and 65 millimeter is the film that requires the largest amount of cellulose acetate.

00:36:24:26 – 00:36:48:07
Alice Lovejoy
And that’s the material that brought Kodak to the bomb. So there’s an industrial connection here that goes very quickly through weapons. Because safety film is made using cellulose acetate, safety film is made using the chemicals acetic acid and acetic and hydride. Those chemicals brought Tennessee Eastman from safety film to making the anti-submarine explosive RDX during World War two.

00:36:48:09 – 00:37:08:28
Alice Lovejoy
And this was happening at the Holston Ordnance Works in Tennessee, the world’s largest ammunition plant at the time, again operated by the world’s largest film manufacturer. And this is a project that was run by Leslie R Groves and the Army Corps of Engineers. And so Groves sees how well Tennessee Eastman is able to sort of build and operate the Holston Ordnance Works at the same time.

00:37:08:28 – 00:37:20:18
Alice Lovejoy
And he says, okay, this is a company that’s going to do a good job, running Y-12. They know how to put these projects together. They know how to operate factories. So let’s ask them to do it.

00:37:20:21 – 00:37:43:15
Dan LeFebvre
Wow. Yeah. So it wasn’t completely random at all. It was they were already doing something beforehand. And then. Yeah, Groves comes in and asks him, wow, it’s fascinating. Well, after everything we’ve learned today, it seems obvious that Oppenheimer is just giving us a small peek at the true story surrounding the Manhattan Project. So let’s say you’re put in charge of making a movie all about the Manhattan Project.

00:37:43:15 – 00:37:49:12
Dan LeFebvre
It’s not called just Oppenheimer. What’s one approach that you would take to telling the story on screen?

00:37:49:15 – 00:38:08:29
Alice Lovejoy
Yeah, and it’s a great question because I would take a different approach in the great man approach, which I think Oppenheimer does really well. I think it goes into this all these questions, as I’ve said with Einstein, with Strauss as the foil, etc. it’s a really good adaptation of the biography, but I think the smaller stories are stories of smaller or less famous people are equally important.

00:38:09:01 – 00:38:37:03
Alice Lovejoy
Because these are stories that were crucial to shaping the Manhattan Project and making it what it was. So one of the characters that I follow in my book is a man, named Alfred Dean, who is, known as the Kodak Spy. So slack was an employee of Kodak who, started in the Rochester, New York factory, moved down to the Tennessee Eastman factories in Kingsport, Tennessee, eventually moved to the Holston Ordnance Works, and then works at Y-12.

00:38:37:06 – 00:39:03:09
Alice Lovejoy
And from his time in Rochester onward, he was spying for the Soviet Union. While he was at Kodak, whether that was giving the Soviets color film technology formulas or whether it was, in the case of Holston Ordnance Works actually giving them samples of RDX, this explosive. So slack was not a spy, though, in a way, we might want to show a spy, if you’re like a the genre of the spy film, right?

00:39:03:09 – 00:39:20:07
Alice Lovejoy
He wasn’t in it for the politics. He was in it for the money. He really didn’t want to be doing it. He was kind of like stuck in this relationship. He wasn’t a very good spy. He kind of like, talk too much. And there are these, you know, things said about him at the plant where he would, you know, he would chat about the atomic bomb even though you were supposed to be doing that.

00:39:20:10 – 00:39:50:01
Alice Lovejoy
And I think that story is interesting because he paid for this. I mean, he went to prison in 1915, again at the height of the Red scare. And his story doesn’t really neatly fit into Cold War narratives because, again, his betrayal was pretty mild compared with people like class folks who we do see in Oppenheimer, who was a Soviet spy who was there, or David Greenglass, who was also at Los Alamos, and who worked for the same Soviet handler as Alfred Dean slack.

00:39:50:03 – 00:40:08:01
Alice Lovejoy
And he’s also slack is also interesting because he’s one of those many, many thousands of people who are working on the industrial processes of the Manhattan Project who don’t have these kinds of big names, but were equally important. And there’s been some wonderful work done to by historians on the women who worked on the Manhattan Project, whose roles were were absolutely crucial.

00:40:08:07 – 00:40:16:26
Alice Lovejoy
But I think the smaller story is the stories of people like slack are, interesting. And they tell us they tell us a lot about the nuances of that period.

00:40:16:28 – 00:40:37:07
Dan LeFebvre
Yeah. That’s fascinating. I guess. You know, there’s always there’s always people that, don’t love their jobs. But you can I think of, you know, as spies. You don’t think of a spy as somebody that. Why would you be a spy if you don’t want to? If you don’t love what you’re doing? It’s such a high risk. But I guess the reward, if the reward is there and it’s monetary and that’s what you want, then.

00:40:37:09 – 00:40:52:28
Alice Lovejoy
Yeah. And I think he was persuaded. Right. I think there was there was persuasion. And that happened by convincing handlers and so yeah, it’s it is one of those odd stories. And he really gets stuck in jail for quite a while. His life is and is ruined by this. And, you know, to be fair, he did spy right?

00:40:53:02 – 00:41:02:24
Alice Lovejoy
He he did it. But it is, in the context of early 50s, where everything is so heightened as we see in Oppenheimer, it can have these consequences that might not have occurred at a different moment.

00:41:02:26 – 00:41:24:21
Dan LeFebvre
That would be a fascinating movie. Speaking of other movies, is it all right if I shift the conversation away from the Oppenheimer movie for a moment? Yeah. I’d like to get your take on current events that I’m sure will be a movie in the future. As a history podcast, it talks about movies and TV shows. We have covered a lot of political events in history, from the Watergate scandal in all the president men to the more recent Nuremberg movie.

00:41:24:23 – 00:41:41:04
Dan LeFebvre
And even with today’s topic, as we talked about Oppenheimer, his political views impacted not only his own life and career, but also impacted how we view his part in history. And all of that is to say, this is not a political podcast, but I think the current events of today will end up in the movies at some point in the future.

00:41:41:09 – 00:41:57:19
Dan LeFebvre
And when it does, I’m sure the events that took place in Minneapolis will play a big part. So as a film historian who lives in Minneapolis, what do you want the filmmakers of the future to know about the true story right now that they should make sure to include in their movies?

00:41:57:21 – 00:42:20:20
Alice Lovejoy
Yeah. Thanks. That’s a great and a really important question because I think, there is a widespread sense, among those of us who live in Minneapolis, in the Twin Cities, and Minnesota, that we are living through history in a way that is, very pronounced right away. That’s not too different from what happened in 2020 after George Floyd was murdered.

00:42:20:22 – 00:42:47:04
Alice Lovejoy
In a lot. It’s playing out in the same area of Minneapolis, in south Minneapolis. So I think what’s interesting about this moment, watching it from the inside, is that there’s so much documentation, there’s so many cameras everywhere showing what’s happening, whether these are, observers, legal observers, with cameras, whether these are, body cameras on federal officers, whether these are drones coming out with their photojournalists.

00:42:47:06 – 00:43:09:28
Alice Lovejoy
And there’s also a lot of national and international media coming here, right, flying in to document what’s happening. And what a lot of what we see in the media is pictures of, physical brutality. We see a lot of pictures of, tear gas, federal forces, use of tear gas and pepper spray, chemical munitions, and all this is happening.

00:43:09:28 – 00:43:33:09
Alice Lovejoy
It’s as accurate, but it also leads to the war zone comparisons that are made by, many media outlets, which are not incorrect. Those are those are correct in many ways, but they’re, the media isn’t able to get, to aspects of what’s happening that I think are fundamental but are less, less, attractive as subjects of documentation of filming.

00:43:33:11 – 00:43:55:25
Alice Lovejoy
One is and I will say, some journalists have done a very good job with this. One is the experiences of people who are in hiding, who cannot go to school or cannot go to work, can’t buy groceries, can’t seek medical care because, they’re afraid of being detained, many simply for the color of their skin. And so this is a less again, it’s a less, it’s a harder thing to document, right?

00:43:55:25 – 00:44:28:22
Alice Lovejoy
When you’re on the streets, when you’re when you’re somewhere that you haven’t been before. Because these are stories of isolation and fear and often deep need. And they’re playing out, you know, in the space of a house or an apartment. They’re one of the central stories of this moment. The second thing is, I think the deep and really extraordinarily, supportive and enthusiastic networks of people who are just there supporting their neighbors and their communities, whether that’s through helping people with rent, helping people with food, and so on.

00:44:28:24 – 00:44:48:17
Alice Lovejoy
There’s a lot of solidarity and, cooperation that’s just about taking care of your neighbors. That’s less dramatic. And it’s also quieter. But I think it’s also an essential story to the moment. So I would hope that future filmmakers, can see that the war like aspects of what’s happening here are one part of the story.

00:44:48:18 – 00:45:10:07
Alice Lovejoy
It’s real. It’s happening. But, I would encourage them to have the courage to make a film that can be quieter and less dramatic. And that would also see all of what’s happening with and longer histories of racial injustice and of community organizing, in Minnesota that are really informing what’s happening here. And we’re not that far off from 2020.

00:45:10:09 – 00:45:30:21
Alice Lovejoy
And I say courage because. Right. More films sell. They sell better. They’re, you know, they’re easy to picture. It’s easy to to, you know, to make these kinds of dramatic images. But it’s harder to make a film that is quieter, right, that is playing out inside a house or an apartment or that’s about neighbors just working together.

00:45:30:23 – 00:45:46:27
Alice Lovejoy
I will say this film could still be made on 70 millimeter. I would love to see a quiet film about, a changed everyday life made on 70 millimeter because you can include so much detail, even everyday detail. But would it be a great man story? It would not be a great man story. And I think that’s the point, right?

00:45:46:27 – 00:45:50:29
Alice Lovejoy
That this is a story that’s holding out, in everyday life in many ways.

00:45:51:01 – 00:46:15:27
Dan LeFebvre
Yeah. Yeah, it’s it is easier to throw up, you know, action movies and explosions and, and big things that you see in war movies and, get an audience that way, as opposed to not saying the films can’t tell good stories, but it is difficult to tell a good story. And when you can just make big explosions, you know.

00:46:16:01 – 00:46:35:21
Alice Lovejoy
Yeah. I think there’s a commercial, right. There’s a, there’s a, you know, how do you make money making movies, too, is one of the questions. And I think, what happens if we make a movie that’s less dramatic but no less, urgent? Right. In terms of what’s actually happening? So I think it’s a great question, and it’s a question about and an accurate portrayal of reality that is many things at once.

00:46:35:21 – 00:46:37:21
Alice Lovejoy
And that’s hard to do in a film.

00:46:37:24 – 00:47:01:05
Dan LeFebvre
Yeah, yeah. I’m just curious because something that we see in a lot of, historical movies especially, you know, talking about something like Oppenheimer, that’s, during World War II, you know, many decades ago is they use a lot of documentation. And for something, it’s I think it’s easier to do, like in a military film where the military documents everything.

00:47:01:07 – 00:47:21:14
Dan LeFebvre
So would you have a recommendation for what people now can do to help document some of those lesser known stories that aren’t going to get documented by, the military or the, you know, like in Oppenheimer. You know, they have documents of everything that happened there that filmmakers can then go back to, what do you think?

00:47:21:14 – 00:47:26:09
Dan LeFebvre
What would you recommend as being able to document some of those smaller stories for feature filmmakers?

00:47:26:12 – 00:47:48:27
Alice Lovejoy
Yeah, and I think part of this is about communities documenting their own work and individuals documenting their own work. We know that diaries have played a huge role. Written diaries have played a huge role in this over time. And Frank’s diary being sort of the most famous example of this. And, I think that the amount of, footage that’s being made every day will be crucial as well.

00:47:48:29 – 00:48:07:18
Alice Lovejoy
I think that, you know, the way we use images has changed a great deal, right? Images are being I as a huge part of this. But also the way images are being slowed down and analyzed forensically and used for identification and all sorts of things, you know, that law enforcement wears them too, like there’s all sorts of different ways that images are being used now.

00:48:07:25 – 00:48:21:24
Alice Lovejoy
And I think that’s part of the truth of the moment to the reality of the moment is that there are so many different ways it’s being, shown and represented. And the more that can be done to preserve them and to sort the I from the rest, I think that’s crucial too.

00:48:21:27 – 00:48:57:04
Dan LeFebvre
Well, thank you so much for coming on to chat about the movie Oppenheimer. Even though we’ve mostly talked about one movie today, it’s worth remembering that the entire cinema industry exists because of the chemistry and technology that made motion pictures possible. And when we’re watching a movie, a war movie like Oppenheimer, I think most people don’t really think about how the technology that made the movie itself possible intersected with war time weapon development, but that’s a connection that you’ve explored in your book called Tales of Militant Chemistry The Film Factory in a Century of War, and I’ve got a link to that in the show notes for everyone to pick up their own copy.

00:48:57:11 – 00:49:04:16
Dan LeFebvre
And while they do that, can you share something that you came across in your research that would come as a surprise to the average moviegoer?

00:49:04:23 – 00:49:30:22
Alice Lovejoy
Great question. I think beyond the fact that the Manhattan Project was so closely tied to Eastman Kodak and to film manufacturing, I think we can go back a little bit and think about George Eastman again, the founder of Kodak, somebody who was closely involved in, the the way that cinema evolved in the way it developed, that he, you know, he grew cotton, on a kind of gentleman’s farm in North Carolina.

00:49:30:22 – 00:49:54:20
Alice Lovejoy
Now, cotton as as many of your listeners will know, is a crucial ingredient in film. It’s, source of the cellulose that goes into much motion. Picture film. And it’s a it’s a material with a very, dark history, racialist history in the United States that goes back to, to, chattel slavery and, and to, to many, many other, you know, plantations, etc., and the United States.

00:49:54:20 – 00:50:20:12
Alice Lovejoy
And so thinking about those connections that, that existed between the, really the founder of film, somebody who made it into the mass of industrial products that became in the 20th century. And these materials is something that I wasn’t expecting to find. But that underscores for me just how, closely tied this material is to events in the 20th century that go beyond cinema.

00:50:20:12 – 00:50:34:06
Alice Lovejoy
Right? Which is something we see in Oppenheimer, to which we see, you know, the links between nuclear weapons and film is not something that we necessarily think of, but in my view, they are two of the most important technologies of the 20th century atomic weapons and film.

00:50:34:08 – 00:50:37:13
Dan LeFebvre
Well, I’ll make sure to add a link to that in the show notes. Thanks again so much for your time, Alice.

00:50:37:15 – 00:50:38:23
Alice Lovejoy
Thanks for having me. It was a pleasure.

The Movie

The movie fades up to the sounds of rain pattering as Cillian Murphy’s version of a young J. Robert Oppenheimer watches. Then, with a cut to a massive explosion, we get some text on the screen that reads:

“Prometheus stole fire from the gods and gave it to man. For this he was chained to a rock and tortured for eternity.”

Then, just as quickly as it cuts to the quote, it cuts back to an older J. Robert Oppenheimer.

The True Story

As you can probably guess, that comes from Greek mythology. It’s not really a direct quote of anything, though, but rather it’s more of a paraphrased synopsis of the Prometheus myth.

The whole story is thousands of lines of text, so I won’t include the whole thing here either, but I’ll add a link to it in the show notes if you want to read it all. The movie’s summary is pretty good, though, considering they’re breaking it all down into just a couple lines.

Prometheus was a Titan who was bound by Zeus’s servants Hephaestus, Power, and Force as punishment for stealing fire from the gods and giving it to the humans. That’s how humans were able to progress to a more civilized society with technology thanks to harnessing fire. When he was bound, Prometheus’s torture was basically being exposed to the scorching sun by the day, freezing at night, and then an eagle would eat his liver. The next day, the liver would regenerate and the cycle repeated itself.

The Movie

Back in the movie, we see Oppenheimer going to Europe to study under Patrick Blackett in Cambridge. He’s played by James D’Arcy in the movie. While Oppenheimer is there, the movie focuses on a rather curious moment when Oppenheimer injects Blackett’s apple with potassium cyanide. Then, the next day, he seems to have a change of heart and when he rushes back to the classroom while Neils Bohr is talking to Blackett, and Oppenheimer knocks the apple down just in time, claiming there was a wormhole in the apple.

The True Story

While the movie doesn’t really focus on Oppenheimer’s time as a student in the United States as it does in Europe, it is correct to mention him going to Europe to study under Patrick Blackett at Cambridge.

To back up for a moment, though, what we don’t see much of in the movie is Oppenheimer’s time at Harvard. He went there in 1922 when he was 18 years old and majored in chemistry. That’s how he got interested in physics, when one of his professors named Percy Bridgman taught a course on thermodynamics that interested Oppenheimer. And so, after graduating summa cum laude in 1925 after only three years, Oppenheimer went to Christ’s College, Cambridge, to study physics.

More specifically, that was at the Cavendish Laboratory at the University of Cambridge’s Department of Physics. Oppenheimer was there for about a year from 1925 to 1926.

And that scene with the poisoned apple? That really happened!

The movie implies that Oppenheimer was rather clumsy in the lab, and that’s a bit of truth that frustrated Oppenheimer. On top of that, Professor Blackett was an incredibly demanding teacher. This grew into a resentment for Blackett and by the time the autumn of 1925 rolled around, the then-22-year-old Oppenheimer was struggling badly and feeling incompetent with his lab work.

So, Oppenheimer used chemicals from the lab and injected them into an apple on Blackett’s desk. There’s some debate around exactly what he used and how much—after all, it’s not like this is the kind of thing that gets documented—but we know it happened because he confessed what he’d done to one of his friends. It was most likely cyanide, and probably wasn’t enough to kill him, just to make him sick.

But, that’s irrelevant, because just like we see in the movie, Blackett never ate the apple. Although the movie shows Oppenheimer having a change of mind and rushing back to toss the apple before Blackett can eat it, and that part of the movie seems to be a bit of dramatic license.

The sources I saw merely mentioned that Professor Blackett simply tossed the apple without ever knowing it had been poisoned. There’s nothing I could find that suggested Oppenheimer had a change of mind and rushed back, or that he was even there when the apple was discarded.

The Movie

Going back to the movie, during the apple scene we also see Oppenheimer talking to the visiting lecturer Neils Bohr. In that conversation and due to Oppenheimer’s lack of skills in the lab, Bohr recommends Oppenheimer go to Germany to study theoretical physics under Max Born because there’s no lab work required for that.

The True Story

Since we already learned the poisoned apple story didn’t happen exactly like that in the movie, it’s probably not a surprise to learn this other side of it didn’t happen the same way either.

What is accurate, though, is that the Oppenheimer did meet the Danish physicist Neils Bohr. While the movie doesn’t really mention much about who he was other than to suggest Oppenheimer was looking forward to hearing him speak. He won a Nobel Prize in Physics in 1922, so when he visited Cambridge just a few years later, I can only imagine how excited Oppenheimer must’ve been to meet one of the most respected minds in his field.

Unlike what we see in the movie, though, it wasn’t Neils Bohr who recommended Oppenheimer go to Germany to study under Max Born.

As you might expect, Max Born was a German physicist and he was also highly respected in the 1920s, and after World War II went on to become one of the people who was instrumental in the development of quantum mechanics.

So, probably the biggest change is the movie simplified the events.

In the true story, Oppenheimer actually met both Neils Bohr and Max Born while he was at Cambridge. Not necessarily at the same time, though, so it makes sense why the movie simplified it all. But amidst Oppenheimer’s depression from his poor lab work, and I’m sure the whole apple debacle didn’t help, but Oppenheimer decided to leave Cambridge to go to the University of GURT-in-en (Göttingen) in Germany so he could study theoretical physics under Max Born.

GURT-ing-en

Unlike his time in Cambridge, Oppenheimer flourished in his theoretical studies. Just six months after moving to Germany, Oppenheimer graduated with his PhD and co-authored the Born-Oppenheimer approximation with Max Born. He was making a name for himself.

The Movie

After studying in Germany, the movie talks about Oppenheimer returning to the United States where he sets up the theoretical physics department at the University of California, Berkley. Then after all of this setup of Oppenheimer’s education and early career are taking place while we see black and white sequences with Robert Downey Jr.’s version of Lewis Strauss hiring Oppenheimer to work at what the movie only calls “the Institute.”

The True Story

This is where we really start to see the movie bouncing around in the timeline, because Oppenheimer wasn’t appointed as the director of the Institute for Advanced Study until 1947. That’s clearly after World War II and the Manhattan Project. Since we’re following the movie’s timeline of events, we’ll be bouncing around a bit as well, but here is a quick overview of Oppenheimer’s timeline in the true story.

After graduating with his doctorate from the University of Göttingen in Germany in March of 1927, Oppenheimer stayed in Europe for post-doc studies where he spent time in Leiden and Zurich studying under the great minds of the day.

In the fall of 1929, he returned to the U.S. and accepted a position as an associate professor at UC Berkley. He stayed there, but in the spring of 1930, he also started teaching at Caltech. For the next twelve years he went back and forth, splitting time teaching as a full professor at UC Berkley while also being a full professor at Caltech, although he had a special agreement with UC Berkley to release him for six weeks out of the year to teach at Caltech for a term.

This is the time that he built UC Berkley’s theoretical physics program into something of renown that we hear Robert Downey Jr.’s version of Lewis Strauss mention in the movie. But that was in 1947 when Oppenheimer joined the Institute, as we talked about before.

So, from 1930 until 1942, he was splitting time at UC Berkley and Caltech. In 1942, he was given leave to work on the Manhattan Project, and then he returned to Caltech in 1946. He resigned both Caltech and UC Berkley in 1947 to take the job of director at the Institute for Advanced Study.

The Movie

Speaking of the Institute for Advanced Study, in the movie that’s where we see another famous scientist: Albert Einstein. If we’re to believe the movie’s version of history, Oppenheimer seems to think Einstein is a has-been. For example, there’s a line of dialogue early in the movie when Strauss tells Oppenheimer that Einstein is the “greatest scientific mind of our time.” Oppenheimer replies by saying, “Of his time.”

The True Story

While I couldn’t find anything in my research to indicate this exact line of dialogue about Einstein being the greatest scientific mind of “his” time, but the movie is correctly capturing the essence of the relationship between Einstein and Oppenheimer. Before he worked at the Institute, Oppenheimer visited Princeton in 1935. After that, he wrote a letter to his brother where he said, “Princeton is a madhouse: its solipsistic luminaries shining in separate & helpless desolation. Einstein is completely cuckoo.”

About ten years later, Einstein said of the theory Oppenheimer was primarily focusing on, “The quantum theory is without a doubt a useful theory, but it does not reach to the bottom of things. I never believed that it constitutes the true conception of nature.”

Despite these differences, they still had a mutual respect and were cordial with each other. After Einstein passed away in 1955, Oppenheimer wrote publicly that, “…physicists lost their greatest colleague…”

The Movie

Heading back to the movie’s timeline, there’s a line of dialogue from Lewis Strauss as he’s showing Oppenheimer around the Institute when he says the position comes with a house for his family: His wife and two children.

And that introduces us to the next major plot point, because the movie doesn’t focus on Robert Oppenheimer’s personal life a lot, but we do see two relationships that he has…and according to the movie they overlap. First, he has a girlfriend named Jean Tatlock, but then he gets a married woman named Kitty Harrison pregnant. Since Kitty is pregnant, Robert leaves Jean while Kitty leaves her husband to marry Robert. But then, later in the movie, we see Robert having an affair with Jean again.

The True Story

This back-and-forth sort of relationship that we see in the movie does a pretty good job capturing what J. Robert Oppenheimer’s personal life was really like. The key thing the movie does, though, is to mess with the timeline because once again it’s jumping around.

Remember, Oppenheimer’s job at the Institute was in 1947. So, his wife at that time was the woman we see in the movie: Kitty Harrison. She’s played by Emily Blunt.

Kitty’s surname in the movie is actually from one of her husbands before Oppenheimer. Her maiden name was Vissering. She married Frank Ramseyer in 1932, then had that annulled in 1933. The next year, she married Joe Dallet. That lasted until he died in 1937, and then in 1938 she married Richard Harrison. They were divorced in 1940 when she married J. Robert Oppenheimer.

The two children Robert and Kitty had together, Peter and Toni, were the only kids either of them had.

The Movie

In the movie, we see Robert having an girlfriend in Jean Tatlock. But he sleeps with Kitty Harrison, who was a married woman as we just learned, and gets her pregnant. So, Kitty divorces her husband, Robert breaks things off with Jean, and then Robert and Kitty get married.

The True Story

Once again, the movie gets the essence of the story correct, but the timeline was sped up and changed from history.

So, here’s a quick rundown to unravel the historical timeline.

Robert Oppenheimer met Jean Tatlock in the Spring of 1936 when he was teaching at UC Berkley. She was a student there, and it didn’t take long for a romance to blossom. And if you’re wondering, since he was a teacher and she was a student, he was 32 and she was 22. Their relationship developed quickly and Jean had a big influence on shaping Robert’s left-leaning political views. Robert proposed to Jean twice, both of which she rejected, and then in the Spring of 1939, she broke it off with him.

A few months later, in August of 1939, Robert met Kitty Harrison at a party hosted by another physicist. At that time, she was 29 and he was 35. Almost immediately, an affair started. They didn’t hide it, either, as there were reports of Robert and Kitty driving around together in the open.

In the summer of 1940, there was a notable event when Robert Oppenheimer invited Richard and Kitty Harrison to his ranch in New Mexico. Richard Harrison declined the invitation saying he was too busy with work, but Kitty accepted. So, another physicist named Robert Serber along with his wife Charlotte, picked up Kitty in Pasadena and drove her to Oppenheimer’s ranch in New Mexico where they found Robert’s brother, Frank, and Frank’s wife Jackie there.

So, again, the affair wasn’t really a secret. Oh, and at that time, Kitty was pregnant with Robert’s child…who would be Peter, their firstborn.

Well, you can probably see where this is going.

On November 1^st, 1940, Kitty divorced her husband. The very next day, on November 2^nd, 1940, she married Robert Oppenheimer.

But…things weren’t all sunshine and rainbows, because only a couple months after marrying Kitty, who should show back up in Robert’s life? Jean. She reconnected with him and the historical record shows that Robert’s first New Years celebration as a married man, he spent it not with his wife Kitty, but Jean Tatlock.

For the next few years, Robert and Jean maintained contact a couple times a year. While we don’t know the specifics of what happened each time, it’s probably safe to say they were romantic connections.

Despite this, from what we can tell, Kitty knew about Robert’s affair with Jean, and she seemed to tolerate it. Although, to be fair, some have debated just how much she knew. Maybe she only knew them to be friends at first. We don’t really know for sure where that line was crossed, but we know from the FBI tapping their lines in 1943 that Oppenheimer himself said he told Kitty about the affair with Jean, so we can assume she at least knew by then.

The Movie

Speaking of Jean, I’ll throw out a quick content warning here, because something else we see in the movie is a suicide. It happens when Oppenheimer tells Jean that he can’t do the affair anymore, she gets depressed and takes her own life. Robert is shaken by this, but Kitty tells him that he doesn’t get to commit the sin and then make other people feel sorry for him.

The True Story

Unfortunately, that’s true. That was in January of 1944 when Jean was discovered in her bathtub in San Francisco. There was an unsigned note that suggested suicide, and officially it was ruled to be the result of ingesting sedatives and alcohol.

The movie makes it seem like she did it because Robert broke off their affair, but there’s been a lot of controversies surrounding her death.

For example, the note was unsigned. An autopsy suggested she’d eaten a full meal before she died, which the doctor at the time found curious since it’d slow down the effect of the drugs she’d ingested. Her body was discovered by her father, John Tatlock, who moved it from the bathtub to the sofa and then burned a bunch of her letters in the fireplace before calling the funeral parlor—it was the parlor that contacted the police some four hours after she’d died.

Curious things, perhaps, and to be fair as with many debated events in history, not all of those are documented as well as others. But, if there was a conspiracy around her death, that begs the question: Why?

Well, to go down that road, we’d have to remember the timeline. January of 1944. At this point, Robert Oppenheimer was working at the top-secret Manhattan Project. Jean Tatlock was a known member of the Communist Party. If you recall, a moment ago I mentioned the FBI tapped Oppenheimer’s line in 1943 and those revealed that he talked to Kitty about the affair with Jean. The whole reason the FBI was tapping his lines to begin with was because of his association with the Communist Party. They started that in March of 1941, even before he was recruited into the Manhattan Project. Of course, it didn’t stop once he was heading up the top-secret project, so that’s why some think perhaps there was a government coverup to kill Jean Tatlock to keep atomic secrets from getting into the hands of the Soviets.

Then again, Oppenheimer himself believed Jean committed suicide. She was clinically depressed, and she worked as a psychiatrist, so she had access to sedatives pretty easily.

What do you think? If you have any other details or research you’ve done, let me know!

The Movie

For now, if we head back into the movie for the next major plot point, it’s Oppenheimer being recruited into the Manhattan Project by Matt Damon’s version of General Leslie Groves.

But the way we see this happening in the movie, Groves tells Oppenheimer that his name didn’t even come up in the search for a project director even though it was Oppenheimer who brought quantum physics to America. So, the impression I got from the movie was basically if it wasn’t for Groves then Oppenheimer wouldn’t be involved in the Manhattan Project at all.

The True Story

In the true story, that’s not really how it happened. To know what really happened, let’s go back to around the time of Oppenheimer marrying Kitty in late 1940, and then Peter being born in May of 1941. While that was going on in his personal life, in his professional life, Oppenheimer was collaborating on a radiation lab with Ernest Lawrence, who won the 1939 Nobel Prize in physics. That lab was where Lawrence had invented the cyclotron, a particle accelerator he’d patented back in 1932.

After the United States entered World War II, Lawrence recruited Oppenheimer to work on fission and fast neutron experiments at the UC Berkley lab. As you recall, he’d built the theoretical physics program there, so from July to September of 1942, Oppenheimer assembled a group of theoretical physicists to come up with the principles of a bomb design. Seeing as Oppenheimer was the one who built the theoretical physics program at UC Berkley anyway, over those few short months he became a leader of that group.

So, all of that is to say:

That is why U.S. Army General Leslie R. Groves recruited Oppenheimer on October 15^th, 1942 to head up something called Project Y. About a month later, the two men visited Los Alamos, New Mexico for what they called Site Y.

The Movie

And that leads us into something else about the movie, because for a movie called Oppenheimer, it makes sense to focus on him as the main character. We do see a few others, like Isidor Rabi and at one point Robert brings his brother Frank in on the project, but the movie also mentions having to build a town with churches and schools and such, so it’s obviously not showing us the full scale.

The True Story

Now would be a good time to clarify the term “Manhattan Project” and why I’m referring to something in Los Alamos, New Mexico. This project was a lot bigger scale than what we see in the movie.

So, General Groves was from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, and in August of 1942, they created something they called the Manhattan Engineer District, or MED. On the surface, it was routine construction in New York City. The true purpose was to cover up the work required for the atomic bomb project.

Over time, that name morphed from the Manhattan Engineer District to the Manhattan Project even though the project itself had sites around the country. As we just learned, Los Alamos, New Mexico was considered “Site Y,” while Oak Ridge, Tennessee was “Site X” and Hanover, Washington was “Site W.”

The Los Alamos location was where the primary work for the bomb design. That’s where Oppenheimer was at, along with about 6,000 workers. The other sites, Oak Ridge and Hanover, were more for providing the materials needed and they were much larger in scale than Los Alamos. There were about 50,000 people working in Hanover that focused primarily on producing plutonium, while Oak Ridge had another 75,000 people focusing on enriching uranium.

So, all in all, the Manhattan Project was a lot larger than what we see in the movie. But again, it’s called “Oppenheimer” and not “Manhattan Project.”

Actually, if you want to learn more about this, I’ve got another companion episode to this one with historian Alice Lovejoy that focuses more on the movie’s portrayal of the Manhattan Project. You can find that over at basedonatruestorypodcast.com/oppenheimer.

The Movie

Back to the movie now, and something that’s very easy to do when we’re watching a historical movie is to look at it from today’s perspective with the knowledge we have today. With that in mind, I thought Oppenheimer did a good job doing was helping us get a sense for what it was like before the nuclear age, because we see Oppenheimer having a major concern that an atomic bomb might start a chain reaction that would just keep going and going until the entire atmosphere has been destroyed and, by extension, everyone and everything on the planet would die.

The True Story

While the movie dramatizes the specifics of it, it’s very true that Oppenheimer and other scientists working on the Manhattan Project considered the possibility that detonating a nuclear device might start an unstoppable chain reaction that’d basically ignite the Earth’s atmosphere and end the world.

Although, as scary as that sounds, it’s often described as more of a “nonzero” risk. So, technically it’s not zero percent chance, but a miniscule chance that from a practical perspective is basically zero.

Except, we’re talking about the end of the world here, so you can understand why even a “nonzero” risk is still worth making sure it doesn’t happen.

The fear was mostly from the physicist Edward Teller, who was worried that a fission bomb would ignite the nitrogen in the atmosphere, or perhaps the hydrogen in the ocean, and just keep using that as fuel to burn. That was as early as 1942.

So, they did the math.

It wasn’t until 1946 that two other physicists at Los Alamos named Hans Bethe and Emil Konopinski formally published a paper that proved the reaction couldn’t continue on forever due to dropping air density and temperature thresholds. That was after the Trinity Test in 1945, but they’d obviously been working on it before then and from what we can tell, they had the math figured out by the time of the test, just hadn’t published the formal paper before it.

The Movie

Speaking of the Trinity Test, let’s head back to the movie because we’re at the point of the test itself. According to the movie, there’s an immense pressure to just use the atomic bomb to end World War II. The military has a list of 11 Japanese cities, and they want to drop two bombs on two of those cities. With a tight deadline, they need to detonate an atomic bomb to make sure it works and gather data like what’s a safe operating distance.

That’s how we get the test. In the movie, Groves asks Oppenheimer what they should call the test, and Oppenheimer says, “Batter my heart, three-person’d god.” Groves replies, “What?” to which Oppenheimer replies, “Trinity.”

It’s the first time an atomic bomb has been detonated and according to the movie, the test appears to be a massive success. As he’s watching this is when we see Oppenheimer use the now-famous quote, “I am become death. The destroyer of worlds.”

The True Story

In the true story, there wasn’t really a list of 11 Japanese cities like we see in the movie. There was actually about 16 cities that were considered by what the U.S. called the “Target Committee,” which was made up of 12 people at its height. Oppenheimer was the chair of the committee, along with members of the military and other scientists in the Manhattan Project.

By the spring of 1945, the 16 Japanese cities were narrowed down to five cities: Kyoto, Hiroshima, Yokohama, Kokura, and Niigata. They were chosen for size, military value, surrounding terrain to help amplify the bomb’s effects, as well as minimal previous bombing so they could see what effect the atomic bomb would have compared to other bombings.

Then came Monday, July 16^th, 1945. The day of the Trinity Test.

The name itself is something the movie alludes to when we see Oppenheimer say, “Batter my heart, three person’d God.” That’s a line from the 17^th-century poem from John Donne called Holy Sonnet XIV, which refers to the Christian Trinity. Much later when Groves asked him about the name, Oppenheimer said he wasn’t entirely sure why he picked it other than to think that “Trinity” might fit in with common Western-style names like “Three Rivers,” “Three Peaks,” and so on.

So, he must’ve thought the name “Trinity” wouldn’t attract much attention. Until it exploded, of course.

And the way see the Trinity Test itself happening in the movie is a pretty good re-enactment of what really happened that weekend. There were about 425 people at the Trinity Test site, which was roughly 210 miles south of Los Alamos, New Mexico. That broke down into about 250 scientists and engineers running the test, another 150 or so military as security, and between 20 to 30 VIPs. That included General Leslie Groves, who joined Oppenheimer at the primary command bunker that they called S-10,000 because it was 10,000 yards south of ground zero. That’s about 5.7 miles.

There were also scientists at N-10,000, and W-10,000, but there were mountains to the east so there wasn’t an E-10,000 post.

As for the goggles we see in the movie, those were real as well. The standard gear was dark lenses that filtered UV, and people were ordered to lie face-down, backs turned and put your arms over your eyes. Of course, not everyone did that. Most famously, Richard Feynman chose not to wear goggles and instead watched through the windshield of a truck.

At exactly 5:29 a.m. Mountain Time, the “Gadget” as they called it, detonated on a 100-foot tower. To say the blast exceeded all expectations was an understatement.

Radiation was higher than expected and people at the posts some 5.7 miles away were knocked over by the blast’s shockwave, although there weren’t any major injuries.

That brings us to the line, “Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds.”

That’s a line from the Bhagavad Gita, a 700-verse Hindu scripture that Oppenheimer paraphrased into that now-famous quote. Chapter 11, Verse 32 says, “I am Time, the destroyer of worlds, grown great, come to consume the worlds.”

Oppenheimer never uttered those words aloud, but in a 1965 documentary for NBC, Oppenheimer recalled that seeing how successful the Trinity Test was, he recounted that he remembered the Bhagavad Gita verse.

The Movie

Heading back to the movie’s version of events, the very next scene after the successful Trinity Test is some military guys saying, “With respect, Dr. Oppenheimer, we’ll take it from here.” And with that, they pack up a bomb and drive away. It happens so quickly in the movie, it’s almost as if that seems to be that they had a successful test, so that’s immediately the end of the Manhattan Project overall.

The True Story

That’s not really what happened. At least not nearly as fast as the movie makes it seem. So, once again, let’s unravel the true story’s timeline.

The Trinity Test was July 16^th, 1945.

About three weeks later, on August 6^th, the uranium gun-type bomb called “Little Boy” was dropped on Hiroshima, resulting in between 70,000 and 80,000 deaths instantly. The movie shows Oppenheimer finding out about the bombs through the radio, but he still worked at Los Alamos, where he found out that evening along with everyone else. Cheers erupted among the teams at Los Alamos on hearing the news, and Oppenheimer joined in the champagne toasts. Although, despite the celebrations, he also had moral qualms with the news.

Three days later, more news. The plutonium bomb “Fat Man” was dropped Nagasaki, with between 35,000 to 40,000 deaths instantly. Back in Los Alamos, there weren’t the same kind of celebrations. Oppenheimer was reported to say, “No, this is too much.”

On August 14^th, 1945, Japan announced their intent to surrender. That’s U.S. time, in Japan it was August 15^th. This effectively ended World War II, although the official surrender document wasn’t signed until September 2^nd.

Then, on October 16^th, exactly three months after the Trinity Test, Oppenheimer resigned from his position in Los Alamos. The Manhattan Project continued on without him, though, until it was disbanded on August 15^th, 1947. As for Oppenheimer, he returned to Caltech where he resumed teaching, but quickly realized his heart wasn’t in it anymore.

The Movie

That leads us right up to Oppenheimer’s meeting with President Truman that we see in the movie. You know, the one where Oppenheimer says, “I feel that I have blood on my hands.” Truman replies with, “You think anyone in Hiroshima or Nagasaki gives a shit about who built the bomb? They care who dropped it. I did.”

Then, as Oppenheimer is shown out of the Oval Office, we can hear Truman in the background saying, “Don’t let that crybaby back in here.”

The True Story

That was a real meeting that took place on October 25^th, 1945, not long after Oppenheimer resigned from Los Alamos. And the movie is correct to show that Oppenheimer told President Truman that he feels like he has blood on his hands. Truman’s reply was a little different than the movie, albeit with the same effect. Ray Month’s book called Robert Oppenheimer: A Life Inside the Center quotes Truman as saying, “Blood on his hands; damn it, he hasn’t half as much blood on his hands as I have. You just don’t go around bellyaching about it.”

Then, he called Oppenheimer a crybaby and said, “I don’t want to see that son of a bitch in this office ever again.”

Except, unlike what we see in the movie, all of that supposedly happened after Oppenheimer had already left so it’s not like it was something he heard as he was leaving like the movie shows.

The Movie

After leaving the Manhattan Project, the movie circles back to something it shows throughout with Lewis Strauss answering to Congress about hiring Oppenheimer for the Institute.

While I was watching that play out in the movie, it gave me the impression that despite Oppenheimer’s contributions to the war effort, his reputation was almost immediately tarnished after the war because of what the movie calls “left-wing associations” and being tied to communism. The movie also seems to imply that Strauss was orchestrating it all, which is quite a turn for the guy who hired Oppenheimer at the Institute.

The True Story

For the most part, the way the movie shows this happening is pretty accurate. It’s dramatized, naturally, but the core elements are there.

What the movie skips are a few years between that meeting with President Truman at the end of 1945 and Oppenheimer’s 1946, when he consulted in Washington on atomic policy and was appointed to the Atomic Energy Commission, or AEC. That leads us up to 1947, which actually takes us back to the beginning of the movie when we learned that Lewis Strauss recruited Oppenheimer to be the director of the Institute for Advanced Study.

What started out as a good relationship turned sour mainly due to Oppenheimer’s Communist ties, such as his wife Kitty and his brother, Frank, who was a confirmed member of the Communist Party USA from 1937 until around 1940.

After World War II, Oppenheimer was famous, but as the Cold War sparked what we now know as the Red Scare, people started to grow suspicious of him. Rumors spread, and anyone with top secret clearance like Oppenheimer had for the Manhattan Project was called into question.

As for Lewis Strauss, that relationship started to sour a couple years after he recruited Oppenheimer. In fact, now that the Manhattan Project is a National Park, here’s a quote from the National Park Services’ website to explain the exact moment Strauss stopped liking Oppenheimer:

Robert Oppenheimer, testifying before the Joint Committee on Atomic Energy including Lewis Strauss in 1949 on the military usefulness of Iron 59 said in part, “You can use a shovel for atomic energy. In fact you do. You can use a bottle of beer for atomic energy. In fact you do.” These and other comments by Oppenheimer, who was known for making biting remarks, caused people to laugh. Strauss looked foolish and was furious. “There was a look of hatred there [on Strauss’ face] you don’t see very often…” said one observer.

It wasn’t just that one comment, though, as you’ll notice that article talks about “other comments.” The Los Alamos National Laboratory’s website has another article that discusses another comment from Oppenheimer in that same hearing:

Strauss believed that radioactive isotopes had military value and argued against exporting them. However, with little patience for those he considered intellectually inferior, Oppenheimer publicly humiliated Strauss by saying, “My own rating of the importance of isotopes . . . is that they are far less important than electronic devices, but far more important than, let us say, vitamins.”

In response, Strauss didn’t hide his look of hatred. Oppenheimer had publicly revealed that Strauss knew little about physics, particularly nuclear science.

After that hearing, Lewis Strauss held a grudge against Oppenheimer. So, as Oppenheimer’s public image started to deteriorate into the Cold War era of the early 1950s, Strauss certainly didn’t want to do Oppenheimer any favors. Quite the opposite, actually, because Strauss asked the FBI to track Oppenheimer in 1953. They did, and delivered a report to Strauss on November 20^th, 1953, which Strauss sent directly to President Eisenhower. Upon reviewing the report, Eisenhower decided to revoke Oppenheimer’s security clearance. That happened on December 21^st, 1953, and Oppenheimer was given the choice to resign or appeal. He appealed the decision, which was heard by a three-man panel. They voted two-to-one not to reinstate the security clearance.

And with that, Oppenheimer’s government career was effectively over. But even though the movie doesn’t talk much about the rest of Oppenheimer’s life, let’s fill out the rest of the true story.

Despite his government career effectively coming to an end when his security clearance was revoked, Oppenheimer was still the director at the Institute for Advanced Study, but in 1954 he started taking vacations with his wife and daughter to the small island of Saint John in the U.S. Virgin Islands. They enjoyed sailing together, and they must’ve loved it there because in 1957, Oppenheimer bought some land and built a vacation home there.

He continued working for the Institute for Advanced Study and in March of 1963 he was awarded the Enrico Fermi Award. That’s kind of a lifetime achievement award for scientists with the medal physically given by the President of the United States. Oppenheimer winning that award was a big deal considering how he’d been shunned by the scientific community.

Unfortunately, though, JFK was assassinated before he was able to give the award to Oppenheimer, so President Lyndon B. Johnson formally gave him the award in December of 1963. Jackie Kennedy attended the ceremony and told Oppenheimer how much her husband wanted him to have the medal.

Oppenheimer was diagnosed with throat cancer in 1965. He tried radiation treatment, but it was unsuccessful, so he resigned from the Institute for Advanced Study in 1966 due to his health. Then, on February 18^th, 1967, J. Robert Oppenheimer passed away in his sleep at home in Princeton at the age of 67.

I thought I’d end our story today with more recent news from just before the movie’s release in 2023. Because in 2022, the U.S. Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm issued this press release:

Dr. J. Robert Oppenheimer occupies a central role in our history for leading the nation’s atomic efforts during World War II and planting the seeds for the Department of Energy’s national laboratories—the crown jewels of the American research and innovation ecosystem.

In 1954, the Atomic Energy Commission revoked Dr. Oppenheimer’s security clearance through a flawed process that violated the Commission’s own regulations. As time has passed, more evidence has come to light of the bias and unfairness of the process that Dr. Oppenheimer was subjected to while the evidence of his loyalty and love of country have only been further affirmed. The Atomic Energy Commission even selected Dr. Oppenheimer in 1963 for its prestigious Enrico Fermi Award citing his “scientific and administrative leadership not only in the development of the atomic bomb, but also in establishing the groundwork for the many peaceful applications of atomic energy.”

The Department of Energy has previously recognized J. Robert Oppenheimer in other ways including the creation of the Oppenheimer Science and Energy Leadership Program in 2017 to support early and mid-career scientists and engineers to “carry on [Dr. Oppenheimer’s] legacy of science serving society.”

As a successor agency to the Atomic Energy Commission, the Department of Energy has been entrusted with the responsibility to correct the historical record and honor Dr. Oppenheimer’s profound contributions to our national defense and the scientific enterprise at large. Today, I am pleased to announce the Department of Energy has vacated the Atomic Energy Commission’s 1954 decision In the Matter of J. Robert Oppenheimer.

00:00:02:01 – 00:00:23:08
Dan LeFebvre
Hello and welcome to based on a True Story. The podcast that compares your favorite Hollywood movies with history. The new Year is upon us, and this is my first time talking to you in 2026, so I thought it would be appropriate to go back into the vault for a classic episode about the topic that got me interested in history to begin with, The Legend of King Arthur.

00:00:23:11 – 00:00:40:22
Dan LeFebvre
Now, I’ll share a little bit more about how that tale got me interested in history, as well as an update for 2026 at the end of the episode, if you want to hear about that. But let’s jump into today’s movie. And there are a lot of King Arthur movies out there, but one of them marketed itself as being a more historically accurate adaptation of the story.

00:00:40:24 – 00:00:59:26
Dan LeFebvre
So that’s why today we’re going to be learning about the 2004 movie starring Clive Owen and Keira Knightley. And let’s start by refreshing our memory of the movie with a quick synopsis. As the movie starts, we quickly learn why this is a little different than other King Arthur movies because Clive Owen’s version of Arthur isn’t a king at the legendary Camelot.

00:01:00:00 – 00:01:28:11
Dan LeFebvre
Instead, he is a Roman trained commander leading a band of some marching warriors stationed in Britain near the end of Rome’s occupation. Their years of service are supposed to be over, and they’re eager to finally earn their freedom papers and go home. The twist comes when Rome orders them on one last mission ride north of Hadrian’s Wall into dangerous territory to rescue a Roman family before a ruthless Saxon army sweeps down and destroys everything in its path.

00:01:28:14 – 00:01:54:20
Dan LeFebvre
That decision pulls Arthur and his men straight into the collision between Rome’s empire, invading Saxons and the native Britons caught in the middle. Arthur’s soldiers in the movie are many names that we’re familiar with from the legends Lancelot, Gwyn, Galahad, Bors and Tristan. They reluctantly accept the mission, knowing that it might be a suicide run. And in the movie, we see them battling brutal weather, ambushes and the constant pressure of the advancing Saxon forces.

00:01:54:22 – 00:02:16:29
Dan LeFebvre
Along the way, they encounter two other familiar characters from the legend Guinevere and Merlin. In this version of the story, Guinevere is a world warrior rather than the courtly queen that we might expect, and Merlin appears to be more of a tribal leader than a wizard. As alliances shift, Arthur is forced to choose between his duty to Rome and his growing sense that Rome has abandoned Britain.

00:02:17:02 – 00:02:38:18
Dan LeFebvre
The story builds to a large scale showdown when Arthur and his soldiers decide to make a stand alongside the Britons instead of retreating with the Romans. The Saxons launch a fierce assault, and the battle claims the lives of some of Arthur’s closest companions, but the defenders ultimately repel the invaders. And in the aftermath, Arthur marries Gwen and steps into the role of King.

00:02:38:24 – 00:03:04:09
Dan LeFebvre
Not by divine sword or mystical prophecy, but by leading the people who chose to stand and fight with him. So you can start to get a sense of how 2004 is King Arthur is trying to be a more realistic version of the Arthurian legend, but how well does it do from a historical perspective? Today’s episode is with Dorsey Armstrong, a medieval literature professor at Purdue University who specializes in Arthurian legend.

00:03:04:12 – 00:03:35:15
Dan LeFebvre
And you might recognize her name from her great Courses lectures, like one of my personal favorites called King Arthur History and Legend. She’s also the editor of the official quarterly journal of the International Arthurian Society called Arthurian. Before we start uncovering the true story behind King Arthur, though, let’s set up our game for today’s episode. Now, if you’re new to the show since based on a true story, it’s all about separating fact from fiction in the movies, you’ll get to practice your skills at separating fact from fiction in this podcast episode with a game of two truths and a lie.

00:03:35:18 – 00:04:02:23
Dan LeFebvre
So I’m about to give you three things that we’ll talk about in this episode. Two of those are true. And one of them, well, one of them is just an all out lie. Are you ready? Okay, here they are. Number one, the famous Round Table appears in early fifth century Arthurian stories. Number two. Merlin was not associated with Arthur until the 12th century.

00:04:02:25 – 00:04:22:10
Dan LeFebvre
Number three. No Romans lived in villas north of Hadrian’s Wall. Got them. Okay, now, as you’re listening to our story today, see if you can figure out which one of those is a lie. And if you’re watching the video version of this, you can see I’m holding up an envelope. This has the answer inside, and we’ll open this at the end of the episode to see if you got it right.

00:04:22:13 – 00:04:35:29
Dan LeFebvre
Okay. Now it’s time to connect with Dorsey Armstrong. All about the historical accuracy of 2004 King Arthur.

00:04:36:01 – 00:04:54:09
Dan LeFebvre
As longtime listeners of based on a true story. No, I always like to kick things off with an overall historical letter grade just to get a sense of how accurate a movie is from a ballpark perspective. So with that in mind, today we are looking at the 2004 King Arthur movie. What letter grade does it get.

00:04:54:11 – 00:05:08:09
Dorsey Armstrong
As far as a letter grade for its historical accuracy? I think that you would have to break it into sections, and some parts would get an A, and many parts would get an F.

00:05:08:12 – 00:05:10:17
Dan LeFebvre
That’s quite a gap.

00:05:10:19 – 00:05:39:14
Dorsey Armstrong
So yes, it it’s there are moments that, are so carefully, scrupulously paying attention to what would have been going on in the fifth century and what we know about early chronicle accounts of who King Arthur was, that pay attention to details and then others. There are other moments where they’ve just thrown everything out the window and they’ve, you know, done something kind of crazy with the story.

00:05:39:14 – 00:06:15:02
Dorsey Armstrong
And so but I will say this, what is great about this film, the further away I get from it in time, the more I like it, because despite what it gets wrong, it gets the idea of Arthur right. So even if it’s not an accurate historical representation of King Arthur, the character who is noble, good, beloved by his men, willing to sacrifice himself, all of those are the elements that we find in the Arthurian legend that have made it so popular.

00:06:15:04 – 00:06:32:17
Dan LeFebvre
It sounds like the movie is more about capturing the essence of the character instead of specific historical events, which we see a lot in movies. So that gap makes a lot of sense. But as a movie, it still has to pull details from somewhere for us to watch. So let’s start digging into those exactly the same way the movie does.

00:06:32:21 – 00:07:01:03
Dan LeFebvre
I’m going to quote the movie. This is a direct quote from the movie quote. Historians agree that the classical 15th century tale of King Arthur and his knights rose from a real hero who lived a thousand years earlier, in a period often called the Dark Ages. Recently discovered archeological evidence sheds light on his true identity and, quote, so the movie specifically says historians agree instead of some historians or even most historians.

00:07:01:06 – 00:07:14:06
Dan LeFebvre
And that to me implies that the movie is suggesting this is just accepted fact. So having the chance to talk to a historian about this movie, I have to ask, do you agree with the movie’s opening statement?

00:07:14:08 – 00:07:47:14
Dorsey Armstrong
Again, it’s like my grade that I gave the movie parts of it. Get, any parts of it get enough. So yes, absolutely. The 15th century hero that we know probably has his origins in a real person, possibly persons who lived during the fifth century. And I will say as much as medievalist, hate the phrase dark ages if there ever was a Dark Age, fifth century Britain after the Romans have withdrawn, is it?

00:07:47:15 – 00:08:23:06
Dorsey Armstrong
It really does count as a dark age. So that part is true. The idea that recent archeological discoveries have located the Arthurian legend, in the north. That’s a little less plausible. I will say that every time a fifth century or thereabouts. Archeological discoveries made, no matter where it is in the British Isles, people attempt to connect it to King Arthur or the Arthur type figure on which he was based.

00:08:23:08 – 00:08:34:18
Dorsey Armstrong
But generally speaking, as far as the legend goes, most of Arthur’s exploits and tales and stories and legends are focused much more towards the South in the southwest.

00:08:34:20 – 00:08:56:08
Dan LeFebvre
Something that stood out to me in that opening statement was the mention of recently discovered archeological evidence. Of course, we have to keep in mind that the movie came out in 2004, so was there some sort of discovery around the 2004 time frame that sort of broke open? Who the real King Arthur was that the movie’s referring to?

00:08:56:11 – 00:09:25:07
Dorsey Armstrong
I what I believe happened in the years before that. Is that up near Hadrian’s Wall, there had been some archeological discoveries, that indicated that a local leader had remained in power and had consolidated a base of power there. After the Romans had withdrawn. But you can say the same about other parts of Britain as well. There are there are several people, understandably, who tried to step into that vacuum of power.

00:09:25:09 – 00:09:36:03
Dorsey Armstrong
And we don’t know much about them, which is why almost every one of them could be considered a candidate for the historical Arthur or, as I like to call him, an Arthur type figure.

00:09:36:06 – 00:09:59:29
Dan LeFebvre
Going back to the movie, we also get an explanation for another of the famous characters from the Arthurian legend, Lancelot. And according to the movie, in 300 A.D., the Romans were expanding their empire to the east. And that’s where the Samaritans live. The Romans defeated them, but they were so impressed with the bravery of the cavalry that they let them live in exchange for each generation of Somalian boys joining the Roman military as knights for 15 years.

00:10:00:01 – 00:10:18:12
Dan LeFebvre
And then fast forward to the year 452 A.D. then we see a young Lancelot being taken from his home to join the Roman military, and he is stationed under Arthur in Britain to defend what you just mentioned, Hadrian’s Wall. The movie describes that as being a 73 mile wall that’s separating the native fighters in the north, where Roman controlled Britain to the south.

00:10:18:14 – 00:10:35:13
Dan LeFebvre
And then, of course, the movie fast forwards 15 years after that to 467 A.D. and that’s kind of the timeline for the rest of the movie. So that’s how the movie sets up everything that we see in the movie itself. How well does the movie establish the timeline prior to the events that we see in the movie?

00:10:35:15 – 00:11:01:04
Dorsey Armstrong
So that’s an interesting question, because on the one hand, yes, wherever the Romans went, they did tend to try and co-opt or bring into the empire, or I’ll just say it, exploit, people who had skills that they thought were valuable and especially useful in fighting. And it is true that at one point very early on that included the formations to the east.

00:11:01:06 – 00:11:29:11
Dorsey Armstrong
But what’s really interesting about this film is that the summation theory, as far as King Arthur goes, is a theory, put forward by Linda melker and C Scott Littleton. And they wrote a book called From Scythian to Camelot. And in that book, they posit that there was no historical Arthur figure, that what happened is the summations are conscripted into the Roman army, which which we know happened.

00:11:29:13 – 00:12:01:27
Dorsey Armstrong
They ended up in Britain so that also did happen. But then their theory is that they’re there in the second century, serving under a Roman leader named Lucius Sartorius. Cassius, and that it is a mix of summation mythology with the reputation and the idealized figure of this leader that, centuries later, would get mushed together to create Arthur and many of the legends, that are associated with him.

00:12:02:03 – 00:12:23:21
Dorsey Armstrong
So it’s interesting that the movie says this is true, whereas the book argues that what a study of the summation question proves is that there was no Arthur and that he wasn’t a real person who lived in the fifth century. And so it puts those two things together in sort of uncomfortable juxtaposition. It makes for a good film.

00:12:23:23 – 00:12:42:01
Dorsey Armstrong
Absolutely. So part is partially true that there were summations, they were incorporated into the Empire. They did make it all the way to Britain, most likely. And they did serve in the second century under someone named Lucius. Our Tory is Cassius, where we get that Arthur name and his middle name.

00:12:42:03 – 00:12:48:15
Dan LeFebvre
That sounds like a perfect example of the contrast between the A and the F letter grade that you gave the overall movie.

00:12:48:18 – 00:13:10:00
Dorsey Armstrong
So I will say this again. The further away I get from the original screen of that film, the more I like it and the more I like what it does in how it encapsulates the essence of why Arthur has become such an important figure for, 1500 years.

00:13:10:03 – 00:13:34:22
Dan LeFebvre
One of the characters from the Arthurian legend that we see in the movie is Merlin. He is not the stereotypical wizard character from a lot of the other Arthurian legend, but in this movie, Merlin is set up as being a world leader. The first interaction that he has with Arthur’s soldiers is actually a fight against them. Although there is a line of dialog they call my year, I think it was Lancelot describing Merlin as a quote unquote dark magician.

00:13:34:24 – 00:13:40:15
Dan LeFebvre
Can you fill in a little more historical context around what we know about Merlin?

00:13:40:17 – 00:14:10:14
Dorsey Armstrong
So this is a really interesting question, because the Merlin character does not get associated with the Arthurian legend, until the 12th century, when a guy called Geoffrey of Monmouth, takes what he knows about one or possibly two figures upon which he bases his Merlin and decides to put it together with the Arthurian legend. Now, we do think that there are possibly two historical figures upon which this Merlin figure is based.

00:14:10:16 – 00:14:34:25
Dorsey Armstrong
One is Merlin Caledonia’s, who was a warrior who went mad and lived in the woods, and the other, is Merlin Ambrosius, who in some of the texts, fought by Arthur’s side early on and had skills maybe not necessarily of magic, but he was a great builder, a great engineer. And so what he did kind of looked like magic.

00:14:34:25 – 00:15:09:20
Dorsey Armstrong
And it appears that Geoffrey of Monmouth, riding around 1136 or so, puts what he knows of this Welsh bard slash warrior wandering through the forest and creates a merlin character, and then moves that Merlin character into the Arthurian legend. So before the 12th century, Merlin is not a wizard who’s in any way associated, with King Arthur and his story, which bums my students out so much every time I tell them that because they really want to believe that at least these two figures are true.

00:15:09:20 – 00:15:19:11
Dorsey Armstrong
And I say, you know what? They’re both probably fifth or sixth century. So they’re they both exist at the right time, but we don’t see them together until the 12th.

00:15:19:14 – 00:15:30:19
Dan LeFebvre
I suppose when it comes to a movie called King Arthur, people are going to expect to see Merlin in a movie about King Arthur. So maybe that’s why the filmmakers decided to add a merlin character.

00:15:30:21 – 00:15:51:25
Dorsey Armstrong
What I would say is that anyone who’s trying to make an historical King Arthur movie is going to run into the huge problem of audience expectations. If you hear Arthur, you’re going to expect that there better be a merlin, there better be a Lancelot. And as far as we know, Lancelot seems to appear fully formed in the 12th century.

00:15:51:27 – 00:16:18:04
Dorsey Armstrong
He’s not there in the original fifth century. If you’re going to have an historical Arthur film set in the fifth century, you can have an Arthur, you can have a Guinevere, you can have a bit of ear, a K, and an early version of Sir Gawain. Walk me. But that’s it. You can’t have a Lancelot. You can’t have a Bors.

00:16:18:04 – 00:16:39:11
Dorsey Armstrong
You can’t have a Galahad. You can’t have Merlin. So you can imagine that if you’re trying to tell the historical story of Arthur in the fifth century and people come to see this film, if there’s not a Lancelot, I think people are going to be very upset. So I sympathize with all movie makers who are trying to wrestle with that question, because it’s a hard one.

00:16:39:13 – 00:16:56:29
Dorsey Armstrong
Because for hundreds of years now, we have come to associate figures like Merlin and Lancelot with King Arthur. To such an extent that they’re really inextricable from each other right now. And you would disappoint your audience if you didn’t have them in the movie.

00:16:57:01 – 00:17:11:03
Dan LeFebvre
One of the concepts I gathered as I watched the movie was that Merlin’s people, the worlds, are a nomadic people who are fighting against the Roman occupation of Britain. Can you share a little more historical context around the words from the movie?

00:17:11:05 – 00:17:44:06
Dorsey Armstrong
So the worlds are based on, a real people, called the pick’s Picts, and their name comes from Picardy, which means painted because they did paint themselves blue before they went into battle. And the dye that they used is called woad. And so I think that’s where the movie gets that word. The reason that Hadrian’s Wall is built in the first place is because there are some really scary blue people up beyond it, and the Romans have said, no, thank you.

00:17:44:08 – 00:18:08:18
Dorsey Armstrong
South of here is good. We’re not going to mess with that up there at all. And so another way that the movie stumbles is that if they’re so scary that there’s a wall keeping them out of the South, why is there a Roman senator living in his lovely summer estate north of the wall, in the most dangerous territory in Britain at the time?

00:18:08:21 – 00:18:11:18
Dan LeFebvre
That’s a really good point. I don’t think they really even talk about that in the movie.

00:18:11:22 – 00:18:14:06
Dorsey Armstrong
What is he doing up there?

00:18:14:08 – 00:18:34:08
Dan LeFebvre
Just a summer home, right? Apparently heading back to the movie’s version of events, let’s shift focus from some of the legendary characters that we talked about so far. Instead, focus on an object that the movie shows from the Arthurian legend the Round Table, according to the way the movie shows the Round Table. Of course, we talked about Lancelot.

00:18:34:08 – 00:18:52:16
Dan LeFebvre
You mentioned Gwyn and Galahad and Tristan and all of these other knights from the legends. And there’s this scene in the movie where Bishop Germanus makes a big deal about needing to sit at the head of the table, to which the Knights reply with something like, of course you can sit wherever you want. And then he enters the room and there’s a round table there.

00:18:52:16 – 00:19:00:15
Dan LeFebvre
There is no head of the table, which obviously doesn’t make him happy. Do we know if the round table that we see in the movie was an actual thing?

00:19:00:18 – 00:19:23:26
Dorsey Armstrong
So it is when the legend starts to pick up in the 12th century. But again, as you may have noticed, there’s a theme here. A lot of what we think of as the foundational elements show up in the 12th century. Now, that does not mean that they weren’t present, perhaps in some form in earlier texts or stories that have been lost.

00:19:23:29 – 00:19:49:17
Dorsey Armstrong
It is just that we only have evidence for their existence in the 12th century. What’s interesting is, that this idea comes from somewhere, and that’s pretty early in the legend, this idea that Arthur, it’s a 12th century writer named Wass who says Arthur sat at a table. He was first among equals, but it was a round table, so no one was above anyone else.

00:19:49:19 – 00:20:15:02
Dorsey Armstrong
And that’s a remarkable idea for the 12th century. So I would like to imagine, that there might be some basis, or it might be an ancient memory of when this Arthur type figure gathered with his warband, because that’s what they would have been. They weren’t knights in the fifth century. They would have been his, his warband that they gathered in, a circle to discuss.

00:20:15:02 – 00:20:29:10
Dorsey Armstrong
And so it really it could have an origin there that they’re gathered around a fire or a half. But as far as a physical table, we don’t have any evidence of that. For sure before the 12th century.

00:20:29:12 – 00:20:46:21
Dan LeFebvre
That makes a lot of sense. I mean, thinking of whether or not a physical object would have survived that long. It’s it’s hard to know. But other than the physical object, there’s just a concept of it. I think we’re all familiar with, you know, the concept of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table. We’re familiar with that in the legend and in this movie.

00:20:46:21 – 00:21:02:15
Dan LeFebvre
The impression that I got for how it presents that scene with the Bishop is basically kind of saying that Arthur sees everyone as equals. Nobody is above anyone else. Do we know if the historical Arthur had that concept of equality?

00:21:02:18 – 00:21:42:02
Dorsey Armstrong
So in the fifth century? That’s a really hard question to answer. If we’re talking about sub Roman Britain and the historical Arthur figure, would have been, as far as we can tell, if he existed. I think someone who was the basis for this figure, who had a name similar to Arthur, did exist. He might not have been all on board with the idea of equality, but whoever this person was based on archeological evidence that shows a Celtic warband led by a leader in the right time and the right place for the historical Arthur, this person must have been an amazing warrior.

00:21:42:04 – 00:22:09:06
Dorsey Armstrong
He must have been charismatic, and he must have just been a really good guy. Given how clear it is that in the wake of Rome pulling out, he was able to rally to his side. Something like a community of over 700 people. It’s estimated, when the average warband at that time. And so say the historians who know such things would have been more like 35 people.

00:22:09:09 – 00:22:35:19
Dorsey Armstrong
So he must have been a great leader, a great warrior, a good ruler, a just person. And I imagine that if you’re going to achieve that measure of success and maintain that level of leadership when the rest of the world is in chaos, that making people feel as if they are valued, even if it’s not actually that they’re being treated as equal with you, would have been important.

00:22:35:21 – 00:22:41:18
Dorsey Armstrong
So I think that there’s a little bit of truth hiding in there.

00:22:41:21 – 00:23:02:00
Dan LeFebvre
Speaking of the bishop, that makes me wonder about another plot point that we see in the movie regarding the Knights and their religion. The movie seems to say that the Knights are following the faith of their forefathers. In other words, they are pagans and not Christians as the Romans are. But they’re still fighting for Rome and the Roman Church, historically speaking.

00:23:02:03 – 00:23:07:17
Dan LeFebvre
Was there a tie between Arthur and the Roman Church like we see in the movie?

00:23:07:19 – 00:23:37:02
Dorsey Armstrong
So probably, most certainly since the Romans had firmly conquered most of what we think of as Britain or England today by the middle of the first century. And they were in power there until 410. So as the Empire went, so went all of the outposts within the Empire. So when the Emperor Constantine converted to Christianity, all Roman citizens would have been expected to do the same.

00:23:37:05 – 00:24:08:04
Dorsey Armstrong
And so by the time we get to Arthur’s lifetime, Rome had been Christianized for well over a century. And so we think that that’s the case, he certainly would have been a Christian as far as the tolerance for other faiths. It’s doubtful it is. It is doubtful, that as a Christian leader, anyone would have been tolerant of what they believed to be blasphemy or anathema.

00:24:08:04 – 00:24:32:28
Dorsey Armstrong
But at the same time, we have to remember that this is the early days of Christianity. So many of its rules, its regulations, its orthodoxy, they don’t exist. Yet. We see a great example of this. What I really liked was the use of, Pelagius. And Pelagius was, for a time he was he was a British monk in the sixth century.

00:24:32:28 – 00:24:59:11
Dorsey Armstrong
So he’s a little later than than Arthur would have been. And he was ousted, from the ranks of the church and declared a heretic because he believed and he preached, what came to be called the Palladian heresy, which was essentially do good works, and you’ll get to go to heaven on the face of it, that seems to make sense.

00:24:59:13 – 00:25:21:17
Dorsey Armstrong
But ultimately, when the church had to decide, they declared this a heresy because in the end, humans cannot earn their way into heaven by doing good. The final decision rests with God. Only God gets to decide who gets in and who doesn’t. So it doesn’t matter what you’ve done yourself during your lifetime, it’s God who makes the final call.

00:25:21:23 – 00:25:49:22
Dorsey Armstrong
But anything that’s a heresy we have to remember only gets called the heresy because a lot of people are believing in it and following it. So for quite some time, people would have believed in the message of Pelagius and, and striven to adhere to it and, and thought, I will do good works to get into heaven. And it’s only when the church decides, no, we can’t have this, this, this is contrary to our doctrine that he becomes a heretic.

00:25:49:22 – 00:26:07:09
Dorsey Armstrong
And so the idea that Arthur is a Palladian Christian is a great idea. I think that makes total sense. And that he is so upset when he discovers that Pelagius had been executed when he returned to Rome. Also makes sense.

00:26:07:12 – 00:26:17:18
Dan LeFebvre
Since you mentioned Pelagius near the end of the movie, I seem to recall that we find out Bishop Germanus is the one who had Plagueis executed. Is there truth to that, then?

00:26:17:21 – 00:26:42:12
Dorsey Armstrong
Yes. Palladio was declared a heretic. Any who believed in the pillage and heresy were, declared heretics. He might be subject to execution or torture and all kinds of nasty ways. And we know that this is a problem, for centuries afterward, because it’s such a popular idea that even in the 14th century, we have the church still trying to root out the Palladian heresy, in all kinds of places.

00:26:42:15 – 00:26:50:27
Dorsey Armstrong
Because who wouldn’t want to believe that if one does good, one gets rewarded. So, it’s an ongoing problem.

00:26:51:00 – 00:27:11:08
Dan LeFebvre
Maybe you already answered this question earlier, but we’re at the point in the movie’s timeline where it makes a big deal out of this final order from Rome to Arthur and his knights. And it’s the final order, because the movie’s concept is they will be done with their service to Rome after this mission. And the mission is for them to go north of Hadrian’s Wall to rescue a Roman named Marius.

00:27:11:11 – 00:27:30:01
Dan LeFebvre
As the movie explains it, one of the reasons that this mission is a big deal beyond just rescuing a Roman citizen is that Marius, his son Leto, is supposedly the Pope’s favorite godson. And then to top it off, there’s a timeline to it because there’s an approaching Saxon army, so Arthur and his knights have to rescue Marius, elected and his household before it’s too late.

00:27:30:03 – 00:27:36:13
Dan LeFebvre
Is there any truth to the scenario set up by the movie for Arthur’s final order?

00:27:36:16 – 00:27:43:00
Dorsey Armstrong
This is where I the the history goes off the rails.

00:27:43:02 – 00:27:46:28
Dan LeFebvre
This is the part of the historical let a great house.

00:27:47:00 – 00:28:10:15
Dorsey Armstrong
Yeah, yeah, the f. So first of all, there are no Romans in their luxurious villas north of Hadrian’s Wall. Also, when the Saxons invade, they are not invading up there. They’re invading much further south, in what’s England? So they wouldn’t have been up there to begin with. And so the movie is, is moving people around and creating a conflict.

00:28:10:17 – 00:28:32:00
Dorsey Armstrong
So there’s a family in distress. They just create a scenario which causes them to be in distress, which is the most implausible scenario, that I can think of. And then we have to add an extra, enemy in the form of the Saxons. Who? These were the people that the historical Arthur figure did rally against.

00:28:32:00 – 00:28:56:15
Dorsey Armstrong
Did fight against. Seems to have stopped and pushed back. And their encroachment across southern Britain from the east to the west. But they’re not up north. Threatening romance that that’s not happening at all. So, yes, Arthur versus the Saxons, but the geographic location is absolutely incorrect.

00:28:56:17 – 00:28:59:28
Dan LeFebvre
So not at all the way the movie portrays it.

00:29:00:00 – 00:29:02:15
Dorsey Armstrong
Right. Sorry.

00:29:02:18 – 00:29:21:22
Dan LeFebvre
There’s another element of Arthur’s mission I wanted to touch on, because in the movie, when Arthur finally gets to Marius is a state, we can see that Marius is using his position as a Roman to subjugate the people of the town. He’s telling you he’s a spokesman for God and it’s a sin to defy him. And then Arthur comes in and he tells the people that they are all free from their first breath.

00:29:21:24 – 00:29:43:15
Dan LeFebvre
And he goes on to try to rescue as many of the townspeople as he can, not just Marius, his family. That was the core of his mission. So in my mind, as I was watching this, it kind of goes back to the movie’s portrayal of the round table concept that we talked about earlier. Work. Arthur seems to favor equality because Arthur gets there and he kind of puts his money where his mouth is, so to speak.

00:29:43:15 – 00:29:58:07
Dan LeFebvre
It’s a stark contrast to the way that the Roman Marius is acting. So would it be fair to assume that Arthur was much more honorable as a person than most others were in that time period of history?

00:29:58:09 – 00:30:26:01
Dorsey Armstrong
I mean, I think yes, he as I said before, given the extent of what we think was his following in the number of people who flocked to his side and the length of time, he was able to rule and restore peace for a couple generations. He must have been a very just person at the same time, another area in which this film gets an F is this idea of all men are born free.

00:30:26:03 – 00:31:07:14
Dorsey Armstrong
No, in the Middle Ages, if you went back in time to the Middle Ages and you asked anybody, would you like to be free, or would you like to be beholden to this Lord, or and subject to him? The first question that anyone would ask would probably be how much land comes with either of those options? And generally speaking, everyone would usually have chosen to be not free because this society depended upon a hierarchy in which lords ruled over people.

00:31:07:14 – 00:31:34:21
Dorsey Armstrong
The people served their lords, and in return for that, they got the Lords protection. They were part of a social network. There was a safety net. So, for example, in times of famine, it would be expected that the Lord would find a way to help his people, to keep them from starving in times of warfare, in exchange for working his land, the Lord would take everyone he could into his fortress or stronghold or castle to protect them.

00:31:34:24 – 00:32:02:10
Dorsey Armstrong
If you are free and you are cut loose from this structure, who’s going to help you? You are alone in the world. How do you farm your land? Because much of farming was cooperative back then. So the villagers would come together to plants, to harvest. And so being all on your own. Well, what’s not impossible would not have been considered a desirable situation to be in at all.

00:32:02:12 – 00:32:35:22
Dorsey Armstrong
In fact, we have accounts, from some parts of the Middle Ages in which during a time of famine, people approached a particular lord and made themselves his slaves, on purpose, because in exchange, they would get fed. They would be clothed, they would be housed. And the seemed to have been a temporary arrangement, but they were happy to to give, you know, their lives up into the service of the Lord and be obedient to him as long as it meant protection for them and their family.

00:32:35:24 – 00:33:00:08
Dorsey Armstrong
So the idea that I am a free man, is absolutely incorrect. As far as the Middle Ages would go. But every age, I like to say makes an Arthur that that age needs. So in 2004, that’s that’s what we wanted to hear, that it’s all about freedom. It’s all about individual freedom. And that’s just it’s not the case.

00:33:00:08 – 00:33:02:02
Dorsey Armstrong
It’s historically inaccurate.

00:33:02:04 – 00:33:15:27
Dan LeFebvre
Speaking of freedom, that’s almost like what I mentioned a moment ago. With this being Arthur’s final mission, it’s his final mission because they were going to be given their own freedom afterward. But it sounds like maybe that wasn’t the case.

00:33:15:29 – 00:33:39:08
Dorsey Armstrong
That that would not have been something they wanted. They would not have wanted. First of all, no one gets papers of safe conduct to go through the Roman Empire in the fifth century. That’s not a thing. There are not checkpoints everywhere. There aren’t even enough people who can read to, you know, to tell you what this thing says that you’re carrying, that says you have the right to move throughout the Roman Empire.

00:33:39:10 – 00:34:02:24
Dorsey Armstrong
And so while they may have if we’re going with the summation theory, they may have wanted to go back to their homeland. They would not have wanted to be cut loose, from the Roman bureaucracy. In fact, the sack of Rome, which started around 410, and then the Empire sort of staggered to its final collapse around 476.

00:34:02:27 – 00:34:27:07
Dorsey Armstrong
The people who attacked Rome were, first of all, attacking, not because they wanted to conquer Rome, but because they wanted to get in. They said, yeah, give us some of that. So many of these people, these were, what we think of as the Germanic peoples that lived north of Rome. Many of them had already been fighting for the Romans as mercenaries.

00:34:27:09 – 00:34:55:25
Dorsey Armstrong
And they saw all the benefits that Roman citizens got. And they said, well, we don’t want to just be your hired hands. We would we would like roads and baths and, you know, reliable food and a functioning government. And so I doubt that many people would have wanted to move away from Rome or felt like Rome was somehow oppressive.

00:34:55:27 – 00:35:20:13
Dorsey Armstrong
And that’s one reason why the Arthur type figure, from what we know from many of the texts, is that apparently his parents had been Romans of some rank in Britain. And then after the Empire collapsed and the legions are withdrawn and called back to Rome, it is someone who has claims to Rome who can rise up and rally the people.

00:35:20:13 – 00:35:27:11
Dorsey Armstrong
And that’s what they were looking for, some sort of vestige of what Rome had done for that.

00:35:27:13 – 00:35:48:26
Dan LeFebvre
So I guess maybe the idea of Marius being the one that is oppressive to his people. I mean, I’m sure there were some leaders that were oppressive like that, but it seems like, historically speaking, that dynamic would have been very different because it’s beneficial to the Lords to have their people doing well.

00:35:48:28 – 00:36:15:11
Dorsey Armstrong
You are exactly correct. So I have no doubt that there, and history shows us that there were some terrible lords and that especially in the 14th century, much later, when there’s, a population crisis and, there’s no more land to be worked. And the Lords are trying, in this case, trying to oppress the people, to keep them on their land, to keep them beholden to them.

00:36:15:13 – 00:36:42:07
Dorsey Armstrong
We have the Peasants Revolt in England in 1381. And part of this is because after the black Death, the first wave of the Black Death swept through and killed up to half of the European population. What had been the land crunch suddenly became, a land free for all. And so there was plenty of land for the taking, so people didn’t need to remain on their particular plot of land.

00:36:42:07 – 00:37:00:18
Dorsey Armstrong
They weren’t so bounded by tradition, and history, because the world had changed overnight, practically. But up until that point, yes. For, for most, it would be considered a mutually, a mutually beneficial situation.

00:37:00:20 – 00:37:20:25
Dan LeFebvre
If we go back to the movie, there’s another character from the Arthurian legend that shows up at the village where Marius is at. I’m speaking, of course, about Guinevere. When she’s first shown in the movie, she’s actually a prisoner who must be sacrificed along with any of the, quote unquote, sinners. Again, going back to Marius, basically saying that anyone who defies him is defying God.

00:37:20:28 – 00:37:36:13
Dan LeFebvre
So in the movie, there’s actually two prisoners that Arthur and his men save. One is a little boy, and then Guinevere, who in the movie is a world woman. Is there any historical truth to the way that we see Arthur and Guinevere meeting in the movie?

00:37:36:16 – 00:38:05:27
Dorsey Armstrong
And a lot of that is really, really, lost in the mists of time. But there have been some suggestions that certainly the Arthur Gwenn of Year marriage, would have been, at that point, politically motivated, even if there, there was affection at the same time. And there seems to be, a situation that suggests that he married more than one woman named Guinevere.

00:38:06:00 – 00:38:10:27
Dorsey Armstrong
That was a very popular name. It’s the early version of Jennifer.

00:38:11:00 – 00:38:12:26
Dan LeFebvre
Okay. Okay.

00:38:12:28 – 00:38:42:12
Dorsey Armstrong
So, so. And Gwen avere, in some instances, appears to possibly have come from north of where Arthur was. So closer to Scotland, probably northern Wales. She has a Welsh name. But as far as her being a pagan who lives north of the wall and is a Pict probably not.

00:38:42:14 – 00:39:02:18
Dan LeFebvre
Well, with that in mind, I’m just going to guess that the movie’s connection tying Guinevere to Arthur and Merlin is not correct. Remember, the movie shows Merlin as a world leader, so then Arthur and Guinevere start to kind of fall for each other. And then the movie strong suggests that that is why Arthur starts to ally with Merlin’s people instead of Rome.

00:39:02:24 – 00:39:17:27
Dan LeFebvre
After all, he’s about to be freed by Rome anyway, so might as well ally with Guinevere as people. At least that’s how the movie tells the story. But is there any connection between Guinevere, Arthur, and Merlin in the historical record?

00:39:18:00 – 00:39:41:06
Dorsey Armstrong
No, there is not. But I think we can safely say that, whomever the Arthur type figure married, that would have been a marriage that brought together, peoples, united them, and created, you know, a larger, network of support against the invading Saxons. So I think it would be safe to assume that.

00:39:41:08 – 00:40:07:07
Dan LeFebvre
Well, you mentioned the Saxons. And if we go back to the movie’s version of events, the first confrontation that we see with Arthur and his knights in the advancing Saxon army takes place on an ice covered light. Arthur and his knights decide they’re tired of running, so they’re going to stay behind and hold off the Saxons while all the civilians that they’re rescuing remember they’re going beyond just Marius and his family trying to rescue as many of the townspeople as they could.

00:40:07:09 – 00:40:28:04
Dan LeFebvre
So all these people, they’re going to try to give them a head start and hold off the advancing Saxon army. I call it a head start because the movie says that it’s seven knights against like 200. Well, I guess there’s eight of them because Guinevere joins the fight. But you have eight people against 200 Saxons in this battle, so they don’t really expect to win.

00:40:28:06 – 00:40:42:10
Dan LeFebvre
Except it’s a movie, so they find a way. But the way that this happened in the movie is by breaking the ice. So the Saxons fall into the icy waters. Is there any sort of historical truth to this battle on the like that we see in the movie?

00:40:42:12 – 00:41:05:20
Dorsey Armstrong
No. And in fact, that fight scene owes a lot to an earlier medieval film called Alexander Nevsky, which had a very similar scene. And I actually wasn’t aware of that film until after I saw the King Arthur film. And I was commenting to someone about how much I enjoyed that fight scene and how clever it was.

00:41:05:20 – 00:41:29:16
Dorsey Armstrong
And, people who know medieval film better than I do said, oh, no, that that’s lifted straight from Alexander Nevsky. That fight scene. And so then I went and checked and. Yes, indeed, it’s still a great scene. But no, there’s no historical basis for that, except for, in the sense that another movie did it before this one.

00:41:29:19 – 00:41:49:00
Dan LeFebvre
Earlier in our chat, we were talking about the kind of person that Arthur was, and we see this again in action during the lake battle, there’s a scene where Arthur is willing to sacrifice himself for one of his injured men. Arthur rushes out and breaks the ice under the Saxons, and then, as he’s exposed to enemy fire, he pulls the injured knight away from the icy waters.

00:41:49:02 – 00:41:54:24
Dan LeFebvre
Do we know if he would have sacrificed himself for his men like we see happening in the movie?

00:41:54:27 – 00:42:04:00
Dorsey Armstrong
We can only surmise. But again, my guess would be anyone who was able to,

00:42:04:03 – 00:42:29:24
Dorsey Armstrong
Arouse so much loyalty, from his people. Must have been someone who made clear that he was willing to fight and die alongside his men. And that is another thing the movie does get right is that in the Middle Ages, kings and leaders are not like modern day generals who are back looking at maps and plotting strategy.

00:42:29:27 – 00:42:36:08
Dorsey Armstrong
You’re right, they’re at the front lines with your men. Otherwise they wouldn’t have considered you, a leader worth following.

00:42:36:10 – 00:43:03:12
Dan LeFebvre
At the very end of the movie, Arthur is freed from his commitment to Rome. Guinevere convinces Arthur that her people are his people, so Arthur decides to stay and fight the main force of Saxons. After initially leaving with the Romans and the rest of the knights come back and decide to stay and fight with Arthur. So that’s how we end up having this big battle at the end between Arthur’s knights alongside Guinevere and Merlin’s woad army against the full Saxon army.

00:43:03:14 – 00:43:18:13
Dan LeFebvre
What’s interesting about this battle is that the movie actually mentioned it by name. It’s called the Battle of Baden Hill, and since it mentions it by name, I have to ask, was that a real battle and how well did the movie do showing what happened?

00:43:18:16 – 00:43:48:00
Dorsey Armstrong
The Battle of Baden Hill comes from a ninth century chronicle in. And we do believe it was a real fight. But at the same time, it wouldn’t have been at Hadrian’s Wall. People have been trying to find Baden for a while. And we think it’s in the south of, of Britain, somewhere in the south. And this supposedly was one of the key battles in which Arthur, the leader, pushed the Saxons back.

00:43:48:02 – 00:44:14:12
Dorsey Armstrong
But also the same text tells us that there were 12 battles. And he’s victorious at this one. In the final battle, which is at Hamlin. And no one can find Camelot. Exactly. There have been lots of theories, people trying to pinpoint it. That is where he is finally killed and defeated at the end. But, as far as the Arthurian legend goes, the Battle of Mount Baden.

00:44:14:12 – 00:44:34:04
Dorsey Armstrong
Yes, was attested very, very early on in the chronicles. Now, where it was exactly not so clear, but but it does show up. So naming that final battle after the battle in the Chronicles makes sense.

00:44:34:06 – 00:44:49:14
Dan LeFebvre
If we’re to believe the movie’s version of this battle, we see Arthur’s men die. Namely, Tristan and Lancelot are the main characters who die in that battle in the movie. And then that leaves Arthur with just four knights along with the World Army. Do we know what happened with his men?

00:44:49:16 – 00:45:16:17
Dorsey Armstrong
No. I mean, we know almost nothing about him from contemporary documents. That would be, you know, from the fifth century or, you know, even a century or two later. That’s as close as we can get. So, we can assume, though, that when Arthur passes away, certainly along the way, some of his men would have also been killed.

00:45:16:19 – 00:45:39:17
Dorsey Armstrong
But again, remember, they’re not knights. They’re warriors. He wouldn’t even have been called king. Probably. And tell maybe the end of his reign. If then. But earlier on, he would have been called either by a Roman title, like a Duke’s Balaram, a war leader. Or you might have been called, comas count. And not early on.

00:45:39:17 – 00:45:52:13
Dorsey Armstrong
Would he have been called King Arthur. And so one thing the movie does get right is that if he’s going to be called King, it wouldn’t happen until very, very late in his life if it ever happened at all.

00:45:52:15 – 00:46:19:17
Dan LeFebvre
That’s a great catch on my using the term knights. I’m so used to the legend of King Arthur and his knights, I just refer to them as his knights, even if they’re not actually that. But switching gears a little bit to another piece of the Arthurian legend from the movie, it’s about this point in the timeline that we see the legendary sword in the Stone, and in the movie, it’s shown in a flashback to Arthur’s childhood, when his mom is killed by Merlin’s people attacking their village, which is initially why the movie explains why Arthur didn’t like the world.

00:46:19:24 – 00:46:38:00
Dan LeFebvre
But in the flashback, Arthur pulls the sword from the stone so he can go and kill Merlin to have revenge for his mother’s death. And then the movie. Merlin says that it was Arthur’s love for his mother that allowed Arthur to pull the sword from the stone. In other words, it was not the hatred for Merlin, but it was love.

00:46:38:03 – 00:46:42:28
Dan LeFebvre
How well do you think the movie does telling the story of the sword in the Stone?

00:46:43:00 – 00:47:06:08
Dorsey Armstrong
So if we if we go to the 15th century and Sir Thomas Malory, which is my main area of study, what we learn then, and that’s sort of where the, the stamp is put on this part of the legend is that there is a sword in the stone, and it appears by magic, and Merlin helps to set it up and the stones in an anvil that says, who?

00:47:06:09 – 00:47:39:00
Dorsey Armstrong
Whosoever shall pull up the sword from the stone is right, wise, born king of all England. But that’s not Excalibur. Excalibur is a sword of Arthur’s very, very early on as well, especially in early Welsh legends. But it comes from the lady of the lake, so it comes out of the water. So she emerges from the water with the sword for him, and he is considered worthy of the sword, because she deems it so.

00:47:39:07 – 00:48:06:24
Dorsey Armstrong
So there are two swords, and later on they get conflated into one that Excalibur is the sword in the stone, but the idea of a sword being pulled out of a stone. I’ve seen a documentary on Arthur. I’ve seen several, actually historical Arthur. And one theory is that in early metalworking, you would use a stone mold and you would pour the metal into it to make, a sword.

00:48:07:01 – 00:48:35:25
Dorsey Armstrong
And that perhaps the legend comes from it being stuck in the stone mold and someone of great strength pulling it out, intact. So that could be the origin of the legend. But the magical sword Excalibur, it’s called Caliban. Or in Welsh or Caleb Burness, which means, cut steel. And, that shows up early on. There’s no mention of it being pulled out of a stone.

00:48:35:25 – 00:49:06:21
Dorsey Armstrong
If anything, it is gifted to Arthur by this mysterious faerie woman who has otherworldly power. And so that is how Arthur is sort of threading this needle between the real and the supernatural. And he has this sort of ordination, that he is meant to rule because he’s favored by people in the, in the fairy world. And he’s also, lauded and praised and held up to be a leader by real human beings.

00:49:06:24 – 00:49:13:04
Dan LeFebvre
So it sounds like, once again, the movie is mixing together a lot of different things to tell this story.

00:49:13:06 – 00:49:36:23
Dorsey Armstrong
Well, what I would say is that if you were doing an Arthur movie, you better have a sword in the stone or the audience is terrible. And so I thought that making it the marker on the grave, made a lot of sense that he is still withdrawing it from, you know, something that could be considered partially stone from the earth.

00:49:36:26 – 00:49:46:27
Dorsey Armstrong
And so that made that made a lot of sense to me to try and figure out how to represent this motif, the theme that is so important in the Arthurian legend.

00:49:46:29 – 00:50:08:15
Dan LeFebvre
At the very end of the movie, there’s a wedding ceremony that we see. Merlin is officiating the marriage of Arthur and Guinevere, uniting the people, and everyone is happy. It’s kind of a happily ever after. And in the movie, that’s when he is proclaimed to be King Arthur. Is there any truth to this single marriage ceremony proclaiming the leader?

00:50:08:18 – 00:50:13:23
Dorsey Armstrong
No. That is. And in fact, that wasn’t even supposed to be the original end of the movie.

00:50:13:26 – 00:50:15:21
Dan LeFebvre
Oh really? How was it supposed to end?

00:50:15:24 – 00:50:46:19
Dorsey Armstrong
That is an alternate ending. Originally, the movie ended with the death of his dies, and it ended on a much more down note. Which I think would be much more true to the legend. And I guess in test screenings the audience said, well, this is not how we want this to end. And so, they did what movie makers have done in order to bump up the happy factor for their audience and close with a wedding.

00:50:46:19 – 00:51:00:18
Dorsey Armstrong
And better yet, let’s have it out a fake Stonehenge, right? So all of that, all of that is, is made up. I understand why it’s there, but it is a it’s a bit over the top.

00:51:00:20 – 00:51:21:16
Dan LeFebvre
It sounds like kind of what we were talking about throughout our chat today, how a King Arthur movie has to have Merlin in it and has to have the sword in the stone. It has to have the round Table. Well, it’s King Arthur and he hasn’t been a king throughout the whole movie. So the movie audiences expect there to be an explanation why it’s King Arthur instead of just Arthur.

00:51:21:18 – 00:51:45:12
Dorsey Armstrong
And I don’t think you have any choice if you’re going to make a successful Arthurian movie, unless you choose to just go completely dark and historical, and it wouldn’t be a happy movie, I don’t think, and I don’t know that anyone would want to go see it. It’d be more like an art film, rather than any sort of popular blockbuster film.

00:51:45:15 – 00:52:06:22
Dan LeFebvre
Speaking of things that audiences expect, I’ll do a variation of what the movie did for my own audience, because even though we talked about the 2004 movie today, there’s been so many stories about King Arthur throughout history in all sorts of mediums, movies and TV, of course, but obviously plenty of books and writings long before movies and TV even existed.

00:52:06:25 – 00:52:17:23
Dan LeFebvre
What’s something that most people might think they know about the theory and legend, but when they learn the true story, it’ll surprise him.

00:52:17:25 – 00:52:40:11
Dorsey Armstrong
Well, I can tell you, what I tell my students every time I teach Arthurian literature. And what’s fascinating is I ask them to tell me on the first day of class, and many of them have not encountered the Arthurian legend in any sort of systematic way. So they haven’t read the early texts. They’d maybe have seen a film or read a story.

00:52:40:18 – 00:53:01:00
Dorsey Armstrong
And so I asked them to tell me everything they know about the legend. And I write it all up on the board. And so they’re telling me, Merlin, and he’s married to Gwen Vivier, and Guinevere commits adultery with Lancelot, and Arthur has knights, and they sit at a round table and they go on quests, including for the Holy Grail.

00:53:01:03 – 00:53:26:27
Dorsey Armstrong
And he lives in a big stone castle called Camelot. And then I have to tell them it’s the fifth century and Rome has left. So unless they’re occupying Roman structures, no big stone castles that smoky little huts. Although it’s possible that, you know, Roman buildings that were left behind could have been reused, reoccupied. That’s possible. We’re not sure where Camelot was.

00:53:27:00 – 00:53:49:24
Dorsey Armstrong
As I’ve said earlier, there’s no Merlin. There is a a vere, but there’s also no Lancelot. The idea of the Round table comes much later. The sword in the stone comes much later. Although he does have a sword with a name like Excalibur from very early on. And the Holy Grail shows up in the 12th and 13th centuries.

00:53:49:26 – 00:54:09:27
Dorsey Armstrong
And that’s another, it’s actually a French writer who says this is a great idea. Arthur’s knights need to go on a quest. What’s the best thing, like a quest for the Holy Grail? And so that wasn’t part of the original legend either. And so I usually have a student yell from the back of the room. Stop it!

00:54:09:27 – 00:54:39:17
Dorsey Armstrong
You’re ruining it. But then by the end of the semester, I think that they have learned to have a deeper appreciation for how and why the legend accreted, to it. All of these elements. Because I say the Arthurian legend is like a magnet. And as time goes by, is there a hero over here who’s fantastic? For example, sir Tristan Tristan had a long history as, a legendary figure all his own.

00:54:39:19 – 00:55:00:19
Dorsey Armstrong
But at some point late in the Middle Ages, someone said, you know what would be great? Let’s make him a knight of the Round Table. And then all of his adventures are connected to Arthur. And so he’s brought in. Same with the Holy Grail. It becomes a quest for the Knights. So you’re three legends like a giant magnet that attracts to it all the cool stuff.

00:55:00:21 – 00:55:20:12
Dan LeFebvre
And it makes some great stories along the way. Well, thank you so much for coming on to chat about King Arthur. I’m such a huge fan of your work. It’s an honor to get to talk to you. One of my favorites is King Arthur History and Legend. I picked that up from one of the audiobook services, so I’ll be sure to include a link to that one in particular in the show notes for my audience to learn even more about the true story.

00:55:20:14 – 00:55:26:15
Dan LeFebvre
But before I let you go, can you share a bit more about that one, as well as where they can find more of your work?

00:55:26:18 – 00:55:53:00
Dorsey Armstrong
So, the King Arthur, history or legend is a series of lectures I did for the Teaching Company, which is now part of Wondrium. And you can get those lectures. There’s 24 lectures. It’s about the evolution of the Arthurian legend from its origins to the modern period. It’s available on DVD. You can also download it online or you can purchase the book that goes along with the lectures.

00:55:53:00 – 00:56:24:12
Dorsey Armstrong
It gives some detail and bibliography. So that’s the easiest way to access that. My other books tend to be, more for a scholarly academic audience. They have lots of footnotes, if you like footnotes. Great. But one thing that I have done is I translated Sir Thomas Malory’s Morte d’Arthur into modern English, because every time I taught that text, I was not happy with the translations that were available to me, that I was sharing with my students.

00:56:24:12 – 00:56:54:02
Dorsey Armstrong
And I finally decided, well, I’ll just do my own. And it’s Malory’s text more than any other at the end of the 15th century, that gives us the shape of the legend that sort of codifies it, puts the template down for everything that comes after. And so that’s now available in a modern English translation. And, my goal was to make it as accessible as possible so that people could enjoy the, this huge book.

00:56:54:04 – 00:57:19:03
Dorsey Armstrong
It’s a massive work that took years for Malory to write, and in fact, it took me longer to translate it, I realized, than it took him to write it, which is a moment that when I hit that point, I realized, oh, well, I’m a little bummed out right now, but, I’m really proud of it. And I think that it conveys, the sense of the time and the culture while still maintaining, accessible language that anyone can read.

00:57:19:06 – 00:57:21:22
Dan LeFebvre
Thank you again so much for your time.

00:57:21:25 – 00:57:28:18
Dorsey Armstrong
Is my pleasure. I’m always happy to talk about King Arthur. Invite me back any time. Next time a movie comes out, invite me back.

00:57:28:20 – 00:57:33:09
Dan LeFebvre
We’ll have to make that happen.

00:57:33:11 – 00:57:43:22
Dorsey Armstrong
It was a pleasure chatting with you.

00:57:43:24 – 00:58:01:24
Dan LeFebvre
This episode of based On a True Story was produced by me, Dan Lapham. If you want to learn more about the legends of King Arthur and the true story behind them, I cannot recommend Doctor Armstrong’s work enough. I have links to that in the show notes so you can check it out. And actually, that leads me right into my own history that I was talking about at the beginning of this episode.

00:58:01:24 – 00:58:27:12
Dan LeFebvre
So the interview that you just heard with Doctor Armstrong was originally published in January of 2023 on based on a true story, and it’s obviously been remastered. I actually rerecorded my entire site to update both the audio and video quality for today’s version, but the origin of how this episode came to be started long before that. When I was in middle school, my mom used to take my siblings and me to the local library to help with researching for our homework.

00:58:27:14 – 00:58:44:24
Dan LeFebvre
One day we were at the library. I can’t remember the specific homework assignment that I had, but I remember going through my usual routine. I would look up the book and at the computer, well, whatever the topic was that I needed, and then I would write down the Dewey Decimal number so I could find the book in the aisle that it’s in.

00:58:44:26 – 00:59:02:19
Dan LeFebvre
Well, this particular day, as I was looking for the number, I happened to see a book about Camelot and the legends of King Arthur. You know the old adage, don’t judge a book by its cover, but obviously something about this book stood out to me. So I grabbed it. And then I continued to find the book that I actually needed for my homework.

00:59:02:21 – 00:59:16:28
Dan LeFebvre
Well, I ended up spending more time reading that book on King Arthur than whatever the book was for my homework assignment. Obviously, I can’t even remember what the book was for my homework assignment, but I do remember being fascinated by the legend of King Arthur, and that was the first day that I was.

00:59:16:28 – 00:59:17:14
Dorsey Armstrong
Actually.

00:59:17:14 – 00:59:36:27
Dan LeFebvre
Interested in something historical. I mean, I had done other homework assignments that required me to read history. It wasn’t my first time reading anything in history, but it was the first time that I remember doing it just for the fun of it. And over the years, that fascination grew into a love of medieval history. Overall, I used to spend countless hours as a child.

00:59:36:27 – 00:59:56:27
Dan LeFebvre
I would sketch out castle designs or mapping fictional land and coming up with various countries. Before long, that love of medieval history blossomed into a love for other historical time periods ancient Egypt, World War Two, Classical Greece and the Roman Empire, and so on and so on. So that’s why the legend of King Arthur has always held a special place for me.

00:59:56:27 – 01:00:17:12
Dan LeFebvre
It was the spark that started my love of stories from history at a young age. And this actually ties into today’s episode even more, because many years before I started, based on a true story, I picked up a few of Doctor Armstrong’s great courses over on audible, and I absolutely love them. I love learning about King Arthur and the real history behind the legend of King Arthur.

01:00:17:14 – 01:00:39:05
Dan LeFebvre
So after I started based on a true story, Doctor Armstrong was on my short list of people that would love to talk to, and it was an absolute honor to get to pick her brain about one of my favorite historical subjects. And I hope you had as much fun learning from her as I did. I’ll add a link to some of my favorite work from Doctor Armstrong in the show notes, so you can learn even more about the historical King Arthur.

01:00:39:08 – 01:00:55:02
Dan LeFebvre
And of course, as always, all of those links will be on the show. His home on the web over at. Based on a True Story podcast.com/381. Okay, now it’s time for the answer to our two truth and a lot game from the beginning of the episode, and it’s a quick refresher. Here are the two truths and one lie again.

01:00:55:05 – 01:01:21:12
Dan LeFebvre
Number one, the famous Round Table appears in early fifth century Arthurian stories. Number two Merlin was not associated with Arthur until the 12th century. Number three no Romans lived in villas north of Hadrian’s Wall. Did you figure out which one is a lie? I’ve got the answer in the envelope here. Let’s open it up. And the lie is number one.

01:01:21:15 – 01:01:39:07
Dan LeFebvre
As we learned from Doctor Armstrong, the legend of the Round Table actually starts around the 12th century, along the same time as Merlin enters the picture. At least as far as we know. As always, when you’re talking about history and legends that are that old, there’s a very good chance that there are some things that have been lost to time, or we just don’t have documentation of yet.

01:01:39:09 – 01:02:01:09
Dan LeFebvre
But that wraps up our look at the historical accuracy of the King Arthur movie before I let you go, though, since this is the first episode of 2026, I thought I would throw out an update on what my release schedule will be for the new year, and well, there isn’t one. If you are a long time listener based on a true story, you’ll know that there has not been a defined release schedule for many years now.

01:02:01:12 – 01:02:28:21
Dan LeFebvre
When I first started the podcast, I used to release every other week. That was back in 2016 when I first started the show, and then I went to a weekly release schedule, and then I think it was in 2019 that I officially announced the schedule would be when I get an episode completed, that’s when it gets released. And since then, I have had times where I’ve been fortunate enough to work on the podcast full time to crank out 1 or 2 episodes a week, and then other times it’s been 1 or 2 episodes a month.

01:02:28:24 – 01:02:47:25
Dan LeFebvre
But in 2026, I am sticking with the release schedule of as soon as I get an episode completed, that’s when it will be released. The biggest change this year from last year that I’ve gotten a new day job this year, so I can’t work on, based on a true story, full time anymore. But the podcast is not going anywhere, and I’ll keep releasing episodes as soon as I get to complete it.

01:02:47:28 – 01:03:04:24
Dan LeFebvre
Actually, I’ve already got some fun episode planned for 2026, so I’m excited for what this year will bring. And as always, you can reach out to me at Dan at based on a True Story podcast.com if you have any questions or comments. Thanks again for your continued support. Listening to based on a true story. Now chat with you again really soon.

 

00:00:02:01 – 00:00:23:27
Dan LeFebvre
Hello and welcome to Based on a True Story, the podcast that compares your favorite Hollywood movies with history. Today, we’ll be learning about the 2013 movie directed by Paul Greengrass and starring Tom Hanks, that simply called Captain Phillips. I’m sure you’ve seen it, but the movie did come out a while ago, so let’s refresh our memory with a quick synopsis.

00:00:24:00 – 00:00:50:02
Dan LeFebvre
The movie is named after Captain Richard Phillips, who was the commander of a container ship called the Maersk Alabama. It was on a typical route along the coast of Africa in 2009. The catch, though, was that route also included traveling through pirate infested waters near the country of Somalia. Despite receiving warnings of heightened pirate activity, Captain Phillips decides to take a shortcut closer to the Somali coast to save time and fuel.

00:00:50:04 – 00:01:15:26
Dan LeFebvre
This decision proves fateful. Two skiffs carrying Somali pirates attack the Maersk Alabama, and the crew executes security protocols by attempting to repel the attackers using fire hoses and evasive maneuvers. And at first it works, but then the pirates return in a stronger boat and they manage to successfully board the vessel. Phillips remains on the bridge and is captured while the crew retreats to the engine room.

00:01:15:28 – 00:01:41:25
Dan LeFebvre
Eventually, the pirates evacuate to a small lifeboat and take Captain Phillips hostage, along with $30,000 in ransom money. The U.S. Navy intercedes with multiple warships, including USS Bainbridge and Navy Seal teams. After intense negotiations and tactical positioning, Navy Seals execute a precise rescue operation, convincing one of the pirates to board their ship and then eliminating the three remaining pirates and freeing Captain Phillips.

00:01:41:28 – 00:02:02:24
Dan LeFebvre
The movie ends with Phillips being rescued and receiving medical treatment aboard the Navy destroyer. How much of that really happened? Today we’ll be joined by none other than Bryan Beckham, the trial lawyer who represented the crew of the Maersk Alabama. In the wake of the events that we see in the movie. So through his work on the trial, he knows the ins and outs of exactly what happened.

00:02:02:28 – 00:02:25:28
Dan LeFebvre
And he’s here today to help us separate fact from fiction in the movie. Bryan is also a podcaster whose wonderful podcast shares insights from a wide range of inspiring leaders. So just do a search for Brian’s podcast called lessons from Leaders with Bryan Beckham, or hop in the show notes for a direct link. Before we get started with Bryan’s breakdown of Captain Phillips, though, let’s set up our game for today’s episode.

00:02:26:01 – 00:02:41:13
Dan LeFebvre
Now, if you’re new to the show since based on a true story, it’s all about separating fact from fiction in the movies, you’ll get to practice your skills at separating fact from fiction in this podcast episode with a game of two truths and a lie. So I’m about to give you three things that we’re going to talk about in this episode.

00:02:41:15 – 00:03:09:12
Dan LeFebvre
Two of those are true, and that means one of them is just an all out lie. Are you ready? Okay, here they are. Number one, Maersk Alabama sailed within the range of known Somali pirates. Number two, the $30,000 on Maersk Alabama was intended as ransom money. Number three, Captain Phillips tried to escape from the pirates at the first chance he got.

00:03:09:15 – 00:03:23:07
Dan LeFebvre
Got him. Okay, now, as you’re listening to our story today, see if you can figure out which one of those is a lie. And if you’re watching the video version of this, you’ll see I’m holding up now. This has the answer inside. We’re going to open this up at the end to see if you got the answer right.

00:03:23:10 – 00:03:38:05
Dan LeFebvre
Okay. Now it’s time to connect with Bryan Beckham about the true story behind Captain Phillips.

00:03:38:07 – 00:03:55:13
Dan LeFebvre
Even though no one expects movies to be entirely accurate, each movie takes different creative liberties to tell the story. So before we dig into some of the details, if you were to take a step back and give Captain Phillips an overall letter grade for its historical accuracy, what would it get?

00:03:55:15 – 00:03:56:14
Brian Beckcom
C minus.

00:03:56:14 – 00:03:59:14
Dan LeFebvre
C minus.

00:03:59:16 – 00:04:18:16
Brian Beckcom
You know, it’s funny Dan here people. When the movie premiered, people were asking me like, what did you think of the movie? What did you think of the movie? I mean, I went I was there opening night. I mean, it was packed. And I said, just like Forrest Gump, it’s a fantastic movie starring Tom Hanks. But none of it’s true.

00:04:18:18 – 00:04:36:14
Brian Beckcom
It is actually so. And in reality, here’s what’s true about the movie. There was an American ship called the Maersk Alabama. It was attacked by Somali pirates. The captain’s name was Captain Phillips. And everything after that is basically made up.

00:04:36:17 – 00:04:59:26
Dan LeFebvre
Okay, well, we’re going to dig into some of the details. According to the movie, at least, and at the beginning of the movie, we’re introduced to Tom Hanks version of Captain Richard Phillips as he takes command of a container ship named Maersk Alabama. And in the movie, his job is to sail it from Oman to Mombasa, Kenya. And for some geographical context, that path takes it around the east coast of Africa, past Yemen and Somalia before reaching Kenya.

00:04:59:29 – 00:05:19:21
Dan LeFebvre
And even though Captain Phillips receives warning of pirate activity in the waters off Somalia, he decides to save time by going like 350. I’m sorry, 250 or 300 miles instead of the recommended 600 miles. This is all according to the movie. How well does the movie do? Setting up the situation with Captain Phillips and the Marshall, Alabama.

00:05:19:24 – 00:05:45:13
Brian Beckcom
Fairly good. Fairly good job of that. And you know what? The movie. What I wish the movie did a little better job of at the beginning in terms of the setup, is putting in context how dangerous these waters were at the time. I mean, we’re talking about I don’t know the exact number, but I want to say like tens and tens, if not hundreds of pirate attacks on both commercial and noncommercial vessels.

00:05:45:13 – 00:06:02:27
Brian Beckcom
In fact, I think there was a naval vessel from Yemen or something that was attacked by pirates. And, you know, the other thing is we got to I don’t know if the movie does a good job of this or not, but this is at the at the time we’re dealing with Somalia or off the east coast of Africa.

00:06:03:03 – 00:06:30:28
Brian Beckcom
Somalia, for all intents and purposes, is a failed country. They have no economy that, you know, they have no really functioning government, and they have a bunch of people there have to eat. And so the people that were, going out and taking these people off of these, ships, either taking them, for ransom, taking them back to Somalia or a lot of these ships carried cash specifically to pay off, quote, pirates.

00:06:31:00 – 00:07:10:21
Brian Beckcom
What what we got to keep in mind is these are not, like, highly trained military style pirates. These are fishermen. I mean, these are Somali fishermen that some of whom are teenagers, who realized that if these commercial ships got within a certain range of the Somalian coast, they had no self-defense and they were easy pickings. And so if you were in that situation, I mean, I don’t blame these Somalians in many respects, like if you are in a failed country and you had to feed your family and you have the choice of going out catching fish all day long and selling them for nothing, or you could go out and make a quick score off

00:07:10:21 – 00:07:34:28
Brian Beckcom
an unprotected American vessel where they basically carry money specifically to pay you. I mean, what would you do? So and that was what, in my opinion, kind of made it worse is not only did they know that at the time this these were literally the most dangerous waters in the world. I mean, maybe 1 or 2 other areas you could compare two, but certainly top 2 or 3.

00:07:35:01 – 00:07:54:03
Brian Beckcom
And everybody knew nobody had any weapons. Right? Nobody had, you know, nobody had any self-defense and everybody knew it. So it’s kind of like, you know, you walk into a really crappy part of town and you hold up your $20,000 Rolex and you start waving at everybody. I mean, what do you expect going to happen? Right?

00:07:54:05 – 00:08:18:00
Dan LeFebvre
I mean, knowing that the movie focuses more on the ship itself, it doesn’t really talk much about what’s going on in Somalia at the time. But I like that context that you gave because it’s it makes a lot more sense why it was happening. But also like even in the beginning of the movie when before the pirates go out, it almost looks I mean, there’s a bunch of them around, almost like, you know, they’re looking for a job for that day.

00:08:18:06 – 00:08:23:01
Dan LeFebvre
And, you know, they’re they’re wanting to feed their families.

00:08:23:03 – 00:08:46:10
Brian Beckcom
Absolutely. Like it’s like in America, sometimes you go to Home Depot and there’s a bunch people outside waiting to get hired, like, do you blame them? Do you blame, where do you fall politically on the immigration issue? If you lived in Mexico and your family was getting threatened by drug cartels, if you were in that violent circumstance, what would you do?

00:08:46:13 – 00:09:12:18
Brian Beckcom
Like, you know, so so in a way, it’s really hard to blame these poor fishermen from Somalia for doing what they do, for doing what they did, especially when we were just basically kind of you know, attempting them, just tempting them to do it, just saying, here’s a bunch of money, here’s a ship with that carries $30,000 in petty cash for every one of these trips that they’ll just give to you.

00:09:12:21 – 00:09:38:12
Brian Beckcom
What do you expect? And by the way, after this case, one of the things that I’m most proud about this case is there hasn’t been a single successful pirate attack on an American, commercial vessel since my case. And there’s a good reason for that. All of the ships are armed. Now, I don’t know if you’re curious to know why they weren’t armed before, and they’re arm now, but there’s a there’s actually a pretty simple explanation for this.

00:09:38:14 – 00:09:45:24
Dan LeFebvre
Yeah. I mean, I am curious because there was going to be one of my question too, because they, there’s they don’t have any weapons on the ship.

00:09:45:24 – 00:10:16:22
Brian Beckcom
None. Zero. Like no, no weapons at all. And now they do by the way. But the so when I filed this case, one of the things I said was, if you are going to require these sailors to go into these pirate infested waters, you should let them defend themselves with weapons. All these ships, for the most part, are insured by, London based insurance companies or insurance syndicates or similar type of insurance syndicates.

00:10:16:24 – 00:10:45:23
Brian Beckcom
And they went the insurance syndicates went crazy when I filed this case and said, you need to arm these guys because what they’re worried about, guess what? Big surprise. They worried about sailors. They’re worried about what’s on the ships making the money. Right. And what they were saying was they were saying, look, if we provide seamen with pistols or other sorts of weapons to protect, to protect themselves, they might kill each other or they might blow up our cargo.

00:10:45:26 – 00:11:07:20
Brian Beckcom
That was their excuse. Okay, I know it’s hard to believe and I was like, I just don’t think that’s true. And have you seen a single report of a U.S. ship blowing up because they had pistols on the ship? Or have you seen any of those reports? Of course you haven’t. And because it was a bad it was a really bad idea.

00:11:07:20 – 00:11:32:27
Brian Beckcom
So anyway, it was a it was interesting to see because at the time, again, remember the context. I mean, we’re talking about pirate attack after pirate attack. I mean, we’re talking about almost on a weekly basis. And so it was super dangerous. And we also knew by the way, you know, these nautical miles staying a certain number of nautical miles off the coast of Somalia, that was extremely specific.

00:11:32:27 – 00:12:09:27
Brian Beckcom
There’s a very specific reason for that. And that is, by and large, these fishermen are fishing boats, and they cannot go out past a certain, distance. And so, like there’s it would be impossible for any of these ships to have gotten attacked past a certain distance by these fishing vessels because they can’t get out that far. What Phillips decided to do, literally, in the face of countless international security warnings, was he basically decided to take a shortcut and go twice as close as he was told to go to save fuel.

00:12:10:04 – 00:12:12:14
Brian Beckcom
That was basically what happened.

00:12:12:17 – 00:12:17:09
Dan LeFebvre
So it was to save time. And money basically was the reason for it, despite the obvious risks.

00:12:17:12 – 00:12:42:26
Brian Beckcom
That’s exactly what it was. That’s, absolutely, exactly what it was. And, you know, people often ask me, how do you get this case back? I’m like, like, how does a lawyer even get this case? And there’s real specific reason for that, too. So this is long before anybody this was international news when it happened. But at the at the beginning, nobody had any idea there was going to be a movie starring Tom Hanks.

00:12:42:28 – 00:13:09:03
Brian Beckcom
So Phillips basically causes the problem. He’s the captain. He’s in charge. He makes the decisions that lead to his crew getting captured. And then what happens afterwards? They all come back to America. The crew gets together with Phillips and says, we want to write a book and maybe do a story about our experience. And Captain Phillips tells tells them, I don’t want to have anything to do with you.

00:13:09:03 – 00:13:28:10
Brian Beckcom
I’m going to write my own book. And they were like, well, hold on a second. You were the one that caught your it was your fault that we did this. So they were like, if he’s going to write a book trying to whitewash all the screw ups that he made, we need to make sure people really know about it.

00:13:28:13 – 00:13:50:22
Brian Beckcom
And so that’s what generated initially, at least the desire of the crew to make sure the true story got out. And, you know, I’ll give you an idea. I can give you an example after example. But there were four pirates. Three of them got killed by Navy Seals. One of them was captured. That pirate is now Fort Wayne, Indiana federal prison.

00:13:50:24 – 00:14:16:17
Brian Beckcom
As the only prisoner in the United States that’s been convicted of piracy in the last 100 years, there’s a question about whether, when he was convicted, whether he was even an adult, because, not surprisingly, the birth records in Somalia are horrible. So it was really hard to figure out his age. But some of your listeners may remember the perp walk when the prisoner was walking down the stairs of federal courthouse.

00:14:16:17 – 00:14:44:04
Brian Beckcom
He had a big eyepatch on like a medical eyepatch, and that was because my unarmed crew took utensils out of the kitchen, and one of my clients stabbed one of that pirate in the eye with a spoon. And so it really, truly was, the crew that was heroic. And the Catholic captain that was the numskull that kind of led these guys into this situation to begin with.

00:14:44:06 – 00:14:55:24
Dan LeFebvre
I can understand, I guess, from his perspective, from the captain’s perspective, then why he would want to write the book that told his version of, you know, to kind of make himself seem better.

00:14:55:26 – 00:15:13:16
Brian Beckcom
Yeah. I, you know, that’s human nature. I think we’ve seen that so many, you know, throughout history, we see that again and again. You know, Winston Churchill, one of my heroes, has a great saying. They said one time they said, what do you think history’s going to say about you, Mr. Churchill? He said, history is going to treat me well because I’m going to write it.

00:15:13:23 – 00:15:15:17
Brian Beckcom
Yeah.

00:15:15:19 – 00:15:17:14
Dan LeFebvre
And I’ll say whatever I want it to say.

00:15:17:16 – 00:15:25:18
Brian Beckcom
Right. History, like history is a story of the victors perspective. Yeah. Pretty much. Right. Yeah.

00:15:25:20 – 00:15:45:11
Dan LeFebvre
So one thing we see in the movie, after Captain Phillips gets the warnings of pirate activity, he runs the crew through some security drills that include exercises for what to do if they encounter pirates. That drills like attaching fire hoses to shoot high pressure water, the attackers making sure cages and doors to sensitive areas are locked, things like that.

00:15:45:13 – 00:16:03:18
Dan LeFebvre
But then, while they’re running through the drills, Tom Hanks version of Captain Phillips notices something approaching on the radar. And they’re actually two small boats approaching not to get too far ahead of the movie’s timeline, but we all know what happens in the movie. So obviously those security drills didn’t seem to work. Can you unravel the security drills on Maersk Alabama?

00:16:03:18 – 00:16:08:02
Dan LeFebvre
What were they supposed to be, and did the movie accurately show it to us?

00:16:08:04 – 00:16:44:16
Brian Beckcom
Yeah. So every single ship that sails internationally like that is supposed to have something called a VSP. VSP Victor, I forget what SS VSP stands for Vessel Security Protocol, and in fact they have to file that with certain international agencies. And those are top secret. And I’m not going to get into the details of any of those, because when I have cases with vessel security plans, I usually have an agreement with the vessel owner that we’re going to keep this confidential because it’s important for the safety of the sailors.

00:16:44:19 – 00:17:08:14
Brian Beckcom
We wouldn’t want that information getting that public. But every single I can talk about it in general terms, every single vessel then and now has a VSP, and they have to execute and practice that VSP on a regular basis. The problem was at the time the security protocols were basically worthless. I mean, like those water cannons you saw on the movie, not they didn’t exist.

00:17:08:16 – 00:17:29:29
Brian Beckcom
There was. And there are a lot of different. I mean, again, think about what we’re talking about. These are these are fishermen, okay? They’re not highly trained pirates. I did a pirate case off the coast of West Africa, where an American marine who was retired, but he was captaining a bow, got got kidnaped by mercenaries from Boko Haram.

00:17:30:06 – 00:17:57:28
Brian Beckcom
Those guys are dead. Those guys are bad news. Like you could be armed and the Boko Haram guys could still get you one weapon. One pistol against these fishermen is enough to make them go to the next vessel because they’re they’re looking at they’re looking for targets of opportunity. They’re looking for the softest targets. But they certainly, in every vessel, including this one, had security practices, security protocols.

00:17:57:28 – 00:18:07:29
Brian Beckcom
They have security drills. The problem is, when you’re drilling something that doesn’t stop anybody, you’re just wasting your time, if that makes sense.

00:18:08:02 – 00:18:15:17
Dan LeFebvre
Yeah. No, that that makes a lot of sense. And it goes back to would really help if they were armed.

00:18:15:19 – 00:18:37:15
Brian Beckcom
Yeah. Well they are now like I said like I said they are now. And it’s really made a dramatic difference. I mean have you seen any story you remember back then there were Italian ships, you know, ships from all these different kind of German cruise ships, all these ships getting attacked and boarded, and that just doesn’t happen anymore, at least off the coast of East Africa.

00:18:37:17 – 00:18:57:20
Dan LeFebvre
Well, if we go back to the movies version of events, the security drills turn into real world. When the crew on Maersk Alabama see those boats approaching, and they know there’s no way that a huge container ship can outrun the two smaller pirates skiffs. So Captain Phillips tries a few tactics to try to discourage the pirates. At first he tries the US maritime emergency line, but there’s no answer there.

00:18:57:27 – 00:19:15:16
Dan LeFebvre
He reaches out to the UK maritime trade operations to let them know what’s going on. They think, yeah, it’s probably just some fishermen so they’re not really much help. So then Captain Phillips pretends like he’s talking to the US Navy on the radio, requesting air support, knowing that the pirates are close enough to be listening to their radio traffic.

00:19:15:18 – 00:19:34:02
Dan LeFebvre
And that seems to work according to the movie. It movie shows one of the two boats turning around because of the radio communications, but then the other boat keeps coming and so Captain Phillips orders the limit on the engine was removed, and the huge ship starts kind of zigzagging so that they can make big waves for the tiny pirate boat to try to overcome.

00:19:34:05 – 00:19:42:00
Dan LeFebvre
And then after a while, that seems to work too, because the single engine on the tiny pirate skiff just loses power and dies. How much of that actually happened?

00:19:42:02 – 00:20:10:25
Brian Beckcom
Not much. Not much. I mean, it is. It is. That movie is highly dramatized. And, you know, to be clear, I’m not complaining about that. Like, that’s what Hollywood does. I mean, they tell stories and sometimes actually all the time they dramatize those stories. So, most of that stuff is either never happened in real life or it happened, but it’s but it’s highly, highly dramatized.

00:20:10:25 – 00:20:33:14
Brian Beckcom
Like, I don’t know if you remember that scene in the movie where Captain Phillips basically gives himself up to the kidnapers that didn’t happen. That. I mean, you like like he he basically went kicking and screaming, like in the movie, they make it sound like he’s heroic and he’s like, I’m giving myself up for the crew. It was actually the opposite.

00:20:33:14 – 00:20:52:11
Brian Beckcom
The crew was the one who was fighting back. He was hiding, trying to figure out a way to get out of this and save his skin. And the pirates just took him. And I tell you something else, it’s really strange about this. And if any of your listeners know the answer to this, please call me, because I still haven’t figured this out.

00:20:52:14 – 00:20:58:05
Brian Beckcom
The $30,000 in bounty money that was on that ship has never been found.

00:20:58:07 – 00:21:06:27
Dan LeFebvre
Did they? I mean, in the movie, I think they give it to the pirates. Did they not do that or do we not know what happened to it? Just kind of disappeared.

00:21:06:29 – 00:21:25:18
Brian Beckcom
We don’t know that there were theories that the Navy Seals took it. There were there were theories that, the pirates got it. There were theories. Maybe Captain Phillips knows what happens to it, but I don’t know. That’s the point. Like nobody ever figured that out. Quite frankly, if the Navy Seals took it, I’m like, I don’t care.

00:21:25:18 – 00:21:45:12
Brian Beckcom
I hope those guys spend it on fun stuff because of what I mean, what they did was, was remarkable. The, the scene where they show, like, as I recall the movie, it’s like boom, boom, boom and the pirates are dead kind of thing. It was more like.

00:21:45:15 – 00:21:46:17
Brian Beckcom
Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.

00:21:46:19 – 00:22:10:06
Brian Beckcom
You mean it was more like there was a lot more? It wasn’t quite as precise as it’s depicted in the movie, but but again, you’re not going to the movie, to learn history. You going to movie to be entertained. So I’m not faulting Hollywood or Tom Hanks or anybody for dramatizing a dramatic movie. But when you’re in the courthouse, in fact, I’ll tell you a good story about that stand.

00:22:10:06 – 00:22:31:00
Brian Beckcom
Once I found out there was a movie, then Tom Hanks was going to play. Captain Phillips immediately went to the court. I went to the judge. I said, hey, judge, this is a real problem. Everybody loves Tom Hanks. Like, and it’s going to prejudice my clients because truly, the person that made the most mistakes in this case was Phillips.

00:22:31:02 – 00:22:51:00
Brian Beckcom
Everybody’s going to associate him with Tom Hanks and it’s going to really hurt my client. So would it be okay, judge, if we went to trial before the movie came out? So Maersk lawyers come up. Oh no, no, no, we can be told we can make sure that we get fair jurors and they won’t let any of that stuff influence their decision.

00:22:51:00 – 00:23:14:28
Brian Beckcom
And we need a lot of time. So anyway, the point is that the judge listened to the defense lawyers and not me, and he didn’t let me go to trial early. And then the movie comes out and all of a sudden I got 5 to $10 million of free marketing publicity. And I still get it. I mean, even today I’m on a podcast 15 plus years later talking about this case.

00:23:15:00 – 00:23:38:06
Brian Beckcom
I get something like 16,000 website views a month, 15 years after the fact. And I tell people I’m like, sometimes it’s good not to get what you want, because the fact that I lost that request ended up being way better for my clients and my firm.

00:23:38:09 – 00:23:53:08
Dan LeFebvre
Yeah, I mean, everybody loves Tom Hanks, though, so I understand that that I mean, I don’t know how you not be have some a little bit of bias, I guess, if you never even saw it. But I mean, it’s a Tom Hanks movie. He’s he’s not going to want to see that.

00:23:53:11 – 00:23:54:05
Brian Beckcom
He doesn’t like Tom.

00:23:54:05 – 00:23:55:08
Brian Beckcom
Hanks.

00:23:55:10 – 00:24:10:00
Brian Beckcom
And I and I by the way, I took Captain Phillips deposition for two days and up in the northeast, that’s it’s confidential, sealed and stuff like that. But let me just let me just put it this way. He ain’t Tom Hanks.

00:24:10:02 – 00:24:10:27
Brian Beckcom
Well.

00:24:11:00 – 00:24:14:01
Dan LeFebvre
To be fair, none of us are. There’s only one Tom Hanks.

00:24:14:03 – 00:24:25:04
Brian Beckcom
That’s true, that’s true. But but but again, I don’t think any of us are comparing our. So if true Tom Hanks maybe playing me in a movie. He ain’t playing you in a movie.

00:24:25:06 – 00:24:43:27
Dan LeFebvre
Fair point, fair point. Well, if we go back to the movie, speaking of, despite failing the first time around, the next day the Pirates try again and the leader of Douala, Musa, returns with a more powerful boat. This time the crew on Maersk Alabama. They try basically the same thing. They try increasing the engine power, doing the hard turns.

00:24:43:27 – 00:25:01:05
Dan LeFebvre
That seemed to work last time, but this time it doesn’t because the Pirates have a slightly bigger boat the movie focuses on. It has two engines instead of one, and then the only other manner of defense are the fire hoses that we talked about earlier, that the crew on Alabama run around the whole ship, making it hard for the pirates to get close.

00:25:01:05 – 00:25:21:08
Dan LeFebvre
You have the water shooting out, but then one of the hoses slips. So we see, I think his name was Shane Murphy. Going to fix it. One of the crew and the Pirates start shooting at him. So then Phillips orders him to get to safety. And that’s how the Pirates managed to attach a ladder to the side of the ship, climb up, and then take over the boat.

00:25:21:10 – 00:25:36:24
Dan LeFebvre
And from Captain Phillips perspective, according to the movie, he knows that his men don’t have the firepower to defend against the pirates. Again, no guns on the ship, so he orders Shane to go down to the engine room with most of the crew to hide where they can lock themselves in, and then cut the power to the ship so the pirates can’t move it.

00:25:36:27 – 00:25:47:14
Dan LeFebvre
And then Captain Phillips and two other crew members stay on the bridge, where they’re captured by the four Somali pirates. Was that ultimately how the pirates were able to take control of Maersk Alabama?

00:25:47:16 – 00:25:50:29
Brian Beckcom
No. No. And,

00:25:51:02 – 00:25:52:24
Dan LeFebvre
I had a feeling it would be something like that.

00:25:53:00 – 00:26:06:12
Brian Beckcom
Yeah, yeah, unfortunately, that’s not really what happened. Although I will say this, one of the ways that the Pirates figured out how to get some more distance from the coast is to use kind of a bigger mothership.

00:26:06:15 – 00:26:07:26
Dan LeFebvre
Yeah. We see that in the movie. Yeah.

00:26:07:28 – 00:26:34:21
Brian Beckcom
Right. Yeah. They would have these, they would have these larger fishing vessels that could actually get out farther and then they would deploy smaller vessels once they got out to where they wanted to go. So that part of it’s true. And again, it’s, it’s like I don’t know how to put this, but it’s like there’s enough truth in the movie for it not to be like a completely fictional story, but everything is.

00:26:34:21 – 00:27:08:22
Brian Beckcom
So, I keep saying the word dramatized, exaggerated as to as to basically be not true, if that makes sense. Like the idea they were, you know, they’re doing. So I mean, it reminds me of Star Wars when like, Luke Skywalker is being chased and an X-Wing fighter and he’s doing all these crazy dodges and he’s, you know, the idea that they were around, they had this giant fishing or this giant commercial vessel in the middle of the ocean doing these, crazy evasive maneuvers while they’re shooting water cannons out the back.

00:27:08:22 – 00:27:44:03
Brian Beckcom
And Captain Phillips is standing there like George Washington crossing the, what was the river? He crossed the Brandywine or whatever on the front of the boat is. I mean, it’s just it’s Hollywood. That’s what it is. And, enough of that happened to where you can say, well, they didn’t totally make it up. But the timing, the sequence, the substance, the procedure is, is, is, by and large, so, so overly exaggerated and overly dramatized as you could, it is to say that that that’s not the way it happened.

00:27:44:07 – 00:27:47:19
Brian Beckcom
I mean, you could probably confidently say that.

00:27:47:21 – 00:27:57:06
Dan LeFebvre
Did they end up, splitting like the movie shows where there were some in the bridge and then some of the crew in the engine room kind of separated like that?

00:27:57:09 – 00:28:20:21
Brian Beckcom
Yeah. You know, that’s an interesting piece of the case. So the crew actually, evacuated as, as they were supposed to to it’s essentially a safe room and, and bolted themselves. And that was one of the, and this didn’t apply just to Maersk Alabama. But generally speaking, in the maritime world, there are rooms that you can seal.

00:28:20:21 – 00:28:53:11
Brian Beckcom
And like if you’re getting attacked, you can use them as safe rooms. In fact, that’s what happened in my marine west coast of Africa case. He went into a room with his crew, bolted themselves. And the problem is that those pirates had, saws that could, like, literally cut through the steel. And then once they made a little hole, they stuck their machine guns through the hole and said, we’re going to start firing this thing into this room, and bullets are going, I mean, everybody’s going to be dead within 10s, right?

00:28:53:13 – 00:29:11:09
Brian Beckcom
Well, so my crew ended up evacuating and they, they they stayed in that room. The pirates locked them in this room for like 18 hours. I think it was 120 degrees the whole time. They had no water and food. So it was it was a it was a pretty bad situation.

00:29:11:12 – 00:29:12:27
Dan LeFebvre
Wow. Wow. Yeah.

00:29:12:27 – 00:29:36:17
Brian Beckcom
That’s they do have safe rooms is the point though. Like on these boats, one of the things I’ll often do is say everybody because think about it. On these boats you’ve seen these like they have doors that they can and seal shed. Like if you’re in super bad weather and you need to make the ship at least parts of the parts of the ship watertight, you can go into these rooms that you can you can really, really seal tight.

00:29:36:17 – 00:30:02:24
Brian Beckcom
So that that is a pretty common, defense mechanism. And then what you do is the idea is you get in there and you buy enough time to where the posse can come get you, right? Like you don’t have to stay in there for a week. You just get in there, you send out a distress signal, you get in that room, you seal yourself in, and you hope that the posse will be there within two, three, 4 or 5 hours, something like that.

00:30:02:27 – 00:30:18:21
Dan LeFebvre
Well, if we go back to the movie, the pirates start searching the ship to try to find the rest of the crew, and Captain Phillips is trying to get the pirates to look in the cargo deck. But the Pirates leader, Musa knows that there’s a problem with the ship’s power, so he wants to go to the engine room.

00:30:18:24 – 00:30:37:09
Dan LeFebvre
Meanwhile, the crew’s hiding away in the engine room and they devise a plan to fight back against the pirates. As Phillips is leading the pirates around the ship, he’s kind of giving little hints here and there. He’d say things like, well, we better hope the emergency power stays on, because if it won’t, then we’re not gonna be able to see anything if it goes off.

00:30:37:11 – 00:30:54:03
Dan LeFebvre
And things like be careful in here with bare feet because you can climb on almost anything. And then over the radio, the crew kind of picks up on some of these. They break some glass to lay a trap for the barefooted pirates. And that works when one of the pirates, a guy named Bilal, I believe it gets badly cut.

00:30:54:05 – 00:30:58:22
Dan LeFebvre
Did the Maersk Alabama crew try to fight back against the pirates like the movie shows?

00:30:58:24 – 00:31:24:19
Brian Beckcom
Absolutely they did. In fact, what I was mentioning earlier is they grabbed utensils and were using those as weapons. And in fact, the one pirate that survived got stabbed in the eye with a spoon. And that’s why he had an eyepatch on. That was one of my clients that did that. I would actually, the way I would say, if you want to be as close to the truth as possible, once the pirates got on the ship, the crew pretty much did exactly what they were trained to do.

00:31:24:21 – 00:31:47:19
Brian Beckcom
Captain Phillips, on the other hand, did not get to where he was supposed to get to, and what ended up happening? It ended up causing the entire security protocol to get thrown off kilter, because now all of a sudden, the Pirates have access to Phillips and all his knowledge, plus the money, and they can use that to leverage what they want to leverage against the crew.

00:31:47:20 – 00:32:10:15
Brian Beckcom
Had the captain come in there like he was supposed to and executed a security plan. You don’t have all these other, outstanding issues that the Pirates can basically use a captain as a as a negotiating, piece. Like, you don’t want to do that like my cam and my, like, again, my, it’s funny because in this case, not funny how it funny ironic.

00:32:10:15 – 00:32:41:10
Brian Beckcom
It’s funny because in this case, the the the person that screwed up was the captain like Phillips, there is no question at all that the reason that these men got kidnaped and taken hostage and put in a room there was 120 plus degrees for more than 18 hours, no food and water. The reason is Captain Phillips and then also the company for letting him deviate so, so wildly from the recommendations.

00:32:41:12 – 00:33:04:28
Brian Beckcom
But in my in my West Coast pirate case, I represented the captain like the captain did everything he was supposed to do. Like, you know, just boom, boom, boom, boom, boom made the distress call that Boko Haram pirates coming, highly trained, highly armed, gets all his crew into the safe room, locks it up, does everything precisely right. And, and he’s.

00:33:05:00 – 00:33:29:23
Brian Beckcom
And by the way, like I said, they drilled a hole to the steel door, put the gun in there and so that he basically he had to say, look, I’m coming out, leave my crew alone, I’ll come out. And so he actually came out, gave himself up to the pirates and was taken into the jungles of West Africa for 18 days and then ultimately released after some really bad stuff happened to them.

00:33:29:25 – 00:33:40:21
Brian Beckcom
But my point is, he did everything right. He still got taken, but he did everything he was supposed to do. Captain Phillips basically didn’t do anything he was supposed to do.

00:33:40:24 – 00:33:52:15
Dan LeFebvre
If he had followed protocol, if Phillips had followed protocol instead of staying up on the bridge, he should have gone down in the room, basically with the rest of the crucial. The entire crew was in there after sending out the signal. Is that right?

00:33:52:17 – 00:34:02:03
Brian Beckcom
Pretty much. Yeah, pretty much. I mean, and there was multiple different areas on the ship where you could use as a secure location. He should have been in one of those.

00:34:02:11 – 00:34:05:08
Dan LeFebvre
Okay. So not necessarily with the crew depending on what he could get to.

00:34:05:08 – 00:34:10:10
Brian Beckcom
But yeah, depending on where he was at the time. Yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah okay okay.

00:34:10:13 – 00:34:29:03
Dan LeFebvre
Well in the movie Musa gets captured by the crew down below. And in particular the movie focuses on, I think it’s the chief engineer, Mike Perry, who subdues him with a pocket knife. So the movie kind of sets up this tension of the pirates holding crew hostage on the bridge, including Captain Phillips. And then they have their own injured leader held hostage down below.

00:34:29:05 – 00:34:52:05
Dan LeFebvre
And that’s when we see Tom Hanks version of Captain Phillips offer the Pirates $30,000 in the ship’s chief in exchange for them leaving on one of the Maersk Alabama lifeboats. And ultimately, that’s what they agree on. So the plan is for the crew to get Captain Phillips back while the Pirates get their leader back. Musa. So then they can leave with the money, and we’ll talk about what happens with that deal in a moment.

00:34:52:05 – 00:34:58:09
Dan LeFebvre
But was the movie correct to show that there was this deal between the Pirates and the crew.

00:34:58:12 – 00:35:20:13
Brian Beckcom
Now and again? Like I said, nobody knows what happened to that money. Like like nobody knows. I mean, I’d love for somebody to call me up and say, I figured out what happened. In fact, there was something really strange that happened a few years afterwards. Two Navy Seals were on, as I recall, was the same vessel and died of a drug overdose.

00:35:20:13 – 00:35:39:13
Brian Beckcom
And there was all sorts of questions about, first of all, why were there two Navy Seals on that vessel? Why was there heroin on that? There was some really weird stuff going on. Where was the where was the ransom money? My period, a name I haven’t heard in quite some time. So he was one of the few crew members that decided not to join the case.

00:35:39:13 – 00:35:46:10
Brian Beckcom
So he was aligned with Captain Phillips. He is, as I recall, was he the first mate?

00:35:46:13 – 00:35:50:00
Dan LeFebvre
I think they mentioned him being the, word chief engineer.

00:35:50:00 – 00:36:07:04
Brian Beckcom
Yeah. So chief engineer is a is a high ranking position on those ships that would put you, you know, depending on how it staff that would that that was certainly put you in that chain of command at least. I mean you’re probably the number one guy on most ships in the engine room. Plus you’re usually an officer.

00:36:07:04 – 00:36:21:27
Brian Beckcom
So he was a real high ranking person. What I found then, and I think most of your listeners that this won’t surprise him is when when company management screws up, company management circles the wagons.

00:36:21:27 – 00:36:26:15
Brian Beckcom
Yeah, you know what I mean? So, yeah, I mean.

00:36:26:17 – 00:36:44:10
Brian Beckcom
What I, when I like when I want to know the truth about what happened. I’m not asking the CEO or the CEO like I want to ask the line level workers. Hey, guys. What happened there? So Perry Perry was one of the he was very vocal in not wanting to join the case. Totally his decision. And totally, totally fine with that.

00:36:44:10 – 00:37:13:09
Brian Beckcom
But not surprising considering he was he was at the at the level, the managerial level where where you might be able to start saying, well, what were you doing, Mike? Like I what why, why, why did he why didn’t you stop, captain? I mean, again, a lot of this stuff is confidential, but there’s internal communications from Phillips and other people that talk about the decision to go to to go more than twice as close as was recommended.

00:37:13:11 – 00:37:19:20
Brian Beckcom
And I’ll just I’ll just put it this way. There’s a reason that Mercer doesn’t want this released.

00:37:19:23 – 00:37:21:11
Brian Beckcom
I mean, that’s fair.

00:37:21:13 – 00:37:22:08
Brian Beckcom
Yeah.

00:37:22:10 – 00:37:33:08
Dan LeFebvre
Well, you talked about the the 30,000. Was that something that they had as specifically for pirates like you were talking about earlier on Alabama? That was specifically for pirates?

00:37:33:11 – 00:38:12:28
Brian Beckcom
Yeah, absolutely. And that, that that is that is and I actually I don’t know if that’s true or not, I, I have a strong suspicion that they carry that kind of money on ships. Now, the back at the time, it was why that was a widespread practice. And, you know, it’s it’s interesting because it’s really there’s something called a Foreign Corrupt Practices Act in America which prohibits, among other things, American companies from negotiating, ransoms like or paying bribes or, you know, things like that.

00:38:12:28 – 00:38:41:24
Brian Beckcom
So it’s really close to the line when you’re talking about and of course, the idea is, you know, the whole we don’t negotiate with terrorists idea like, because that’ll encourage more terrorism. That’s the idea. Like, we don’t want companies paying bribes because encourage more bribery. We don’t want ransoms because paying ransoms is going to encourage more kidnapings. And so it’s you got to be super careful as an American company about how you deal with those situations.

00:38:41:24 – 00:39:17:27
Brian Beckcom
In fact, like in my West Coast case, you date the the captain was ransomed from the pirates, but he was not ransom by the American company like, they go through, intermediaries usually located in the UK in places like that, that then go through intermediaries that then take care of what they need to take care of. There’s in fact, there was a movie, I think, called Proof of Life or something like that, which kind of depicts some of these specialist kidnaping, a ransom, companies that will go in and take care.

00:39:18:00 – 00:39:41:18
Brian Beckcom
But the problem is, is like Exxon, let’s say they have an employee off the coast of, West Africa that gets kidnaped. Exxon can’t they’re it’s illegal for them to pay ransoms. It’s a legal for them to negotiate with terrorists like that. That is explicitly illegal under United States also. So they got to be real careful about how they do it, you know?

00:39:41:21 – 00:39:56:09
Brian Beckcom
But on the other hand, they want take care of their employees if they can like and good for that. I hope they figure out a way to do that. I mean, if you got billions of dollars, you should you should spend some of that on your on your people.

00:39:56:12 – 00:40:13:10
Dan LeFebvre
Yeah. I mean, in, in that context, you know, you know, in this particular case, you know, like $30,000 for the Alabama and the crew, I mean, it’s it’s worth 30,000. Like, I mean, to for their safety.

00:40:13:13 – 00:40:14:23
Brian Beckcom
Yeah.

00:40:14:25 – 00:40:35:01
Dan LeFebvre
Well, you mentioned the ransom. And if we head back into the movie, the exchange of, Captain Phillips and Mousa doesn’t go as well. It doesn’t go as planned. I should say. And instead, as the pirates are leaving the ship, they don’t let Phillips leave the lifeboat. He was in there kind of showing them how it works. And then the lifeboat is launched from Maersk Alabama with all the pirates inside and Captain Phillips as their hostage.

00:40:35:03 – 00:40:44:10
Dan LeFebvre
And the movie suggests that the pirates weren’t happy with the $30,000 from the safe, so they wanted to ransom Phillips for even more money. Did that happen the way the movie shows it?

00:40:44:12 – 00:41:10:02
Brian Beckcom
Not really. And again, there was some really strange questions about. So the money, far as everybody knows, that the cash went on to that, lifeboat with Phillips and with the, with the pirates. Now the pirate that didn’t get killed wasn’t on the lifeboat. He stayed on board. But that money was on that lifeboat and was has never been found.

00:41:10:02 – 00:41:40:11
Brian Beckcom
There’s there’s theories that the Navy Seals did something with it. The precision of the operation that’s depicted in the movie was not how quite as precise as that in real life. Like there was a lot more stuff going on, but but look, I mean, again, Phillips was taken out alive, but he didn’t give himself up. He was taken against his will, basically kicking and screaming for all practical purposes.

00:41:40:14 – 00:42:01:29
Brian Beckcom
And the Navy Seals did come in there and the Navy Seals did it. Badass job getting them back. So all that stuff is true. But again, the details are. So I’m just kind of like, what’s the movie? Saving Private Ryan? Remember, the beginning scene is Saving Private Ryan. Like, how intense that was. That is so highly dramatized.

00:42:01:29 – 00:42:22:24
Brian Beckcom
It’s ridiculous. All that stuff. Like, there were men that stormed the beaches that were men. They got killed. All that stuff happened, but they have to compress like that event into something that you can digest on a movie screen in about five minutes, or however long that scene took, ten minutes or whatever it was in the Maersk Alabama.

00:42:22:24 – 00:42:47:24
Brian Beckcom
I think that scene takes five minutes, and then you’ve got Tom Hanks afterwards doing the Tom Hanks thing where he’s breaking down all that stuff. But I’m talking about the actual operation of rescuing him was significantly longer, and they got to compress the time and they got to make it interesting and stuff like that. So, the basically the details of the movie are, are all made up.

00:42:47:29 – 00:43:00:02
Brian Beckcom
That large picture of what happened is true, but the details are just and I’m not again, I’m not criticizing Hollywood or anybody like that, that that’s what they have to do.

00:43:00:04 – 00:43:22:00
Dan LeFebvre
Yeah, yeah. Again, movies are for entertainment. Well, you talked about the the Navy, and we’re at the point in the movie’s timeline where the Navy starts to, come into the picture after all of this escalation. We see the US Navy getting involved. They send multiple ships to deal with the hostage situation with Captain Phillips. The primary ship in the movie is a destroyer called USS Bainbridge.

00:43:22:03 – 00:43:41:06
Dan LeFebvre
In the movie, the US Navy has identified the Somali mothership that we talked about briefly earlier. It’s a they say it’s a Taiwanese fishing ship that was hijacked by pirates a year earlier under a Somali warlord named Garrard. And then we kind of get a little bit of a little, almost a little backstory that captain, the captain of Bainbridge, recognizes Garrett’s name.

00:43:41:12 – 00:43:59:29
Dan LeFebvre
He’s somebody who apparently just wants money. So they think they can negotiate for Captain Phillips. But the clock is ticking because the Pirates are trying to reach the Somali coast. There’s two more Navy ships that are coming, USS boxer and USS Halliburton. They’re sent with the Navy Seals. And the way the movie sets this up, basically, Bainbridge is their first.

00:44:00:04 – 00:44:10:09
Dan LeFebvre
And if they can’t resolve the situation before the Seals get there, the Navy Seals are going to take care of it. Can you share what the situation was like as the Navy entered the picture?

00:44:10:12 – 00:44:46:08
Brian Beckcom
Yeah, that the the Maersk Alabama was actually lucky in a way. I mean, I had to I had to say lucky given what happened. But they were lucky that there were American naval ships that were so close by. That’s that’s almost never the case. And so at that point, there really is nobody and I mean, Captain Phillips, at some point loses command of the vessel, like the most famous saying, you know, maybe if I’m the captain now, I mean, how many times that there’s basically a that’s a, that’s a meme now.

00:44:46:08 – 00:45:10:21
Brian Beckcom
And by the way, I’ll tell you a cool story about that. That was completely ad libbed. And that actor, it was not a professionally trained actor. Like he’s Somalian, but they, they they did a casting call in Milwaukee where there was a huge Somali community, and they picked those four guys and they’re not actors. They had no training at all.

00:45:10:21 – 00:45:32:04
Brian Beckcom
When he comes up there and he says, I’m the captain now, that’s completely ad libbed. And that’s the most famous line in the movie, and probably the most famous line of any movie, or at least top five over the last 15 years. Right. I’m the captain now. But in any event, once the. So there are and I got to be a little bit cautious about.

00:45:32:05 – 00:46:00:11
Brian Beckcom
I don’t want to give up any confidentiality, but there are people in Africa who, serve as conduits between commercial and governmental interest. And these pirates or terrorists or whatever you want to call them. And it’s like, I like we were talking about just a few minutes ago, there’s a foreign corrupt practices that got me super duper careful about running afoul of that.

00:46:00:13 – 00:46:28:22
Brian Beckcom
But like, there are local, warlords and chieftains, there are people like Russell Crowe on the movie Proof of Life who specialize in dealing with those people. There are back channels that oftentimes you can utilize to get stuff done. But on the flip side, the more you do this, the more you encourage more attacks. I mean, the more to, the more ransoms that are paid, the more kidnaping.

00:46:28:22 – 00:46:51:14
Brian Beckcom
And so it’s a really, really tough problem. I mean, if it was your family or a family member that was kidnaped, you would God wouldn’t care how much you pay him or whatever they want. I want my family member back. But the policymakers have to look beyond just the one individual events. They have to look at, kind of a broader.

00:46:51:17 – 00:47:09:19
Brian Beckcom
And so, boy, it’s a it’s a tough call. But then once you’ve once you’ve got once you’ve engaged the United States military, they’re in charge like that, that at that point you’ve lost, you’ve lost control. Like once you send them in, they’re going to they’re going to do what they’re going to do. And there’s not anything anybody can do to stop it.

00:47:09:19 – 00:47:11:07
Brian Beckcom
Quite frankly.

00:47:11:10 – 00:47:13:00
Dan LeFebvre
They’re the captain now okay.

00:47:13:02 – 00:47:16:15
Brian Beckcom
Yeah. Yeah, exactly.

00:47:16:17 – 00:47:17:20
Brian Beckcom
And perfect.

00:47:17:20 – 00:47:40:27
Dan LeFebvre
Love it. Well, the movie kind of it focuses then kind of shifts to talking about, you know, with Captain Phillips and that hostage situation. But we do see a brief scene where the Navy, there’s some Navy who go on the Alabama, and there’s there to escort it to Mombasa. Did they actually did that happen? Did they get a Navy escort basically to make sure they made it there safely the rest of the way?

00:47:40:27 – 00:47:41:12
Dan LeFebvre
Okay. Yeah.

00:47:41:12 – 00:48:05:24
Brian Beckcom
Oh yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah. And again, it was kind of luck as I recall. And you can fact ship me on this. The reason that we were able to, use Navy Seals to rescue these guys is because they were in close proximity. And the reason they were in close proximity is I think we were doing some aggressive military exercises over there, and they were able to divert some assets and take care of this pretty quickly.

00:48:05:28 – 00:48:25:06
Brian Beckcom
So people criticize Obama all the time for not going to war with Syria and a lot of other things he did. But I’ll tell you what, he made some tough calls like that Navy Seal thing could have gone sideways. And I like they could captain Phillips could have been killed. The crew could have been killed. That thing could have gone sideways in a heartbeat.

00:48:25:08 – 00:48:43:11
Brian Beckcom
He made the call. Well, let’s go in there and get him that. You know, that stuff is the way that all that Special Forces stuff is depicted in movies is super clean and almost antiseptic, that it is not like that in real life, like it’s nasty. I mean, when they went in, got bin laden and one of the Black Hawk helicopters crashed, right?

00:48:43:11 – 00:49:02:24
Brian Beckcom
It was a mess like it was did did not go the way they planned at all. But but it was fortunate as I recall again, people can fact check me. The military was doing some sort of exercise, some sort of joint exercises over there, and so they were able to get over there quickly where that’s that’s usually not the case, unfortunately.

00:49:02:27 – 00:49:26:23
Dan LeFebvre
That. Yeah, that makes sense. And in the movie they show the the other ship start arriving with, with Bainbridge. But we see Captain Phillips, he tells his captors that he has to pee, and they let him go outside and then Phillips pushes that one of the pirates is watching him below. He pushes him into the water, and then he jumps into trying to escape, and he starts swimming towards the Navy ships.

00:49:26:23 – 00:49:44:06
Dan LeFebvre
But then the pirates turn around the lifeboat. They start shooting at him in the water, and so they bring him back and bring Captain Phillips back into the lifeboat, and they start beating him pretty severely. Pretty much at that point you get the impression from the movie that he tried to escape, and because they beat him so badly, he’s not going to try to escape again.

00:49:44:08 – 00:49:47:15
Dan LeFebvre
Is it true that Captain Phillips tried to escape like we see in the movie?

00:49:47:18 – 00:50:07:28
Brian Beckcom
No, that is complete. That is this. So again, that that’s that was it. And that was part of the I was that was what that’s the kind of stuff that worried me the most because it basically inverted the real story. The real story was Captain Phillips screwed up, Mer screwed up, and the crew made the best of it.

00:50:08:03 – 00:50:32:08
Brian Beckcom
I mean, that’s really what the crew was heroic, and I could tell story after story. But we already told you about Spann against AK 47. That was not Phillips. That was the crew. And and the way the the part of the movie that you’re talking about is the part that I think bothered my clients the most because it really was the opposite of what actually happened.

00:50:32:15 – 00:50:55:21
Brian Beckcom
Phillips he wasn’t beat up. He didn’t jump in the water and try to escape. None of that happened. I mean, that is completely and totally not what happened. And it makes it look like the crew was a bunch of idiots and Captain Phillips is some sort of heroic figure, and it was like it was the complete opposite, like I said.

00:50:55:21 – 00:51:00:23
Brian Beckcom
And so that that part is definitively not true.

00:51:00:26 – 00:51:13:07
Dan LeFebvre
Okay. Yeah, it definitely does make him seem more heroic when, you know, he’s trying to escape. He’s doing doing these things and taking this. But I guess that’s Tom. You have Tom Hanks in a movie. You gotta be Tom Hanks sometimes. Yeah, yeah.

00:51:13:07 – 00:51:34:01
Brian Beckcom
Well yeah, that that’s exactly right. And again, they’re not trying to win a lawsuit in this movie. They’re trying to entertain people who have come to sit in a seat for two hours and be entertained. And so I don’t blame Hollywood for doing any of this stuff. What I had to be careful about and what my job was and still is, is to protect my client’s interests.

00:51:34:01 – 00:52:01:12
Brian Beckcom
And so what I was concerned about, and I’m very proud, quite frankly, the fact we’re able to do this, I’m normally not taken on $1 billion, international corporation with multiple billion dollar insurance companies behind them. I do that all the time. But then what I don’t do is have Hollywood and the Hollywood publicity machine on top of that talent, a narrative that hurts my case.

00:52:01:12 – 00:52:37:29
Brian Beckcom
That was the hard part of it. Right? So I had to I mean, going against these big insurance companies, these big corporations. That’s a Tuesday for me. Going against Hollywood in their publicity machine was a completely new experience. Fortunately, I was we did a fantastic job of like, everybody basically knows, I think that that movie was a good movie, but there’s questions about the accuracy of it, and that was because we were able to go on, you know, nowadays you can get on social media, you can go websites, you can put up videos, you can put up all this information even 15 years ago.

00:52:38:02 – 00:52:59:23
Brian Beckcom
You know, I have a degree in computer science. I’m a technically pretty competent. I was able to use that to get our news out there to get on Nightline, Dateline, London’s Daily Telegraph, you know, New York Times, when you looked up Captain Phillips The Movie to two lengths below, it would say the truth about Captain phillips.com. That would take you to my website.

00:52:59:23 – 00:53:23:06
Brian Beckcom
So that was really the the most difficult, part of the case. I mean, like proving what happened. That’s right. In my wheelhouse. I do that on a daily basis, proving what happened without letting Hollywood and all the publicity completely hijack the narrative. That was that was a little bit more challenging.

00:53:23:08 – 00:53:49:28
Dan LeFebvre
While the movie ends with a whirlwind of events, the Seal team arrives. They take over command and communication with the pirates, and immediately they confuse the Pirates by listing off all of their names and where they’re from. They go on to say that they’ve spoken to their tribal elders, and the elders are being flown in to negotiate and exchange Captain Phillips for the money, and while that happens, they need someone to go aboard Bainbridge to negotiate the deal with the elders, and they’re going to tow the lifeboat to the exchange spot.

00:53:50:01 – 00:54:12:20
Dan LeFebvre
Moussaoui agrees to do this. The tow line is attached and to attach the lifeboat, I should say. And then Musa goes to Bainbridge for the meeting with the elders. And that leaves the other three pirates with Captain Phillips on the boat. Meanwhile, the Navy ship turns on these really bright lights because I think it was like, oh, 400 so early in the morning, dark out, and they tell the pirates that’s just for towing them to the exchange spot.

00:54:12:20 – 00:54:30:04
Dan LeFebvre
But really what they’re doing is they’re getting the snipers into position. We see Phillips start fighting against his captors. They subdue him, tie him up, blindfold him, and then that moment that you talked about before, you see the three Navy Seals, just perfectly timed shot, you know, three shots to kill the remaining pirates at the exact same time.

00:54:30:07 – 00:54:50:28
Dan LeFebvre
And then back on Bainbridge. Moussaoui is taken into custody. There’s no elders, no negotiation. And then, as the only pirate left alive, he’s going to face trial for piracy in America. Captain Phillips returned safely in Bainbridge. And that’s where the movie ends as he’s getting medical treatment. How well does the movie do showing the way the whole situation came to an end.

00:54:51:00 – 00:55:24:12
Brian Beckcom
It does a decent job of that. I mean, the way Tom Hanks depicts Captain Phillips breaking down is all Tom Hanks. That is nothing at all like captain. I mean, that is Tom Hanks at his best. Okay, the Navy Seals would never allow Hollywood to show their trade secrets. So some of the stuff that they basically it was like a bait and switch is what’s depicted in the movie.

00:55:24:12 – 00:55:48:18
Brian Beckcom
We’re going to put the pirates are going to be looking this way, and we’re going to be doing stuff over here. They do that kind of stuff all the time. The actual operational details, are not same because again, there’s all sorts of different security issues involved in this. I mean, people probably don’t appreciate. I went on an inspection at Los Angeles Harbor two weeks ago.

00:55:48:18 – 00:56:13:06
Brian Beckcom
I brought a friend of mine, and she could not believe how dangerous we were on huge commercial cargo ship doing an inspection with 18 wheelers trains. It was raining. We have these cargos, you know, going over. I couldn’t believe how dangerous it was. What what people don’t realize is how every time one of these huge ship comes into a port, it’s like an enormous bomb.

00:56:13:06 – 00:56:42:03
Brian Beckcom
Like those things are so, tempting. These big commercial ships for bad actors that the security plans and the security protocols are, like, extra critical. And we don’t want people knowing about them publicly. So a lot of the stuff that the military does or that the companies do, they won’t talk about publicly, but she can talk about it on or on the edges.

00:56:42:03 – 00:57:10:14
Brian Beckcom
So, yes, the Navy Seals did a fantastic job. Yes, they ended up rescuing Captain Phillips. But the surgical nature of this depicted in the movie is nothing. Nothing like it actually happened. In the movie, there’s three shots, right? But they did a, they did a, naval investigation afterwards. And that there was at least 20 rounds fired.

00:57:10:16 – 00:57:30:28
Dan LeFebvre
A little more, a little not as a surgical precision as you know. Yes. As a VC in the movie. Yeah. No. Wow. Well, thank you so much for coming on to chat about the movie Captain Phillips. Aside from being a trial lawyer who represented some of the Maersk Alabama crew, after the events we see in the movie, you’ve got a fascinating podcast of your own called lessons from Leaders with Bryan Beckham.

00:57:31:00 – 00:57:40:27
Dan LeFebvre
Now, if you’re listening to this, check the show notes for a link to Brian’s podcast so you can cued up after we’re done here. And while they do that, and before I let you go, Brian, can you give us an overview of your podcast and where they can learn more about you?

00:57:41:00 – 00:58:07:05
Brian Beckcom
Yeah, lessons from later started and started in middle quarantine features. People that are positive leaders that maybe, a lot of people don’t know about, mainly military sports. That’s so New York Times bestselling authors, and it’s a focus on people that are doing really, really cool things that maybe not, maybe don’t get quite the publicity that they deserve.

00:58:07:05 – 00:58:26:20
Brian Beckcom
So, it’s a great show, and I think you’re you’re it kind of ties in a little bit with this. Like, you’re getting a true story of, like, leadership on the ground. So, you know, we have all these leaders on TV or so-called leaders on the we see all these all the time. But my theory is the real leaders, you don’t really hear much about them.

00:58:26:20 – 00:58:29:09
Brian Beckcom
And those are kind of people I try to feature on my show.

00:58:29:12 – 00:58:31:27
Dan LeFebvre
Fantastic. Well, thanks again so much for your time, Brian.

00:58:32:00 – 00:58:43:26
Brian Beckcom
Thank you. It’s been a it’s been a real, real joy. A lot of fun.

00:58:43:28 – 00:59:03:18
Dan LeFebvre
This episode of based On a True Story was produced by me, Dan the Fan. Thank you once again to Bryan Beckham for sharing his time and expertise to help us separate fact from fiction in the movie Captain Phillips. As you’ve seen from Brian today, he has a ton of knowledge that he’s happy to share, and beyond that, he’s also a podcaster who’s great at harnessing the knowledge of his guests.

00:59:03:23 – 00:59:20:17
Dan LeFebvre
So go subscribe to Brian’s podcast called lessons from leaders. I’ve got a link to that in the show notes as well as on the shows home on the web at based on a True Story podcast.com/380. Okay, now it’s time for the answer to our two tours and a live game from the beginning of the episode. And there’s a quick refresher.

00:59:20:19 – 00:59:45:08
Dan LeFebvre
Here are the two truths and one lie again. Number one, Maersk Alabama sailed within the range of known Somali pirates. Number two the $30,000 on Maersk Alabama was intended as ransom money. Number three, Captain Phillips tried to escape from the pirates at the first chance he got. Did you figure out which one is a lie? Got the answer right here in the envelope.

00:59:45:08 – 01:00:05:13
Dan LeFebvre
So let’s open that up. And the lie is number three. Brian, explain how the scene in the movie where we see Tom Hanks version of Captain Phillips jumping to the water, trying to escape from the pirates was completely fictional. Thank you so much for sticking around to the end. If you’re watching the video version here, in a moment, you’ll see the credits roll.

01:00:05:20 – 01:00:25:26
Dan LeFebvre
If you want to get your name in the credits for the next video and on the website at. Based on a True Story podcast.com/credits, you can learn how to become a based on a true story producer using the link in the description or at based on a true Story podcast.com/support. Once again, that’s based on a true story podcast.com/support.

01:00:25:28 – 01:00:31:18
Dan LeFebvre
Until next time. Thanks so much for spending your time with Brian and I today, and I’ll chat with you again really soon.

 

00:00:02:01 – 00:00:30:17
Dan LeFebvre
Hello and welcome to Based on a True Story, the podcast that compares your favorite Hollywood movies with history. Today is December 7th, which means exactly 84 years ago is when the United States was violently rushed into World War Two with a surprise attack at Pearl Harbor. Now, if you’re a long time fan of the show, you’ll know that we’ve covered numerous movies depicting this event over the years, from 1970s toward toward Tora, and 2001 Pearl Harbor to 2000 and nineteenths midway.

00:00:30:19 – 00:00:53:03
Dan LeFebvre
Today, we’re going beyond what the movies show us, because most movies talk about the surprise attack at the harbor itself. But in the true story, that was just one part of the Japanese offensive on December 7th. And to do that, we’ll be looking at a range of different movies to get a sense of when and where the numerous attacks took place on that day, not just in Hawaii, but around the world.

00:00:53:05 – 00:01:15:11
Dan LeFebvre
Returning to based on a true story to help us unravel the true story beyond Pearl Harbor in the movies is Joshua Donahue, the adjunct professor of history at two different colleges, Suffolk County Community College and Farmingdale State College. Before we get started, though, let’s set up our game for today’s episode. Now, if you’re new to the show since based on a true story, it’s all about separate fact from fiction in the movies.

00:01:15:13 – 00:01:34:11
Dan LeFebvre
You’ll get to practice your skills at separating fact from fiction in this podcast episode with a game of two truths and a lie. So I’m about to give you three things that we’ll talk about in this episode. Two of those are true, and one of them is just an all out lie. Are you ready? Okay, here they are.

00:01:34:14 – 00:02:04:29
Dan LeFebvre
Number one, Wake Island was attack just a few hours after receiving word of the attack on Pearl Harbor. Number two, Phil Rasmussen went up in his P30 six wearing pajamas and landed with about 500 bullet holes in his plane. Number three in addition to military targets, the Japanese attacked numerous civilian targets around Pearl Harbor. Got him. Okay, now, as you’re listening to our story today, see if you can figure out which one of those is the lie.

00:02:05:02 – 00:02:28:09
Dan LeFebvre
And if you’re watching the video version of this, you’ll see I’m holding up this envelope. This has the answer inside, and we’ll open it up at the end of the episode to see if you got it right. Okay. Now it’s time to connect with Joshua Donahue to go beyond Pearl Harbor in the movies.

00:02:28:11 – 00:02:51:11
Dan LeFebvre
Today’s episode is a little different than the typical episode of based on a true story, because we’re not talking about just one movie’s timeline. Instead, we’re flipping it around to focus on the timeline of events before, during, and after the attack at Pearl Harbor and then pulling from an array of movies about Pearl Harbor to get a deeper understanding of history beyond what we see in the movies.

00:02:51:13 – 00:03:16:03
Dan LeFebvre
So let’s start today with a classic film from the year 1953 starring Burt Lancaster, Deborah Kerr and Frank Sinatra called From Here to Eternity. Most of this movie depicts life before the surprise attack at Pearl and it shows what life was like for the US military in 1941. And if we’re to believe the movie’s version of events, things in Hawaii before the attack were calm.

00:03:16:06 – 00:03:41:28
Dan LeFebvre
The movie throws in some internal drama among the men stationed there, but it’s soldiers chasing promotions and women. There’s no mention of the conflicts going on around the world, so after watching that movie, I was left with the impression that basically the average person on Pearl before the attack lived in their own little bubble. Is that a fair assessment of what it was like for the military before the attack at Pearl?

00:03:42:00 – 00:04:11:08
Joshua Donohue
Yes, it absolutely was. And you just mentioned the movie really kind of focuses more so on the, the love story. And as it really it compares in a lot of ways to, the 2001, Michael Bay film, of course, starring, Ben Affleck, Josh Hartnett, Kate Beckinsale. So, going into the film here, eternity, it’s a I really enjoy this movie and it has plenty of drama to it.

00:04:11:15 – 00:04:31:29
Joshua Donohue
And really with the backdrop and the climactic event, you know, I was thinking, you know, it’s the Pearl Harbor films are almost like in a lot of ways, it’s like the Titanic. All right. You know, you know what’s coming. But there’s all this buildup and all this drama that happens before it so gets to sort of, you know, pander to different audience, cater to different audiences, I should say.

00:04:32:04 – 00:04:54:18
Joshua Donohue
But from what I read, the novel is between 80 to 90% accurate. And it would take private James Jones’s. And it’s based on his memoirs, A Full Decade from the writing in the publication, from his first novel, From Here to Eternity, in the autumn of 1951. So the central narrative of the book draws upon Jones’s two years at Schofield Barracks.

00:04:54:25 – 00:05:23:15
Joshua Donohue
And this would, of course, culminate with the attack on Pearl Harbor. So he was a boxer or a bugler. Those things are touched upon in the film. And Ken played by his character, Robert Lee Prewitt. So there is definitely an air of confidence where I would say overconfidence that existed on Oahu. And what you notice in From Here to Eternity that you usually don’t see much in regard any way of concern, for a potential Japanese attack to occur.

00:05:23:18 – 00:06:00:18
Joshua Donohue
While the film largely centers on the two really separate romantic, themes between, Sergeant Milton Warren, played by Burt Lancaster, and Karen Holmes, played by actress Deborah Kerr, the other between Montgomery Clift character Robert E Lee Prewitt and the actress, binary, who plays Alma Lorene Burke. So what I did like about the film itself is this authenticity of especially the scenes that Schofield you see the military, mustering in the training and again, the marching that you see in the film, again, taking place on the parade ground and Schofield Barracks.

00:06:00:20 – 00:06:22:27
Joshua Donohue
So since the film was released in 1953, barely ten years after the actual attack, it really does. Well, as far as its authenticity of military light both on and off the off the base. So the men have the proper period gear. You see the World War One era, the Brody helmet, the 1903 Springfield rifle. That was period correct.

00:06:23:00 – 00:06:48:29
Joshua Donohue
The uniforms, the gear, etc.. Any sort of, you know, history nerd like myself is really going to appreciate those little details. And films. So Army life at Schofield was very regimented, as you see in the film. Revelry at 6 a.m.. Roll call at 630. Breakfast barracks detail, uniform inspection, calisthenics, Infantry drill, mail call, noontime lunch after work duties and 5 p.m. retreat.

00:06:49:06 – 00:07:11:06
Joshua Donohue
And then, the ceremonial lowering of the flag. Evenings were free, so Jones and his comrades would hang around the base or went into the neighboring village, of Louis. Wally, I should say, to drink and sort of view, you know, carouse and everything that they were doing in the film. So the, the men really made few trips to Honolulu since the bars.

00:07:11:06 – 00:07:38:26
Joshua Donohue
They’re really too expensive for the humble enlisted men. You know, maybe the officers went into town there. Schofield life there really emphasize also intramural sport, which is also a theme with each company fielding football, baseball, basketball, track, boxing, boxing. You see, as a theme as well. You can also reference that to the Pearl Harbor film of 2001, Doris Miller, the character played by Cuba Gooding Jr.

00:07:39:03 – 00:08:04:12
Joshua Donohue
And and all the heroics that, again, is also portrayed in Tora Bora. Tora miller was the, boxing champion heavyweight champion on this ship, the USS West Virginia, which was sunk, at Pearl Harbor. So during Jones’s time at Schofield Barracks, his company won three regimental championships, athletic mediocrity. You know, notwithstanding, they took part in boxing.

00:08:04:12 – 00:08:27:06
Joshua Donohue
Football. He would hurt his ankle in the latter. And this injury would continue to bother him for several months. So it also captures the typical nightlife in Oahu, in Honolulu with Oahu, the bars there, the, the brothels, etc.. Hawaii was far from home for the servicemen who were stationed there. So they wanted to make most of their time.

00:08:27:13 – 00:08:46:12
Joshua Donohue
It was a great obviously post during the there were a tropical, place. So the scene where the men were eating breakfast at the mess hall at Schofield Barracks, which was two miles, from Wheeler Army Airfield, which was again based on the accounts, Private James Jones, you see the great scene there where they’re having breakfast on the Sunday morning.

00:08:46:12 – 00:09:14:08
Joshua Donohue
They’re at Schofield, barracks, mess hall. And all of a sudden, you hear, the explosions, taking place, outside. And what I also really enjoyed about the film is that you see actual footage of the attack happening. Oh, the the Arizona exploding, which is obviously the most famous image, captured of the attack. So it’s, I think the the film does a good job really capturing what it was like.

00:09:14:08 – 00:09:22:07
Joshua Donohue
It really was not a whole lot of, you know, fear. And as it was after the attack, it was completely different climate altogether.

00:09:22:09 – 00:09:40:17
Dan LeFebvre
It puts a whole new spin on it. And we all know it as, you know, a surprise attack. But just the, the, the contrast of what we see in, you know, from here to eternity. And, and it’s like you’re saying a post to a tropical location. It’s, it almost seems like they’re on vacation and, you know, there’s really nothing to worry about.

00:09:40:17 – 00:09:45:11
Dan LeFebvre
And then all of a sudden they’ve got stuff to worry about. You know, a.

00:09:45:13 – 00:10:13:18
Joshua Donohue
Whole new ballgame. It’s it’s no longer a tropical, you know, I’ll get into a little bit later. But yeah, after the attack, the entire life on Oahu changes 180 degrees. And it goes from this, you know, great nightlife and great post and, and kind of getting into trouble and drinking women, all these sorts of things to blackouts, to drills to, you know, a martial law which will be declared, following the attack.

00:10:13:20 – 00:10:32:23
Dan LeFebvre
Well, you mentioned Tora, Tora tours. So let’s move on to that one. It’s a 1970 film, just probably one of the most common movies depicting the attack on Pearl Harbor. The first half of that movie is all about the events leading up to the attack, and we find the U.S. military trying to figure out where the Japanese are going to attack.

00:10:33:00 – 00:10:57:08
Dan LeFebvre
They think it might be the Philippines, or maybe Thailand or maybe Borneo. They don’t seem to think the attack will be at Pearl Harbor, which of course we know from history factored into why it was such a surprise attack like we were talking about, because the movie then focuses mostly on the surprise attack at Pearl. It seems to imply that perhaps those other locations that just mentioned weren’t targets.

00:10:57:09 – 00:11:09:20
Dan LeFebvre
Now, correct me if I’m wrong, but didn’t the Japanese also launch attacks in other locations? Other than Hawaii, such as Wake Island? Can you give some more context around the scale of the Japanese offensive in December 1941?

00:11:09:22 – 00:11:42:11
Joshua Donohue
Yeah, that’s absolutely correct. And it at that point in time, the Japanese military between the ground, sea and air operations were seemingly everywhere in the Pacific, especially following the attack on Pearl Harbor. Keep in mind the midway, another film that depicts the attack, obviously, you know, fast forwarding into June of 1942, while that climactic battle will take place, actually, midway is struck also, during that that time period as well, that morning, by a pair of Japanese destroyers, you know, nominal damage.

00:11:42:11 – 00:12:09:03
Joshua Donohue
But again, it’s it’s again a multi-pronged attack. Wake Island, as you mentioned, located about 2000 miles, to the west of the Hawaiian Islands, was struck about four hours after receiving word by radio from Pearl Harbor that it was under attack. So all of these locations, really from, wake on over the Philippines, Hong Kong, obviously. Or it’s December 8th, 1941, since it’s lying on the other side of the International Date Line.

00:12:09:06 – 00:12:40:07
Joshua Donohue
So the story of wake itself is often forgotten amidst the attack on Pearl Harbor and bases on Oahu. The 1942 film starring Brian Dunne, Levy, Robert Preston and McDonnell Carey was the first time that Americans really had a visual sense of of somewhat what happened there. Although it was not accurate in many ways, especially the ending part, where the Japanese who says basically come and take, you know, come and get us and, you know, the island falls and the Americans fight to the last man.

00:12:40:09 – 00:13:13:06
Joshua Donohue
That’s obviously not what happened. Most of the wake veterans who later saw the film, after they returned home from Japanese P.O.W. camps, didn’t really think too much of it just due to the just the overload of inaccuracies in it. And, of course, wake would fall to the Japanese on the 23rd of December, 1941, after a fierce 16 day battle work in the American garrison, there was about 450 Marines, about 1200 civilians who are in charge of, you know, building, the government contract with the base facilities, road networks, these types of things.

00:13:13:06 – 00:13:42:26
Joshua Donohue
So, the island falls and the Japanese will capture and will be held, all the way through until the end of the war. So the, the Japanese forces also began landing, in the Philippines. And on December 8th, 1941, they would seize most of the island of Luzon by December, December 24th and more than 120,000 Japanese troops were committed during, the battle and against a force of about 150,000 American and Filipino defenders.

00:13:42:28 – 00:14:09:07
Joshua Donohue
So amphibious landings were there, were supported by air attacks, fighters and bombers, coming in from the island of Formosa, which is modern day Taiwan. So these air attacks devastated the Far East air Force, much of which was destroyed on the ground, as we see happened to Pearl Harbor. All of those aircraft just parked out in the open wingtip to wingtip, for fear, obviously, that was going on with Jack with, you know, fear of Japanese sabotage.

00:14:09:12 – 00:14:37:18
Joshua Donohue
So Japanese, you know, aviators were just looking at these targets out in the open. All they had to do is simply just press the trigger. So the invasion force that was sent to the Philippines consisted of, the Japanese 14th Army under the command of general Masaharu Homma. And at about 3:40 a.m. on December 8th, 1941, The Fallen Ring, Lieutenant General Douglas MacArthur’s lavish apartment atop the Manila Hotel.

00:14:37:21 – 00:14:57:15
Joshua Donohue
It was MacArthur’s chief of staff telling him about the news about Pearl Harbor and that MacArthur, again as the commander of American forces in the Philippines, he had sort of wrestled what what to do next? Should he attack Formosa? Should he not? And there was bad weather in the area which actually prevented the Japanese from attacking.

00:14:57:20 – 00:15:23:24
Joshua Donohue
So MacArthur doesn’t really seize the initiative here before he authorizes the strike. It’s it’s far too late. So, the Japanese, you know, would again eventually take the Philippines and again, you would have the fall of Corregidor, soon after the fall of Bataan. They had again occupied Korea, Southeast Asia, Malaysia, Formosa, and large portions of the Chinese mainland.

00:15:23:24 – 00:16:08:14
Joshua Donohue
And they would also occupy, the Solomons, the Gilberts, the Marianas, the Carolinas, the Marshall Islands. So there were literally, no bases between Hawaii and Japan. And the first Japanese landings also would take place in December 8th in northern Malaya, in southern Thailand. So, General Yamashita, on the 10th of December, had penetrated the Malayan frontier all the way, to the city of kata and eventually sinking the Japanese, to the two British battleships, I should say the HMS Prince of Wales and the HMS repulse, which enabled the Japanese now to continue landing their troops, establishing bases in Malaya with really without any limit, really limited Allied interference.

00:16:08:21 – 00:16:46:01
Joshua Donohue
So they, had again advanced all over Southeast Asia and in places all around, they continued. Then by February the 15th, the defenders had driven back to the suburbs of Singapore. And again, food and water supplies were low and that evening, British general Arthur Percival would surrender to the Japanese. So again on 8:00 on this eighth, December 1941, eight hours after the Pearl Harbor attack, again, it had been a disaster, and it would continue to be one bad piece of news after another.

00:16:46:04 – 00:17:07:10
Joshua Donohue
Guam would also be attacked and it would fall. Hong Kong, it would also form what would be termed, Black Christmas. When Hong Kong was surrendered to the Japanese on December 25th, 1941. So pretty much from, you know, the beginning of December, right from the Pearl Harbor attack on the Japanese were were everywhere. And really, we were really, really on the ropes.

00:17:07:13 – 00:17:30:27
Dan LeFebvre
And it sounds like, from everything happening on December or December 8th across the International date line, like with Wake Island and the Philippines, one unique thing about Pearl Harbor, other than being, you know, part of the United States instead of, you know, a territory, is they didn’t have boots on the ground like they did in some of these other places.

00:17:30:27 – 00:17:49:15
Dan LeFebvre
And so it seems like almost I mean, I don’t want to make it seem like Pearl Harbor wasn’t a devastating attack, but, you know, they didn’t land boots on the ground and and actually capture it and take it over, like they did in Wake Island. So, I mean, just the logistics of that of of all of that at once.

00:17:49:15 – 00:17:56:12
Dan LeFebvre
I mean, the logistics of the attack at Pearl Harbor alone. But the logistics of, of all of that just had to be massive.

00:17:56:14 – 00:18:28:04
Joshua Donohue
Yeah. And that’s that’s really where America found itself when Pearl Harbor was attacked. And again, things could have been much worse. A lot of people don’t really think about it as much of a disaster as the attack really seemed. And again, there was you didn’t have the real time information that we have nowadays, and news sort of still traveled really slowly back and, you know, 1941, but once the smoke starts to clear, the, you know, the Japanese didn’t sick of the aircraft carriers.

00:18:28:04 – 00:18:50:24
Joshua Donohue
Luckily that day there were, you know, the USS Lexington was, bringing fighters to midway at the time, and the USS enterprise was coming back from Wake Island. It had delivered the, forward echelon of VMF to 11, under, a major Paul Putnam. Those 12 fighters were b the only Air force that Wake Island would have throughout the the entire siege.

00:18:50:26 – 00:19:10:03
Joshua Donohue
Seven of them were completely destroyed on the ground when the Japanese hit. They really only had four aircraft. Really that the most at a time. And little by little, those numbers were kind of whittled down as the attack went on. They were literally scavenge scavenged, salvaged parts from, you know, derelict planes to put them on usable ones and fly them.

00:19:10:03 – 00:19:31:10
Joshua Donohue
And just the, the engineering and the ingenuity, on the ground there at wake in the stories I’ve read about the accounts there, it’s just it’s almost like a heavyweight fight and just two boxers just going at it, you know, the Marines being, you know, the the unmanned underdog. But they just kept fighting and fighting and fighting until the Japanese, you know, just, you know, brought everything to bear.

00:19:31:11 – 00:19:52:28
Joshua Donohue
They actually thwarted an amphibious invasion three days after that, sunk a, a destroyer. Henry Elrod sunk another following, few hours later with small bombs from little Wildcat fighters. And that’s how the that how much the fighting spirit you would get the, you would receive the Medal of Honor for that. He would not actually survive the battle.

00:19:53:01 – 00:20:03:28
Joshua Donohue
He was killed on the very last day in the morning, and from Japanese fire. So in the wake story, you know, it’s it’s tied to Pearl Harbor in many ways. And, it’s it’s pretty remarkable.

00:20:04:05 – 00:20:24:10
Dan LeFebvre
If we go back to Hawaii and back to to water to the first wave of Japanese planes that we see there, in the movie take off from their carriers as the sun is rising on December 7th, 1941. And we see them flying across Oahu’s farmland and right to Pearl Harbor, where they ultimately commence the first wave of attacks at Pearl.

00:20:24:12 – 00:20:43:00
Dan LeFebvre
And while the movie does show a few other things like USS firing on a Japanese sub just outside Pearl and the B-17s, it got mixed up in the raid on Pearl. Those are all tied to the attack at the base at Pearl Harbor. So I can see how someone watching that movie might think that Pearl Harbor was the only place surprised by the attack.

00:20:43:03 – 00:20:49:04
Dan LeFebvre
Were there any other military installations in Hawaii that were surprised by a Japanese attack on December 7th?

00:20:49:06 – 00:21:16:06
Joshua Donohue
Yeah, and the Japanese first attack, wave, was assigned many fighters and bombers, specifically, purpose for the air base, suppression of all the fighter bases around Oahu. So the fighters set the planes afire with the machine gun and cannon fire. As I mentioned, they’re all parked out in the open. And all of the, you know, all the installations across, you know, every one Wheeler, every field, Kaneohe Bay, all out in the open again.

00:21:16:06 – 00:21:35:07
Joshua Donohue
There’s that fear of the Japanese sabotage. So they want to have visual, you know, a look at every single plane that’s out there. And it turns out to be an absolutely terrible decision. So literally all of the Japanese pilots have to do is just fly right in a straight line. And for the wing tanks and the planes are destroyed.

00:21:35:10 – 00:22:01:07
Joshua Donohue
The second attack wave also had airfield strikes among its tasks. So the subject of my latest article in World War two, history magazine, which is on newsstands now, I wrote about the attack on the Marine Corps Air Station at, Mooring Mast Field. It’s about seven miles to the west of Pearl Harbor, home to several squadrons of clothing, as I mentioned, a VMF 211, which was the, again, the same squadron sent to Wake Island.

00:22:01:07 – 00:22:20:29
Joshua Donohue
And lo, we fought the very last aircraft, after the initial seven were destroyed on the ground and the initial Japanese raid. So the base there was attacked that morning, a few minutes prior to the attack on Pearl Harbor, by the feared Mitsubishi A-6, m2 zero fighter, which at that time was the most dominant fighter in the skies.

00:22:20:29 – 00:22:51:11
Joshua Donohue
At that point, the Americans had no, real answer for it at the time. So any zero or, D3, a Val dive bomber, which and expended its ordnance at Pearl Harbor against the ships and the other the targets there would fly back and use whatever, ammunition or bombs that they had against every field ever field, unfortunately, had the luck, the bad luck of being located right near where the Japanese rendezvous point was when they were going to form up to fly back to the ship.

00:22:51:12 – 00:23:16:17
Joshua Donohue
So all of that activity flying out of Pearl Harbor, going in and coming out ever was really caught in the middle of that maelstrom. So you also had Wheeler Army Airfield in central Oahu, which was Hawaii’s main fighter base. It was also heavily attacked. Some 140 planes were on the ground there, merely P40 and P30 six pursuit planes, nearly two thirds were destroyed or put out of action.

00:23:16:19 – 00:23:41:18
Joshua Donohue
So a similar, proportion of B-17, B18 and A20 bombers at Hickam Army Airfield, which was located right next to, just looking to the east, or Pearl Harbor Navy in that Navy yard. It was also wrecked and damaged enough to keep all of them grounded. So many of the men, killed at Hickam when the Japanese bomber barracks, smaller Bellows Field was on eastern Oahu, was also hit.

00:23:41:24 – 00:24:22:23
Joshua Donohue
Just really mostly straight. I the a couple of Japanese, zeros. They destroyed a couple of P-40s trying to take off. Two pilots actually tried, into the teeth of that enemy onslaught. It was a, you know, again, an active it just, you know, courage and bravery. So the U.S. Navy and Marine Corps air stations on Pearl Harbor, Fort Island, at and ever and the West Pearl at Kaneohe, Bay near Bellows Field, again received all sorts of concentrated attention from the Raiders and was aircraft complement mainly carrier bombers and fighters, was reduced to nearly 50 operational planes to less than 20.

00:24:22:23 – 00:24:45:23
Joshua Donohue
So nearly every plane was either damaged or destroyed. So Fort Island in Kaneohe were also home to several squadrons of long range PBY patrol. Sea planes also attacked heavily, with Fought Island losing about half its planes in Kaneohe, all but a few. So the Naval Air Station, at Kaneohe Bay was bombed very, you know, particularly hard.

00:24:45:26 – 00:25:08:17
Joshua Donohue
It’s to the on the east coast of Oahu. It’s a major Navy ship, sea patrol plane base. And one of the main reasons why the Japanese would target these bases is because they didn’t want to have the risks run the risk of having any long range planes. Follow them all the way back out to find where the carriers were, and then you know exactly where they’re at, and they can send war attack planes to out against them.

00:25:08:24 – 00:25:31:06
Joshua Donohue
So it was imperative to the Japanese that they were attacking every single plane on the ground. And you also touched upon, the USS Woodward and the B-17s depicted, in Tora, Tora, Tora, these events truly what makes that film so true to life? Because there are really otherwise other really overlooked and other films about Pearl Harbor.

00:25:31:14 – 00:26:03:09
Joshua Donohue
They’re important because of the sinking of the Japanese mini sub, by the ward’s gunners. Again, it was contrary to popular belief, but it was was the Americans who actually fired the very first shot at Pearl Harbor. And again, the the tour. Tora, Tora! You know, with the P-40s, you know, we talk about them with the, both the George Welch and, Kenneth Taylor, as we see in the film itself and loosely portrayed in the 2001 film as well, we loosely, loosely portrayed.

00:26:03:09 – 00:26:28:23
Joshua Donohue
Yeah, for a variety of reasons. Yes. Yeah. Michael Bay gets a little carried away with those scenes. But the one, the one scene in Tora, Tortuga, which always blows me away, is the one seen at Wheeler Field, where you have the P-40 that’s hit and it crashes in to the flight line of other P-40s. You actually see it from different scenes, shot from different angles, but it’s the same scene.

00:26:29:00 – 00:26:45:27
Joshua Donohue
That was actually an accident, that that scene was not supposed to happen the way it did. And you see the way that you see those guys running for their lives, they’re really running for their lives in that scene. So look at that scene again. That was not some not meant to happen the way it was supposed to.

00:26:46:01 – 00:27:06:21
Joshua Donohue
Total. Luckily, no one was injured. But yeah, that was that was an interesting one. Also to note, and just in addition to those other bases, Kaneohe Bay, Hickam Field, Wheeler Bellows, Ford Island and ever you also have a lot of smaller coastal defense, forts that are in and around the Pearl Harbor area.

00:27:06:27 – 00:27:29:02
Joshua Donohue
You have Fort Armstrong, you have Fort Barrett. A soldier there was killed by a strafing Japanese plane. Fort de Russie, you have Fort Kamehameha. Seven men were killed or four wounded there. A soldier was also killed at nearby Fort Shafter, by an errant U.S. Navy shell, which was meant for a Japanese plane, but would unfortunately not explode until it hit the ground there.

00:27:29:06 – 00:27:50:09
Joshua Donohue
So the Japanese didn’t really specifically target these in of these installations, but the men there were fighting back with everything they had. They really only had coastal defense guns, so they couldn’t aim them up in the sky and shoot them at the Japanese planes. But if there was a rifle or a machine gun to be had and loaded, you know, the men, they were going to be fighting back with everything they had.

00:27:50:12 – 00:27:59:15
Dan LeFebvre
And I have to go back and watch to our to our to Oregon now. Yeah. I mean, I guess it’s a war movie. So I guess if something like that happens and all your props are destroyed, you mind, you got to throw it in the family got it.

00:27:59:17 – 00:28:18:02
Joshua Donohue
And what’s great is they, they they had the wherewithal to shoot it from different camera perspectives. And if you look, they shoot that scene and, and put it in from different angles. So it looks like a different scene, but it’s actually taken from the same scene. I mean, you had to use that material because that you cannot capture that kind of drama.

00:28:18:02 – 00:28:22:10
Joshua Donohue
And, and in normal, normal, rehearsed kind of settings. So. Yeah.

00:28:22:13 – 00:28:44:16
Dan LeFebvre
Wait, we you talked a lot about the planes on the ground and something else that we see in some of the movies about Pearl Harbor are American planes that are already in the air when the attack happened, we talked about the B-17s. We touched on those, from Twitter, Tora! And 2019 midway. We see Clarence Dickenson casually flying his plane back to base when he notices explosions in the distance that he might be artillery training.

00:28:44:19 – 00:29:02:26
Dan LeFebvre
That changes a moment later when he shot it by the Japanese planes. In in towards moratoria again, there’s, actually a trainer. It’s that’s surrounded by the Japanese planes on their way to the attack. They don’t shoot at the trainer because it’s not a military plane. But then there’s movies like 1960s Storm Over the Pacific or 2001 Pearl Harbor.

00:29:02:27 – 00:29:18:06
Dan LeFebvre
We don’t really see any American planes in the air when the attack happens. So there seems to be a mixed message from the movies when it comes to planes already in the air at the time of the attack, can you unravel the historical side of things? Were there American planes already in the air when the attack took place?

00:29:18:09 – 00:29:38:19
Joshua Donohue
Yeah, there were and they were mainly civilian. That really, really ruined any military. The really the only military planes really in the air were the ones that were coming in. The B-17s were coming in from the West coast, from California, from the 38th and 80th Reconnaissance Wings, just a mixture of B-17 simply there were 12 of them.

00:29:38:21 – 00:30:09:06
Joshua Donohue
And recall that it was also on a Sunday before 8 a.m.. So really the only planes airborne that morning were were mainly civilians. So you mentioned the scene in Tora to our Tora. And that actually did did happen at John Rogers Airport, which is, current day Daniel K in a way, airport. This is just really, you know, right to right below where, Hickam Air, Army Airfield is just where the battleships were at the top of the target list.

00:30:09:09 – 00:30:34:28
Joshua Donohue
A Hawaiian Airlines DC3 had just boarded passengers as was preparing to depart. Local attorney, Roy V to second his son Martin, who was 17, were circling the airport about 800ft and ATC 65 and Aaron Cook, rented from what was was the Gambo Flying Service, one of three flight schools that had been established on the airfield to provide instruction under the civilian Flight training program.

00:30:35:01 – 00:31:00:18
Joshua Donohue
So the owner of that school, Marguerite Gambo, was teaching a student, in a myers OT biplane flying near another Japanese target, kind of yohe. So plumes of smoke rising now from Kaneohe made it clear to Gamboa at this point that the war planes were not American. Her and, her airplane was actually buffeted by the turbulence of the fighters pulling up from their strafing runs as they’re nearing her.

00:31:00:18 – 00:31:35:23
Joshua Donohue
So the fighters didn’t engage the biplane as accurately as you see in the film. However, Gambo, whose encounter was likely the one depicted in the film Tora, Tora, Tora, albeit the wrong aircraft. Again, there’s that history nerd stuff again. The it turned and raced towards John Rogers Airport. There were also a pair of Piper cubs that departed, John Rogers that morning at 740 and headed northeast, flying just off Waikiki Beach towards Diamondhead before turning west and then bound for, camp mahala Callaway on the other side of the island.

00:31:36:00 – 00:32:10:19
Joshua Donohue
And this was where the soldiers of the California National Coast Guard, 251st Coastal Artillery Regiment were based at that time. So the Cub pilots was a passenger of one of the aircraft. Were all members of that unit? So Sergeant Henry Blackwell, corporal Clyde Brown had both been taught to fly, in their off duty hours, by, Robert Tice, who was the, co-owner of the Katy Flying Service, one of three civilian schools and based at John Rogers Airport, and then Sergeant Warren D Rasmussen had come along for a sightseeing, excursion.

00:32:10:25 – 00:32:34:01
Joshua Donohue
So Tice and his wife and the had meanwhile arrived at the airport, not long after the Cubs departed and minutes before the fighters began to strafe the field. So Tice was standing next to his wife on the ramp and was hit in the head, in the first moments of the attack and killed instantly. And this would be one of the first of between estimates, I’ve heard between 47, 54 I’ve heard.

00:32:34:01 – 00:33:09:24
Joshua Donohue
And the number I see most is 68, civilians, struck down. So the soldiers had trained, and were flying about two miles offshore and at around 500ft, headed towards their base. And the V the sects were also circling overhead, having returned, from their flight. And they were, also again, another instructor, Cornelia Fort, was flying Interstate S1 a cadet with a local student, the defense worker and the cadet was approaching John Rogers Airport to practice touch and goes.

00:33:09:27 – 00:33:42:12
Joshua Donohue
So a sailor aboard a Navy tugboat whose account included in the Honolulu Star Bulletin story, which was published on December 20th, 1941. Had sworn in a deposition that they recalled seeing, two yellow cubs flying offshore about 500ft when the Japanese aircraft pounced on flight. There were about seven enemy warplanes, in that number, one Cub plummeted into the ocean, while the other circle for a moment also, before diving in the water, presumably hit, and the only really small fragments were ever found.

00:33:42:14 – 00:34:05:24
Joshua Donohue
So there were a number of, again, military aircraft around, Oahu’s airspace, as I mentioned, of course, the B-17s that were trying to land at Hickam Army Airfield, they’re low on gas. There are. Even when they see the smoke, there’s still not quite sure what they’re seeing until they start seeing Japanese planes flying all around them. It’s about as accurate as it gets when it when it’s shot.

00:34:05:24 – 00:34:30:07
Joshua Donohue
And Tora, Tora, Tora with major Truman landing and he’s trying to land. But he has got one real up, and the plane actually skids to a halt. That the plane they’re probably depicting is the one that’s actually, shot, a zero strafed as it’s landing, it’s splits in half and you see just the upright portion of it sticking up the the tail is completely you know, away from the plane.

00:34:30:09 – 00:34:52:24
Joshua Donohue
That photograph is quite, you know, you see that quite common. There’s also the story of the crew of the San Antonio Rose, B-17 e of the idiot Reconnaissance Squadron, who ended up landing on the seventh fairway of the Kahuku Golf Course on Oahu’s north eastern side. And I always think to myself, if I ever get a chance to play golf on Oahu, I’m going to play golf there.

00:34:52:27 – 00:35:12:24
Joshua Donohue
Or the one next to ever feel that might never come back. Yeah. So they’re that most of the many, you know, the planes were in the air were civilian that morning. And again, the among the first casualties, especially, as I mentioned, those military members who had lost their lives in that one civilian aircraft, were the first, to lose their lives that morning.

00:35:12:27 – 00:35:34:08
Dan LeFebvre
I think it was a I think it was in Tora, Tortuga when the B-17s, the pilots like, what a what a heck of a way to fly into a war or something like that as their, as they’re flying in. I mean, I can only imagine how terrifying and terrifying it would be. But also, like you look at it like there has to be moments of is is this real?

00:35:34:08 – 00:35:54:18
Dan LeFebvre
Like what is what is like just pure disbelief, especially for, you know, trainers and you know, that there’s, military. So you might not know if the military is doing exercises or like with Dickinson and in many ways, like, you know, maybe they’re doing artillery training and they’re I think one of the his, copilots like, oh, that’s, you know, it’s a weird time to do training, right?

00:35:54:18 – 00:36:00:03
Dan LeFebvre
And then they get shot at. So obviously it’s not training, but, can’t imagine what’s running through people’s heads.

00:36:00:05 – 00:36:23:14
Joshua Donohue
And there’s a, there’s a story even from wake Island, when the, when they first see the that flight of Japanese bombers approaching out of a low cloud bank only a few thousand feet off the ground, and they start dropping bombs. Some of the observers say, oh, look, they’re dropping their wheels. They’re, you know, they’re friendly planes. They’re dropping like, no, they’re they’re dropping bombs, open fires.

00:36:23:14 – 00:36:35:20
Joshua Donohue
So, yeah, I mean, right up until that, until the bombs literally started falling, people just couldn’t understand or comprehend that this was even possible. And here it here it was unfolding right before their eyes.

00:36:35:22 – 00:36:54:26
Dan LeFebvre
I’m reminded of you talking about, you know, dropping the wheels. I, I was it towards I think it was toward toward where, where, there is, a plane that’s flying over Pearl Harbor. Japanese plane. And the officer is like, I’ll get that guy’s name. We’re gonna write him up, right? And then they see the bomb start dropping and and it’s like, obviously, you know, so it’s like, yeah, that disbelief, that.

00:36:54:26 – 00:37:28:18
Joshua Donohue
Scene is actually very accurate to to that’s, that’s that’s actually based on, the very first bomb that’s dropped on Ford Island is what that scene is. And again, they’re they’re all in mourning, you know, the, the flag ceremonies, the other bands playing that was going on exactly at that moment. And when you see that first plane, a Val drop a bomb and explode, that bomb is actually on is dropped on hangar six, which is the very which is the seaplane base at the very, southeastern end of Fort Island.

00:37:28:24 – 00:37:32:09
Joshua Donohue
So that actual scene is based on reality.

00:37:32:12 – 00:37:55:07
Dan LeFebvre
Well, you might have already answered this question, but some of the movies about the attack show airfields away from the harbor itself. Toward toward. Toya shows an attack on what I believe is Wheeler Field. 2001 Pearl Harbor has a scene that I think might also be Wheeler Field, that it it doesn’t really mention it in the movie, because I think that part of the movie is mostly just an excuse to get Ben Affleck and Josh Hartnett’s characters in a plane to take off and fight back.

00:37:55:09 – 00:38:07:27
Dan LeFebvre
So for those of us who haven’t been there, can you give us, a bit of geographical context and an overview of the American airfields on Oahu in 1941, and then which ones of those were attacked?

00:38:08:00 – 00:38:32:27
Joshua Donohue
Yeah. So as I mentioned, Wheeler, you mentioned Wheeler Field, and that was the route that is the main fighter base Wheeler is on. The airfield is located in central Oahu, about 12 miles to the north of Pearl Harbor. And Wheeler again was the site of several major historic, actually aviation events, including the first, nonstop mainland to Hawaii flight by Army Air Corps Lieutenant Lester J.

00:38:32:27 – 00:39:03:07
Joshua Donohue
Maitland and Albert Helgenberger in 1927. There was also the great Gold Derby air race from Hawaii, California to Hawaii. Also in 1927, the first trans Pacific flight in the United States to Australia, the Australian squadron leader, Charles Kingsford Smith in 1928 and the first Hawaii to mainland solo flight in 1935 by none other than Amelia Earhart, who flew from Wheeler Field to Oakland, California.

00:39:03:09 – 00:39:36:12
Joshua Donohue
Amelia Earhart also, had an accident on Ford Island’s airstrip, which was, formerly Luke Field. She ground looped, her aircraft there. And we just completely just flipped it over and, you know, it was was again, very obviously active, in that area and during many of her, her flights and this again, also brings us to, every field, in is often pronounced Iowa field, but it’s actually every field, it’s that is several miles as I mentioned, to the west from Pearl Harbor.

00:39:36:14 – 00:39:57:23
Joshua Donohue
You also again have Hickam Army Airfield, which is just situated to the east of Pearl Harbor. That was hit hard during the attacks and again possessed longer range aircraft. It could potentially locate the Japanese carriers and attack them. So this is where the B-17s arriving from California were landing. Most of them were. Again, they were all meant to land there.

00:39:57:23 – 00:40:19:05
Joshua Donohue
All but I believe four landed there. So Tour Territory does a great job depicting the scene. So since Hickam set really to chase into Pearl Harbor, it was hit severely and it had the highest number of losses in comparison to ever Wheeler, bellows, Kaneohe and the Escort Island. So nice. Pearl Harbor lies directly in the middle of Pearl Harbor.

00:40:19:12 – 00:40:41:17
Joshua Donohue
There’s a little tiny island there, if you look on a on Google Maps, and the airstrip is actually still there, but it hasn’t been used many years. The battleships were lined up all along side for four islands the eastern side, the Nevada, the Arizona, the Vestal, the West Virginia, the Tennessee, Oklahoma, Maryland and California. The USS Neosho as well.

00:40:41:20 – 00:41:10:11
Joshua Donohue
The on the western side of Fort Island, you have the light cruisers USS Detroit, USS Raleigh, the former battleship USS Utah, which was converted to a, a target ship. Utah is actually one of the first ships that’s torpedoed. They actually initiated the Japanese, torpedo planes that attack Utah. Some of their pods think it’s actually an a carrier is parked there, and they mistake the Utah for me care, because normally a carrier is parked on that side of the island.

00:41:10:17 – 00:41:31:25
Joshua Donohue
So they, the Utah rolls over and capsizes, kills about 58 men inside of it. So in Tau Tau Tau, when the first wave arrives, you get to you just mentioned that great part about, you know, dropping the bomb and getting that guy’s number on the seaplane ramp. That, again, is depicted, at Ford Island on, the seaplane ramp there.

00:41:32:02 – 00:41:56:21
Joshua Donohue
And another lesser known base I mentioned it earlier was, Bellows Army Airfield. This is really a sub post for Wheeler Army Airfield until it became its own separate military post, in July of 1941. And it’s located on the southeastern side of Oahu. And it’s during the attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7th. Again, there were, two military members killed and six wounded at bellows.

00:41:56:28 – 00:42:17:01
Joshua Donohue
They didn’t kill three, included three pilots of the 44th Pursuit Squadron, who were at bellows for gunnery training and attempted to take off in their P-40s. Again, one was killed climbing into his play, in the second was killed, shot down immediately after getting into the air. And the third, Samuel Bishop took off in his P-40, but actually got shot down.

00:42:17:02 – 00:42:42:18
Joshua Donohue
Actually had to swim back to shore after his plane was damaged and crashed into the ocean. So if you really look at a Wahoo from a defensive perspective, because I mentioned they have a lot of other, coastal artillery defense, positions that were built, they had positions built in the side of mountains. There were casements. There were, you know, fire control bunkers all over the island.

00:42:42:18 – 00:43:17:16
Joshua Donohue
So Oahu is in a, in essence, a floating, land based, battleship. And it was bristling with guns, especially concentrated very heavily around the mouth of Pearl Harbor, because obviously, you have, you know, ships coming in and out of there. You have aircraft for Kamehameha was really the buffer, and fought Fort Armstrong with being the other, being two of the major, you know, strategic, coastal artillery positions that were again assigned to protect anything that was coming in and out of the harbor, anything that was coming out from the sea.

00:43:17:19 – 00:43:29:05
Joshua Donohue
You know, if this Japanese had ships that they were going to invade, Oahu that morning, those, you know, those sides would have been, you know, firing away at those ships and trying to, as many as they possibly could.

00:43:29:07 – 00:43:47:07
Dan LeFebvre
But you might have already answered my my next question because you talked a little bit about the, collateral damage, I’ll say, for the you know, civilian getting shot, movies tend to focus on what’s happening in the harbor itself, of course, but some of them do cut away to show scenes from a distance. First comes to -2019.

00:43:47:07 – 00:44:09:24
Dan LeFebvre
Midway shows Patrick Wilson’s character at Layton as he pulls his car over on the side of the road. For a moment, just to end. He sees, you know, numerous ships ablaze as more Japanese planes continue their attack. 2000, which Pearl Harbor also shows civilians around the island watching the planes fly over as the attack unfolds. And the way that these sequences in the movies play out, it almost seems to imply that the attack is at Pearl Harbor.

00:44:09:24 – 00:44:31:18
Dan LeFebvre
And you talked about some of the other airfields and stuff, but, maybe anybody who is now in one of those areas that’s a target must be safe, because they’re watching these explosions go from what seems like to be a safe distance. Can you help explain what the morning of December 7th, 1941, was like for people who were on Oahu, but maybe not actually at Pearl Harbor, even one of the targets themselves?

00:44:31:20 – 00:44:55:19
Joshua Donohue
Yeah, the, the it was not only an absolutely terrifying few hours and especially in the days, weeks and and really years after there were the blackouts, there was martial law declared on the entire city of Honolulu, was basically on lockdown. There were air raid drills, gas attack drills. You couldn’t go out at night. So life on Oahu was never really the same after the attack.

00:44:55:22 – 00:45:16:02
Joshua Donohue
And most civilians who had heard or saw the Japanese planes coming over just assume that it was another drill by the US Navy or the US Army Air Force, you know, conducting practice sorties, you know, and even with the the when the bombs started dropping and the explosions in thinking from here to eternity even say, okay, they must be blasting the coral heads.

00:45:16:05 – 00:45:37:01
Joshua Donohue
And then all of a sudden the explosions were right outside the window. Okay. Maybe not. So, I can going back to that, that this scene also in from here to Eternity and where they see the planes themselves and assuming that they’re American. But yeah, it’s odd for a Sunday. What are they doing? And again, it’s that scene in Tora, Tortuga where the flying over to get that guy’s number.

00:45:37:07 – 00:45:55:27
Joshua Donohue
They just couldn’t really imagine, you know, the Japanese, you know, attacking like that in, in the 2001 Pearl Harbor movie. Josh Hartnett’s character, Danny, makes a similar comment when he and Ben Affleck’s character are walking on the ice of the attack with a sleeping on the back of their car and said, why is the Navy running?

00:45:55:29 – 00:46:19:27
Joshua Donohue
You know, running, you know, drills on Sunday? And I think about also Daniel Inoue’s quote from a Ken Burns series when he when he sees the anti-aircraft fire and smoke coming from Pearl Harbor, he calls his dad out at that moment, sees three planes fly over, presumably zeros over their house. And in a way, he said, at that moment, he knew exactly what was happening.

00:46:20:00 – 00:46:41:18
Joshua Donohue
He was a 17 year old, you know, volunteer for the Red cross and had just the grim duty of having to recover. A lot of the civilians were killed that morning. So during the attack, there were incredible acts of courage and bravery taking place. Civilians were working alongside military personnel at all of the military installations which were attacked that morning.

00:46:41:18 – 00:47:07:28
Joshua Donohue
So they were exposed to the same dangers as the soldiers, airmen, sailors and Marines. So really, the most the most civilians that were killed by Japanese bullets were against civilians who were working in and around military installations. One story was George Walters, who was, civilian dockworker. He was a crane operator at the Pearl Harbor Navy Yard.

00:47:08:01 – 00:47:33:12
Joshua Donohue
The battleship USS Pennsylvania was in drydock directly in front of him with the two destroyers, the USS Carson and the USS Downes, ahead of the Pennsylvania drydock. So when the attack occurred, he positioned his crane directly over the Pennsylvania in an effort to shield the ship and its crew from the attacking planes. He would be injured by a bomb and struck, that struck the battleship, but only caused minor damage.

00:47:33:18 – 00:47:57:03
Joshua Donohue
So the cast and the downs were both hit by bombs that were seriously damaged. As a result, a lot of the, if you see a lot of them moving and, you know, the the the photographs of the attack, the biggest were some of the biggest columns of smoke, obviously coming from Battleship Row, but it as it goes over, further, you see the USS Shaw, which is on fire, and the castle and the downs and all of the, the planes, on the Hickam Field flight line.

00:47:57:10 – 00:48:34:00
Joshua Donohue
So again, you see a lot of this, take place, again, during the attacks. So smoke columns are coming up, everywhere. And more than anything else, there was this sort of unshakable belief amongst the civilian population that the Japanese were going to be back in some way, shape or form, whether that be another attack wave of planes and even rumors were flying at that night that Japanese soldiers are landing on Hawaii, that there are paratroopers that had been seen, though the rumors and the misinformation and the things that people don’t know and that that could be, you know, a dangerous thing, too.

00:48:34:02 – 00:48:56:15
Joshua Donohue
I especially felt for the Japanese Americans whose lives were really, again, completely upturned and again, and the events that occurred during Pearl Harbor and after you really notice it in Tora Bora tours, where the attack is going on, it’s almost over. And you see that one scene where there was an officer has that interaction. He was that male and with that young Japanese boy.

00:48:56:19 – 00:49:25:19
Joshua Donohue
And it gives him that real stern kind of like, you know, just, you know, just that his face is just all contorted. And the young boys just looking at him like just, you know, you can kind of paralyzed. But, you know, for civilians, it was, a scary situation and, a number that the majority of the civilians who were killed that morning are actually not killed by Japanese bombs were bullets, but by American shells that are being fired from Pearl Harbor.

00:49:25:23 – 00:49:57:11
Joshua Donohue
They’re not exploding in the air. They’re continuing to arc until they land. And many of those shells land in Honolulu and surrounding areas. So there’s about I would say, there was a one, person who did some research on and said it was about 57 or so impact sites in and around the city area. That again, you know, the stories of civilians who are, watching the attack, the planes or they’re standing outside and all of a sudden an explosion happens right down the street.

00:49:57:18 – 00:50:19:12
Joshua Donohue
And, you know, there was one where, there was a Packard that was driving was for, civilians inside of it. And a navy shell landed right next to it, and it just blew the car apart and killed all four of the civilians inside of it. Not only that, a piece of the shrapnel from that explosion kill the young girl who was standing on her front porch, watching it happen with her family.

00:50:19:15 – 00:50:44:16
Joshua Donohue
Her family doesn’t realize what happened to get her inside, and she just, you know, dies right there. So, Yeah, it’s for the civilians again. The Japanese aren’t targeting them. But there are instances. I mean, I even talk about, you know, look at, Ken Taylor and George Welch, the two P-40 pilots, as they’re driving from Wheeler to to Holly Eva field, which is on the North Shore where they get their planes, they’re strafed by Japanese planes.

00:50:44:19 – 00:51:08:04
Joshua Donohue
Colonel Claude Larkin, who’s the CEO. Whatever field he’s dragging from Honolulu to the base, he has the ditch his car twice because planes are strafing him all the way around. And the car still running. He’s lying in the ditch, waiting for the planes to pass away. Perhaps over, I should say so. The. You know, whether it be military, civilian, you know, if it was, you’re in a vehicle and you’re moving, you know, it was a dangerous place to be that morning.

00:51:08:06 – 00:51:26:21
Dan LeFebvre
Well, you mentioned something. They’re saying that that they weren’t targeting civilians. And, if we go to 1953 In harm’s Way, starring John Wayne and Kirk Douglas, when we see the first wave of Japanese planes attacking, part of the plot point finds Kirk Douglas, his wife, played by Barbara Bush, having an affair on the beach when the attack starts.

00:51:26:23 – 00:51:44:18
Dan LeFebvre
And then. But from the movie’s perspective, it’s obvious this was a key part of the plot. But as as I watched when I was watching, that is kind of like, well, from the Japanese pilot’s perspective, they’re just strafing it around a man and woman on the beach. So from their point of view, they’re just to civilians, but they’re clearly targeted because there’s nobody else around on the beach.

00:51:44:25 – 00:51:55:22
Dan LeFebvre
Otherwise it just be an empty beach and planes are shooting at them. So it’s not really a strategic military target. So would it be correct to say, yeah, the that there were no civilian targets that morning.

00:51:55:24 – 00:52:15:09
Joshua Donohue
Yeah. That’s correct. And there was you know, there were the civilians were really in the line of fire that morning, but they weren’t quote unquote targeted. But that didn’t stop a few of the pilots from attacking civilian areas. You know, out of 353 planes used that morning, you can expect every single one of them is just going to avoid civilians.

00:52:15:09 – 00:52:44:29
Joshua Donohue
It was the temptation to see a large kind of juicy target, whether it be, you know, a, you know, some of the plantations that were actually attacked ever being one of them right outside the base gates. So, some sources claim, that these were accidental. And ever feel, for example, just outside the base, one of the youngest victims of the attack, six year old, Yoko Lillian Oda was was the very last civilian to die from the attack.

00:52:44:29 – 00:53:23:11
Joshua Donohue
She passed away from a piece of shrapnel, which struck her in the head just outside of the ever field gate. She passed in February of 1942. So a few of the Japanese POWs likely saw, especially as I mentioned, the plantation, the sugar mills, which were located on these plantation villages, seeing those as targets of opportunity, one of the Marines outside the base, it ever was hit along with, I shouldn’t say that the, Marines, but one of the, civilians, killed on the town of Hawaii who it was, two sugar plantations was, the one there in the one it ever.

00:53:23:15 – 00:53:46:18
Joshua Donohue
So another thing to consider here is that there were also civilian workers in and around the epicenter of the attack. So there were civilians killed or wounded just due to them really being at the wrong place, at the wrong time. So the again, as I mentioned, the commanding officer ever, Lieutenant Colonel Claude Larkin, was driving his 1930 Plymouth, from his home to ever and again had to ditch his car on two occasions.

00:53:46:24 – 00:54:10:04
Joshua Donohue
And again, you mentioned that George Welch and Ken Taylor, pilot, the two three P-40 pilots were nearly killed as they make their way up to Oahu’s North Shore. So, as I mentioned earlier, there, between 49 and other estimates have 68 civilians who lost their lives during the attack. Most of the casualties, again, were caused by, falling anti-aircraft shells that were fired by the ships in the, the guns of Pearl Harbor.

00:54:10:06 – 00:54:45:25
Joshua Donohue
The fuzes on the shells were a time that properly so instead of exploding in the air at a predetermined altitude, they would simply continue to arc into the city of Oahu and other residential areas. And again, some of them would just explode on impact. So, as I mentioned, that one, where the, the the scene with the Packard, is, destroyed in, in Pearl Harbor, the 2001 will be again, one of those scenes that gets a little bit carried away where they’re just flying raw and just strafing people, just, you know, just in cold blood.

00:54:45:27 – 00:55:11:06
Joshua Donohue
That’s not really what’s going on. So, yeah, there’s there’s another instance where, and this is, this is quite, quite, striking, jutsu Ohara Saki, who is a 48 year old Japanese American who ran a restaurant in Honolulu on the morning of the attack. He was at his diner with his family when a five inch shell from a navy, ship explode, came to the window and exploded.

00:55:11:09 – 00:55:19:17
Joshua Donohue
Harris Sakai was killed instantly, as were his three children, 14 year old cousin and seven young men who just happened to be eating breakfast that morning.

00:55:19:19 – 00:55:41:03
Dan LeFebvre
Wow, wow. I mean, I, I would assume and correct me if I’m wrong, but I would assume that with the anti-aircraft, the fuze is not being set correctly. And then, of course, shooting towards a populated area. I imagine a lot of that was just from the confusion of everything that was going on and rushing to get to shoot it, whatever you could basically.

00:55:41:03 – 00:56:00:11
Joshua Donohue
Yeah, because a lot of their ammunition was locked up. They had to go through, you know, you know, bust open, you know, at every field and other places that I read stories where, you know, they’re basically trying to scramble to get these guns prepped and loaded. It’s a multi-person effort to get especially the larger caliber guns, that they have to fire it.

00:56:00:12 – 00:56:31:18
Joshua Donohue
It’s not just one person out there you’re doing this. All in all, it’s a it’s a time consuming process. And in that process, you’re probably not thinking, oh, yeah, let’s just try to maybe have the fuze explode and it would a preset altitude and the Japanese planes are going to be they’re just shooting blindly. And this would happen really throughout the attack, especially as we see with some of the military planes coming in, the planes from the enterprise and other P-40s and that are coming in and around, they’re taking you off trying to find the Japanese planes.

00:56:31:21 – 00:56:44:05
Joshua Donohue
They’re now being shot at by their own gunners on the ground because there’s stur, you know, there’s there’s such a frenzy of confusion and trigger happy gunners on the ground. They see something flying. They’re going to shoot first and ask questions later.

00:56:44:07 – 00:57:10:10
Dan LeFebvre
It’s Yeah. I mean, it’s interesting. I mean, it goes from assuming that the planes that are flying over must be doing some drill, and then all of a sudden it becomes anything flying in the air is a target. It must be the enemy. It’s just that that flip, that the chaos of war, I mean, I can, I can thankfully, I’ve never been in that situation, but I can I can understand how that, confusion is just everywhere and rampant.

00:57:10:15 – 00:57:29:27
Joshua Donohue
Yeah. And it kind of was just, you know, the streets of Honolulu were, you know, there were there were fires. There were they were having the civilians there. Again. It must have been terrifying. And they’re not thinking, of course, at the time. Oh, these are probably shells coming from Pearl Harbor, they think, and this is the Japanese trapping and bombs and killing, you know, innocent civilians.

00:57:29:27 – 00:57:54:07
Joshua Donohue
So thinking about that and and what happens, as I mentioned, after, you know, the fallout, especially for Japanese Americans who are living in Hawaii and, of course, on the West Coast and everything that happens with, you know, later on in World War two with the Japanese internment camps. And there’s that overall anti-Japanese sentiment. It’s starting to really build, I think of, Grace to Kuno.

00:57:54:09 – 00:58:13:08
Joshua Donohue
I believe her name was she was a student at Berkeley, in California when the attack happened. And she was going to, to a school that I get off the bus that morning. And the radio was just given the all the information about Pearl Harbor. And she’s looking around her, and everyone’s looking right at her and staring here and giving that that look, I was telling you, all extraterritorial.

00:58:13:15 – 00:58:23:14
Joshua Donohue
It was just instant. Like, all of a sudden, you know, everyone’s. It’s just the whole climate changes, literally with those, those, you know, in a matter of a few hours.

00:58:23:16 – 00:58:44:11
Dan LeFebvre
Well, one of the common themes in movies about Pearl Harbor is how the attack rallied American morale in support of joining World War two. Perhaps the most famous movie quote is at the end of Tora tour Tora! When Admiral Yamamoto says, I fear all we have done is to awaken a sleeping giant and fill him with a terrible resolve.

00:58:44:13 – 00:59:02:18
Dan LeFebvre
Of course, as we’ve talked about a lot today, the movies mostly cover the attack at Pearl itself instead of the things going on elsewhere that we talked about. You know, like with Wake Island and such. But back in 1941, was there a lot of coverage for any of the other attacks that we’ve talked about today outside the base at Pearl itself?

00:59:02:21 – 00:59:24:28
Joshua Donohue
Yeah. And it’s it’s you think about, you know, the information, how quickly we get it nowadays. So we haven’t really the palm of our hand just was not the case back then. Americans in those days were getting their information via newspaper, radio or the newsreels that they would see being shown at local movie theaters. And newsreels would be shown before the film started.

00:59:24:28 – 00:59:49:19
Joshua Donohue
So American audiences were getting, you know, all the information that, you know, that was available to them at the time. So they’re getting an actual visual, not just, you know, hearing it and reading in the newspaper. So, as I mentioned, they were, you know, audiences were getting nothing but bad news from what was going on between Japan’s offensive, which we talked about earlier, all of their operations in the Pacific, but also what’s going on in Europe as well.

00:59:49:22 – 01:00:09:22
Joshua Donohue
And it unlike the professional armies of Germany and Japan, the US armed forces were completely unprepared to fight a major war. I think they said in 1940 the US Army was smaller than that of Romania and of about 174,000 men in uniform. I think they said there were more men in the NYPD than there were in the Marine Corps.

01:00:09:25 – 01:00:33:07
Joshua Donohue
So, the Army still own tens of thousands of cavalry horses. And so, you know, the war was so far away, it simply didn’t occur to most Americans that such an attack was even possible. And in the events of the outside world, which is seemingly impossibly far away, especially due to the fact that the country was still in the midst of a Great Depression and were now just trying to pull itself out of it.

01:00:33:09 – 01:00:50:21
Joshua Donohue
The country that really been hit hard, especially in the Midwest and a lot of the farming areas. So Americans would go to movie theaters where, again, they’d see these newsreels because you’d see what was going on with, you know, with Hitler coming to power. Then you can fast forward to, you know, the civil war in Spain in 1936.

01:00:50:21 – 01:01:20:11
Joshua Donohue
We see, you know, civilians being attacked and then the Nazis seizing Czechoslovakia in 1938, invading Poland in 1939 and officially starting the Second World War from that event, when both England and France would declare war on Germany. Then you, of course, would have the fall of France. You you you’d you’d see the news with Dunkirk, for example, with the massive retreat of the forces of the British and the French there, Denmark, Norway, Holland fell, Belgium was crushed.

01:01:20:13 – 01:01:46:11
Joshua Donohue
Fans of France would fall in 1940. Britain would fall under attack during the Blitz in 1840, British cities at Cannes being attacked relentlessly by the, the air, by German warplanes and other, you know, terror weapons like the V-1. And you’ll American we had reporters. Edward R Murrow was in London reporting on these attacks and giving Americans a real just an awful glimpse of what was going on.

01:01:46:18 – 01:02:08:22
Joshua Donohue
So the overall feeling in the country at that point was similar to that of the of the, you know, before the First World War, that was isolationism. You know, Americans were hoping that the country could stay out of the war. And from December 1941 until June, I would say, of 1942, Americans were getting nothing but bad news coverage, in all, in every way, shape or form.

01:02:08:24 – 01:02:27:02
Joshua Donohue
And once Pearl Harbor happens, you can. It really makes the news more and more urgent. It can. The Japanese were on the offensive in the Pacific. The Americans were starting to make some small gains in the interim. Again, you had the fight at wake that happens. And that kind of bolsters, America’s, you know, spirits a little bit.

01:02:27:08 – 01:02:54:16
Joshua Donohue
But once the island was surrendered, it was again, once, once again, back to a low point. But as you start to see, over time, you know, the Americans begin to turn the tide. The you, of course, have the, Doolittle raid on April of 1942, which again, is not a is depicted in, torture in, 2001 Michael Bay film, you know.

01:02:54:16 – 01:02:57:18
Joshua Donohue
Yeah, yeah.

01:02:57:20 – 01:03:00:04
Dan LeFebvre
Yeah. It’s all you need to say on that one, I guess. Yeah, yeah.

01:03:00:06 – 01:03:05:27
Joshua Donohue
And I there’s there’s this there’s some liberties that were taken.

01:03:06:00 – 01:03:07:12
Dan LeFebvre
That’s a nice way to put it. Yeah.

01:03:07:15 – 01:03:32:16
Joshua Donohue
But, you know, but over time in really this, you have to sort of, you know, Americans start to see the gains that we’re making. You know, the Doolittle Raid as we the first major event that you have, the battle of the Coral Sea in May of 1942, which is really a some people would say a draw, a tactical victory for the Japanese, but more of a, you know, a sense of America’s navy is beginning to catch up to the Japanese.

01:03:32:16 – 01:03:53:09
Joshua Donohue
We lose a carrier. The Japanese, would lose, a carrier as well. And once you get to the Battle of Midway, which takes place in June of 1942, as we see in that and that film, again, we we, we have picked ourselves back up again. We are again using intelligence, breaking the Japanese code. We know where they’re going to be.

01:03:53:15 – 01:04:11:22
Joshua Donohue
You know, we have the proper people in place, intelligence gathering. You have, you know, Admiral Nimitz out there, you have a Bull Halsey at you have some great admirals out there who are again, going to take what’s left of the US Navy after the attack and bring it to the Japanese. And of course, we see what happens at midway.

01:04:11:22 – 01:04:23:08
Joshua Donohue
And, again, it’s it’s the decisive battle of the Pacific, I believe in the Pacific theater from the at that point in time and from really from that point on, the Japanese would never really recover.

01:04:23:11 – 01:04:42:20
Dan LeFebvre
Well, speaking of midway, the movie at least, a common theme that we see in a lot of movies about the attack at Pearl is how it ties into other battles after it, like in In Midway after the attack at Pearl is is at the beginning of that movie, then it obviously covers the Battle of Midway, the 1960 Japanese film storm of the Pacific does the same thing.

01:04:42:22 – 01:05:04:17
Dan LeFebvre
2001 Pearl Harbor you talked about, goes from the attack of Pearl to the Doolittle Raid. Interestingly, the main characters in those movies seem to also take part in the other battles. Correct me if I’m wrong, I’m pretty sure Ben Affleck and Josh Hartnett characters in Pearl Harbor are fictional. Yeah, we still see them as pilots during the attack at Pearl and then going on to take part in the Doolittle Raid in 2019.

01:05:04:17 – 01:05:23:24
Dan LeFebvre
Midway, we see pilots like Dick Bast and Clarence Dickinson taking part in the Battle of Midway after having lived through the attack at Pearl. So the impression that I get from the movies is that many of the American pilots who survived Pearl Harbor went on to some of America’s most decisive naval and air battles later on in the war.

01:05:23:26 – 01:05:27:21
Dan LeFebvre
Is there any truth to that concept? The movie seems to suggest so.

01:05:27:21 – 01:05:57:15
Joshua Donohue
To go back to the 2001 film, the characters played by Ben Affleck and Josh Hartnett, they’re really in that film. Are loosely based on George Welch and Ken Taylor, the pilots, you see that they’re actually portrayed as they are in Tora, our Torturer. And, you know, we’ll get into that in a moment. So those, the actions of those P-40 pilots, again, as I mentioned, that happened there, that that particular film, as I mentioned, offers the most accurate portrayal of their actions.

01:05:57:15 – 01:06:15:18
Joshua Donohue
So one thing to note is that neither pilot took part in the Doolittle Raid, as we see later on happening in the film with, you know, Affleck and, you know, Josh Hartnett piloting the B20 fives with, you know, Alec Baldwin and who was playing Jimmy Doolittle in the in the famous raid.

01:06:15:18 – 01:06:18:09
Dan LeFebvre
And they’re all planes are the same. You can just pilot. Yeah.

01:06:18:11 – 01:06:36:00
Joshua Donohue
Yeah, yeah, no big deal. Just we’re just going to go on to the carrier getting the planes and just here you go. But some of the, some of the, the story of that was in the film that you see is actually true. They had to lighten the load as much as possible, right down to, you know, having broom handles for aircraft.

01:06:36:04 – 01:06:56:11
Joshua Donohue
You know, any aircraft, you know, 50 caliber machine guns, I guess you could say. But as far as the the the real story of the pilots of George Welch, one of the, you know, the P-40 pilots who got up in the air and helps you down a number of Japanese planes that morning, he would actually go on to earn, the Distinguished Service Cross for his actions on December 7th.

01:06:56:13 – 01:07:21:26
Joshua Donohue
He would later go on to claim 16 victories in 348 combat missions. Malaria would actually end his war. He would later be killed in 1953, after his, aircraft. I believe he was flying a F-100 Super Saber. Would disintegrate, during a test. So a lot of these abuses, said I, Chuck Yeager, was another good example.

01:07:21:28 – 01:07:44:16
Joshua Donohue
Would go on to fly, you know, test out some of, you know, America’s newest, jet fighter planes. So Welch’s wingman and friend, Kenneth Taylor, he would go on to fight in the skies over Guadalcanal. He was later wounded in a Japanese airstrike on Henderson Field in 1943. He was able to down two more aircraft while he was stationed there, which would bring him to ace status.

01:07:44:19 – 01:08:09:16
Joshua Donohue
Another aviator who gained fame after the Pearl Harbor attack was a guy named Phil Rasmussen. He earned the name the Pajama pilot. He was literally in his pajamas when the attack happened. He jumped into his P 36 fighter and fought Japanese aircraft over Kaneohe Bay, where the naval air station was under attack. I think when he landed, they counted like 500 holes in his airplane.

01:08:09:22 – 01:08:12:29
Joshua Donohue
The tail wheel was shot away. I mean, how he was able to get.

01:08:12:29 – 01:08:14:01
Dan LeFebvre
He still landed?

01:08:14:03 – 01:08:40:28
Joshua Donohue
Yes. He somehow landed, at Wheeler Field. So after shooting down one plane, he was attacked by two more zeros, more shells and, 20 millimeter cannons and go! Fire blew away the canopy, destroyed his radio, severed the hydraulic lines, the water cable. He would sort you seek refuge in the cloud bank and begin flying back towards Wheeler and again, counting more than 500 bullet holes.

01:08:41:04 – 01:09:04:24
Joshua Donohue
And he is actually in the Air Force Museum. There is a, a p 36. That is, the paint scheme is just like his, like a silver. And as the 86 on the side and, Yeah. The other pilots you mentioned, Dick best and Clarence Dickinson, in midway. That’s more of an actual, you know, accurate portrayal of what happens.

01:09:04:24 – 01:09:42:26
Joshua Donohue
Dickinson’s plane is shot down by a Japanese zero as he is flying his SBD Dauntless from the Enterprise to Oahu. So his wingman was shot down. His plane was taking fire. He bailed out his rear gunner, William Miller, who had already claimed one zero, was presumably killed by, a second one. And he went down, with the plane, actually at every field, and number, including Clark, and witnessed this, they start to see, planes, Japanese planes and American planes, you know, kind of, you know, going into the skies just low over the over the field, a, I believe Revelle and a Dauntless, one of the Dauntless from the

01:09:42:26 – 01:10:15:28
Joshua Donohue
enterprise collide and crash right outside of Ever field, and going on to, the midway battle. You have, Clarence Dickenson, landing a bomb on the deck of the Kaga during the Battle of Midway. He would later earn three Navy Crosses, the first to do so, along with fellow aviator Lieutenant Noel Gaylor. So, many of the pilots has, you know, we mentioned especially Welch and Taylor, not taking place in the Doolittle raid, but they would again go on and fly, you know, missions and serve with distinction.

01:10:16:00 – 01:10:23:09
Dan LeFebvre
I just assume the, the uniform for pilots after that would just be pajamas, right? I mean, because apparently that’s what it takes to.

01:10:23:11 – 01:10:43:13
Joshua Donohue
Well, Welch, Welch and Taylor when they were tuxedo. Oh, really? Yeah. Oh, yeah, they were, they were, they were partying the night before, you know, that just that’s kind of how, when Affleck and, Josh Hartnett were waking up from that, you know, they were fighting each other, drinking the night before. So it is similar to the circumstances of what Welch and Taylor did, you know, had to deal with that morning.

01:10:43:17 – 01:10:49:22
Joshua Donohue
And they. Yes, they were in their, their tuxedo, pants and whatever they else they had on from the night before.

01:10:49:22 – 01:10:58:28
Dan LeFebvre
Wow, wow. I guess it just goes to show, I mean, it was such a surprise. And then again, at being so early in the morning on a Sunday, I mean, yeah, you’d expect to sleep in.

01:10:59:00 – 01:11:02:10
Joshua Donohue
Exactly. You know, you expect to be talking about the Japanese. That’s.

01:11:02:12 – 01:11:04:13
Dan LeFebvre
Which is probably why they did it then.

01:11:04:18 – 01:11:06:10
Joshua Donohue
Yes. But,

01:11:06:12 – 01:11:11:01
Dan LeFebvre
Are you open to doing, a hypothetical what if type of question from a movie we haven’t talked about yet?

01:11:11:02 – 01:11:12:03
Joshua Donohue
Yeah, let’s do it.

01:11:12:06 – 01:11:37:12
Dan LeFebvre
The storyline of 1980s The Final Countdown follows the nuclear powered USS Nimitz as it goes through a storm that takes them back in time to December 6th, 1941, and they have the option to stop the attack before it happens. Ultimately, the time traveling storm come back before they’re able to do that. But let’s say the US did have a nuclear powered carrier like USS Nimitz during the attack.

01:11:37:15 – 01:11:47:26
Dan LeFebvre
Would that have been enough firepower to stop the attack, and if so, how do you think stopping the attack would have changed the course of history?

01:11:47:29 – 01:12:20:03
Joshua Donohue
That’s a good question. And, it would be interesting to see in one of those sort of war game simulations, those scenarios that play out, that they put. What would the most likely outcome of this type of, you know, hypothetical, what if scenario B, so if hypothetically, we you know, we can we had all of the advanced tech say if it’s just a carrier minus the task force, because especially if it’s a carrier and it’s task force, you’re going to wipe out that that opposing force pretty much a no problem at all.

01:12:20:03 – 01:12:41:07
Joshua Donohue
Because just a just based on your reach alone. Just what missile technology, how far it had come. So you could theoretically wipe out, I would say an entire Japanese task force with a few pursues and strikes, especially with guided missiles, advanced and advanced radar systems by this time. So you could really, you know, reach out and touch the enemy without them even knowing you’re there.

01:12:41:07 – 01:13:11:15
Joshua Donohue
You to the miles away. And again, missiles are starting to hit your ships and your the your aviators can’t land. You know, you’re going to lose all your air, your air support again. You’re going to attack the support ships as well. So I believe especially the biggest difference from the end of the Second World War, if you think about it, were you really have until it going up to the 1980s and the advances and guidance systems, you know, targeting systems and ordnance and things like that, things we’ve done with trial and error.

01:13:11:15 – 01:13:33:05
Joshua Donohue
You even had, drones in World War Two. Most people don’t realize that there’s actually a famous picture of Marilyn Monroe building a drone, I think, in Burbank, in the 19, 1944, I believe. So they were already experimenting with, you know, unmanned planes, guided weapons systems were already being, you know, like the Germans. I know we were very active with that.

01:13:33:10 – 01:14:04:02
Joshua Donohue
So you would need hundreds, in some cases, thousands of bombers on a single mission using these sort of unguided bombs, which is simply falling out of your bomb bay. You’re not guiding this ordnance to Earth. They’re just falling and causing untold casualties, especially in civilian areas, which, you know, of course, we find out later on, you know, that, the bomb damage assessment is, again, it’s considerable because you really wanted to, you know, have a precision strike.

01:14:04:07 – 01:14:42:06
Joshua Donohue
But when you’re putting up this many bombers at once and trying to drop, you know, thousands and thousands of tons of, you know, ordnance on a target, you there were times where they wouldn’t even be successful. It’s bad weather if they’re using smoke screens on the ground. And this would this would happen throughout the war with advanced systems on the, you know, with the planes that we have especially it’s maybe say go to 1984, 85 around that time and say you what runs how the movie was out, you had the F-14 Tomcat, you had the A-6 intruder, you have the, the E2, C Hawkeye, which with its radar dome, could detect threats from hundreds and

01:14:42:06 – 01:15:14:17
Joshua Donohue
thousands of miles away. So you could again reach out and hit the enemy. They would never even know you were there. And if it was it for it to be decisive, weapon and changed the course of the war. Yeah, I got to believe, you know, and again, in a hypothetical sense, that with the advancements that had been made really from the beginning of, you know, World War II to all the way through to the mid 1980s, and again by that time also, it was, you know, the 1980s were still like those last Cold War years.

01:15:14:24 – 01:15:39:00
Joshua Donohue
You know, the US military’s undergoing, you know, just a complete, you know, overhaul from, you know, the, from the end of the Vietnam War with new planes, you know, new bombs, new, you know, new theories, all of these things were just, you know, are always constantly changing and being upgraded, improved. So, hypothetically. Yeah, I think it could have been a decisive, decisive, outcome.

01:15:39:02 – 01:15:41:21
Dan LeFebvre
It would switch the surprise to being on the other side.

01:15:41:25 – 01:15:47:14
Joshua Donohue
Exactly. Yes. Yeah. Flipping that, flipping the script and flipping the tables on that literally.

01:15:47:16 – 01:16:05:19
Dan LeFebvre
Well, thank you so much for coming on to cover a lot of the things that we don’t see in the movies about the attack on Pearl Harbor. For anyone wanting to learn about another little known piece of history, you have a fantastic new article about the embattled Marines Air Station. Eva almost pronounced that you are, It takes a.

01:16:05:19 – 01:16:05:26
Joshua Donohue
Bit.

01:16:06:03 – 01:16:18:07
Dan LeFebvre
It takes a bit. I’ve got that linked in the show notes for everyone watching this to check that out. And while they do that, what’s something that you learned? One writing that article that might surprise someone who has only seen the movies about Pearl Harbor?

01:16:18:09 – 01:16:38:11
Joshua Donohue
There were, you know, once you start to get down to, you know, the individual stories. And when I was researching, I, I’d done quite a bit of research, as I do for all my written projects. I like to know that the little stories, the things you don’t normally hear about, you know, the things that were going on in Honolulu with the civilians were dealing with during the attack.

01:16:38:13 – 01:17:04:11
Joshua Donohue
One particular individual, and this took place at every field, was a marine who actually lost his life at the hands of his, his fellow Marines. His name is William Edward. Lou Sean. He was a marine, who was stationed at ever that morning. And there have been, many stories about and, about what really happened.

01:17:04:11 – 01:17:27:03
Joshua Donohue
There were, eyewitnesses who were there, you know, inside the base. Outside the base, from what, I found out, this particular marine that once the attack started to happen, the base starting to be hit. If he had maybe upset someone, if he had, you know, there would have been, you know, who knows what really happened.

01:17:27:06 – 01:17:54:22
Joshua Donohue
But from what, I read and researched, he was. They tried to apprehend him for whatever reason they thought he was helping the enemy. I’ve heard people say it was because of his German last name. His parents were German. That that had something to do with it. He was trying to help the Japanese. And this is kind of ridiculous, this story that he was running out into the cane fields, burning arrows into the cane field to help direct the Japanese planes towards ever.

01:17:54:25 – 01:18:23:22
Joshua Donohue
That’s probably not going to happen. But, what happens is he eventually, finds a weapon and the marine, his fellow Marines, and they go into a shootout towards the entrance of the base. Lushan is eventually killed as believe. What happens is they send a car, literally, like almost. This is something that kind of a Dick Tracy comic there in the back of the like a like a Packard with a Tommy gun, you know, out the window at them.

01:18:23:22 – 01:18:53:09
Joshua Donohue
And the one of the one of the, Marines who was there was Albert Caselli was one of the Marines who took part in the actual, the killing of Lucia and says he was filled with so many holes, we had no idea which one was the one that killed them. So that I looked into that and a solution was buried at a, a military cemetery, which in even, Claude Larkin Ebsco makes referenced in his report that there was one exception.

01:18:53:15 – 01:19:18:06
Joshua Donohue
Everybody else fought hard. And all this except with one exception, basically Lushan. And it’s not really known the circumstances of. So what happens is it was it it was he trying to collaborate that we did. We didn’t really get the full picture of what happened. I looked later on and it said that he was cleared of all wrongdoing and again, was, you know, it was, you know, buried in the military cemetery.

01:19:18:06 – 01:19:49:18
Joshua Donohue
So we don’t really we know, but we don’t know, kind of what happened in that in that case, another thing that people may not realize is that there was a second attack on Pearl Harbor. This takes place in March of 1942, and what’s known as operation K, the Japanese will send two, colonies a k Emily flying boats filled with bombs to try and hit Pearl Harbor at night, to try and disrupt the salvage and, the repairs going on there.

01:19:49:20 – 01:20:13:00
Joshua Donohue
They are unsuccessful. Oahu was under a total blackout, which proves effective. The bombs land either in the Pacific Ocean or on the side of a an extinct volcano. I think there was, I think Roosevelt High School. I think the windows were blown out or something like that, but they don’t get even close to their intended target. So kind of little stories that you find out as you’re doing your research, it’s it’s pretty interesting stuff.

01:20:13:03 – 01:20:15:28
Dan LeFebvre
Not so much a surprise anymore in 1942.

01:20:15:29 – 01:20:25:00
Joshua Donohue
Exactly. We were ready. We’re we’re ready this time. Or they actually had radar. They they believe the radar operators this time around, unlike the first time around.

01:20:25:02 – 01:20:30:22
Dan LeFebvre
Well, I’ll make sure to add a link to that in the show notes. And, before we started recording, you mentioned some things that you’re working on now.

01:20:30:26 – 01:20:55:15
Joshua Donohue
Yeah. So I am currently working on the sort of the last, phases of finishing my article about my uncle who fought in Vietnam. He was with the 17th Cav, 198th Light Infantry Brigade, the 23rd of Macao. He fought, from August 1968 to August 1969. So it’s it’s going to be focusing on his time there.

01:20:55:17 – 01:21:13:27
Joshua Donohue
And although I’ve interviewed a bunch of the veterans who knew him and they just, you know, they all rave about him. He actually passed away, about ten years ago. So it’s definitely a personal story. He was somebody I admired and looked up to my whole life, and he never spoke of the war. You know, I never once asked him about it.

01:21:14:00 – 01:21:42:15
Joshua Donohue
And, you know, now, hearing about what, you know, all of his exploits and how well-respected he was amongst his men in Vietnam was just saying, look, I have to write this story. It’s just it’s just too good not to. I am also in the early phases of writing my first book. That is going to be about a soldier, John Hollar, Lieutenant John Hummel, who fought, during the Battle of Bataan when the Japanese invaded the Philippines.

01:21:42:18 – 01:21:58:01
Joshua Donohue
So he was with the 194th Tank Battalion. And it’s about his story. And, it’s it’s remarkable. I was reading through his memoirs and the some of the stuff that I read, I was like, I have to tell this story. It’s just just too good not to.

01:21:58:04 – 01:22:07:26
Dan LeFebvre
Wow, I can’t wait for those. And for anybody watching this, check the show notes, because as soon as those are available, I will make sure to add those in there. But the Iva article is available right now. Thanks again so much for your time.

01:22:07:26 – 01:22:17:08
Joshua Donohue
Josh, thank you so much for having me on. Appreciate it.

01:22:17:11 – 01:22:35:23
Dan LeFebvre
This episode is based on a true story was produced by Dan the Fab. Thank you once again to Joshua Donohue for helping us learn the things we don’t get to see in the movies about Pearl Harbor happened in the show. Notes. To find a link to Josh’s latest work as of this recording, that is his article entitled Embattled Marines at Air Station Iva.

01:22:35:25 – 01:22:55:11
Dan LeFebvre
We talked about that throughout this episode, but if you’re catching this episode later, Josh talked about some of the things that he’s working on right now as of this recording. So as soon as those are available, I’ll be adding those to the show notes as well. As always, you can find the links to everything over at. Based on a True Story podcast.com/379.

01:22:55:14 – 01:23:20:10
Dan LeFebvre
Okay, now it’s time for the answer to our two tours and a live game from the beginning of the episode. And as a quick refresher, here are the two truths and one lie again. Number one, Wake Island was attacked just a few hours after receiving word of the attack on Pearl Harbor. Number two Phil Rasmussen went up in his 36 wearing pajamas and landed with about 500 bullet holes in his plane.

01:23:20:12 – 01:23:33:07
Dan LeFebvre
Number three. In addition to military targets, the Japanese attacked numerous civilian targets around Pearl Harbor. Did you figure out which one is a lie? I’ve got the answer in the envelope, so let’s open that up.

01:23:33:09 – 01:23:54:06
Dan LeFebvre
And the lie is number three. As we learned from Josh, there were not any civilian targets around Pearl Harbor. But that’s not to say that there weren’t civilian casualties. Josh told us stories of some of those civilians caught at the wrong place at the wrong time. And we also learned that many of the civilian deaths were actually caused by friendly fire and the chaos of the surprise attack.

01:23:54:06 – 01:24:15:21
Dan LeFebvre
Anti-Aircraft rounds shot by Americans in the harbor ended up landing in and around Honolulu. Thanks for sticking around to the end. If you’re watching the video version here, in a moment you’re going to see the credits roll, and if you want to get your name in the credits for the next video and on the website, you can learn how to become a base on a true story producer using the link in the description or over at based on a True Story podcast.

01:24:15:26 – 01:24:27:15
Dan LeFebvre
Combat support once again, that’s based on a true story podcast.com/support. Until next time. Thanks so much for spending your time with Josh and today, and I’ll chat with you again really soon.

 

00:00:02:06 – 00:00:28:21
Dan LeFebvre
Hello and welcome to Based on a True Story, the podcast that compares your favorite Hollywood movies with history. Today we’ll be learning about the new movie called Nuremberg, directed by James Vanderbilt. Nuremberg is set during the Nuremberg trials in the wake of World War Two. In the movie, we see Michael Shannon’s version of justice Robert Jackson as a main driver behind the trial in an attempt to force the Nazi leadership to answer for their crimes during the war.

00:00:28:24 – 00:00:47:17
Dan LeFebvre
The movie focuses mostly on Russell Crowe’s version of Hermann Goering, who was one of the most powerful figures in the Nazi Party. And that brings us to one of the other main characters in the movie. Rami Malik’s version of Doctor Douglas Kelly. In the movie, Doctor Kelly is tasked with assessing the mental competence of Goering and other Nazis to stand trial.

00:00:47:20 – 00:01:04:20
Dan LeFebvre
To help us unravel the true story behind the movie today we’ll be talking with none other than Jack ally. Jack is the author of the book that they used as a basis for the movie. That book is called The Nazi and the psychiatrist. And you can find a link in the show notes to pick up your own copy right now.

00:01:04:23 – 00:01:23:11
Dan LeFebvre
But before we dive in, just a quick heads up. As of this recording, Nuremberg is still playing in the theaters and if you’ve listened to any based on a true story episodes before, you know that we can’t really dig into the historical accuracy without getting into the movie’s plot. So consider this your spoiler alert. Okay, now let’s set up our game for this episode.

00:01:23:12 – 00:01:39:12
Dan LeFebvre
Now, if you are new to the show, since based on a true story is all about separating fact from fiction in the movies, you’ll get to practice your skills at separating fact from fiction in this podcast episode with a game of two truths and a lie. So I’m about to give you three things that we’re going to talk about at some point throughout this episode.

00:01:39:14 – 00:02:00:12
Dan LeFebvre
Two of those are true, and one of them is just a lie. And your task is to see if you can figure out which one is the lie. Are you ready? Okay, here they are. Number one, Doctor Kelly was fired for talking to a newspaper reporter in Nuremberg. Number two, Doctor Kelly delivered letters from Hermann Goering to his family.

00:02:00:12 – 00:02:18:23
Dan LeFebvre
Like we see in the movie. Number three Doctor Kelly talked to growing more than any of the other Nazi prisoners in Nuremberg. Got them. Okay. Now, if you’re watching the video version of this, you can see I’m holding up an envelope. And this envelope has the answer inside. So we’ll open this up at the end of the episode to see if you got it right.

00:02:18:26 – 00:02:34:22
Dan LeFebvre
Okay. Now it’s time to connect with Jack ally about the historical accuracy of Nuremberg.

00:02:34:24 – 00:02:57:10
Dan LeFebvre
My audience knows movies aren’t expected to be 100% factual, but some movies do better at adhering to history than others for a wide range of reasons. So I always like to start off by getting an overall sense for how well, movie does from a historical perspective. So with that in mind, what letter grade would you give the movie Nuremberg for its historical accuracy?

00:02:57:12 – 00:03:00:05
Jack El-Hai
I would give it an A minus eight.

00:03:00:12 – 00:03:01:24
Dan LeFebvre
That’s very good.

00:03:01:26 – 00:03:31:04
Jack El-Hai
It is very good, I think. I feel good about recommending Nuremberg to my friends because it is mostly historically accurate. There are a few variations from fact, but they’re mostly, unimportant points. The the main way in which Nuremberg differs from my book, The Nazi and the psychiatrist is in its focus. The movie Nuremberg covers about one year of time.

00:03:31:05 – 00:03:35:09
Jack El-Hai
My book covers about 45 years.

00:03:35:12 – 00:03:45:11
Dan LeFebvre
Well, that makes sense. I mean, especially, you know, in a movie, it just being a different format, different medium. There’s only so much you can do before really confusing the audience.

00:03:45:13 – 00:03:47:24
Jack El-Hai
Exactly, exactly.

00:03:47:26 – 00:04:09:01
Dan LeFebvre
Well, at the beginning of the movie, it it sets up the situation. It says it’s May 7th, 1945, the last day of war in Europe. Adolf Hitler is dead. The Nazi high command is in disarray. 70 million people are died across the globe. And then in the opening sequence of the movie, we see, black Mercedes with Nazi flags honking to get what appear to be refugees along the road to move out of the way.

00:04:09:03 – 00:04:33:21
Dan LeFebvre
And then some American soldiers nearby immediately jump to high alert when they see the car. They have their guns pointed at the car and it just stops. And the movie is very careful to not show the face of the people inside. Quite. Yet he just. The man in the back of the car tears off a white piece of cloth from a woman’s dress next to him, hands it to the driver, shows it to the soldiers, and then as he gets out from the backseat, the American soldiers recognize who it is.

00:04:33:22 – 00:04:43:27
Dan LeFebvre
Russell Crowe’s version of Hermann Goering, and he seems to just kind of drive up and surrender himself and his family to the Americans. Is that really how Goering was captured by the allies?

00:04:43:29 – 00:05:12:18
Jack El-Hai
Yes. That’s almost exactly how he was captured. He surrendered to American troops. And that very scene is in my book, although it’s not at the beginning of my book. And, I was really happy to see that scene in the book because it even includes, a joke. When Goering asks the American soldiers to unload his luggage, that did actually happen as well.

00:05:12:18 – 00:05:16:26
Jack El-Hai
And that was kept in the in the screenplay.

00:05:16:28 – 00:05:38:13
Dan LeFebvre
What would the soldiers have known him? I mean, assuming that I mean, just the car itself kind of lends itself to being an officer or something like that. But the soldiers immediately recognized him in the movie. I’m assuming then Goering was well known enough among just. I’m assuming those are just average soldiers.

00:05:38:15 – 00:06:01:01
Jack El-Hai
One of the soldiers recognizes him in the movie, and I, my impression from watching that scene in the film is that the others didn’t necessarily know who he was, so one, one was enough. And but I think that Goering was quite recognizable to people who, had been, following the ups and downs of the war.

00:06:01:01 – 00:06:09:05
Jack El-Hai
But that doesn’t mean, perhaps all U.S. soldiers were that aware of who the German leadership was.

00:06:09:08 – 00:06:33:12
Dan LeFebvre
Soon after, during his capture in the movie, were introduced to Justice Robert Jackson. He’s played by Michael Shannon, and according to the movie, Jackson is pushing for putting the Nazis on trial for their war crimes. But the problem with that, according to the movie, is that would require an international tribunal requiring judges from the four main allies the United States, France, Great Britain and the USSR.

00:06:33:14 – 00:06:51:24
Dan LeFebvre
And that’s never been done before. Looking back on the events of World War two through a historical lens, I think we can all agree that it’s pretty obvious the Nazis committed countless crimes against humanity. And so it would seem obvious that if the Nazis were put on trial, they’d be found guilty at least looking at it through a historical lens.

00:06:51:29 – 00:07:09:11
Dan LeFebvre
But the impression that I got while I was watching the movie was that a lot of the evidence that we know about now is only because it was made public during the trials. So before the trials began, it seems like nobody really knew which way they would go. There seem that could be a chance the Nazis might actually be set free.

00:07:09:13 – 00:07:23:00
Dan LeFebvre
Goring himself in the movie, he suggested that in years to come, people would look back on the trial as a farce. Can you give a little more historical context around what people thought of the authenticity of the trial at Nuremberg at that time?

00:07:23:03 – 00:07:58:12
Jack El-Hai
This kind of trial had never been attempted before. So it was an international tribunal. The four largest Allied powers, U.S., USSR, France and Great Britain, got together to to hold these men accountable and responsible for their crimes. Not all of those countries, as he suggested, were, initially on board. Winston Churchill in particular, thought that the German leaders should be lined up and shot without a trial.

00:07:58:19 – 00:08:33:21
Jack El-Hai
But interestingly, it was FDR and Joseph Stalin who convinced him otherwise, and they wanted a trial that would present all of the evidence. So that, they feared that if the German leaders were simply shot without a trial, no one would really know the extent of their crimes and their legacy could live on. And that goering’s dream that there would be statues of them all over Germany in 15 or 20 years would come true.

00:08:33:23 – 00:09:03:24
Jack El-Hai
So, and, in the course of, developing this trial, the prosecution team, which was very large, unearthed in a very short amount of time, huge masses of evidence, the as much as the, German government tried to cover its tracks and destroy, paper materials. They couldn’t there was so much they could not get at all or even come close.

00:09:03:27 – 00:09:58:08
Jack El-Hai
So there was, a gigantic amount of evidence against them. And, this part of the film, Nuremberg is where there is a deviation from my book, The Nazi in the psychiatrist’s. It’s not that this part giving the background to the trial is not factual. It it is largely. But, I didn’t cover it as extensively as other parts, other areas of the story that I was more interested in and in in particular, I did not follow the adventures of Justice Robert Jackson because, in my book, because his big moments, came after Douglas Kelly, a psychiatrist, had actually left Nuremberg, even though in the film he’s shown to be there.

00:09:58:10 – 00:10:16:28
Dan LeFebvre
I mean, that sounds like that could be a whole book by itself. Just talking about Jackson and that the way the trial is all set up and everything like that. But it sounds like they wanted to get a lot of it was to get the evidence out there was one of the big drivers for for doing the trial.

00:10:17:01 – 00:10:45:21
Jack El-Hai
Get it out there, not just among the people who would be attending the trial or listening to it on the radio or watching in newsreels, but, into the wider world for years and years so that the, the real legacy of the Nazi regime would not be mistaken and, and nullified. So that was a big part of the purpose of the trial.

00:10:45:23 – 00:11:03:25
Dan LeFebvre
That makes sense. And I would say that it work that we definitely got to learn what they were actually about. You mentioned his name. If we go back to the movie, Remy Malik’s version of Doctor Douglas Kelly enters the picture. Around this time, he’s tasked with inspecting the mental health of the Nazi prisoners in anticipation of the trial.

00:11:03:27 – 00:11:29:06
Dan LeFebvre
But according to the movie, it’s not just Goering, but the movie really kind of focuses on Goering and then three others doctor Robert Ley, he’s the chief of the German Labor Front, who spearheaded the Nazi slave labor program. Great Admiral Carl Donitz, the German Navy commander in chief, architect of the U-boat attacks. And then Julia Streicher, the, movie, says he’s Hitler’s director of propaganda and publisher of the national anti-Semitic paper called Der Sturmer.

00:11:29:09 – 00:11:49:23
Dan LeFebvre
Not to get too far ahead of the timeline in the movie, but then later on, the movie does mention, I think, 22 Nazis going on trial. So it seems like there’s more that the movie just doesn’t show. And the true story. Did Kelly focus on the main characters, those four main characters that the movie shows us, or was he tasked with inspecting all the Nazis going on trial at Nuremberg?

00:11:49:25 – 00:12:19:29
Jack El-Hai
Well, yes and no. Kelly examined and interviewed the entire group. So that was 22 members of the Nazi high command, and, he found Hermann Goering to be the most intriguing of the bunch. And so he spent more time with Goering then with any of the others. And in fact, he spent more time with Goering than with several of the others combined.

00:12:20:02 – 00:12:48:11
Jack El-Hai
So, the three that, you mentioned that are also shown in the movie, and there’s another one, too, Rudolf Hess, is given some playtime in the movie. These were important figures in the trial, but there were many other important figures that Kelly dealt with and maybe here, it might be a good time for me to mention that because you addressed his role, Kelly’s role there.

00:12:48:13 – 00:13:17:20
Jack El-Hai
He was, brought in by the tribunal to ensure that the defendants were mentally fit to stand trial in. This is a very low bar of fitness, mental fitness. So it means can they understand the charges? Do they know the difference between right and wrong? Can they participate in their own defense? And in Kelly’s opinion, all of them satisfied that requirement.

00:13:17:22 – 00:13:47:15
Jack El-Hai
But he was there among these men who were considered the arch criminals of the 20th century, all in one place together. And he saw it as a wonderful opportunity to do more. So he set up for himself a more ambitious project to determine whether they shared a common psychiatric disorder or what Kelly like to call a Nazi virus that, could account for their behavior.

00:13:47:17 – 00:13:54:21
Dan LeFebvre
Okay. Yeah. So he’s going above and beyond to take advantage of all of them being in one location. It sounds like.

00:13:54:23 – 00:13:56:04
Jack El-Hai
That’s right.

00:13:56:06 – 00:14:13:21
Dan LeFebvre
What? You mentioned his name, and Rudolf Hess does end up coming in. He I think he arrived at the prison a little bit later, but the movie briefly mentioned his story. It talks about how he flew a plane to Scotland in 1941, tried to negotiate a truce with Britain and Germany so they could both team up to defeat the Soviet Union.

00:14:13:24 – 00:14:41:12
Dan LeFebvre
That doesn’t work. Hess was then in prison and then conveniently got hit with amnesia, where he couldn’t remember anything for years. Then, in February of 1945, he said that he was faking his amnesia the whole time. Then after I think the movie mentioned in July of 1945, after Germany collapsed, the amnesia returned. So now in the movie, Kelly tries to get Goring to help, to get Hess to talk, and Goering agrees to do this in exchange for Kelly getting letters to his wife and daughter.

00:14:41:12 – 00:14:49:12
Dan LeFebvre
And we’ll talk about those letters in a moment. But is the movie correct to set up this scenario of Goering helping Doctor Kelly to try to get has to talk?

00:14:49:15 – 00:15:19:01
Jack El-Hai
Absolutely. Goering was offended by Hess’s behavior because Hess, he probably was not suffering from amnesia. So Hess was pretending not to recognize Goering. And, during found this offensive. And during did assist with Kelly’s efforts to determine whether has really had amnesia or not, I think.

00:15:19:03 – 00:15:32:11
Dan LeFebvre
Yeah, I think in the movie, when they first he first sees him, Hess does the Nazi salute and then later, Russell Crowe’s version of Goering points that out and he’s like, yeah, he’s faking because he recognized me the moment that he saw me.

00:15:32:13 – 00:15:37:15
Jack El-Hai
That’s right. And I believe that event also. Did that truly occur?

00:15:37:17 – 00:15:42:00
Dan LeFebvre
Wow, wow. Even little details like that. That’s it. Yeah. Makes for the A minus.

00:15:42:03 – 00:15:42:28
Jack El-Hai

00:15:43:00 – 00:16:03:12
Dan LeFebvre
Well I’m assuming that the Nazis who were helping Doctor Kelley with other Nazis like with Hess were only doing that to get something out of it themselves. Kind of like we see with, you know, Goering getting Kelly’s help with the personal letters. Were there any other scenarios of the other Nazis helping the allies interrogate other Nazis, or was Goring the only one?

00:16:03:15 – 00:16:37:24
Jack El-Hai
Not that I can recall. Goering was the only one who who provided substantive help, in that way. And there were some, like you mentioned, Admiral Donuts, who resisted, being of any help at all. So, enduring was amenable at least to doing this one thing to, try and figure out what was going on with Hess, because during wanted something in return.

00:16:37:26 – 00:17:00:25
Jack El-Hai
And, maybe we’re jumping the gun here a little bit, but, it would Goring wanted was a closer connection with his, family, his wife and daughter, who were outside of the prison, living on their own for a while. And then there was a time when Mrs. Goering was imprisoned and her daughter, was being kept in a convent.

00:17:00:25 – 00:17:09:17
Jack El-Hai
And during was very upset about all of this and wanted to open a line of communication with them.

00:17:09:19 – 00:17:27:17
Dan LeFebvre
Yeah. No, that makes sense. So that’s what the movie shows. I was actually going to be my next question about those letters because, we see in the movie, Doctor Kelly is delivering letters from going to his wife, Emmy Goring, and their young daughter Edda. And throughout the movie, we see Kelly taking multiple trips to the Goering household.

00:17:27:17 – 00:17:48:28
Dan LeFebvre
He’s even invited into the home to watch Edda play the piano, which then he recounts back to Hermann when they get back to prison, and as this happens, it seems, according to the movie, that that Kelly is forming a bond with the Goring family. And then later in the movie you mentioned, getting arrested. We see or we don’t really see it happen necessarily, but we see the aftermath of Emmy and Eddie getting arrested.

00:17:49:03 – 00:18:03:11
Dan LeFebvre
And then Colonel Andrews asks Kelly how he knew where they’re hiding out. And that, to me, implies that these were not really sanctioned trips. So is it true that one of the ways Kelly got through to Hermann Goering was by secretly delivering these letters to his family?

00:18:03:13 – 00:18:34:15
Jack El-Hai
Yes, he he several times delivered letters to Emmy and Edda, and they they were not sanctioned. And the prison administration did not know that he was doing this. And the reason why I know these these letters were passed along is that copies of them exist, and they were among the trove of Douglas Kelly papers that I found.

00:18:34:17 – 00:18:42:14
Jack El-Hai
About 15 boxes of stuff that that led to me being interested in writing about this story.

00:18:42:17 – 00:18:55:26
Dan LeFebvre
Do we know if that was something that, I mean, I’m assuming Goehring kind of initiated that and then Doctor Kelly going along with it. I mean, I assume he would get in trouble if he was found out.

00:18:55:28 – 00:19:19:09
Jack El-Hai
Goering definitely initiated it. It didn’t occur to Kelly to try something like that. And if he had been caught doing it, he probably would have gotten into trouble. How serious a trouble? I’m not sure. He certainly would have been scolded, but I don’t think it would have been a huge blot on his military record.

00:19:19:12 – 00:19:42:06
Dan LeFebvre
Well, that speaks to the trust, I guess, would be that the word between Goering and Kelly. Because at least according to the movie, it seems like the allies don’t know where his family is. And once they find out, that’s when they arrest them. So I’m assuming then Goering knew that they would be in trouble or have potentially be arrested.

00:19:42:06 – 00:19:46:28
Dan LeFebvre
If Kelly gave up that information and trusted that he wouldn’t.

00:19:47:01 – 00:20:10:18
Jack El-Hai
Yes it would. Goring was preoccupied by the worry that his family was vulnerable to all kinds of hazards and dangers. And, Goring was a man of action, and for him to be confined in prison and unable to do anything to help was immensely frustrating to him.

00:20:10:21 – 00:20:27:01
Dan LeFebvre
That makes me wonder, because he he surrendered himself, did he assume that his position would be that he would be able to keep in contact with them and everything? And then all of a sudden he’s put in prison and obviously not able to.

00:20:27:03 – 00:21:07:28
Jack El-Hai
When Goering surrendered, he had a vision of how things would go after that. He was the, last living very top dog among the German leaders. Hitler, Himmler and gerbils had committed suicide and, during envisioned a time when he would, he saw himself as the statesman. So he would, resume the leadership of the German government and negotiate with the allies and lead Germany through this very difficult postwar time.

00:21:08:01 – 00:21:31:26
Jack El-Hai
But that plan, was nothing like what the allies were expecting to happen. And when, General Eisenhower, who was in charge in Europe in that time, heard about Goering’s expectation that he would be treated like a statesman, he said no way. And Goering was summarily shipped to prison.

00:21:31:28 – 00:21:52:11
Dan LeFebvre
Well, throughout the movie, we see numerous mentions of Remy Malik’s version of Doctor Kelly, saying that he believes Hermann Goering is an extreme narcissist. For example, there’s one scene when he’s talking to Justice Jackson and a JAG lawyer, Colonel John. Amen. I believe. And Kelly tells him that, above all things, the only thing that Hermann Goering cares about is Hermann Goering.

00:21:52:14 – 00:22:13:01
Dan LeFebvre
He doesn’t care about the Jews. He also doesn’t care if they die as Russell Crowe’s version of Goering says in the movie, the anti-Semitism helped gather followers, focus their emotions and give them someone to blame. So as I was watching that, the way I interpreted the movie was that basically during was willing to do anything and everything to rise to power himself.

00:22:13:07 – 00:22:23:24
Dan LeFebvre
You know, if that meant lying about his beliefs about Jews and murdering millions of people in the process. How old do you think the movie does showing Doctor Kelly’s analysis of growing?

00:22:23:26 – 00:22:56:24
Jack El-Hai
I think it does a great job of showing the ambiguity of Kelly’s position regarding Goering. You know, anything Goering said had to be taken with a huge block of salt because he was in prison. He was. He knew his life was at risk. But the film does accurately show what Goering told Kelly. How much Kelly believed it all.

00:22:56:27 – 00:23:27:12
Jack El-Hai
It is open to question. So I don’t think in in the evidence presented later at the trial shows that Goring was much more involved in the very harsh, overt anti-Semitic acts of the Nazi regime. And, it would be hard, after looking at that evidence, to say, well, this is just something that Hermann played along with so that he could take the opportunity to grasp power.

00:23:27:14 – 00:23:47:02
Jack El-Hai
So I don’t accept Hermann Goering’s explanation in that sense. And I have a feeling that Douglas Kelly didn’t either. So I guess that’s a long way of saying that. What’s shown in the movie is a simplified version of of what Goering said. But there is more behind it.

00:23:47:04 – 00:24:15:12
Dan LeFebvre
Yeah. Which speaks to how difficult of a job it must have been for, for Kelly to unravel these things of what somebody is telling you may not be the truth, and probably likely is not the truth. I mean, I mean, beyond just, you know, being politicians or things like that, but, you know, these people in a position where their life is at stake and they’re not really used to that.

00:24:15:15 – 00:24:17:12
Jack El-Hai
Absolutely.

00:24:17:14 – 00:24:36:27
Dan LeFebvre
There’s another story I wanted to ask you about from the movie that it comes from a discussion with Doctor Kelly alone in his cell with going I’m sorry in Goering cell not, not in, in doctor Kelly’s. No. But they’re alone together and and going tells the story from his childhood and the Jewish man that he was named after Hermann von Stein.

00:24:36:29 – 00:25:11:13
Dan LeFebvre
And according to the movie, Epstein was was Goering’s father’s best friend. And then Epstein was also extremely rich and let the growing family move in with him at the castle that he own goes to lend itself to how rich he was. He owns a castle, and he goes on to tell Doctor Kelly that living in the castle, the child, he started to realize just how rich, quote unquote, Uncle Herman was, so rich that he could move the Goering family into his castle, so rich that he could make Goering’s father live in a bedroom on the ground floor, while his mother lived in a bedroom just down the hall from Epstein’s own bedroom, and so rich

00:25:11:13 – 00:25:27:29
Dan LeFebvre
that whenever he wanted, he could walk down the hall and enjoy. Goering’s mother in the movie going, uses that story to tell Doctor Kelly that just because someone is your ally doesn’t mean they’re on your side. But how much of that story from Hermann Goering’s childhood really happened?

00:25:28:01 – 00:25:42:12
Jack El-Hai
I think all of it. I think that story is factually correct. And Goring did tell Kelly about it during their in the prison interviews.

00:25:42:14 – 00:25:46:15
Dan LeFebvre
Wow. Wow. I mean, that’s really.

00:25:46:17 – 00:25:53:05
Dan LeFebvre
It’s a peek into Goering’s mind, you know, childhood and.

00:25:53:07 – 00:26:09:27
Dan LeFebvre
How he I guess the way that it was still on his mind. But then using that manipulation. It sounds like he’s trying to manipulate Kelly in the movie using, you know, this, using this nugget of truth and using it to manipulate. I mean, that’s in there.

00:26:09:27 – 00:26:53:11
Jack El-Hai
That’s an important thing to remember about both of these men. They were master manipulators. Both of them. One of my big sources when I was researching the book was I had tracked down Doctor Kelly’s son, Doug. And, so he had all of his memories of his families. Plus he provided me with those boxes of documents. And when I have talked with Doug about this meeting of Goehring and Kelly, we always refer to them as King Kong versus Godzilla because they were both highly intelligent, both, the Egotists, both absolutely sure of their own opinions, stubborn.

00:26:53:13 – 00:27:29:04
Jack El-Hai
And so that were those similarities were part of the basis of their affinity. I won’t call it a friendship. Because Kelly, the entire time was very aware of Hermann Goering’s dark side. The his ruthlessness, lack of conscience, lack of empathy, all of that and would never, considered during a friend. But they did develop a bond just from spending all of those hours together and and sharing so much about their, their pasts.

00:27:29:06 – 00:27:32:29
Jack El-Hai
So that that is a big part of this story.

00:27:33:01 – 00:28:04:06
Dan LeFebvre
Well, that leads right into my next question, because if we go back to the movie’s timeline, the trial is beginning. And something that the movie focuses on is film of the Nazi concentration camps that they play at the trial. Those are just horrible images from the Holocaust, and I’m sure many of us have seen by now. But afterwards, when Kelly talks to Goering in his cell, Kelly is understandably shaken by what he just saw, and he flat out asks Goering how he could be the second in command in Nazi Germany and not know about this.

00:28:04:08 – 00:28:23:14
Dan LeFebvre
And Granger says, oh, Himmler was in charge of the camps. And then Kelly points out that it wasn’t Himmler who was second in command behind Hitler. It was Goering. And then Goering says, oh, well, the films were faked and, you know, comes up with more excuses. And then Goering uses another excuse. He says, you know, Americans bombed Japan, killing 150,000 Japanese.

00:28:23:14 – 00:28:52:08
Dan LeFebvre
That included civilians. And that’s when in the movie, Kelly just blows up at Goering and says, there’s a difference between bombing war factories and civilians dying as collateral damage, and Goering’s Nazi Party building 1200 camps designed to exterminate an entire race. So if were to believe the movie’s version of events, this kind of seems to be a turning point between Kelly and Goering, where I won’t call it a friendship, but they have this this connection going on.

00:28:52:08 – 00:29:06:03
Dan LeFebvre
And then once Kelly sees the films of the concentration camps in the trial and the reality of what the Nazis did, he kind of snaps back to reality. Was that a turning point in how Doctor Kelly interacted with Goering? Like the movie suggests?

00:29:06:06 – 00:29:50:23
Jack El-Hai
Yes, the movie presents, I would say, a concentrated version of that conversation all happening in one scene. In, in actuality, it happened over several days. And so it happened not exactly as shown in the movie. I think, one thing in the, in this scene that Goering is trying to do and something they actually did struggle with during his imprisonment is, was how is he going to present himself when it is his turn to testify in the forthcoming trial?

00:29:50:25 – 00:30:16:27
Jack El-Hai
And so he was strategizing different ways. And so, I’ve always thought that this denial that he makes at the beginning, you know, he had nothing to do with the camps. And then the films were fakes. These were trial balloons that he was sending up to see how Kelly would receive them. And then maybe Goering could make a determination whether to really use that based on Kelly’s reaction.

00:30:17:00 – 00:30:33:20
Dan LeFebvre
Oh, okay. Yeah. So using Kelly as, a guinea pig, almost of his use of his defense. Wow. Okay. Yeah, that that makes sense. Now that you mention that, I didn’t even think about that. There is a character that we see pop up here and there throughout the movie. We haven’t talked about much yet. And her name is Lila.

00:30:33:21 – 00:30:58:27
Dan LeFebvre
She meets Doctor Kelly on the train before he arrives at Nuremberg. Then, after blowing up at Goering and seeing the footage of the concentration camp, we see Doctor Kelly drinking at the bar, and then she shows up again. And that’s when we find out she’s a reporter. The movie seems to imply his drinking played a part, but in the next scene after that, we see a newspaper article with the headline that says Prison Doc Tells All, and that’s Colonel Andrus is not happy with Doctor Kelly talking to a reporter.

00:30:58:27 – 00:31:05:08
Dan LeFebvre
So he orders Kelly back to the States where he’s going to be discharged. Was that really how Doctor Kelly was effectively fired from the job?

00:31:05:11 – 00:31:37:27
Jack El-Hai
No, there’s that’s one place where the story in the film deviates from fact. The reporter character you mentioned is, as far as I know, the only completely made up person in the in the screenplay and in the film, Doctor Kelly did talk with a reporter and said some things that were probably imprudent for him to say, and it was reported in Stars and Stripes, the military newspaper.

00:31:37:29 – 00:32:08:13
Jack El-Hai
But, again, Kelly only got a scolding for that. He did not get him fired. In fact, Kelly was never fired. He left on his own initiative here and then was honorably discharged from the Army. And so, if if the movie gives the impression that Kelly left under some kind of cloud, then that is inaccurate. And in probably there for drama’s sake.

00:32:08:15 – 00:32:31:13
Dan LeFebvre
I know that. Yeah, that makes sense. Again, it is a movie. There’s a there’s another character that we see throughout the movie that we haven’t talked about much yet, and that’s Leo Whittle’s character, Sergeant Howie Triste. He’s the translator, has been working with Doctor Kelly this whole time. So after Kelly is fired in the movie and he’s about to leave, she stops him at the train station and tells him his own story.

00:32:31:16 – 00:32:50:23
Dan LeFebvre
According the movie, he is a German Jew born in Munich. His family was trying to get out of Germany with the rise of the Nazis and they managed to get exit visas in 1940. But only had enough money for one ticket to the United States. His sister was too young to go alone, so she stayed behind with the parents, and that left Howie alone in America, and he tried to enlist.

00:32:50:23 – 00:33:11:03
Dan LeFebvre
After Pearl Harbor, but he was refused because he wasn’t an American citizen. Then, two years later, he was drafted into service and ended up landing on Omaha Beach on D-Day in 1944. I loved the line in the movie where Treece looks at Kelly and says, four years earlier, I left this country scared and alone in the middle of the night, and I came back with the goddamn army.

00:33:11:05 – 00:33:28:20
Dan LeFebvre
And that’s when he comes back as he finds out, according to the movie, that his sister ended up in Switzerland with relatives, and the records show that his parents arrived in Auschwitz in 1942 and then camp was liberated 1945. And there’s no record of them. All of that ends up being the story after after Kelly is fired, he’s about to leave.

00:33:28:23 – 00:33:42:03
Dan LeFebvre
He hears this story, and he hears the importance of what he’s doing and how he can still help with this case against the Nazis. How well do you think the movie did, recounting the story of Sergeant Harry Treece?

00:33:42:05 – 00:34:16:24
Jack El-Hai
How he traced was a real person. He was one of several translators who worked with Doctor Kelly and others in having conversations with the German defendants. I interviewed him, and, I think the way the movie presents his life story is essentially correct. I, don’t have a record of this myself, but I do recall my phone interview with Howie that he did have a slight German accent when I spoke with him.

00:34:17:01 – 00:34:52:16
Jack El-Hai
And, as, Leo Woodall speaks in the movie, it’s completely, non accented, American English. So there there is maybe one, liberty taken there, but his story is, is as it happened pretty much. And and and he, how he Trieste did write a book of his own experiences, before my book was written.

00:34:52:18 – 00:35:06:27
Jack El-Hai
And I use that as a resource. And that line you mentioned, I came back with the U.S. Army. It sounds familiar to me, and I think it may be from how his own book. I may have used it in my own book. I don’t recall.

00:35:06:29 – 00:35:29:17
Dan LeFebvre
It’s a great line now. Well, after hearing this story, Kelly decides not to leave yet. Instead, we see in the movie, we see him giving all of his research on going to Justice Jackson and fight for justice from Great Britain. He gives him all his private files off the book conversations, everything that he’s gathered to put into his own book that he wanted to write after the war.

00:35:29:17 – 00:35:38:19
Dan LeFebvre
He hands over to the prosecutors to help them build their case. Did Doctor Kelly hand over everything he had on going to the Allied prosecutors the way the movie shows?

00:35:38:21 – 00:36:16:04
Jack El-Hai
No. He took it home with him. And and it ended up in those 15 boxes that that I had a chance to look at. So here, here, events do get a little factually murky here because by the time, Goering was going to appear at the trial and give testimony, Kelly was already long gone from Nuremberg. He left in January 1946, and I believe during made his first appearance on the witness stand in March or April of 1946.

00:36:16:06 – 00:36:52:04
Jack El-Hai
So Kelly did not present this stash of, valuable info to the prosecution and to to Justice Jackson. He did, however, during the months that he was in Nuremberg, provide a stream of information to the prosecution team and this was in the form of memos, that he sent periodically, mainly from his conversations with Goering and a lot of that information was about how Goering planned to conduct his own defense at the trial.

00:36:52:04 – 00:36:57:04
Jack El-Hai
So it’s partly factual part, partly not.

00:36:57:07 – 00:37:31:14
Dan LeFebvre
It sounds like a simplified and condensed for the movie. Did Kelly have a lot of off off the record tape conversations with Goering or and with the manner of his work? Because he was, as you mentioned before, kind of going above and beyond and and not just doing the bare minimum. But he was doing extra. Was that still officially documented or recorded, or is that something that he just kept in his own own stuff and never made it to anybody else?

00:37:31:14 – 00:37:32:02
Dan LeFebvre
Basically.

00:37:32:04 – 00:38:07:17
Jack El-Hai
This was his personal project. The court was not interested in it. And, even had they known it was going on, they wouldn’t have been interested in it. And the prosecution, same thing. Kelly was doing this for his own to satisfy his own professional curiosity and to, enable his own later personal glory, as he imagined it when he published his book in 1947, the book was called 22 Cells in Nuremberg.

00:38:07:17 – 00:38:17:17
Jack El-Hai
It’s really hard to find now, and that’s because it sold poorly at the time, and there were just not that many copies out there.

00:38:17:20 – 00:38:40:09
Dan LeFebvre
Well, that’s fascinating that they wouldn’t have been interested, but I guess they had plenty of other evidence to sift through and the whatever current things that they’re saying, you know, we’re talking about earlier, they might not be truthful anyway, whatever Goering is saying. So stick to the evidence, stick to the facts for the trial. It sounds like it’s basically what they were, right.

00:38:40:09 – 00:39:21:26
Jack El-Hai
And whether or not the, defendants, you know, shared a psychic common psychiatric disorder that really was of no import to the prosecution. They just wanted to know, are these men sane? And is it, you know, are they fit to be tried? This, what Kelly was after was really a of importance to, you know, to history or to he and his fellow psychiatrists and, what he, his what he learned from it all is important, because it affected him for the rest of his life.

00:39:21:28 – 00:40:04:11
Jack El-Hai
And it was that if there was no Nazi virus, that these men did not share a psychiatric disorder. In fact, they were not psychiatrically disordered at all in any way that their personalities fell within the normal range. Meaning not that everyone’s capable of doing what they did, but that there are, in every country, every era, all around us, people like that who, lack conscience, lack empathy, have no concept of public service in or out for their own power and glory, and will trample, many, many other people to get there.

00:40:04:14 – 00:40:25:12
Dan LeFebvre
What? You might have already answered my my next question, but if you go back to the movie’s timeline, it’s there’s another day of trial. And Justice Jackson from the US and five from Great Britain managed to get going to admit something that ends up being his ultimate demise, at least according to the movie. Throughout the whole case, he’d been denying knowledge of what was going on in the concentration camp.

00:40:25:15 – 00:40:45:27
Dan LeFebvre
But then, thanks to Kelly’s tip that Göring would never turn on Adolf Hitler, asks him point blank while Göring is on the stand, even if he didn’t know what was going on in the concentration camps. Now that he does, with the evidence presented to him in court, would he still follow Hitler? And Goering says yes, he would, at least according to the movie, I’m assuming.

00:40:45:29 – 00:40:47:25
Dan LeFebvre
Did that actually happen.

00:40:47:28 – 00:41:20:13
Jack El-Hai
That those, scenes are, were, are a little bit outside of the scope of my book because Kelly was already gone. And, and so, my impression, though, is that it wasn’t just five who helped Jackson out. It was the large prosecution team. It was a team effort. It is true that when Jackson was questioning Goering, Goering was scoring some very good points and making Jackson look bad and making himself look good.

00:41:20:15 – 00:41:44:16
Jack El-Hai
And so it did require, something of a rescue effort by the rest of the prosecution team, but that I think that mainly came in the form of an avalanche of evidence against Goering, contradicting, some of the claims he had made earlier that he didn’t know about the Holocaust. He had nothing to do with death camps, etc..

00:41:44:16 – 00:41:47:24
Jack El-Hai
And the evidence showed that that wasn’t true.

00:41:47:26 – 00:42:07:03
Dan LeFebvre
What after Goering’s fate is sealed along with the other Nazis in the trial, the movie shows Colonel Andrus addressing the men that the executions are scheduled for midnight, but to maintain discipline, the prisoners aren’t going to be told about it until 11:45 p.m., when they’re offered last rites. And while he’s telling his men this, he gets notification that Goring took a cyanide pill.

00:42:07:06 – 00:42:21:12
Dan LeFebvre
So the impression that I got watching the movie was Goering didn’t know that was the night of the execution, because he didn’t tell anybody. But he knew it would be soon. And somehow he managed to get this cyanide pill. Was that what really happened?

00:42:21:14 – 00:42:52:10
Jack El-Hai
Yes, more or less. When Goehring surrendered to the Allied authorities, he had cyanide capsules with him hidden in his luggage and maybe other places. And these were the capsules that, that Himmler and gerbils had used to to take their own lives earlier. And so nobody really knows how Göring got a hold of one of those capsules in his cell.

00:42:52:13 – 00:43:26:18
Jack El-Hai
But the most convincing theory I know, and this isn’t gotten into in the film, is that he made an arrangement with an American guard, and in exchange for the guard receiving some valuables, the during had, jewelry and rings and things like that. The guard provided Goering with access to the most hidden cyanide capsules. I think, aside from the one that Goering did take, to commit suicide, there was another one found in his cell at the same time.

00:43:26:21 – 00:43:46:02
Dan LeFebvre
Oh, wow. Wow. Well, I guess kind of what you’re talking about before, you know, King Kong versus Godzilla. But, you know, a guard is not King Kong or Godzilla or anywhere in that scheme. So I could see how somebody like Goering would be able to manipulate people to kind of do what he wanted.

00:43:46:05 – 00:43:57:26
Jack El-Hai
Absolutely. He was a charmer, and he could turn on the charm when he wanted it. And everybody was bored in prison. And charm could go a long way.

00:43:57:28 – 00:44:15:16
Dan LeFebvre
At the end of the movie, there’s a scene with Doctor Kelly being interviewed by a radio host back in the United States. And when the host mentions the Nazis are a unique people, I want to quote what Raymie Maltz version of Doctor Kelly replies with, because I think the dialog here was extremely well-written. He says, quote, they are not unique people.

00:44:15:16 – 00:44:42:22
Dan LeFebvre
There are people like the Nazis in every country in the world today. And then the host button interrupts them and says, Not in America. And then Doctor Kelly continues, quote, yes, in America, your personality patterns are not obscure. They are people who want to be in power. And while you say they don’t exist here, I would say I’m quite certain there are people in America who would willingly climb over the corpses of half the American public if they knew they could gain control of the other half.

00:44:42:25 – 00:45:05:15
Dan LeFebvre
They stoke hatred. It’s what Hitler and Goring did, and it is textbook. And if you think the next time it happens, we’re going to recognize it because they’re wearing scary uniforms. You’re out of your damn mind. And that’s the end of the quote. Now, even though this is not a political podcast, I do think that’s an important thing to keep in mind, because it seems like these days there’s a lot of hatred being stoked to try and gain control.

00:45:05:18 – 00:45:15:11
Dan LeFebvre
So my final question for you, what lessons do you think we can learn from the true story of Doctor Kelly’s work in the Nuremberg trials?

00:45:15:13 – 00:46:00:13
Jack El-Hai
Those words that that you repeated, that Doctor Kelly says in the movie were absolutely Douglas Kelly’s words. I don’t know if he actually spoke to them in a radio interview, but they’re in his book. And, I think there are two strands of, of contemporary resonance that this story has today. And one is how important it is for people in in positions of leadership, positions of responsibility to be held accountable by the international community, as happened at Nuremberg for crimes against peace, crimes against humanity, genocide, all of it.

00:46:00:16 – 00:46:29:24
Jack El-Hai
And then the other is the threat that we face, in our country, the threat to our democracy from these extremist ideologies. Kelly came back to the US and his perspective had been changed from, spending so much time with these defendants. And he saw, things very close to Nazi ism all around him. So this was in 1946.

00:46:29:26 – 00:47:05:07
Jack El-Hai
It was expressed, mainly in the form of the power grabs made by southern politicians, the racial segregationists who had very high state offices at the time, governors, senator, senators. And, but he made it clear and Kelly made it clear that this did not only apply to those people and that it applied to anyone who would use emotion, try and fight off, critical thinking as a way to make decisions.

00:47:05:10 – 00:47:36:25
Jack El-Hai
People who use, degrading terms. For of other of their opponents based on race, religion, where they’re from, all of that. Kelly saw it around him and was against it, and he even laid out a plan for fighting it. So it’s it’s a message. He was prescient, and it’s a message that I think we need to pay attention, especially now.

00:47:36:27 – 00:47:55:00
Dan LeFebvre
I agree. Thank you so much for coming on to chat about the movie Nuremberg. The movie is based on your fantastic book Nazi and the psychiatrist, which goes into a lot more depth than we ever could on a single podcast episode. So for everyone wanting to learn more about the true story behind the movie, I have a link in the show notes where you can get your own copy of Jack’s book right now while they do that.

00:47:55:00 – 00:48:03:12
Dan LeFebvre
And before I let you go, Jack, can you share one of your favorite stories from the process of making the movie?

00:48:03:15 – 00:48:46:14
Jack El-Hai
Sure. I, was was fortunate to be invited by the film’s director and screenwriter, James Vanderbilt, to come to Hungary. This was the last year in 2024 to, visit this the set. It was actually a gigantic soundstage on the outskirts of Budapest and, see some of the filming. So I got there, and on the first day of shooting that I was witness to the scene that they were shooting that day was a set built to look like a big transport plane, the inside of a big transport plane.

00:48:46:16 – 00:49:20:02
Jack El-Hai
And, this was used in a scene where all of the German defendants are being transported from Luxembourg, where many of them were initially held, to Nuremberg, where the trial would be held. And, I had written this scene in my book and had imagined it a particular way. And when I saw the cast and it was almost everybody crammed into this small space representing the inside of the transport plane.

00:49:20:04 – 00:49:45:13
Jack El-Hai
When I saw that, coming to life before my eyes, I was just dumbfounded because it played out exactly as I imagined it. And, you know, even to the point of the interactions between the defendants and Doctor Kelly, who was also aboard. So that was the first thing I saw. And it has really stayed with me all this time.

00:49:45:16 – 00:49:59:05
Dan LeFebvre
I mean, that’s that’s high praise that they nailed it what you had in your head. And it’s also high praise of what you had in your head, also came out in the book. Obviously, it translated to the other side too, where they were able to see what you had in your head as you wrote.

00:49:59:07 – 00:50:18:24
Jack El-Hai
Yeah. And James Vanderbilt, the screenwriter and director, is, very attuned to history as well as being an excellent screenwriter. And, I think he placed a priority, whenever possible, to make things as historically accurate as possible.

00:50:18:27 – 00:50:21:07
Dan LeFebvre
Well, thank you again so much for your time, Jack.

00:50:21:09 – 00:50:31:15
Jack El-Hai
Thank you. Dan, good to be here.

00:50:31:17 – 00:50:48:02
Dan LeFebvre
This episode is based on a true story was produced by me, Dan the Fed. Thank you once again to Jack ally for sharing his time and expertise to help us separate fact from fiction in the movie Nuremberg. If you want to dig deeper into the true story, I can’t recommend Jack’s book enough. It’s called The Nazi and the psychiatrist.

00:50:48:04 – 00:51:05:17
Dan LeFebvre
And as we learned, this is the book that they based the movie on. I’ve got a link to this in the show notes, so you can pick up your own copy, as well as on the shows home on the web over at based on a True Story podcast.com/378. Okay, now it’s time for the answer to our two truths and a lie game from the beginning of the episode, and it’s a quick refresher.

00:51:05:18 – 00:51:28:08
Dan LeFebvre
Here are the two truths and one lie again. Number one Doctor Kelly was fired for talking to a newspaper reporter in Nuremberg. Number two, Doctor Kelly delivered letters from Hermann Goering to his family like we see in the movie number three. Doctor Kelly talked to growing more than any of the other Nazi prisoners in Nuremberg. Did you figure out which one is a lie?

00:51:28:10 – 00:51:46:10
Dan LeFebvre
I’ve got the envelope here, so let’s open this up. And the lie is number one. As Jack pointed out, the reporter that we see Doctor Kelly talking to in the movie is a fictional character. And we also learned that Doctor Kelly left Nuremberg. I was on a court and he was never fired like we see in the movie.

00:51:46:13 – 00:52:02:01
Dan LeFebvre
Thanks for sticking around to the end. If you are watching the video version here in a moment, you’re going to see the credits roll, and if you want to get your name in the credits for the next video and on the website, you can learn how to become a based on a true story producer using the link in the description or over at based on a True Story podcast.

00:52:02:01 – 00:52:13:17
Dan LeFebvre
E-commerce support once again, that’s based on a true story podcast.com/support. Until next time, thanks so much for spending your time with Jack and I today, and I’ll chat with you again really soon.

00:00:01:29 – 00:00:35:26
Dan LeFebvre
Hello and welcome to Based on a True Story, the podcast that compares your favorite Hollywood movies with history. Today we’re going to the Golden Age of Hollywood as we learn about the TV show simply called feud. Now, as of this recording, there are two seasons of feud, with each season focusing on a completely different, well, feud. So more specifically today we’re talking about the first season, eight episodes that aired in 2017, all about the rivalry between legendary actresses Joan Crawford and Betty Davis.

00:00:35:29 – 00:01:03:03
Dan LeFebvre
So let’s start with a quick refresher of what happens in the TV series. The first season of feud centers around the two successful actresses joining forces to make the movie called Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? In the early 1960s, Joan Crawford is played by Jessica Lange, while Betty Davis is played by Susan Sarandon. Episode by episode. The show traces how two aging legends in a male dominated Hollywood fight for respect, relevance, and recognition.

00:01:03:05 – 00:01:31:11
Dan LeFebvre
In the first episode, Joan, whose stardom is fading, pushes for Baby Jane and teams up with Betty Davis and director Robert Aldrich, only to find their strong personalities clash from the start. Aldrich is played by Alfred Molina in episode two. Tensions rise as homelife pressures, creative pride and external meddling. Studio politics, the press, showy supporting actors and so on drive Joan and Betty further apart, even as the production demands cooperation.

00:01:31:14 – 00:01:54:26
Dan LeFebvre
In episode three, we learn more about Joan’s family life with her daughters. By episode four, Baby Jane becomes a hit. There’s critical acclaim for Betty as Joan grows jealous. Then, in episode five, the rivalry is sent into the public’s eye at the 1963 Oscars, thanks to a secret plan from Joan and her friend had a Hopper. They talk nominee’s into letting Joan accept the award for them.

00:01:54:28 – 00:02:15:25
Dan LeFebvre
Hopper is played by Judy Davis in the TV series. Episode six suggests another teaming up of Betty Davis and Joan Crawford on yet another movie by Robert Aldrich called hush, Hush, Sweet Charlotte. But things turn to the worse in episode seven, when Joan finds out that Betty and Robert are having an affair, and this seems to give Betty some extra power on set.

00:02:15:26 – 00:02:45:21
Dan LeFebvre
So Joan tries her own stunt to get attention. She fakes an illness that forces the film’s production to a halt. That is, until she’s replaced on the film by Olivia de Havilland, who’s played by Catherine Zeta-Jones. And then the season concludes in episode eight, showing Joan’s final retirement from the movie business. Her illness and eventual death. Joining us today is Scott Simon, the author of a number of biographies from figures in the Golden Age of Hollywood, from Cary Grant and John Ford to Cecil B to Mel and John Wayne.

00:02:45:23 – 00:03:00:17
Dan LeFebvre
Scott’s newest book is called Joan Crawford A Woman’s Face, and you’ll find a link to it in the show notes to pick up your own copy. And while you find that, let’s set up our game for this episode. Now, if you’re new to the show, so it’s based on a true story is all about separating fact from fiction in the movies.

00:03:00:19 – 00:03:19:12
Dan LeFebvre
You’ll get to practice your skills at separating fact from fiction in this podcast episode with a game of two truths in a lie. So I’m about to give you three things that we’ll talk about in this episode. Two of them are true, and that means one of them is just an all out lie. Are you ready? Okay, here they are.

00:03:19:15 – 00:03:46:17
Dan LeFebvre
Number one, Joan Crawford’s best friend was Hedda Hopper. Number two, Joan Crawford was never officially diagnosed with cancer. Number three, Joan Crawford learned the most about acting from Lon Chaney. Got him. Okay, now, as you’re listening to our story today, see if you can figure out which one of those is alive. And if you’re watching the video version on YouTube, you can see I’m holding up an envelope.

00:03:46:24 – 00:04:07:11
Dan LeFebvre
And this has the answer inside. So we’ll open this at the end of the episode to see if you got it right. Okay. Now it’s time to connect with Scott Simon about the historical accuracy of feud.

00:04:07:14 – 00:04:31:01
Dan LeFebvre
Everyone knows TV shows can stretch the truth. However, since each show is different with the creative liberties that they take. I was like to start up top with an overall ballpark idea for how accurate something is. So with that in mind, if you were to give the first season of the TV show feud a letter grade for its historical accuracy, what would it get?

00:04:31:04 – 00:05:01:27
Scott Eyman
Well, it’s a it’s a network, a mini series, produced and directed by Ryan Murphy. So if you approach it with, with a certain, a certain, delicate, approach, c c minus and it’s subtle and some of the inaccuracies don’t matter. They’re irrelevant, essentially. So I’m not hung up on those other inaccuracies I think do matter.

00:05:02:00 – 00:05:31:21
Scott Eyman
For instance, and this doesn’t matter. This is an inaccuracy. That doesn’t matter when the show opens. She’s living in California in a vast Beverly Hills mansion, where everybody comes to visit her, you know, at an opera and or her, aide de camp. Mamacita, a German woman that for some odd reason. Crawford called Mamacita. Actually, she was living in New York, by 19.

00:05:31:24 – 00:05:54:26
Scott Eyman
She moved to New York in 1955 for her marriage or last marriage to Alfred Steele. They had a very nice, two story, apartment house across the street from the Frick Museum. And she was still in there, in 1960, and 62. She didn’t move until 1964, until several years after the film was made.

00:05:55:02 – 00:06:22:23
Scott Eyman
So she had an apartment in LA in a little building that Loretta Young owned. But, I mean, she didn’t she had sold the house in, in in Brentwood, I believe, in 1959 or 1960 and bailed. So that’s a small inaccuracy. That doesn’t matter. I understand it’s just easier rather than going having a logo, say New York, and then you have her, you know, fancy New York apartment and you’re cutting back and forth between now, like, just everybody now, like, okay, fine.

00:06:22:25 – 00:06:35:25
Scott Eyman
That’s a small inaccuracy. Other inaccuracies, bothered me a lot more than that, frankly. But we can get into that. We should, of course.

00:06:35:25 – 00:06:59:21
Dan LeFebvre
Of course. What? In the first episode of the series, we see Olivia de Havilland talking about the feud by saying this is a quote from the series. It says for nearly half a century, they hated each other and we love them for it. She’s speaking, of course, about Joan Crawford and Betty Davis, and the TV show is set mostly in the 1960s around the filming of the only movie that those two starred in together called Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?

00:06:59:23 – 00:07:23:08
Dan LeFebvre
So based on the Havilland’s quote and the fact that TV series takes place in the 1960s after both Crawford and Davis are already established stars, I got the impression that there had already been a feud going on long before the timeline of the TV series. So can you give me an overview of how and when The Few started between Joan Crawford and Betty Davis?

00:07:23:14 – 00:07:43:06
Scott Eyman
Well, feud is a good, awfully strong word. Actually, it’s not like a feud implies to me that that other person is in the forefront of your consciousness all the time, or almost all the time. And I’m sure, you know, decades went by when they really didn’t speak to each other that much because they weren’t really a part of each other’s life.

00:07:43:08 – 00:08:05:18
Scott Eyman
As far as I can tell, the animus, began in 1935 when Franchot Tone went over, left MGM, where he was having a torrid affair with, Joan Crawford to went over to, Warner Brothers to do a movie with Betty Davis called dangerous and Betty Davis stuff. And shot down was the most gorgeous thing she ever seen in her life.

00:08:05:21 – 00:08:29:19
Scott Eyman
And she made every effort possible, to, to seduce him. And he really wasn’t interested because he just wanted to get back to MGM and Joan Crawford, which didn’t, didn’t, endear him, to, to, to Betty Davis. And it didn’t endear Joan Crawford to Betty Davis either. But really, they weren’t in each other’s life.

00:08:29:20 – 00:09:00:08
Scott Eyman
They weren’t part of each other’s social circle at all. Until, Crawford came to Warner Brothers in 1944 after leading MGM. Basically her entire career picture career was at MGM from 1927, not 1925 to 1943. She was the MGM, and she only did a 1 or 2 loan out in all that time, and she left MGM in 1943 and sat around the house in Brentwood, for about a year.

00:09:00:09 – 00:09:29:27
Scott Eyman
But she said it was like three years. It wasn’t three years. It was more a year, more like a year. And, then, she signed with, Warner Brothers where Betty Davis was the Queen B Gurley. So I’m sure at that point Davis was looking over her shoulder, you know, at, at this, pretender to Earth row, because there was no one at Warner Brothers bigger than Betty Davis on the female side of the cat roster against, roster of actors.

00:09:30:00 – 00:10:04:04
Scott Eyman
But they again. Yeah, they didn’t they were really they didn’t play the same kinds of parts for the most part. I you could theoretically put Betty Davis in Mildred Pierce. You could theoretically cast her in Humoresque. But I think she’d fit better in Mildred Pierce than she would at Humoresque. Because Humoresque is is, the woman is a an alcoholic, the very highly sexed.

00:10:04:06 – 00:10:32:11
Scott Eyman
And Betty Davis didn’t really give off those vibes. You know, she always had a kind of Puritan thing because it was an authentic projection of her personality, even though she did drink. Obviously, they both drank, but they weren’t really up for the same parts. She might have turned down Mildred Pierce, so it’s possible that was passed, by her a Davis, and she might have turned it down.

00:10:32:13 – 00:10:54:14
Scott Eyman
But it was always kind of slotted for Crawford because they had signed her and they had to give her something. And that thing was that script was, hanging fire. You know, once they figured out how to do it, it wasn’t a terribly art picture shoot, but there were a lot of writers on that picture. They had north of six writers, eight writers.

00:10:54:18 – 00:11:22:08
Scott Eyman
It was a lot of different scripts floating around at that, and nobody was quite sure how to get past the ace office number one and, how much sex it could have. And it was Jerry Wald’s idea. Basically, he saw Double Indemnity one day and decided, a murder flashback. Murder flashback because there, you know, murder in the book.

00:11:22:10 – 00:11:41:27
Scott Eyman
And the book is told, not told in flashback form either. But he thought the secret to Double Indemnity was a murder. Be the flashback. And, so that’s Jerry Wald injected that into Mildred Pierce, and nobody was sure it was going to work or not. But Wald was the was the producer of the picture, and they let him run with the ball.

00:11:42:00 – 00:12:11:14
Scott Eyman
And it turned out to be. Yeah. The as Crawford, and James McCain, the author of Mildred Pierce aided edit that aided the murder. And the only thing Crawford told of what we tried it without the murder, but the murder kind of tied it all together, which was true. The murder does tie it all together. So a long answer, a short question, admittedly, but, they, they kind of regarded each other warily from opposing corners of the ring.

00:12:11:17 – 00:12:37:14
Scott Eyman
You know, at Warner Brothers, because basically they were different kinds of actresses. Crawford at a sexual component that Davis had less of. I think it’s fair to say Davis was regarded as the superior actress. I think it’s fair to say, but they they weren’t really the they didn’t they weren’t developing the same kind of scripts for both women by any stretch of the imagination.

00:12:37:16 – 00:12:49:21
Dan LeFebvre
And you mentioned, you know, maybe feud is a strong word to use. Would you go the other way and say that at any point where they friendly with each other, or were they just kind of professional rivals? Almost.

00:12:49:24 – 00:13:20:29
Scott Eyman
No, they were never friends. They were never. Crawford had, actress friends. She was very close with Barbara Stanwyck, for instance. She was very close with Virginia Gray. Myrna Loy was a friend for, almost 50 years. She had a lot of friendships with actresses on her level or close to her level. But, no, she and she and Crawford would never friendly.

00:13:21:01 – 00:13:49:18
Scott Eyman
As Robert Aldrich says. I quote him in the book. He says, I think it would be fair to say they detested each other, but they were actually completely professional, which is true, which is one of the big, inaccurate things about the TV show. They make it sound like it was like Ali versus Frazier in the third fight, and they just went to their opposing quarters, and they came out trying to kill each other.

00:13:49:20 – 00:14:19:13
Scott Eyman
And it really wasn’t like that. Not even close. And the reason it wasn’t like that is because Robert Aldrich had $900,000 to make that movie all in, that’s all in. And the movie runs two hours and ten minutes, and they had a six week shooting schedule. So work the work, the logistics out. There was no time for an afternoon spent haggling over what that bitch said to me, or what the other bet that wasn’t going to happen.

00:14:19:16 – 00:14:43:00
Scott Eyman
This was a sprint. It wasn’t a straw. The only way to get that picture made was, was absolutely everybody showing up, knowing their lines. Rehearse it once, rehearse it twice, shoot it. Move on. Otherwise, you weren’t gonna get the picture done in six weeks and there was no more money. There was no more money. There was no overage because it was independently financed.

00:14:43:03 – 00:14:55:27
Scott Eyman
It wasn’t financed by Jack Warner, was financed by, Ken Hyman. $900,000. And that was all in. And if Robert, if they had gone over budget, Aldrich would have had to come up with the extra money.

00:14:56:00 – 00:14:58:24
Dan LeFebvre
Which isn’t likely to do or want to do.

00:14:58:24 – 00:15:13:22
Scott Eyman
Fisher wanted to do it. He certainly didn’t want it. That wasn’t the business. It was that he would do that. He did do that. A fair number of occasions. A lot of the pictures he made, both in the latter part of the 50s, in the 60s, things like The Big Knife and Attack essentially were financed by Robert Aldrich.

00:15:13:24 – 00:15:41:16
Scott Eyman
He’d get an advance from distributor, he contribute, a portion of the budget out of his, his own coffers. But his own coffers came and went. You know, it’s when you’re an independent, filmmaker like that. Not everything makes money. And, you know, when you when you when you’re when you’re when your wallet is low, there’s it’s not like you could just go to, you know, your rich uncle, and get a, get a couple hundred thousand dollars to tide you over.

00:15:41:19 – 00:16:05:29
Dan LeFebvre
True. What you may have already answered my next question, but in episode two, when we start to see the filming underway, according to the series, it. It doesn’t take long to realize that Joan Crawford and Betty Davis are just a nightmare to work with. They’re constantly trying to undermine each other. Even force the hand of, You mentioned Robert Aldrich, the director, to fire a younger actress after she makes Joan feel old.

00:16:06:01 – 00:16:20:24
Dan LeFebvre
Was Baby Jane a particularly hostile set like we see in the series? Was it because Betty and Joan were working together? That seems to be what the series is implying. Or did the real Joan Crawford have a history of being difficult to work with even without Betty Davis there?

00:16:20:26 – 00:16:43:01
Scott Eyman
No. Well, the the dynamic Crawford wanted a happy set always. And that’s why she had this routine of on the first day of the picture, she would greet everybody on the crew personally, work under the picture, tell them she looked forward to working with them during the shoot. She would give people presents. Certainly the director, occasionally the cameraman.

00:16:43:01 – 00:17:04:23
Scott Eyman
She would also get presents to. She wanted a happy set. Now, there might have been an element of calculation in some of this. Certainly. But she wanted everybody, on her side, and she was willing to do what, you know, to act like, a generous, spirited granddaughter in order to get that the vibe. Got the vibe.

00:17:04:23 – 00:17:32:26
Scott Eyman
She wasn’t going. She didn’t like a hostile set. She didn’t function well in hostility. She had enough of that in her early life. She had a wretched, wretched childhood. And. And she didn’t go out of her way looking for contention, looking for aggravation. Betty Davis was stimulated by aggravation. Betty Day, always Betty Davis was stimulated by confrontation. She enjoyed it.

00:17:32:29 – 00:17:57:25
Scott Eyman
She had a gladiatorial frame of mind. I was friends with Lindsay Anderson, who directed her in Whales of August, which was she did with Lillian Gish. Was Lillian Gish last picture. And, I talked to Lindsay about the experience of working with her. And Lillian Gish at this point was 92 or 93 years old, literally. She was over 90, and she showed up every day with her lines.

00:17:57:27 – 00:18:24:22
Scott Eyman
And except for one day when she came on the set at 8 a.m. and she didn’t know where she was, and, and Lindsay thought the film was about to collapse because there’s no way to cut around it. This is the gamble you take with a very elderly performer, you know, and if suddenly they can’t remember their dialog, well, you can cover that with, cue cards, you know, but with an actress who doesn’t know where she is.

00:18:24:25 – 00:18:52:21
Scott Eyman
But, yeah, it was panic time, but, but, but 75, 90 minutes later, she was fine. She realized she was making the movie. She asked, and she remembered her dialog was the only time she had a memory slip on the picture. But Davis was very volatile and very angry and very hostile. Sluggish for no reason. Because, as Lindsay would said, Lillian was a sweet old lady.

00:18:52:24 – 00:19:17:19
Scott Eyman
She never had a bad word to say about anybody, but that just made Davis all the more angry, really, because she wanted someone to push back against, you know? And Gish wasn’t going to fight. She needed every ounce of her energy to get through the day. When you’re 93 and you’re making a movie, and he and Lizzie said, I began to think that Betty was insane.

00:19:17:25 – 00:19:43:20
Scott Eyman
Literally crazy. Now this is down the road from Baby Jane. This is in, the late 80s, 1986, 1987. But it was a harrowing experience for Lindsay because he didn’t expect this, because he worshiped Betty Davis. He never he liked silent movies, but he grew up watching Betty Davis in 30s and 40s in England. And, he’d always loved her.

00:19:43:23 – 00:20:03:28
Scott Eyman
And here she was, a bitch on wheels. And he wasn’t prepared for that. Well, if he talked to some people from Hollywood, he would have been more prepared for it because she could make you. It was glad it. Or it could be glad it’s real. With Betty Davis. So, as Aldrich said, it’s fair to say they detested each other.

00:20:04:05 – 00:20:26:16
Scott Eyman
But there was never a harsh word spoken because a there wasn’t time. And B and if you look at the picture, Crawford doesn’t have that much to do. She’s up in the room in the second floor. It’s basically big baby Jane’s movie. It’s Betty Davis, this movie. She’s got most of the screen time. She’s got most of the movement.

00:20:26:16 – 00:20:56:23
Scott Eyman
The character Crawford never leaves the house until the last scene in the picture, baby Jane is got. She’s doing banking. She’s messing around with Victor Buono, who hates his mother. You know, there’s she’s actually interacting with other people. Crawford character does interact with anybody except her sister, Baby Jane. So Crawford is basically working in one room for the production, whereas Baby Jane is out and about and she’s shopping.

00:20:56:23 – 00:21:19:24
Scott Eyman
We see her going in the car. That’s old car. They haven’t, but she’s much more, everything happens because of Baby Jane and that sense she’s not only the title character, she’s the fulcrum of the movie. She’s the she’s she’s the movement of the movie. Everything happens because of Jane Hudson. And not because of anything. The Crawford character does.

00:21:19:28 – 00:21:40:18
Scott Eyman
The Crawford character is completely reactive, completely reactive. So that’s a but but she knew that going in. And another thing is, is that the idea of the two of them doing a movie together was Crawford’s idea. Crawford and Aldrich had done a film before. Autumn leaves, a very good movie, by the way.

00:21:40:20 – 00:22:07:02
Scott Eyman
And at some point between Autumn Leaves and Baby Jane and six years, I believe, 6 or 7 years between the two pictures, she had mentioned to Betty Davis somehow I don’t know what the where they were, but Aldrich said the you know, his letter to Betty Davis sending her the novel A Baby Jane. This is in Aldrich’s papers, which is where most of my information came from.

00:22:07:02 – 00:22:28:06
Scott Eyman
The Robert Aldrich a collection at UCLA. He mentions that Betty Davis had mentioned to you, Davis, I mean, that Crawford had mentioned to, Davis at some point in the future that they should do a movie together. And it got Aldrich thinking, and he said, I think I’ve got the property. And he sent her a copy of the novel.

00:22:28:06 – 00:23:04:20
Scott Eyman
Script had been written yet, and he wanted to gauge your interest in the story. So he sent her a copy of a cover letter and a copy of The End. Farrell mobile. And her agent Davis had her agent write back inquiring about money and billing. And, you know, the negotiations started. Now, at this point, Davis is going into, night of the Iguana on Broadway playing Maxine, which is alluded to in the first hour to show, not one of her finest hours.

00:23:04:23 – 00:23:31:01
Scott Eyman
And, she’s working. But the reviews for this show and her weren’t great. Not that she cared, and, but basically she had, I think, a six month contract or a run of the play contract that she got out of it after six months because Tennessee Williams wasn’t happy with the show and the performance, and she wasn’t happy with the play and whatever.

00:23:31:04 – 00:24:03:09
Scott Eyman
So at that point, when she leaves night of the iguana, she’s available. And the doors were not being beaten down for her or for Crawford. Neither one of them was getting any work in movies at at all. Crawford had made a movie since 1959, and we’re talking 1961 here, 1960 or 61 at this point. And nobody’s beating down her door and her husband has died, and she’s sitting alone in her huge apartment in New York City, twiddling your thumbs, wishing the phone would ring.

00:24:03:12 – 00:24:29:02
Scott Eyman
And the phone’s not ringing. But Aldrich was very much in the game that had a successful run with Autumn leaves, and, she had mentioned him that she thought she and Betty Davis should make a movie. Okay, so it got Aldrich thinking. He sends the book to Betty Davis, and the dance begins and they start talking contracts. And that goes on for six months while the script’s being written, basically.

00:24:29:04 – 00:24:52:18
Scott Eyman
And, the show moves and but he can’t get it financed. Nobody wants to finance that one because they’re both both Davis and Crawford regarded as washed up. Nobody wanted to put up the money, so he went shopping for independent money, and he got Ken Hyman to, put up $900,000. And Jack Warner agreed to distribute the film on a straight percentage basis.

00:24:52:21 – 00:25:12:04
Scott Eyman
Just 30% off the top. Okay. I’m sure Warner didn’t think much was going to happen, but he didn’t have any money involved in it. So what did he care if it did? It did if it did $800,000, we get 30% of $800,000 or whatever. So that’s the way the picture went forward. So it was done on a shoestring.

00:25:12:04 – 00:25:36:16
Scott Eyman
What amounted to a shoestring, and there was some haggling over, but there was some haggling over percentages. There was haggling over billing. Davis got top billing, I believe I don’t have I don’t have my book in front of me. I believe Crawford got a slightly higher percentage of the profits because Davis got top billing. But that was it.

00:25:36:16 – 00:25:58:18
Scott Eyman
In the end, the film was shot basically on time. I think they went three days over schedule or something like that, but it had to be shot on time because there was no extra money. And it was not, as Aldrich said, they detested each other, but they were absolutely professional. There was never the only incident that Aldrich alluded to involved.

00:25:58:21 – 00:26:20:02
Scott Eyman
There’s shooting a scene with the two of them, and Crawford had a cold and they’re haggling, and there was some problem with the lighting. So it was going to take 20 minutes or half an hour or so, Crawford said. Would you mind if I go to my dressing room? And Aldrich said, no, of course. And Davis said, well, you’d think we’d all be professionals by now.

00:26:20:04 – 00:26:37:01
Scott Eyman
That was it. And Crawford just looked at her and got up and went to her dressing room, and when they were, the problem was solved. They called her, and she came right back out and they went into the scene, you know. But that was actually that was Aldrich says. That was the only actual unpleasantness on the picture, that one incident, you’d think we’d all be pros by now.

00:26:37:07 – 00:26:38:20
Scott Eyman
That was it.

00:26:38:22 – 00:26:46:10
Dan LeFebvre
It sounds like, Betty Davis just kind of trying to push a button there cause some drama, if that’s something that she was feeds on.

00:26:46:13 – 00:26:57:13
Scott Eyman
Yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely, absolutely. That was her M.O.. And Crawford wouldn’t be goaded. She is. Wouldn’t be that bigoted because a she wanted the picture.

00:26:57:16 – 00:27:25:21
Scott Eyman
She just desperately needed to work. She she was okay about money at that point. It wasn’t about money. It was about the work. She was desperate to work. And because she’d been working since she was 13 years old, literally. And I once their mother, you know, whether it was cookie in a, you know, in a school or a chorus girl for the Schubert’s and Broadway or at MGM, she was a worker worker.

00:27:25:21 – 00:27:48:21
Scott Eyman
B that was how she defined herself. The movie stardom was kind of an accident because she never dreamt she could ever achieve that. I don’t think that was a a wild, you know, something? You wake up, you lure yourself to sleep at night thinking a buck wouldn’t be wonderful to be a big movie star when you rub dirt or in Kansas and and and Texas, good God.

00:27:48:27 – 00:28:16:02
Scott Eyman
You know, and Oklahoma or. So it was it, you know, stardom was something it was hard for her to grasp, but hard for her to accept. Whereas Davis was always going to be an actress, she always going to be an actress. I think in her own mind, stardom was always a distinct possibility. But no, because her goal was to be the the very best, the very top of the League of the elite.

00:28:16:04 – 00:28:29:02
Scott Eyman
And whereas Crawford’s goal was survival. Stardom was stardom was accidental in her mind. And and she never felt.

00:28:29:04 – 00:28:50:23
Scott Eyman
She said the person who taught her the most about acting was Lon Chaney. She made one picture at lunch in 1927 called The Unknown, and it’s a remarkably good movie. And you really. But she said, is total concentration. Nothing interfered with his concentration when he was working. There was nothing else. World War Three could have broken out.

00:28:50:23 – 00:29:18:12
Scott Eyman
World War Two could have broken out. And he would have continued with his take with the take. You know, he just he was totally, focused on being an actor, acting that scene, communicating the character’s emotions to the audience. And that’s where Crawford got her M.O. as an actress from Lon Chaney and and, but stardom, that was a role as a crazy roll the dice.

00:29:18:15 – 00:29:26:16
Scott Eyman
And given her background and her lack of education, why would she think that? Why would you think that was something attainable? No.

00:29:26:19 – 00:29:42:21
Dan LeFebvre
Yeah. No, that makes sense. It, a dream perhaps, but sometime, I guess it sounds like she had imposter syndrome. Like she would never believe that she was the star, that a lot of other people saw her as being.

00:29:42:24 – 00:30:04:24
Scott Eyman
I think she settled into it after a time, but I never think. I don’t think she ever felt entirely secure with it because she grew up with nothing. When you grow up with nothing in the back of your mind, there’s always the possibility that nothing can come back, not back knocking at your door. You know, catastrophe is always a possibility.

00:30:04:26 – 00:30:08:09
Scott Eyman
And,

00:30:08:12 – 00:30:34:07
Scott Eyman
So when things went south, as they tended to do for actresses in that era, because there was nothing but the movies, really, television was in its infancy and it was a lower form of showbusiness life. And movie stars generally didn’t do TV, you know, in the 50s it just wasn’t done. A number of them tried it. Irene Dunne at a, show that didn’t work.

00:30:34:14 – 00:31:03:28
Scott Eyman
Stanwyck had a show that didn’t work. Then in the 60s, she had The Big Valley, which kind of worked. It’s not a great show, but it was offered, I don’t know, four years, maybe five years. Okay. But for that generation of actors and actresses, you worked. You didn’t just sit around the house and watch the flowers grow in the garden, in the backyard in Beverly Hills, you know, because they were all almost all of them came from nothing came from blue collar backgrounds.

00:31:04:00 – 00:31:36:22
Scott Eyman
Or if you weren’t working, you weren’t earning. And if you were earning, next month’s groceries were going to be a problem. So they believed in work. But on the other hand, TV was so dumb down market in the 50s, you know, nobody really took it seriously. People who succeeded in television were often people who had failed in the movies, like Milton Berle, you know, who was huge in television in the 50s and, and people like that, or Red Skelton, who had worn out his welcome in the movies, and he became a big star in TV.

00:31:36:25 – 00:32:08:05
Scott Eyman
But he downshift. It was sense of downshifting. They were still good money, but it wasn’t the same prestige. So and especially for a Crawfords born in 1905. So, in the she’s when she does Autumn leaves for Aldrich, she’s 51, 50 or 51 when she’s doing Baby Jane, she’s 57, 58, and she looks older than 57 or 58 because she’s made up to look on the 50 certificate.

00:32:08:07 – 00:32:26:04
Scott Eyman
You know, her hair’s a messy. She’s not she’s not actually not she’s not. They’re dressed. They didn’t dress them up. They’re making them look as horrible as possible to emphasize the squalor they’re living, the emotional squalor as well as the impending physical squalor.

00:32:26:06 – 00:32:44:26
Dan LeFebvre
Well, I’d like to ask about another side of Joan Crawford, because in the TV series, in episode three, we see Joan Crawford’s personal life a little bit more. When we see her twin daughters, Kathy and Cindy, they’re having dinner with their mom. And then, you know, Joan seems to be spending time with them. But we also hear a mention of another daughter named Christina, who is opening in a play.

00:32:44:29 – 00:33:05:21
Dan LeFebvre
We never see Christina in the episode, but John’s made you mention her before. Mamacita gives Joan and a card to mail to Christina, and for a moment she almost refuses to sign the card, almost refusing to give any words of encouragement for Christina, which seems to be pretty a stark contrast to her talking to her twin daughters for dinner.

00:33:05:21 – 00:33:10:16
Dan LeFebvre
So can you explain what Joan Crawford was like as a mother to her children?

00:33:10:18 – 00:33:14:07
Scott Eyman
It depends on which of the children you ask.

00:33:14:10 – 00:33:18:06
Dan LeFebvre
I mean, that’s fair. It seems like there’s this contrast even in that scene. I mean, that they’re one.

00:33:18:09 – 00:33:55:05
Scott Eyman
That’s lit, that that’s actually accurate. She adopted four children. The twins, and Christina and, a boy, they were four, she batted 500. The boy turned out to have a lot of problems with the law. Was arrested many times. Christina and Joan, it’s fair to say there was a, they never got along or they did get along, but not for very long.

00:33:55:12 – 00:34:27:17
Scott Eyman
It was constant grinding gears, constant grinding of gears. Christina, of course, wrote Mommie Dearest after her mother died, after Joan died, and the twins, said none of that happened. It was nothing that Christina describe, or very little that Christina described actually happened. There were no beatings at Saratoga there. But Christina insisted this was God’s honest truth.

00:34:27:19 – 00:34:56:10
Scott Eyman
Well, you can read my book. But you, she and Christina, even when Christina was a teenager, it was a constant thing, you know, they just didn’t get along. And whereas the twins were, she always basically had a good relationship with them. And in her will, Joan disinherited Christina and the boy, whereas the twins were included in her in her estate.

00:34:56:12 – 00:35:18:12
Scott Eyman
So there are various reasons for the, for the, imbalance between them. But, and Crawford talked about that. It even got into the print when they were, when Crawford was alive, Christina would give an interview blasting her mother, and then the reporters would go over to Crawford, and Crawford would give an interview about her difficulties with Christina.

00:35:18:14 – 00:35:36:20
Scott Eyman
It was just one of these kind of soap opera ish, thing where two people just really couldn’t get along, you know, and, and, as I write in the book, you know, five under is a pretty good average for baseball. It’s not too good with Joan.

00:35:36:22 – 00:35:56:26
Scott Eyman
But it does happen. You know, it does happen. But, the twins are both gone now. They died in the last, 6 or 7 years. But, in her will, Crawford disinherited both the Christina and her son.

00:35:56:29 – 00:36:14:17
Dan LeFebvre
Wow. Yeah. It seems like there’s there is a contrast there. So. Yeah. I mean, it makes sense. The episode the or in the episode where we see that stark contrast of having dinner with, with the twins and then almost like refusing any sort of encouragement, it just seemed like, yeah, I was seeing the contrast in there.

00:36:14:17 – 00:36:23:29
Scott Eyman
So that’s an allusion, I’m sure, to the the ending. Mommie dearest, which everybody you know is in the back of her mind when it comes to Joan Crawford, especially at that stage, your life.

00:36:24:01 – 00:36:40:08
Dan LeFebvre
Yeah. Well, I think the episode is even called Mommie Dearest, so it definitely alludes to, because she writes that in the card, I think is what she ended up writing to Christina, in which I’m sure the specifics of that part of it was probably fictionalized, but just the concept getting across. It sounds like was pretty, pretty spot on.

00:36:40:10 – 00:37:07:13
Dan LeFebvre
We’re up to episode four of the TV series now. The filming of Baby Jane is completed, but it’s not released yet and no one really expects it to be good. Meanwhile, Joan Crawford and Betty Davis both seem shocked that they’re not getting offers since they thought Baby Jane would immediately rekindle their careers. As I was watching this episode, my takeaway wasn’t so much that their struggles in finding work had anything to do with Baby Jane since that hadn’t been released yet.

00:37:07:15 – 00:37:22:18
Dan LeFebvre
But the reason Joan and Betty weren’t getting offers seems to be because that’s how it was in the 1960s for older actresses in Hollywood. Is the series correct a show? It’s difficult to find parts, even for someone of Crawford’s career, simply because of her age and gender.

00:37:22:21 – 00:37:44:12
Scott Eyman
See? See, the difference between then and now is an actress in there? Well, I mean, to Susan Sarandon and Jessica Lange, we’re playing Betty and Joan. They’re six two in their 60s. They work all the time because there’s different strategies of show business now. But in the period we’re talking about, there was the movies or there was. That was it.

00:37:44:17 – 00:38:13:15
Scott Eyman
There wasn’t anything else. Now you’ve got streaming, you’ve got cable, there’s all these different things and they’re all needing product. And so there’s a lot more work for actresses after they’re no longer leading ladies. 28 to 35, shall we say. You know, where they’re playing. Women who don’t have necessarily families and two husbands or three husband.

00:38:13:17 – 00:38:39:20
Scott Eyman
There’s a lot more work now for actresses of a certain age than there was in the period that we’re talking about. That’s just the reality of it. And but there was no the not until the film broke and suddenly became a smash hit. And then suddenly everything changed. Suddenly the phone started ringing again. It must have been a wonderful, you know, and then and then Aldrich gets an offer from Fox to come over there and do our show.

00:38:39:20 – 00:39:16:17
Scott Eyman
Sweet Charlotte, you know, and do another Betty Davis Joan Crawford movie. And I’m sure he thought long and hard about. Long and hard about it and but and so the negotiations start again. And then the Oscar nominations come out for Baby Jane and Davis gets a nomination and Crawford does it. And then it gets interesting because, Crawford announces that she’ll be happy to accept the award for anybody that can’t make it to the ceremony.

00:39:16:19 – 00:39:35:07
Scott Eyman
And because she’s a previous winner of the Best actress Oscar, of course, she always is asked to present, you know, as former, former, winners are if they’re not working and they can get there, they’re often asked to present an award to this year’s winner. So she was asked to present. So she said she’d be happy to present.

00:39:35:10 – 00:39:59:07
Scott Eyman
And she also be happy to accept the award for whoever won. Well, Davis is there, of course, hoping she’s going to win and she doesn’t win. And Bancroft wins for the miracle worker. And Crawford gets up and accepts that. And she reads Bancroft’s note of acceptance that Bancroft, etc.. In case you want.

00:39:59:10 – 00:40:33:03
Scott Eyman
And in the during the broadcast, Crawford had been holding court actually had a little bar open in the back of the stage. And there was Pepsi-Cola, of course, as well as vodka and bites and things to eat for people because you get hungry, because the show goes out for 3 or 4 hours as she well knew, and everything was very convivial and, and Davis took I’m sure she took it took and Bancroft winning as, untoward.

00:40:33:05 – 00:41:02:11
Scott Eyman
And she wasn’t thrilled about, Crawford being the belle of the ball backstage, either. And at that point, that’s when that was when the situation went to the third degree between the two. And Crawford seems to have been unaware of it until they got on the set of Hush Hush with Charlotte. But that was the point at which Davis really dug it and dug in and said, I got really angry.

00:41:02:13 – 00:41:08:19
Scott Eyman
And de Betty Davis angry was quite a sight. It was like Vesuvius, you know, just.

00:41:08:21 – 00:41:09:24
Dan LeFebvre
Something I want to see angry.

00:41:09:27 – 00:41:13:19
Scott Eyman
So you don’t want her coming at you? You really did want to know.

00:41:13:22 – 00:41:33:05
Dan LeFebvre
Well, we see that in, episode five. We see how that play out in the Academy Awards. And if we’re to believe the TV version, then Joan Crawford was the one that kind of went around and called the nominees to see if, you know, she could accept on their behalf. And she kind of seems to be the one driving a lot of that.

00:41:33:05 – 00:41:43:26
Dan LeFebvre
Was, was she actually driving a lot of that, or was that just because she was, a former winner then she can present and since she’s already going to be there, or was she kind of driving it?

00:41:43:28 – 00:41:46:23
Scott Eyman
I think she was probably driving.

00:41:46:25 – 00:41:48:22
Dan LeFebvre
Okay, okay.

00:41:48:24 – 00:41:54:20
Scott Eyman
I can’t I can’t speak with 100% certitude, but I wouldn’t be surprised.

00:41:54:22 – 00:41:58:19
Dan LeFebvre
Okay. So it she knew what was going on there pretty much.

00:41:58:22 – 00:42:04:29
Scott Eyman
Well, she was not averse to getting a little time in front of the camera, let’s put it that way.

00:42:05:02 – 00:42:07:18
Dan LeFebvre
I mean, that makes sense. She’s an actress, too.

00:42:07:21 – 00:42:32:08
Scott Eyman
And the Academy Awards, everybody watched the Academy Awards in that era. You know, everybody watched the Oscars because everybody went to the movies. Now, not that many people go to the movies, and not that many people watch the Oscars, because not that many people see the movies that are being nominated. So it’s an entirely different moviegoing environment now than it was in 1963, when they’re giving up the Oscars for the 1962 films.

00:42:32:11 – 00:42:44:06
Scott Eyman
But in that era, everybody watch the Oscars until you got sleepy, you know? And and round about 10:00, America went to bed, but they were still giving out the awards.

00:42:44:09 – 00:43:03:08
Dan LeFebvre
So it sounds like it may have been more, that that more about the awards themselves. Not necessarily as much. I mean, the TV show it obviously plays up on. She’s doing this because she knows Betty Davis is going to hate this. Right? That’s the reason she’s doing it more than she wants, you know, to be on camera.

00:43:03:10 – 00:43:23:19
Scott Eyman
I can’t speak to her, her or her, her intent, you know, on the other hand, I mean, there was no guarantee she was Betty Davis going to lose. She could have won. Maybe she was number eight. She lost to Anne Bancroft by three votes. Who knows? You know, they don’t announce the vote of, Bancroft did give a great performance.

00:43:23:25 – 00:43:53:13
Scott Eyman
There’s no question about that. Hollywood loves a comeback story. But Bancroft is great in The Miracle Worker. She was always great. She was a wonderful actors. But, Davis took it personally, took as a personal affront, and, probably took it to her grave. There’s a a quote from Robert Aldrich I found. He said, Joan Crawford, Woody could be angry for 2 or 3 days.

00:43:53:15 – 00:44:14:02
Scott Eyman
Eddie Davis would be angry forever. She’d share a grudge and she yelled out it was forever. Crawford would get over it, but Davis would not get over it. And Davis never did get over it. She always thought that that Crawford somehow didn’t ace her out of the Oscar.

00:44:14:04 – 00:44:34:18
Scott Eyman
But shoehorned her way in front of the camera. That was it. That was that was what really pissed off Davis. That she was up there getting some of Anne Bancroft, glory by accepting the award. Even nobody. No, nobody thinks of it that way. But for Davis, it seemed that way.

00:44:34:20 – 00:44:53:10
Dan LeFebvre
Well, there is a brief line of dialog in episode six where Betty Davis mentions Anne Bancroft probably hasn’t even laid eyes on her Oscar since Joan accepted it. Do we know if Joan Crawford kept the award like the TV show seems to imply? Or did she actually give Bancroft or her Oscar? I would assume.

00:44:53:12 – 00:45:13:20
Scott Eyman
She gave Bancroft her Oscar this picture Bancroft hugging her Oscar in her apartment in New York City. She was she was married to Mel Brooks by that time. And they were living in an apartment. Not a terribly fancy apartment at that point, because neither one of them really made much money at that point. Yeah, but she got her Oscar in is remember, Crawford lived in New York.

00:45:13:23 – 00:45:25:09
Scott Eyman
She was going to leave. She was going to leave after the ceremony and go back to her house in her apartment in New York. So it was perfectly normal for her to get it to to Bancroft a couple days later.

00:45:25:12 – 00:45:30:00
Dan LeFebvre
Make sense? Yeah, I do feel like that was. No, that’s not true. But that seems a little far.

00:45:30:06 – 00:45:32:06
Scott Eyman
That would be pathological behavior.

00:45:32:09 – 00:45:54:07
Dan LeFebvre
Yeah. Well, you mentioned the movie before, and in episode six, director Robert Aldrich seems it’s time to recapture the success of Baby Jane. And this time it’s a film called hush, Hush, cousin Charlotte brings back Joan Crawford and Betty Davis, and this movie set doesn’t really seem to be any better than what we saw with Baby Jane. Joan is constantly drinking.

00:45:54:07 – 00:46:00:18
Dan LeFebvre
There are strong hints that Betty Davis and the director are sleeping together, which only makes Joan even more angry with that situation.

00:46:00:21 – 00:46:02:02
Scott Eyman
Once sleeping together.

00:46:02:04 – 00:46:03:03
Dan LeFebvre
They weren’t sleeping together.

00:46:03:03 – 00:46:23:18
Scott Eyman
Aldrich was not. Aldrich was not attracted to 60 year old women. No, he wasn’t a he didn’t make a habit out of sleeping with his late. Actually, Alfred Molina is very good in that in this film he actually gets a sense of Aldrich across. He, he’s bulked up. I think he’s padded. But he’s got his tie exactly the way Aldrich wore his tie.

00:46:23:21 – 00:46:41:05
Scott Eyman
You know, you didn’t, it it was just kind of crossed with with the thing, and halfway down his chest, was exactly how Aldrich was, you know, with an open shirt. That’s how Aldrich dressed. He never had it. Were in their era, a lot of directors wore, you know, a coat and tie when they’re working. Orders didn’t do that.

00:46:41:07 – 00:47:10:21
Scott Eyman
He was very much more casual dungarees and stuff. But, Molina, actually, I think did get, he must have talked to somebody or looked at stills of Aldrich and tried to replicate what he was actually like because Ortiz was a big split ball player. You know, he was a burly guy, came from money. The Rockefeller had branch, the Rockefeller estate, wanted to he didn’t share their politics and didn’t care about their money.

00:47:10:24 – 00:47:19:09
Scott Eyman
So he went out on his own, became a really, really fine director. But he was a he was a born nonconformist, ordered.

00:47:19:11 – 00:47:44:01
Dan LeFebvre
For the believe, the TV show. And in that episode, the impression I got for Joan Crawford on the set of Cousin Charlotte was that she basically seemed like she hated being there, but she’s also a workaholic, and so she kind of seemed to rely on alcohol to help her get through it. Would you agree with the TV shows depiction of the way it portrays Joan Crawford doing her shows?

00:47:44:03 – 00:47:45:07
Dan LeFebvre
Because it’s early.

00:47:45:09 – 00:48:09:00
Scott Eyman
I talked to a number of people who work with Joan Crawford. They’re still a lot. Well, 3 or 4, and they all say the same thing. She didn’t drink. She sipped. She was never drunk. And David Ladd, Alan Ladd, son, who worked with her. The last thing she did, actually, for television. Last thing she did forever in 1971 or 2.

00:48:09:02 – 00:48:32:14
Scott Eyman
He said a lot of the studio people, people from the studio era did that. They would sip vodka or whiskey, whatever it was through the day. They were never drunk. He said. Including my father. He said they didn’t get drunk, but they weren’t. But but it was it was their it was a way of medicating themselves, of their anxiety, of professional anxiety.

00:48:32:16 – 00:48:53:03
Scott Eyman
And they could and they had been doing it long enough so that they, they could kind of knew what their, capacity was, and they wouldn’t go beyond a certain point because it would be unprofessional if at 3:00 in the afternoon, you suddenly can’t get up out of your chair to do it because, you know, and I never got to that point, she said.

00:48:53:03 – 00:49:13:11
Scott Eyman
She sipped. She didn’t guzzle at all. She was she was. She appeared sober, even if she was sipping like it was always vodka. So I guess that that’s accurate in terms of the film. But she wasn’t drunk working. She wasn’t working.

00:49:13:14 – 00:49:18:29
Dan LeFebvre
Yeah. The impression I get is that she was drinking all the time, but not necessarily not just sipping. It seemed like she was.

00:49:18:29 – 00:49:19:17
Scott Eyman
No, I know.

00:49:19:18 – 00:49:20:09
Dan LeFebvre
Full on drinking.

00:49:20:16 – 00:49:50:18
Scott Eyman
It was not, a blackout drunk. Because who’s going to hire a blackout drunk? Really? Because we’re gets around fast. If you’ve got a drug problem or if you’re, like, drunk on the set, that’s really tough to get a past, you know, any time, any time, Errol Flynn got away with it some of the time because he, he was an alcoholic, not just sipping, I mean, either at as, after two in the afternoon, you didn’t get a lot of footage on Flynn.

00:49:50:21 – 00:50:14:17
Scott Eyman
Yeah, that was just the way it was. And everybody knew that. If you factored that into your day, there were maybe 5:00 scenes with Flynn. He weren’t going to be there. He was going to be in his dressing room sleeping. And I’m sure there probably were a couple other people like that, you know, but they didn’t work much, you know, and Flynn, they put up with Flynn because he was a huge, huge star.

00:50:14:20 – 00:50:22:16
Scott Eyman
You got to be a huge star. Guaranteed gold at the box office to get to for Dale. But for them to put up with that kind of behavior.

00:50:22:18 – 00:50:46:22
Dan LeFebvre
Well, speaking of not working in episode seven of the TV series, Joan Crawford seems kind of fed up with the Cousin Charlotte film. And after finding out that some of her lines are cut, she ends up in the hospital where she’s diagnosed with pneumonia, and this forces the film to a grinding halt. Production company 20th Century Fox doesn’t believe she’s actually sick, and they threatened to sue Crawford if an independent doctor determines that she’s not actually sick.

00:50:46:24 – 00:51:04:13
Dan LeFebvre
She’s just saying that she is, for the purposes of delaying the film. And of course, the series. In the series, the doctor determines that she’s healthy, but she still refuses to leave the hospital. So the studio fires her from the film and instead hires Olivia de Havilland to play Crawford’s role. Is that what really happened?

00:51:04:19 – 00:51:39:06
Scott Eyman
No. What happened? And this is again from the Robert Aldrich Papers, which has all the medical reports, her doctors reports from the hospital, etc., etc., etc.. Two things happened. Davis started sniping verbally at her, and Crawford got sick and she started calling in sick, which she never did in her career, ever. She always showed up, you know, MGM, if you had a major, massive coronary, you’d better show up.

00:51:39:06 – 00:51:59:13
Scott Eyman
I mean, they made it. There were some exceptions. There was a Judy Garland problems. You know, speaking of the kind of thing we were talking about a little bit ago, they put up with things from Judy Garland. But again, Judy was a huge, huge star. And also she was kind of grew up at MGM. So she was family in a way.

00:51:59:15 – 00:52:19:26
Scott Eyman
Crawford started went to the hospital. This is like the second week of the picture. They shot for a couple days in Louisiana for for the long shots of, because it takes place in the South. So they needed to get the location stuff out of the way. So they shot for a week or so in Louisiana, and that was okay.

00:52:19:28 – 00:52:46:03
Scott Eyman
And then they got back to Hollywood, and Crawford started calling in sick. She went to Cedars. She got a lot of doctors examinations. The reports are in the Robert Aldrich papers that I’ve gone through. Basically, she had a lung infection and her white blood cell count was sky high. So she wasn’t faking. She was sick. She got to the hospital.

00:52:46:03 – 00:53:13:11
Scott Eyman
She went back. They shot for a couple days. She felt sick again. Went back in the hospital. Just. This went on for some weeks. Davis was sniping at her, and it was partly, I’m sure, psychiatric psychological, partly physical. You know, but Davis had taken the whole Oscar thing as a personal insult and and and was make. Is that the way you’re going to do it?

00:53:13:14 – 00:53:37:12
Scott Eyman
Is that you’re good. That’s the way you’re gonna play the scene kind of thing. And and Crawford began to feel derailed. I think, whatever, increased sense of, security. She’d gotten from the success of Baby Jane dissipated. And then she got this lung thing and is old. Robert Aldrich says. Said you can’t fake a high blood, high white cell blood cell count.

00:53:37:15 – 00:53:56:01
Scott Eyman
I mean, that’s you can’t you could make some stuff that you’re not going to fake. White blood cell count. They thought she might have leukemia. So this went on for several weeks. She. She’d be there for a while, then she’d have to go back to hospital. They even put a, detective on her tail to see if she was faking.

00:53:56:03 – 00:54:23:09
Scott Eyman
And, the results of that were inconclusive. And ultimately, they had to make a decision. This is about, 4 to 5 weeks later where they’ve got maybe a half hour of film after four weeks, and they should be finished or more. And they didn’t have a lot of film, and they basically had to make up their mind as Fisher cut bait, but then they had to decision.

00:54:23:09 – 00:54:47:24
Scott Eyman
Okay, well, if we fire, if we let her go, who do we get? So, Joe Cotton, who was playing the male lead in the picture, said that Aldrich asked Vivien Leigh if she’d like to come and do part in Vivien Leigh wired back so I could just about stand to be in a Louisiana plantation with Joan Crawford, but not with Betty Davis.

00:54:47:27 – 00:54:51:24
Scott Eyman
So Vivien Leigh out of it. She to my God, that’s a.

00:54:51:27 – 00:54:53:00
Dan LeFebvre
Wonderful way to say no.

00:54:53:03 – 00:55:18:26
Scott Eyman
Yeah, exactly. And part of the problem was that, Davis had approval in her contract of her costar, which she had given, and she would have approved Vivien Leigh Aldrich wanted to get it to Katharine Hepburn and see if Katharine Hepburn would do it. Now, I don’t believe Katharine Hepburn would ever have done a movie. This movie, if you’ve seen the movie, this is not a movie Katharine Hepburn is going to do.

00:55:18:28 – 00:55:42:29
Scott Eyman
I mean, at one point, Bruce Dern’s head bounces rather jauntily down, up, down a long, winding staircase. That’s not a Katharine Hepburn picture. It’s it’s not. But Davis had approval and she didn’t want her to work opposite. So Hepburn’s out. Even if she wanted to do it, Ephron would. She wouldn’t accept her. So who will you accept?

00:55:43:01 – 00:56:09:09
Scott Eyman
She’d accept a lady to Harvard because they were friendly. So the Warner Brothers dealt then. So Aldrich gets on a plane to goes to Switzerland, where they have living at that point. And, basically they, he talks her to taking the picture as a favor to Betty. So that’s the scenario. Then they announce it. Once they’ve got to Havilland, they can let John go, they can say what she’s indisposed, etc., etc., etc..

00:56:09:11 – 00:56:31:15
Scott Eyman
And, John was, unhappy. I’m not sure why, because she hadn’t worked. She’d worked less than 50% of the days they were supposed to be working, you know, and they were basically they had a choice. I had to recast the part or cancel the picture. And if you cancel the picture, then you’re going to make an insurance claim, and then it gets into lawyers.

00:56:31:17 – 00:57:02:03
Scott Eyman
And three years later, the lawyers will still be haggling the reality of it. That’s what happens when you cancel a whole movie because of something. And she I mean, the white blood cell count was sky high, etc., etc.. So she felt, Crawford was upset and as I said, I think it was her upset was unjustified. The Fox put up with quite a bit a lot of absences, orders put up with quite a lot of absences.

00:57:02:05 – 00:57:24:21
Scott Eyman
They had a picture hanging there. They wanted to get it done, so they got it done. And it did okay. Didn’t do anywhere near as well as Baby Jane. It did about half as well as Baby Jane. It probably would have done a lot better if Crawford had been the picture, frankly. Although Aldrich said he actually thought the Avalon was better for the picture.

00:57:24:24 – 00:57:46:22
Scott Eyman
Because if you’ve seen the movie, to have one is the heavy had to have the Crawford characters the heavy and and because it’s a flip on baby Jane, whereas Baby Jane is the heavy in the original picture. But in this picture, Crawford was going to be the habit. So, he said, you don’t expect Italy to. Olivia de Havilland Melanie for Gone with the wind to be the heavy.

00:57:46:28 – 00:58:01:10
Scott Eyman
She didn’t play heavy, you know. So he thought in that sense that it worked better for the audience. But it didn’t work as well commercially because Olivia de Havilland didn’t have the same cachet the Joan Crawford did in concert with Bill gates.

00:58:01:13 – 00:58:10:16
Dan LeFebvre
Yeah, that makes that makes a lot of sense. It sounds like there was a lot made up for the TV show. I appreciate you clarifying a lot of that.

00:58:10:18 – 00:58:33:06
Scott Eyman
Oh yeah, oh yeah. Yeah, yeah, that’s a it almost goes off the rails. I thought at that point because they’re just making they’re really kind of making wild, melodramatic. I think it was I mean, melodrama is bad enough when you’ve got private detectives tailing actresses around Beverly Hills to see if they’re going shopping at bullocks. Oh, it’s got this.

00:58:33:06 – 00:58:55:05
Scott Eyman
When they’re when they’re too sick to work, you know, that kind of, but but that’s, that’s the movie business. Yeah, it’s a little crazy, but Aldrich said, and then he put it, he said he thought it was. He liked the picture. He thought it worked out okay. It’s a good picture. It’s a surprise, considering the trouble they had on it.

00:58:55:07 – 00:59:10:21
Scott Eyman
It’s a good picture. It’s too. It’s two like that. But he said in retrospect, he thought it was a mistake for him to do it because he didn’t want to be Alfred Hitchcock. He didn’t want to come out of the same, same hole twice, he says. He wanted he wanted to make all different kinds of pictures, which he did.

00:59:10:26 – 00:59:34:26
Scott Eyman
If you look at his filmography, there’s Westerns, there’s there’s wars, there’s character pieces, there’s war films, there’s romances, there’s there’s melodrama, a lot of melodramas. He really did direct every kind of movie. And, he said he thought it was a mistake to do, a story that was so similar to Baby Jane. Right after Baby Jane.

00:59:34:28 – 00:59:58:18
Scott Eyman
He said I didn’t want to be Alfred Hitchcock. I never wanted to be Albert Hitchcock, who basically did one kind of movie over and over again, over. And I could see his point and his filmography, backs him up that he wasn’t that kind of director. Who wants it, who wants to type himself? There are directors who want to type themselves, you know, so the audience will know what they’re going to get, more or less, more or less when they go to see the movie.

00:59:58:21 – 01:00:20:20
Scott Eyman
That can be a commercial advantage. But there are directors who want to do all sorts of different stuff and reinvent themselves every, every, every picture, every other picture in Aldrich with one of those guys, all of the emotional temperature in Aldrich picture is always I, you know, it’s never casual, relaxed. Well, let’s let’s have a mint julep under the tree.

01:00:20:22 – 01:00:31:07
Scott Eyman
No, no, no, people are screaming. Hatchets are coming down. Cars are going off cliffs. The Aldrich love melodrama.

01:00:31:09 – 01:00:55:27
Dan LeFebvre
But, speaking of things a little different. And episode eight is the final episode of the series, and we see Joan making one more attempt at film in 1970. And this is a low budget horror movie called Trog that seems to be quite different than what Joan Crawford is used to doing. She also gets a book deal from Simon and Schuster, but then at the book signing, she realizes her public image isn’t really something that she likes.

01:00:55:27 – 01:01:05:07
Dan LeFebvre
And then with that, she calls her agent and tells him to stop submitting her for new roles. Is that really how Joan Crawford retired from the film business?

01:01:05:10 – 01:01:40:21
Scott Eyman
Yes and no. She had done films, but in between, Charlotte and Trog, she’d made, I think, 3 or 4 films. None of them I would recommend, particularly. But at that point, her need to work, was far greater than her. Her sense of discretion about her screen image or career. She just wanted to work. It was important to her to worry, to her identity that she work because she’d always been a worker.

01:01:40:26 – 01:02:12:28
Scott Eyman
From the time she was, like I said, 12 or 13 years old. They were they were, riffs on, riffs on Baby Jane, essentially. And Charlotte, you know, slasher movies on the low budget side. The advantage of that was she got a percentage, and a couple of them were quite lucrative at that point, money began to get more important because she had this gorgeous apartment across the street from the Frick two floor apartment.

01:02:13:00 – 01:02:33:28
Scott Eyman
But it was very expensive, and she’d had to move out. She had to cut thick cut bait because it was just eating up too much cash. And she moved out in 64, I believe, of the apartment and into a different building where she spent the rest of her life. It was a perfectly nice five room apartment.

01:02:33:28 – 01:03:11:03
Scott Eyman
Five, six room apartment. But compared to the place she’d been in and compared to the place in Brentwood that she’d sold in 1960, it was kind of claustrophobic. So there was a sense of diminishment, you know, professional diminishment as well as smaller space. And Mamacita was still with her, you know, a friend of Crawford’s that I interviewed for the book said, last time she saw John was at Christmas time in 1976, and Joan died in May of 77, and she came over to visit.

01:03:11:03 – 01:03:36:23
Scott Eyman
And Mamacita had gone back to Germany. And at Christmas time, at 76in. And then I knew that she was dying. The joke died because Mamacita would never have gone back to Germany unless it was over. You know, she did a couple films in between. Then she did Trog, which is an atrocity, an embarrassment. I talked to the girl who was in.

01:03:36:23 – 01:04:07:08
Scott Eyman
It’s got the second female lead in the picture. Marvelous woman, Jim Brady. And that was it. And there was a TV film after that TV episode after that, and then that was it. And about 72 or 73, she did an event in New York City, and there was some pictures taken of her and Rosalind Russell together. And Rosalind Russell was on massive a doses of steroids because she had terrible arthritis and she was puffy.

01:04:07:10 – 01:04:34:09
Scott Eyman
Rosalind Russell was very puffy. And between Russell and and the angle the photographs they picked really unflattering, shots. And Crawford looked at herself until, well, that’s what I look like. I’m not. They won’t see me anymore. So she never worked out that she’d go out. I mean, she didn’t become a hermit in her apartment. She would go out to dinner, her grandchildren would visit once a month.

01:04:34:11 – 01:04:57:17
Scott Eyman
Did the children of, one of the twins who lived, two hours away in Pennsylvania. The parents would drive them down to New York on Saturday to drop the kids off at Crawford’s apartment, and they’d go out at the parents would go out on the town, you know, go out to dinner and show, and Crawford had the grandchildren for the day.

01:04:57:19 – 01:05:20:17
Scott Eyman
This happened every month, you know, for years. And she was great with the kid, with the grandchildren. The grant the grandson assisted me with the book, gave me access to a lot of family material. But she did. And she saw friends, and she was there. 21 was your favorite restaurant in New York City. That was the place you could always find her on the second floor.

01:05:20:20 – 01:06:02:13
Scott Eyman
21. And she go. She went out to the theater. She went out to restaurants like, 21. But she pulled back from show business. She really did pull back show business. And, her world got smaller and smaller and smaller. And then she got sick. And because she was a kind of queasy, half assed Christian Scientist, not completely, but she always believed and, you know, cold, cold showers and, you know, buck up and healthy, healthy, healthy and had enormous animal energy, you know, very energetic, naturally.

01:06:02:15 – 01:06:24:16
Scott Eyman
Old age didn’t really sit well with her. She was 72 when she died, which is not old age as we think of it. 892 was old age, like Lillian Gish. That’s old. But she was 72. But the last five years where she slowed down, she did slow down considerably. And I think it was a low level depression, frankly, because she had to find herself as a worker.

01:06:24:16 – 01:06:49:19
Scott Eyman
She had to find herself as a as an actress, as a star, and suddenly that kind of drifted away. It just drifted away. And she didn’t really replace it with, you know, all stars have that problem. At a certain point, you know, nobody just start for in their 20s, like she was and also a star in their 70s, mid 70s.

01:06:49:19 – 01:07:15:11
Scott Eyman
I, you know, at some point things drop out, and, you know, you replace it with family, you replace it with other, other activities. Golf, palm Springs, you know, summers in Europe, you can replace it with all sorts of things. She didn’t have anything to replace it with, really. Her life just got smaller, and then she got sick and then she died.

01:07:15:13 – 01:07:28:23
Dan LeFebvre
Well, we do see hints of that in this series. At the very end, it it seems like her health kind of declines pretty quickly. She does seem to be a recluse. She’s diagnosed with with cancer. And then the TV show.

01:07:28:23 – 01:07:29:02
Scott Eyman
She was.

01:07:29:02 – 01:07:30:03
Dan LeFebvre
Never and.

01:07:30:05 – 01:07:31:23
Scott Eyman
She was never diagnosed.

01:07:31:25 – 01:07:33:09
Dan LeFebvre
She was never actually diagnosed. Okay.

01:07:33:09 – 01:07:36:13
Scott Eyman
Or actually diagnosed. There was serious weight loss.

01:07:36:16 – 01:07:36:27
Dan LeFebvre
Okay.

01:07:36:27 – 01:08:01:01
Scott Eyman
And she started, she was in terrible pain and there was a lot of weight loss. And she had back pain. Very bad back pain. So the general feeling within the family was that she had pancreatic cancer, but she wouldn’t go. She wouldn’t go because of the back. And also pancreatic cancer. By the time is diagnosed, it’s too late.

01:08:01:04 – 01:08:16:07
Scott Eyman
There’s there’s no treatment because the pancreas is inaccessible. Unlike other areas of the body where you get at it. The pancreas is inaccessible. So by the time it’s diagnosed, it’s already stage three.

01:08:16:09 – 01:08:38:24
Scott Eyman
But she never actually was diagnosed. She just lost weight. She had a hospital bed, moved into her bedroom in the apartment. She had some friends that would come in. She ordered takeout. The restaurant she liked would send over food for her, people that her friends within the building. The apartment building? She had a dog. She adored dog.

01:08:38:24 – 01:08:58:27
Scott Eyman
She always had a little dogs. Little dogs? She always had dogs. And she had a dog in this building. And the dog would get housebound apartment because she couldn’t get any exercise. So the neighbors were to take the take the dog and run the dog up and down the hallway to get exercise, you know, get a tired out of it because she couldn’t do it.

01:08:58:29 – 01:09:08:10
Scott Eyman
So it was kind of a, self-imposed sad ending, really very isolated set it.

01:09:08:12 – 01:09:20:27
Dan LeFebvre
One of the towards the end. You mentioned her friends, and towards the end, we we see her kind of hallucinating with some some friends around her table, like Hedda Hopper and Jack Warner and even Betty Davis.

01:09:20:27 – 01:09:22:12
Scott Eyman
She was never friends with Hopper.

01:09:22:19 – 01:09:31:08
Dan LeFebvre
That’s something that was going to be my question, because it seems like in the series, she’s like one of her best friends is Hedda Hopper. And she even helps, like writing things about Betty. And it just seems to fuel this feud.

01:09:31:08 – 01:09:55:00
Scott Eyman
You know, had a hopper, was was a bitch to everybody. Basically. It wasn’t personal with Crawford. But but Hopper, she were not friends. And you could. They’re. Hopper’s papers are voluminous. They’re at the academy, and there are interview transcripts of her interviewing Crawford. And there’s no intimacy whatever between the two of them. It’s very formal, very formal.

01:09:55:03 – 01:10:17:23
Scott Eyman
There’s no girlish give and take about, or there’s no social aspect. Whatever it’s. She’s asking Crawford. Hopper’s asking kind of professional questions, and Crawford is giving her professional answers. No intimacy, no insight. Really? No. They were never friends because,

01:10:17:25 – 01:10:27:26
Scott Eyman
Hopper was a tough, tough, broad. Really tough. She knew where the bodies were going to be buried that weren’t dead yet.

01:10:27:28 – 01:10:29:15
Dan LeFebvre
Well.

01:10:29:17 – 01:11:00:04
Scott Eyman
Really, I mean, he was tough, and not a lot of fun and not a lot of fun. Kind of mean spirited as a as a human being. She didn’t like Crawford. She thought she. Although they had similar backgrounds. Both came from nothing. Nothing. And were self and self invented, essentially. Well, Crawford gave her mother money, but she never gave her time.

01:11:00:07 – 01:11:23:04
Scott Eyman
She didn’t like her mother particularly. And chances are, she probably shouldn’t have liked your mother. Frankly, she kept her mother arm’s length. Her mother never wanted for anything. She had a house. She had all the money she needed. Crawford supported her. But Crawford would go 2 or 3 years without seeing they talk on the phone. So that was about it.

01:11:23:06 – 01:11:48:22
Scott Eyman
She wanted her mother at arm’s length. And there were good reasons for that. Hopper. Hopper. Kind of like the mother when she thought Crawford was a bad daughter. She didn’t know the whole story. I found a husband of Crawford’s mother that nobody knew existed. And there was with her for I think there were four that we know about.

01:11:48:25 – 01:11:52:00
Dan LeFebvre
It’s bad when you start to lose. Lose count of how many husbands there were.

01:11:52:00 – 01:12:00:29
Scott Eyman
Yeah, I think there were four, but it could have been three. But there was. There were other guys passing through to at the same time, uncles, you know, uncles.

01:12:01:01 – 01:12:01:23
Dan LeFebvre
These uncles.

01:12:01:24 – 01:12:02:12
Scott Eyman
They would be.

01:12:02:14 – 01:12:02:27
Dan LeFebvre
With.

01:12:03:00 – 01:12:24:09
Scott Eyman
Uncle. Yeah. Your uncle. Your new uncle. Yeah. That you know that. Yeah. She had a lot. So. Crawford. Now, Hopper. Hopper probably didn’t know about all that. You know, she just thought, well, Joan’s wealthy, she lives well, and her mother’s got a nice little house, but she never spent any time with her mother. That’s not nice. She’s a bad daughter.

01:12:24:11 – 01:12:41:06
Scott Eyman
She didn’t get the whole picture. And Crawford was certainly not going to try to justify herself that, she didn’t feel she had to justify herself to anybody. So they were never friends? No. That’s a pure invention on the part of of of, the filmmakers.

01:12:41:09 – 01:13:00:06
Dan LeFebvre
Okay. Yeah. I mean, yeah, the friendship that they had and, and the TV show was the kind of friendship that. Yeah, she would have known that because they were talking like best friends. They were telling each other everything, so. No. Yeah. No. Okay. No. Makes a lot more sense. Thank you so much for coming on to chat about the TV show feud.

01:13:00:09 – 01:13:33:22
Dan LeFebvre
Since the show mostly focuses on the later years of Joan Crawford career, we didn’t have much time to talk about her earlier life and career, but that leads me right into my final question for you, because you have a brand new book out now called Joan Crawford A Woman’s Face. And having had the chance to read the advanced copy, there’s so many details and fascinating elements of Joan Crawford’s life and career that we’ll never get to cover on the podcast today, but I’ve got links in the show notes for everyone to get their own copy of your new book, and while they do that, can you share one of your favorite stories about Joan Crawford

01:13:33:22 – 01:13:36:15
Dan LeFebvre
that you came across while writing your book?

01:13:36:18 – 01:13:43:18
Scott Eyman
Well, I mentioned how the biggest influence on her as an actress was Lon Chaney.

01:13:43:21 – 01:14:06:20
Scott Eyman
And I found that very moving because this is a chorus girl, basically. She spent a year in New York working for the Schubert’s as a chorus girl, and then she got signed to the standard $75 a week beginners contract with MGM. Six month contract, all options on the studio side. And they threw her into the deep end of the pool.

01:14:06:21 – 01:14:32:21
Scott Eyman
You know, you’re doing bits, you’re doing walk ons, you’re posing for stills. Nobody knows who you are. Nobody cares who. Epoch. And she slowly begins to get a little traction. And then they start throwing her into different movies, trying to be Westerns. Opposite to McCoy, big western star. And then they put her up against Lon Chaney, who was a huge, huge star.

01:14:32:23 – 01:14:59:18
Scott Eyman
And generally speaking, in Lon Chaney’s movies, the actress is just the girl. You know, Chaney’s the star. The girl is just window dressing. But in this movie, it’s not just that she holds her own as an actress, which she shouldn’t have by all. By all means. I mean, she’s been in the movies for 18 months at this point, you know, and she’s a great actor at the top of his game.

01:14:59:21 – 01:15:07:22
Scott Eyman
And she’s just the girl. But she holds her own. She’s startlingly beautiful and compelling.

01:15:07:24 – 01:15:34:18
Scott Eyman
When she’s in a two shot with Lon Chaney, you watch her, not Chaney. And Chaney is a great actor and a great star, but she’s holding her own opposite Chaney. And when you see the movie, you realize, oh, that’s how it happens. You know, you throw them in the deep what amounts to the deep end of the pool, and most of them drown.

01:15:34:20 – 01:16:04:27
Scott Eyman
But every once in a while, there’s someone who just they may not have a great set of professional skills, but they’ve got magnetism, they’ve got charisma. There’s something about them that compels attention. And she’s doing scenes with Chaney, and you’re watching her, not Chaney. And I found that very moving because she didn’t know she was as good as she was.

01:16:05:00 – 01:16:26:09
Scott Eyman
You know, I think she thought she needed everything going for her. She needed the script. She needed the best cameramen. She knew the director. Everything had to be just so for her to get away with it. She didn’t. I’m not sure she realized how good she really was and how fast she got good. You know, because she always had doubts.

01:16:26:09 – 01:16:46:06
Scott Eyman
She always had those voices in her head and a lot of the Joan Crawford on a lot of the style with which she lived, the larger than life persona, the, telegraphing ahead when she’d be getting on the train would bring her into New York so her fan club would be there to meet her. All of that.

01:16:46:08 – 01:17:10:17
Scott Eyman
I think she thought she needed that, and I don’t think she needed that. I think she was extraordinarily gifted, naturally gifted. And, training would only have gotten in the way because she learned by doing it. She didn’t learn by being at Broadway for eight years or ten years and watching evil a galleon or Elena’s. She learned by watching Wayne Chaney and other actors.

01:17:10:19 – 01:17:37:09
Scott Eyman
Eleanor Boardman, she thought, was a wonderful actress, and she learned by also seeing actors who weren’t very good and what they did wrong. She talked to the cameraman, who told her what to do and what not to do more than the directors did, because the cameraman understood. There are certain people that the camera loves, and there are certain people that the camera hey, not the not the it doesn’t come across, but the camera loved her.

01:17:37:11 – 01:17:57:06
Scott Eyman
And over time, I don’t know that she ever loved herself. I think she learned to tolerate or so you know. She had a lot of insecurities. That’s what the book’s about dealing with insecurities, dealing with professionalism, learning how to act, learning how to be a star. Learning how to be a human being.

01:17:57:09 – 01:17:59:24
Dan LeFebvre
Well, thank you again so much for your time, Scott. Really appreciate it.

01:17:59:25 – 01:18:09:10
Scott Eyman
Happy to do it. Thanks for your time.

01:18:09:12 – 01:18:27:22
Dan LeFebvre
This episode of Based On a True Story was produced by Dan Lapham. Thank you once again to Scott Simon for helping us separate fact from fiction in the first season of feud. Scott’s new book is called Joan Crawford A Woman’s Face, and it adds yet another amazing biography from the Golden Age of Hollywood to Scott’s list of works.

01:18:27:25 – 01:18:49:16
Dan LeFebvre
If you’ve read any of Scott’s other biographies, you’ll appreciate his incredibly researched and narrative driven style. And as always, you’ll find links to Joan Crawford. A Woman’s Face by Scott Simon in the show notes for this episode, as well as on the show’s home on the web over at based on a True Story podcast.com. Okay, now it’s time for the answer to our Two Truths and a lie game from the beginning of the episode.

01:18:49:24 – 01:19:13:07
Dan LeFebvre
And as a quick refresher, here are the two truths and one lie again. Number one, Joan Crawford’s best friend was Hedda Hopper. Number two Joan Crawford was never officially diagnosed with cancer. Number three, Joan Crawford learned the most about acting from Lon Chaney. Did you figure out which one is a lie? I’ve got the answer in the envelope right here.

01:19:13:07 – 01:19:37:24
Dan LeFebvre
So let’s open this up. And the lie is number one. Even though the TV series has columnist Hedda Hopper as one of Joan Crawford’s best friends throughout the entire season, Scott explained, that is simply not true. Hedda Hopper was a real person. She was a real columnist who interviewed many of the actors and actresses of the time, Joan Crawford included.

01:19:37:26 – 01:20:00:14
Dan LeFebvre
But they weren’t super close friends like we see in the TV series. Thanks for sticking around to the end. If you are watching the video version on YouTube here, in a moment you’re going to see the credits roll. If you want to get your name in the credits for the next video and on the website, you can learn how to become a based on a true story producer using the link in the description or over at based on a True Story podcast.com/support.

01:20:00:17 – 01:20:10:25
Dan LeFebvre
Once again, that’s based on a true story podcast.com/support. Until next time. Thanks so much for spending your time with Scott Nye today, and I’ll chat with you again really soon.

 

00:00:02:01 – 00:00:32:21
Dan LeFebvre
Hello and welcome to Based on a True Story, the podcast that compares your favorite Hollywood movies and TV shows with history. With spooky season upon us. Today we’re pulling another classic episode from the vault. Actually, more than that, we’re going to do three episodes all about the same TV series History Channel’s Project Blue Book. In case the title alone doesn’t tell you what it’s about, Project Blue Book was the codename for the United States Air Force’s systematic study of UFOs.

00:00:32:23 – 00:00:56:27
Dan LeFebvre
Perhaps the best way to summarize it is from this fact sheet from the Air Force themselves, and I want to link to the whole thing in the show notes. If you want to read it all. But it starts like this. From 1947 to 1969, the Air Force investigated unidentified flying objects under Project Blue Book. The project, headquartered at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio, was terminated December 17th, 1969.

00:00:57:00 – 00:01:28:06
Dan LeFebvre
Of a total of 12,618 sightings reported to Project Blue Book, 701 remained unidentified. Now, if you’re watching the video version of this, you might notice some of my little corrections to that document, because technically, Project Blue Book itself didn’t start in 1947. The truth is a little more complex than that, as we’ll hear throughout this episode. But as you might imagine, the TV show that shares the name of the Air Force’s Project Blue Book covers some of those reports created by David O’Leary.

00:01:28:07 – 00:01:51:00
Dan LeFebvre
Project blue Book ran for two seasons of ten episodes each. The first season was in 2019 and the second in 2020. So that means we have a lot to cover today. And to kick this off, we’ll get to hear from the host of one of my all time favorite UFO related podcasts, Rob Christofferson. He’ll help us separate fact from fiction in each episode of the entire series, both seasons.

00:01:51:04 – 00:02:10:08
Dan LeFebvre
So that’s two episodes, one for each season. And then for the third episode, we’ll get to go behind the TV show itself as we hear from the creator, David O’Leary and the showrunner, Sean Blonsky. Before we kick this off with Rob Christofferson, though, let’s set up our game Two Truths and a lie for the first season of Project Blue Book.

00:02:10:10 – 00:02:28:10
Dan LeFebvre
Now, if you’re new to the show, since based on a true story is all about separating fact from fiction in the movies and TV, you’ll get to practice your skills at separating fact from fiction. In this podcast episode, with the game of two Truths and lie. So I’m about to give you three things that we’ll talk about during the first season of Project Blue Book.

00:02:28:13 – 00:03:01:03
Dan LeFebvre
Two of those things are true, and one of them is just an all out lie. Are you ready? Okay. Here, there. Number one, Project Blue Book was the first time the government investigated UFOs. Number two, former Nazi Wernher von Braun teamed up with Walt Disney to promote the U.S. space program after World War two. Number three, the term Foo Fighters was used by World War Two pilots who saw unexplained phenomena.

00:03:01:06 – 00:03:20:25
Dan LeFebvre
Got them. Okay, now, as you’re listening to our story today, see if you can figure out which one of those. It’s a lie. And I’ve got the answer in the envelope right here. And we’ll open that at the end of season one of Project Bluebook to see how well you did. Oh, and speaking of the video version here, just so you know, these episodes are from the vault.

00:03:20:25 – 00:03:47:18
Dan LeFebvre
They were recorded in 2020 and 2021, respectively. And that was before I did video episodes. So these are remastered audio only episodes. But with that, now it’s time to playback my chat with Rob Christopherson from 2020 about the historical accuracy of Project Bluebook Season one.

00:03:47:21 – 00:04:24:15
Dan LeFebvre
I’d like to start by setting the stage for Doctor J. Allen Hynek and his work on Project Bluebook. Now, according to the TV show Doctor, Hynek was an astrophysics teacher at Ohio State before he he’s recruited by the US Air Force to investigate flying saucers, what they called Project Bluebook. Now, there’s one little bit of dialog in the show where they give a very vague reason as to why they picked Doctor Hynek, and it’s when General James Harding tells Captain Michael Quinn that Hynek, quote, did some things for us in the war, end quote.

00:04:24:18 – 00:04:45:24
Dan LeFebvre
So not a lot of details there about that. But they do give some details about why they started Project Blue Book itself. Now, the reason that the show gives for that was because there are Hollywood movies about aliens coming out, and the public know something’s going on, but no one knows exactly what, including the government. According to the show.

00:04:45:25 – 00:05:08:00
Dan LeFebvre
So they want to find out, but they also want to cover it up. We get the sense from the show that the military picked Hynek because of his scientific background, because he’s not in the military, they’re hoping that they can give a little bit of some scientific proof to the public for flying saucers. That’s outside of the military.

00:05:08:03 – 00:05:30:12
Dan LeFebvre
Now, in the show, Doctor Hynek agrees to join Project Bluebook on three conditions. One is that he stays on staff at Ohio State. Two is he gets a paycheck from the government, some extra money for his family. And the three is that he gets recognition for whatever he finds. So that is, according to this TV show, a kind of setting all of this up.

00:05:30:14 – 00:05:36:19
Dan LeFebvre
How well do you think the show did depicting the way that Doctor Hynek got involved in Project Bluebook?

00:05:36:21 – 00:06:08:19
Rob Kristoffersen
So Doctor Hynek, joining Project Bluebook was kind of a matter of convenience for most. So, when Project Bluebook comes into being in late 1951, this is essentially the government’s third attempt to study the UFO phenomenon. And doctor J.L. and Harnick was part of the government’s first UFO study, which is called Project Sign, signed commenced in January of 1948 and was shuttered later that year.

00:06:08:21 – 00:06:40:11
Rob Kristoffersen
He joined the project in the spring of 48, for a few different reasons. He was at the time the director of the observatory at Ohio State University. All of the government’s UFO projects were run out of Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, which was about 60 miles away from him. And Hynek already had a high security clearance from his work on the proximity fuze during World War two, which is what they kind of allude to him doing things for us during the war.

00:06:40:14 – 00:07:06:05
Rob Kristoffersen
And when you factor in all of these things, Hynek was kind of the guy they needed an astronomer to rule out any kind of astronomical explanation that there could be for the sightings. And, he was a perfect guy to do it. So, as our good friend Sam stated on the Not Alone podcast, right place, right time, Wright-Patterson Air Force Base.

00:07:06:08 – 00:07:10:27
Dan LeFebvre
I love that. So,

00:07:10:29 – 00:07:46:27
Rob Kristoffersen
When Hynek took the job, he believed that this would be a quick one. He was pretty sure that what the UFO phenomenon was at the time was just Cold War nerves, world War two, latent nerves, you know, stuff left over. So, one of the most important cases that Hynek worked on, and that will come full circle for his involvement in Project Blue Book is a case involving a pilot by the name of Thomas F Mantell, who died while in pursuit of a UFO in January of 1948.

00:07:47:00 – 00:08:25:29
Rob Kristoffersen
Mantell and a few other pilots were taxiing planes from Marietta, Georgia, to Stanford Field in Kentucky. And while they were doing that, Godman Air Force Base, which was located near Fort Knox, had received a few unidentified blips on their radar and asked Mantell and his crew of a few other pilots to go investigate it. Well, Mantell pursued the object, but, unfortunately, he didn’t have oxygen on board, so when his plane climbed too high, he suffered from epoxy, which basically caused him to crash his plane.

00:08:26:02 – 00:08:50:15
Rob Kristoffersen
And Hynek was the one that kind of made his determination on this case. And he claimed that he was chasing the planet Venus. So really just kind of debunking mentality. And that was at the start of Project Sine. That was the mentality that, and Hynek had. So.

00:08:50:18 – 00:09:17:06
Rob Kristoffersen
Project sine was basically shuttered largely because of a document called The Estimate of the situation, which basically said that these crafts were extraterrestrial in origin. No surviving copy of this document exists, though, like, the generals that this report went to basically said, you have to destroy every single one of these, documents. There’s no way that we’re going to the president or anybody with this kind of information.

00:09:17:06 – 00:09:54:02
Rob Kristoffersen
So no surviving copy has ever been found, but there have been people who have attested to it, including Doctor Hynek himself. So signed was shuttered and was reactivated as Project Grudge. Now, grudge was strictly a debunking campaign. They downplayed reports and at times just threw them out. Didn’t even bother to investigate them. Grudge officially lasted for about a year, but they kind of kept somebody on staff so that if somebody did want to report UFO sightings to there, there would be somebody there.

00:09:54:02 – 00:10:25:14
Rob Kristoffersen
And that guy’s name was Lieutenant Jerry Cummings. And in 1951, there was a sighting at Fort Monroe, Monmouth, new Jersey, and Air Force personnel witnessed a disc shaped object. And a report was, filed, but was ultimately dismissed by Cummings under the directive that he had been working with. And this report made its name to a general by the name of CP Campbell, who requested to see the report and didn’t really like the looks of it.

00:10:25:15 – 00:10:55:04
Rob Kristoffersen
He didn’t feel like people were being honest with him, and Cummings basically told him how the project had been handled up to this point, that it was there just to debunk reports. And, at that point, Cummings got or sorry, Campbell got pretty angry and, he ordered that, Project Grudge be reactivated in full force. Unfortunately, Cummings was on his way out, back to a civilian life.

00:10:55:04 – 00:11:08:09
Rob Kristoffersen
So he got a gentleman by the name of Captain Edward Rupert, who was the first Project Bluebook head to, spearhead this project. So.

00:11:08:12 – 00:11:32:16
Rob Kristoffersen
Captain Rupert was essentially the backup pilot, for the crew of the Enola Gay. So if any, of the pilots that were involved in that flight couldn’t, somehow make it, for whatever reason, he was the guy that was going to fly that plane, and he had worked with Doctor Hynek before on Project Sign, and he quickly got in there.

00:11:32:16 – 00:11:52:15
Rob Kristoffersen
He whipped this project into shape, and it soon it would be relabeled Project Blue Book. But one of the things that he did was he went back into the old reports just to see what was there, to see how things were ruled. And Rupert was the kind of guy who was going to give you his objective opinion.

00:11:52:15 – 00:12:14:20
Rob Kristoffersen
He wanted this to be as objective study as possible. So if you leaned one way, either one way to one side or the other, you were kicked off the team. So, one case report that he looked at was the Thomas F Mantell case, and he saw that Hynek was the one that made the determination on that one.

00:12:14:22 – 00:12:47:00
Rob Kristoffersen
So he basically called him up and said, I need you to come back in here. We need to reexamine this case. They determined that what Mantell was chasing was a Project Mogul balloon. This was a newly declassified project. As of 1951, that essentially set up weather balloons to, with audio equipment attached to them. And they were basically there to detect Soviet atomic bomb tests.

00:12:47:03 – 00:12:56:29
Rob Kristoffersen
And that’s basically how Hynek made his way onto Project Bluebook. He stayed, after that, through the entirety of the project.

00:12:57:01 – 00:13:14:26
Dan LeFebvre
So just to make sure I’m understanding there was a captain, because in the show, there’s Captain Quinn, and we also meet a couple generals. General Harding and General Valentine are the character names. Were they also were they based on those, those generals and the captain that you were referring to, or they just completely fictional?

00:13:14:29 – 00:13:55:22
Rob Kristoffersen
They’re inspired. They’re not, totally those people. For instance, Captain Quinn is kind of based on to Project Blue book heads, Edward Powell, like I mentioned. And, another one by the name of Colonel Robert Friend, who was a Tuskegee Airman, and he served, I think, for about a year. But he was he had had that Edward Pelt mentality, which was he they were skeptical, but they wouldn’t let their, skeptical beliefs really shatter any kind of, reports or anything like that or, you know, lead them down a road.

00:13:55:22 – 00:14:24:12
Rob Kristoffersen
They didn’t think they should be going. In general, Valentine, I do believe, is based on General Nathan Twining, who was the general that actually created Project Sign, and he was kind of a figure in the background during the government UFO research project. So he was always kind of there in the background, always kind of got Intel and he’s, you know, made some interesting statements on UFOs and such.

00:14:24:14 – 00:14:36:05
Rob Kristoffersen
The there’s some funny interviews with him. There’s one in which he alludes to UFOs kind of thwarting U.S. forces in Vietnam and stuff like that. It’s, there’s a lot of fun stuff out there.

00:14:36:08 – 00:14:49:19
Dan LeFebvre
Well, yeah. Okay. I was just curious because obviously Doctor Hynek being real. I was just curious who on the military side of it would have been real. But it sounds like they’re more just composite characters, which is very common that we get for movies and TV shows.

00:14:49:22 – 00:14:59:18
Rob Kristoffersen
Yeah, for the most part, the only, real to life characters on the show are Doctor Allen Hynek and his wife, Mimi. Mimi Hynek.

00:14:59:21 – 00:15:25:25
Dan LeFebvre
You mentioned the pilot there, and that leads right into the next question that I have, because in episode one, it kicks off with something that they call the Fuller Incident. Now, I’m going to assume that’s not necessarily the the same incident that you were referring to, because this in the show at least happens in Fargo, North Dakota, and it’s named after Lieutenant Henry Fuller, who is the pilot who gets into this dogfight with a flying saucer.

00:15:25:27 – 00:15:48:18
Dan LeFebvre
And according to the show, that was essentially the reason why they started Project Blue Book. But then after the investigation of the incident, Doctor Hynek concludes that the object the lieutenant was chasing was nothing more than a weather balloon. And you mentioned something similar to that. So was the fuller incident that we see in the show. That event that you were referring to, is that something else?

00:15:48:20 – 00:16:20:04
Rob Kristoffersen
No, that’s a little bit different. It has some of the hallmarks of the Thomas F Mantell case, but the Fuller incident is based directly on an incident called the Gorman dogfight. And, this involved a man by the name of George F Gorman, who was an Air National Guard pilot out of Fargo, North Dakota. And on October 1st, 1948, his squadron was returning from a flight at night, and Gorman decided he wanted to stay up in the air for a little bit, longer for some night flying practice.

00:16:20:04 – 00:16:42:06
Rob Kristoffersen
And after circling around a football stadium, this was around 9 p.m. that night. He was approaching Hector Airport and was notified by the tower that there was a Piper Cub plane below him. And, he was forced to circle the airport for a short period of time. And on one pass, he saw what he believed to be the tail light of another craft.

00:16:42:06 – 00:17:10:26
Rob Kristoffersen
Pass the cape, the Piper Cub plane on his right. It was white and color, blinking in intervals and approximately 6 to 8in in diameter. So this object was not registering on radar in any way. But, he went into an investigate it. And when Gorman made his approach, the light stopped blinking and basically just took off. And Gorman engage with the object.

00:17:10:26 – 00:17:40:28
Rob Kristoffersen
He pursued it. He found himself out, maneuvered basically at every turn, but was able to get behind it at one point. But when he did, the object basically turned around and flew straight in his direction. It passed right over his canopy and turned around to do it again. But before it seemingly was supposed to make impact, the light abruptly turned upward and shot straight up into the air.

00:17:41:01 – 00:18:04:22
Rob Kristoffersen
Now, Gorman attempted to pursue the object, but it was such a steep climb that his plane stalled out at 14,000ft. He was able to restart it, though, and landed. So, it’s not like it is. It’s depicted in the show. It’s the. He doesn’t crash the plane or anything, but, what makes this sighting so powerful is that there were numerous eyewitnesses to it.

00:18:04:29 – 00:18:28:05
Rob Kristoffersen
The two men manning the tower that night, Lloyd de Jensen and H. Johnson attested to the object’s fast speed, maneuverability, and the Piper Cub plane. The pilot of it, doctor A.E. cannon, also saw the light and testified to basically the same thing. And here’s a here’s a fun quote from, Mr. Gorman, quote.

00:18:28:05 – 00:19:08:18
Rob Kristoffersen
I am convinced that there was definite thought behind its maneuvering. I am further convinced that the object was governed by the laws of inertia, because its acceleration was rapid but not immediate, and although it was able to turn fairly tight at considerable speed, it still followed a natural curve. End quote. So this case was one of the Landmark Project’s nine cases, the other being The Test, the death of Thomas F Mantell, and another account known as the Child’s Weighted Account, which involved two civilian pilots that witness basically a long cigar shaped object fly alongside their plane at night.

00:19:08:21 – 00:19:18:01
Rob Kristoffersen
So that’s really what, that incident and, what that, episode was based on.

00:19:18:03 – 00:19:22:08
Dan LeFebvre
Sounds like movements that you would expect from a weather balloon. Right.

00:19:22:10 – 00:19:32:18
Rob Kristoffersen
Kind of. It kind of reminded me of, like, if you think about it, like, maybe like an alien playing with a laser pointer, you know, it’s it’s got those hallmarks there, I like that.

00:19:32:19 – 00:19:33:21
Sean Jablonski
Yeah.

00:19:33:23 – 00:19:36:03
Dan LeFebvre
There you go. And we’re just the cats following along, right.

00:19:36:05 – 00:19:37:13
Rob Kristoffersen
Absolutely.

00:19:37:15 – 00:19:57:13
Dan LeFebvre
Well, something that happened after this in the show was when Doctor Hynek used the term UFO for the first time. And, it was I thought this was funny because when he used it, the Captain Green character, you kind of looks at him as like a what? And then he goes on to explain, well, I’m kind of trying to coin this term to explain what we’re investigating.

00:19:57:16 – 00:20:02:13
Dan LeFebvre
Was he the one that actually coined the term UFO? And was it after that incident?

00:20:02:15 – 00:20:28:26
Rob Kristoffersen
No. Actually, the person that coined the term is it’s one of the people that coined is based on, Edward Rupert. He actually coined the term and early 52, he was looking for a different term because, flying saucer had such, negative, connotation associated with it. So he wanted a fresh term to go in with an unidentified flying object, is what he came up with.

00:20:28:28 – 00:20:36:25
Dan LeFebvre
I guess. Makes sense, too, because it’s not. You mentioned earlier a cigar shaped craft. They’re not always saucer shaped.

00:20:36:27 – 00:20:37:29
Rob Kristoffersen
No.

00:20:38:02 – 00:21:05:05
Dan LeFebvre
Now, in episode two of the show, Doctor Hynek and Captain Queen go to investigate a case in West Virginia where a mother and her children see something strange. And this is the case, according to the show called The Flatwoods Monster, because it’s not a flying saucer. This time or a UFO use that term, but it’s also involving a creature of some sort.

00:21:05:07 – 00:21:25:11
Dan LeFebvre
Maybe an alien creature. Well, that’s what Doctor Hynek and Captain Queen are there to find out. Ultimately, Doctor Hynek once again gives a rational explanation for the strange things that were seen. He stands up in front of the town and gives this speech. Captain Quinn and Doctor Hynek explained that the spaceship they saw was just a meteor.

00:21:25:14 – 00:21:47:00
Dan LeFebvre
The creature that they saw was a great horned owl. And Doctor Hynek goes on to give a scientific explanation about hot air and cold air, causing light to refract in different directions. It’s why stars twinkle and mirages are formed in the desert, according to his explanation. And it’s also how you can see an owl in a burning forest and think it’s a monster.

00:21:47:03 – 00:22:00:28
Dan LeFebvre
So that’s how the the movie or I’m sorry in the movie, the TV show sets up the flatwoods monster case. Was that a real investigation and how well did the show do explaining those events that happened?

00:22:01:00 – 00:22:30:04
Rob Kristoffersen
The flatwoods monster case was a real case that, took place in September of 1952. And it really is almost something out of a horror movie, especially when you look online at the images that were created once the eyewitnesses described what they were seeing. So, a group of kids, Eddie and Fred Mae and Tommy Heyer, witnessed this fireball in the sky in September of 1952.

00:22:30:07 – 00:22:55:29
Rob Kristoffersen
And they saw it go down in the forest. So they gathered a small group that included, the Mae’s mother and Gene Lemmon, who was a 17 year old National Guard member. And Lemmon led the charge into the into the forest. And they had first see what they believe was just two lights. But the more that they stare at them, the more that they realized that they look more like eyes.

00:22:56:02 – 00:23:23:29
Rob Kristoffersen
And then they see this large metallic looking creature that had, they described it like a spade behind its head, but it was completely red and apparently everyone in this group, which consisted of seven the seven people witnessed this creature. The town was kind of on edge a little bit, but not as bad as they depict it in the show.

00:23:24:01 – 00:23:54:09
Rob Kristoffersen
But, Project Blue Book really didn’t play much of a part in this case. This was really more investigated by civilian, UFO groups and, independent investigators. One of the most prominent was a an investigator named Gray Barker, who, did and investigated a number of cases, including the, famed Mothman flap in, West Virginia in 1966 and 1967.

00:23:54:11 – 00:24:32:06
Rob Kristoffersen
But basically all Project Blue Book did was looked at the, sighting of the object in the sky and just basically determined that it was a meteor. But they didn’t seem to acknowledge the creature at all in their, in their files. So, yeah, they didn’t really play much of a part, but, I did enjoy the depiction, of the way that they did things the skeptics have pointed to, an owl in a tree as being the culprit of this, but, I don’t necessarily pi that.

00:24:32:09 – 00:24:35:19
Dan LeFebvre
But it’s but it’s just, you know, the hot air and the cold air and.

00:24:35:21 – 00:24:36:02
Sean Jablonski
Well, the.

00:24:36:02 – 00:24:48:27
Rob Kristoffersen
Cool thing is the, when he’s talking about how stars twinkle, he was the astronomer that discovered how stars twinkle. So. Oh, it’s kind of fitting for him, you know?

00:24:48:29 – 00:24:58:00
Dan LeFebvre
Yeah, well, that’s cool. I didn’t realize that. That they. I’m sure they they pulled that in as a as a little, little nugget there too, for somebody to find that cool.

00:24:58:03 – 00:25:25:22
Rob Kristoffersen
Or the, the cool thing about this show is that his children, Paul and I think another one of his children actually consult for the show. So it’s a lot more it’s it has its, you know, dramatic elements, but it’s, pretty accurate, as best as they have been able to contribute, there are some mannerisms that Aidan Gillen will do that, apparently are the same ones that Doctor Hynek would do.

00:25:25:22 – 00:25:54:04
Rob Kristoffersen
And, and, they’ve actually used like, personal items that, Jalen Hynek and maybe Hynek had for their characters in the show. So, you know, it’s a cool it’s a cool nod. And, the show is very respectful of his legacy. So I, I appreciate it for that because he is this really monumental figure in UFO research.

00:25:54:07 – 00:26:20:04
Dan LeFebvre
Well, let’s, continue on because there’s more episodes that we need to cover. After the flatwoods monster case, we see that Doctor Hynek is he’s taking his role very seriously, and he’s he’s really trying his best to come up with some scientific rationale behind both the faller incident and the flatwoods monster. But then the next case is the Lubbock Lights.

00:26:20:04 – 00:26:40:11
Dan LeFebvre
And that’s when things start to change as far as the show is concerned. And this is episode number three in the series. It’s the first time that both Captain Quinn and Doctor Hynek experienced something themselves. They’re out in the middle of the night, in the middle of nowhere, and Captain Quinn is inside the car and Doctor Hynek is outside of the car.

00:26:40:11 – 00:27:13:16
Dan LeFebvre
When the car just starts going crazy, lights are flashing, the radios tuning frequencies, the entire car is shaking, and then a massive V-shaped crack with blue lights fly over, and they both see it now in the show. General Harding and General Valentine in the military give Quinn and Hynek the explanation that what they saw was a top secret experimental craft that has a V shape wing, and they show some photos that look like they could be real from that time period.

00:27:13:18 – 00:27:38:12
Dan LeFebvre
But despite this explanation, Doctor Hynek doesn’t believe that this is true. Doesn’t really believe what the military is telling him. And so he’s starting to get the sense that perhaps he’s not getting the full story. At the very end of episode three, we see him writing in his notebook. He writes possible government cover up. So was the series correct?

00:27:38:12 – 00:27:49:27
Dan LeFebvre
And showing that Doctor Hynek started to have experiences of his own that he couldn’t explain around the time of the Lubbock Lights? And did he start to suspect that he wasn’t being fed the full story from the Air Force?

00:27:49:29 – 00:28:15:20
Rob Kristoffersen
Hynek, as far as I know, never witnessed a UFO while investigating any cases during Project Blue Book. There’s a really great biography of him called The Close Encounters Man by Mark O’Connell, and in it he talks about a sighting that he may have had while looking, through a telescope. He claimed he saw, like a strange object, fly over the face of the moon or something like that.

00:28:15:20 – 00:28:56:17
Rob Kristoffersen
But, he never had an overt UFO experience during his time. In regards to what the Air Force was letting him in on, Hynek was the one of the people that was on the inside. So it they never really kept anything from him. If anything, he knew things that he couldn’t really talk about. And, in 1953, there was a CIA led panel called the Robertson Panel, which basically came in, and the reason why they came in, we’ll, it’ll be coming up later in, in the line of questioning.

00:28:56:17 – 00:29:32:19
Rob Kristoffersen
And then it pertains to an episode like the last episode in the season. But they came in, they assessed the work of, Project Bluebook, and they basically determined that, like Project Grudge, they had to now downplay reports in order to keep the public calm. So, in order to prevent mass hysteria, they were going to have to misidentify things and, essentially Project Blue Book from 1953 onwards became Project Grudge all over again.

00:29:32:21 – 00:30:17:15
Rob Kristoffersen
But Hynek was there. He was he was doing the best that he could. He couldn’t really come forward and say what he wanted and not. Or he would be losing access to the Project Blue Book Files, which at the time were the best place to get UFO files from. There weren’t civilian organizations as of yet. They would pop up not long after, but, essentially in 53, that was a turning point for Hynek, where he had started to change from this total skeptic there to debunk reports to, okay, now I’m being told that I can’t do my job properly.

00:30:17:20 – 00:30:41:23
Rob Kristoffersen
I don’t like this, so I don’t really trust the CIA at this point. And, he would essentially go through this metamorphosis over time where he would become a believer in the phenomenon. So the way that they kind of depict it in the show, his turn doesn’t happen that quickly, but, it does it does happen over time.

00:30:41:25 – 00:30:57:08
Dan LeFebvre
Okay. Yeah. It sounds like they, again, we see this a lot in movies and TV shows where they simplified it. It sounds like they just gave him an experience. Instead of trying to explain the CIA panel and all of these other, aspects, perhaps.

00:30:57:10 – 00:31:26:11
Rob Kristoffersen
Yeah. Absolutely. And, the Lubbock Lights photographs are real photographs. I do believe the ones they show in the actual episode are the real Lubbock Light photographs. And, that case took place in early 51. That was during the transitionary period from when Rupert was coming in. But, that was a case that stumped a lot of people.

00:31:26:13 – 00:31:50:18
Rob Kristoffersen
There were scientists that studied it, and, the the individual that actually took the photographs. He was a student, I do believe, at one of the universities. They took these photographs over a couple different nights, but they essentially show a group of lights in an arrow type shape, in passing over the skies of Lubbock, Texas.

00:31:50:18 – 00:31:55:19
Rob Kristoffersen
It’s, it’s really fascinating case. Then, go look up those photos online.

00:31:55:19 – 00:31:56:20
Sean Jablonski
They’re fun.

00:31:56:22 – 00:32:14:26
Dan LeFebvre
Yeah. And in, in the show, don’t they kind of pass it off as possibly a flock of birds or something like that, reflecting off lights. Was that a, an excuse or a, natural reason that was kind of thrown around there as one of the possibilities.

00:32:14:29 – 00:32:42:22
Rob Kristoffersen
Yeah, that was an actual reason that, investigators pinned, and they did end up doing a test and taking photographs. And what happened was you could see one speck of light from one bird. There wasn’t enough, reflection to actually pick it up. So it’s not clear exactly what the Lubbock lights were. They actually traveled quite fast.

00:32:42:25 – 00:32:51:11
Rob Kristoffersen
They determined, when they flew over them, that they were traveling at somewhere near 1800 miles an hour or so. Pretty sure birds can’t do that.

00:32:51:18 – 00:32:55:04
Sean Jablonski
Not many birds that they come across. Okay.

00:32:55:06 – 00:32:58:21
Dan LeFebvre
I hope not. At least that would be, the fast flying birds.

00:32:58:24 – 00:32:59:08
Rob Kristoffersen
That is a.

00:32:59:08 – 00:33:02:14
Sean Jablonski
Flat like work.

00:33:02:16 – 00:33:33:02
Dan LeFebvre
Well, the the next episode, episode number four, brings in Operation Paperclip. And this is when we’re introduced to Verner von Braun. He is a former Nazi who built the V-2 rocket and post-World War II two. He’s heading up America’s space program. So Doctor Quinn and or. I’m sorry, doctor Hynek and Captain Quinn get a firsthand look at von Braun’s work, as they think that maybe one of the UFOs that they’re investigating is just one of his rockets, and it’s a top secret rocket.

00:33:33:04 – 00:34:00:17
Dan LeFebvre
So during this on the show, von Braun pulls Doctor Hynek aside and offers him a job to work with him. But Doctor Hynek doesn’t trust the former Nazi. I wonder why. But then, regardless, von Braun tells Doctor Hynek that he can’t explain the sightings. He knows about anybody. He can’t explain them. And then at the end of the episode, we see von Braun overseeing a test with an American pilot being forced into a giant flying saucer.

00:34:00:19 – 00:34:23:12
Dan LeFebvre
And as the saucer starts to take off, there’s some massive rings rotating around it. Obviously, you know, we have some effects going on there and then, you know, poof, it just disappears. And then von Braun simply says it worked like he’s not. The IT show is implying that he’s working on a lot more than just rockets. Can you give us an overview of Operation Paperclip?

00:34:23:12 – 00:34:31:26
Dan LeFebvre
And did Project Bluebook cross with paperclip and take Doctor Hynek to meet up with, Verner von Braun?

00:34:31:28 – 00:34:33:12
Sean Jablonski
So.

00:34:33:15 – 00:35:02:21
Rob Kristoffersen
For Operation Paperclip? Basically, as World War Two was winding down, American, British and Russian forces were racing to scour Germany for military resources, technological advances and anything that they could get their hands on that the Germans may have created, the Germans at the time were known for, really high technological advances, especially in, in rocketry.

00:35:02:23 – 00:35:30:17
Rob Kristoffersen
And, the allies actually discovered a list called the Ozen Berg List that contain the names of every single scientist, that had worked for the Third Reich. Funny enough, they found it in a toilet. So let’s take that for what you will. Okay. The allies, essentially tracked down 1600 scientists and brought them to America. The OSS, the sponge, expunge their records.

00:35:30:19 – 00:36:04:29
Rob Kristoffersen
So they were basically given a slate clean slate to work for the government. And the most infamous individual was, Wernher von Braun. And he is basically the father of modern rocketry. He designed the V-2 rocket, and he was instrumental for us, in the space race. He pretty much got us to the moon. So, I got to say, Dan, I didn’t really expect to find anything because I didn’t think that Hynek had done anything with V-2 rockets or had met Wernher von Braun.

00:36:04:29 – 00:36:21:15
Rob Kristoffersen
But, you brought out the best to me, Dan. So I got to thank you for that. Now, I discovered this blog post on, I think it was Ohio Moo Funds website. And let me tell you, this website looks like it’s from the 90s. I love it.

00:36:21:18 – 00:36:23:13
Sean Jablonski
Hey, nice.

00:36:23:15 – 00:36:55:16
Rob Kristoffersen
And it was written by John Hynek secretary, a woman named Jenny Zeeman, and apparently Hynek worked on V-2 rockets while at White Sands Missile Range after the war. Now, he had imagined he had allegedly met Wernher von Braun at that time. But nothing. Nobody has ever come forward with this information like it’s not even in his biography. And even Heinrich’s closest friends do not know anything about this.

00:36:55:18 – 00:37:07:18
Rob Kristoffersen
So, yeah, apparently he may have worked on, V-2 rockets at one point. So, Yeah, that that’s new information to me, man. So good job.

00:37:07:21 – 00:37:18:07
Dan LeFebvre
Wow. Yeah. No, I mean, there are two high profile characters. I mean, I’m I’m not intimately familiar with Von Braun, but he’s kind of the the face.

00:37:18:07 – 00:37:19:19
Rob Kristoffersen
Of.

00:37:19:22 – 00:37:42:03
Dan LeFebvre
The US after the war, getting a lot of of Nazi scientists to to work on American technology. And for me, he was always kind of the face of that. So when I saw them together on the show, I knew that was something I had to ask, like, did they actually meet each other? Or is this just a show, having two names that people might recognize and using it as an excuse to put those two together?

00:37:42:06 – 00:37:47:15
Rob Kristoffersen
Right. Yeah. And, apparently they did cross cross paths at one point.

00:37:47:18 – 00:38:05:29
Dan LeFebvre
Well, speaking of crossing paths with names, I’m going to ask you another one here, because in the show there’s one point where Doctor Hynek tells Captain Quinn, as you know, he doesn’t trust Von Braun. And he’s like, you know, how do you make a Nazi look legitimate? You have Walt Disney give him his own special and Beemer right into your living room.

00:38:06:01 – 00:38:13:13
Dan LeFebvre
And we see this happen on the show. Did Von Braun and Walt Disney actually team up for a TV special?

00:38:13:15 – 00:38:37:24
Rob Kristoffersen
Oh, yeah, a number of times. The first time was on an episode, what they called Disneyland back at that time. Today, you would know it as the wonderful world of Disney and he appeared on screen to talk about plans for the American government to go to the moon. So, he would also appear in a number of Disney specials after that.

00:38:37:24 – 00:38:51:01
Rob Kristoffersen
So Wernher von Braun was the face, early on of the for the space race. So, yeah, he definitely did team up with, Walt Disney a time or two.

00:38:51:03 – 00:39:17:05
Dan LeFebvre
Wow. That’s that’s fascinating. Wow. Okay, so moving on to the next episode. This is episode number five, and it’s entitled Foo Fighters. And in this episode, we see that Lieutenant Fuller from the very first episode, he’s back. And this time he’s in a group of people who have experienced something similar to him. You know, lights in the sky, maybe not the exact same thing as him, but they’re all similar experiences.

00:39:17:07 – 00:39:46:02
Dan LeFebvre
And Captain Quinn explains the title of the show. He explains that during World War Two, pilots would see lights that they couldn’t explain, and they called them Foo Fighters. That’s why they named the episode that. But in the episode, Lieutenant Fuller and his group of experiencers show Doctor Hynek and Captain Quinn the lights themselves. They bring out this contraption that they’ve built, and they seem to be able to call the lights, to them.

00:39:46:05 – 00:40:12:11
Dan LeFebvre
But Doctor Hynek is quick to dismiss these as just car truck headlights bouncing off the fog in the distance. They’re not really calling them to them. And then at the end of the episode, Doctor Hynek runs across Fuller at a secret hospital in Cedar Rapids, Iowa that’s now abandoned. And Doctor Hynek shows Fuller something and almost immediately, Fuller douses himself in gasoline and sets himself on fire.

00:40:12:13 – 00:40:37:24
Dan LeFebvre
Now, after this, the show cuts to General Harding and General Valentine. This is very stereotypical, secret government. They’re just kind of sitting around this table in, you know, very dark room and just kind of what you would expect for a secret military government, I guess. But, but they talk about how somebody or something must have flipped Fuller’s off switch, whatever that means.

00:40:37:25 – 00:41:01:03
Dan LeFebvre
It doesn’t really explain a lot right there. It just says, oh, it must have flipped him off, which sounds like something else, but that’s. But, in the show, they said, flip the off switch. Now, when I was watching this episode, it was one of the first episodes that I was thinking, am maybe this really wasn’t based on something real.

00:41:01:06 – 00:41:24:27
Dan LeFebvre
After all, the episode itself was claiming that Foo Fighters were was a term used in World War Two, and this is, after all, after World War Two. And so I just assumed that maybe this was the show stretching things, and I got the implication just watching the show, that Doctor Hynek probably never actually investigated Foo Fighters because those were during World War Two.

00:41:24:27 – 00:41:32:03
Dan LeFebvre
And this is supposed to be happening after World War two. Or am I wrong there? Did he actually investigate Foo Fighters like we see in the show?

00:41:32:05 – 00:42:04:25
Rob Kristoffersen
He did not investigate Foo Fighters. He was really busy working on the proximity fuze by that time. But, Foo Fighters were a real phenomenon during the war. And it was experienced by both Allied pilots and axis pilots, and they both believed that this was, technology from both sides being thrown at planes. But, that’s kind of confusing because like, clearly it’s not none of them, you know, claimed responsibility for it.

00:42:04:27 – 00:42:33:17
Rob Kristoffersen
And, if we’re talking about, like, the Germans, the Germans would totally take responsibility for that back in the day. There’s no way that they wouldn’t. But yeah, the Hynek never investigated the Foo Fighters. There wasn’t really a lot of, resources to investigate the Foo Fighters at the time. They there was a brief investigation done by American forces, but they couldn’t come to any definitive conclusion.

00:42:33:17 – 00:42:49:11
Rob Kristoffersen
But, yeah. Doctor Hynek, he was working on that proximity fuze, which I do believe time magazine ranked it as the third best innovation to come from the Second World War.

00:42:49:14 – 00:42:51:04
Dan LeFebvre
What is the proximity fuze?

00:42:51:07 – 00:43:14:08
Rob Kristoffersen
Basically, it’s a fuze that sends out radio waves. And when the radio waves bounce off something and come back and that signal gets shorter and shorter, the bomb basically explodes and realistically, you see that same technology in, like, noise cancellation headphones. Now.

00:43:14:11 – 00:43:16:00
Dan LeFebvre
We have Doctor Hynek to thank for that.

00:43:16:02 – 00:43:17:18
Rob Kristoffersen
Yeah.

00:43:17:21 – 00:43:42:25
Dan LeFebvre
So I’m curious though, because in the in the show, when we see Lieutenant Fuller, his off switch flipped or whatever happens there and he it’s a very tragic death. It you know, he sets himself on fire. But if his experience was based on, a pilot named Gorman, I believe you said, was that what essentially what happened to Gorman?

00:43:42:27 – 00:43:57:28
Rob Kristoffersen
No. There’s not a lot known about Gorman, but he seemingly lived a normal life after the Gorman dogfight. He served in the, forces for a little bit longer, and then, went off and did his own thing.

00:43:58:00 – 00:44:26:24
Dan LeFebvre
Okay, well, the next investigation in the show covers green fireballs. They’re sighted over a nuclear testing ground. And Project Bluebook is called in to verify that these are, in fact, meteors, a perfectly natural explanation. But something happens during the investigation, and Doctor Hynek sees the fireballs in the sky himself. And they are very clearly not meteors. Now, with another super secretive character on screen.

00:44:26:27 – 00:44:47:00
Dan LeFebvre
Man, that is simply cast. I had to look them up afterwards, he just to see if he had an actual name. But they just call him the Fixer. He shows up and, Doctor Hynek theorizes out loud that perhaps the green fireballs are some sort of craft monitoring our nuclear testing sites, because that’s where they were seen.

00:44:47:03 – 00:44:53:23
Dan LeFebvre
Can you give us an overview of the the real event that this episode had based on and what Doctor Heinrich’s reaction was to it?

00:44:53:25 – 00:45:23:04
Rob Kristoffersen
Sure. In November of 1948, reports started to trickle in, out in the west of of the phenomenon known as green fireballs. They were at first quickly dismissed as green military flares, but on the night of December 5th, 1948, two separate plane crews, one military and one civilian, in New Mexico, each attested to seeing a green fireball while in the air.

00:45:23:06 – 00:45:41:29
Rob Kristoffersen
Each of them described the object resembling a green meteor, but ruled out meteors when the object basically abruptly turned, turned up, and then leveled off, which I’ve never heard of a meteor doing. But, you know, the those fancy meteors, they just do what they want these days.

00:45:42:00 – 00:45:44:10
Dan LeFebvre
Well, you’ve never heard of birds that fly that fast either, so.

00:45:44:10 – 00:45:46:10
Sean Jablonski
No meaning.

00:45:46:13 – 00:46:17:04
Rob Kristoffersen
So, three days after that sighting on the eighth to Air Force Office of Special Investigations, pilots witnessed similar phenomena while they were in the air. And they described it as resembling a military flare. But it was too big and it was a lot brighter. And then four days after that, a man by the name of Doctor Lincoln LaPaz, he was an astronomer with the University of New Mexico, had his own sighting of the green fireballs.

00:46:17:04 – 00:46:40:29
Rob Kristoffersen
A lot of people were seeing them in and around military bases in New Mexico, mostly. And, he basically was able to triangulate their position over Los Alamos National Laboratory. And in a letter to the Air Force, he stated that they could not be a meteor because it was traveling too slow at the time, and it didn’t have a tail coming off of it.

00:46:41:02 – 00:47:14:19
Rob Kristoffersen
So those sightings would continue from, yeah, November of 1948 until April of 1949, and most of them were centered in New Mexico. Now, Doctor LaPaz was tasked by the government to study the phenomenon. So it wasn’t carried out by this would have been, Project Grudge at this point. Went from project sign to Project Grudge. But the military was growing concerned that this was, foreign weapon, which could, you know, would make sense for them.

00:47:14:21 – 00:47:39:28
Rob Kristoffersen
It seems weapon like. So, a lot of their top secret projects were also conducted in New Mexico. So it makes sense that they would be, interested in it. And there were also similar objects sited over nuclear storage areas in Fort Hood, Texas. So, Doctor LaPaz determined that whatever these objects were, they were not natural.

00:47:39:29 – 00:48:16:00
Rob Kristoffersen
Most, or. Yeah, they were not natural. Most of the sightings were centered. Yeah, really in Los Alamos National Laboratory and many of the staff there, he interviewed and many of them claimed to see these green fireballs. Now, the sightings would become more sporadic after April of 49, but, they still continued on to the point where, in December of 1950, the government decided to set up an instrument observation station at Holloman Air Force Base, and it was only manned by two officers.

00:48:16:00 – 00:48:22:23
Rob Kristoffersen
But they, classified this project as Project Twinkle.

00:48:22:25 – 00:48:57:09
Rob Kristoffersen
So, LaPaz, you know, had other ideas. He felt like this deserved a more rigorous study. And ultimately, when the government was done in 1950, they would downplay the sightings in their final report. But the sightings still continued on after that for a little while. Every witness that saw them claimed that it could not have been a natural phenomenon, which is, you know, rare because you’re talking about trained observers, scientists and the such.

00:48:57:11 – 00:49:20:17
Rob Kristoffersen
Another fun fact about Doctor LaPaz. He had an earlier UFO sighting in 1947. And it was in Roswell, New Mexico. So he may have witnessed the actual Roswell craft crash, maybe, I don’t know, but, it’s just an interesting little tidbit there, but, Hynek, we’re not really sure of what Hynek thought about these.

00:49:20:17 – 00:49:37:27
Rob Kristoffersen
We’ve never gotten any comments from him about it. And the investigation wasn’t carried out by Project Sign or Grudge. It was something that the government was trying to keep under wraps. So, yeah, not really sure what happened and what Hynek thought there.

00:49:38:00 – 00:50:03:26
Dan LeFebvre
Do we know if there were many other, cases like that that were outside of Project Sign or garage or Bluebook? I guess I’m assuming that those projects were the kind of the official official government investigation. And it sounds like this one was kind of, and off the books. Not really. I mean official, but not really official, if that makes sense.

00:50:03:26 – 00:50:10:22
Dan LeFebvre
You know, in that way, to kind of not throw it in with all the others where there are a lot of other cases like that that we know of.

00:50:10:24 – 00:50:42:11
Rob Kristoffersen
Not really. There isn’t a lot of declassified information that I’ve ever come across that really points to additional, government studies. Though Hynek later in his career, after really Project Bluebook was shuttered, he would make these comments that he was like the public face of like the UFO investigations, but he always made it seem like there was something else going on behind the scenes that the public didn’t know.

00:50:42:11 – 00:50:46:21
Rob Kristoffersen
So there’s a possibility that there are projects that we don’t even know about.

00:50:46:24 – 00:50:47:15
Dan LeFebvre
Of course.

00:50:47:17 – 00:50:49:14
Sean Jablonski
Yeah. Okay.

00:50:49:16 – 00:51:11:29
Dan LeFebvre
Well, moving on to the next episode. We’re up to episode number seven, and we come across the first hoax in this series. And according to the show, it’s with a Boy Scout troop leader who claims to see a UFO and even claims to shoot at it and hit the alien that comes out of the craft. And for some time, the Scoutmaster disappears.

00:51:12:03 – 00:51:35:03
Dan LeFebvre
But then he staggers back into town, just as Doctor Hynek is explaining that the lights that they saw were caused by swamp gas. And before long, though, Doctor Hynek and Captain Quinn are able to figure out that the town’s sheriff sent a telegram to Hollywood about having proof about the flying saucer story. And that happened before the scoutmaster came back into town with that proof.

00:51:35:03 – 00:51:49:00
Dan LeFebvre
So it would seem that the sheriff and the Scoutmaster were in on this, trying to make a bunch of money on, what clearly was a hoax, trying to sell the movie rights. Did this hoax really happen the way that we see in the show?

00:51:49:03 – 00:52:17:24
Rob Kristoffersen
Man, this is one of my all time favorite cases. This is a really fun one. This is the case of a Florida scoutmaster by the name of Sunny divergence uncorked on August 19th, 1952. Divergence was, driving a group of Boy Scouts home, when he saw a bright light flash over. It’s a trail called Military Trail near West Palm Beach, Florida.

00:52:17:27 – 00:52:42:19
Rob Kristoffersen
He thought it could have been a stranded motorist or a plane that had gone down. So he pulled over onto the shoulder and basically went in to investigate. He told the three boys that, he was driving home to remain in the car, and he basically took a machete and a, flashlight with him, and he instructed the boys to run to the farmhouse that was nearby.

00:52:42:19 – 00:53:09:21
Rob Kristoffersen
If he didn’t come back in 15 minutes or so from the car, the boys claimed that they could see like a ring of lights, descending into a grove of trees. And they could also see, the flashlight as well. And when they saw that his flashlight had gone out, the boys ran to the farmhouse, and soon an officer arrived on scene and they were, about to commence a search.

00:53:09:24 – 00:53:38:23
Rob Kristoffersen
And it had been an hour or so, but divergence emerged from the, palmettos and was frantically waving his machete in the air and just, like, raving like a mad man. But, according to his testimony, he had been searching for about four minutes when he started to smell this nauseating odor. He also said that you felt like he was being watched, and he next claimed to feel this really intense heat that was coming down from above him.

00:53:38:23 – 00:54:03:12
Rob Kristoffersen
And when he looked up, he could not see the stars above him. There was this object that was just hovering over him, and it was, he described it as a dull black object in the shape of a saucer approximately 30ft in diameter. Divergence moved back from the object. And when he did, he claimed to hear this metallic scraping sound.

00:54:03:14 – 00:54:31:07
Rob Kristoffersen
And when he looked up again, there was this hatch that was opened on the side of the object. He noticed a red light coming from the inside it, and it soon developed into a mist that engulfed his body. And, the divergence lost consciousness not long after that, and he woke up a short time later and he was propped up against a tree, but he couldn’t really remember propping himself up against a tree.

00:54:31:09 – 00:54:57:17
Rob Kristoffersen
And his eyes were apparently so burned that he couldn’t see out of them. But, divergence underwent questioning with the local police, and they had noticed that the hairs on his arms were actually singed. So, they also went back to the area of where it where it occurred, and they discovered burnt patches of grass on the ground.

00:54:57:19 – 00:55:27:02
Rob Kristoffersen
Now, when Project Bluebook was notified, Edward Ruppel went to investigate and he took samples and then had them tested. They found that the soil had only been burnt at the top. So whatever had happened to them, it wasn’t some kind of natural rot from underneath that or anything like that. But Rupert would come to call this entire case a hoax, and in fact, he would call divergence the best hoax or that he had ever seen.

00:55:27:04 – 00:55:47:22
Rob Kristoffersen
He was painted as media hungry and also an opportunist willing to sell his story. But the problem was, is that they were never able to explain how he did it. They were never able to explain the burnt patches of grass, or like they couldn’t explain anything that this guy did. They just did hoax.

00:55:47:24 – 00:55:57:29
Dan LeFebvre
Oh, wow. Okay, so even after the investigation, they’re just like, we’re not going to even bother to try to figure out exactly what happened here. Just assume that he’s he’s hosting it.

00:55:58:01 – 00:56:24:06
Rob Kristoffersen
It those kind of cases. And they were very rare at the time like case cases, something very extreme. It’s on the level of like, a flatwoods monster kind of incident. And the government didn’t really want to get involved with cases like that. And you would see, from time to time that, if they were reported, they would downplay them almost immediately.

00:56:24:06 – 00:56:30:12
Rob Kristoffersen
So, yeah, the government really didn’t want to talk about weird cases like that.

00:56:30:15 – 00:56:52:25
Dan LeFebvre
I’m curious, though, because one of the things that we see in the show, I mentioned very briefly, but, is when Doctor Hynek is when he’s explaining lights, he uses that says it was, caused by swamp gas. And that’s I have to ask about that because it’s something that I’m familiar with from, that movie Men in Black, of course, because they use that an explanation of, you know, swamp gas.

00:56:52:25 – 00:57:05:19
Dan LeFebvre
You know, that’s pretty much the explanation for UFOs. And so I think it’s something that’s kind of caught on in popular culture as a common explanation for UFOs. Was that really an explanation that started with Project Bluebook?

00:57:05:21 – 00:57:32:15
Rob Kristoffersen
It mostly started with Hynek. One of the most infamous investigations that he did occurred in Michigan in 1966, in the Dexter Hillsdale area, for approximately a week, sightings had been taking place in that area. It began on, March 14th, of 66. The police and Washtenaw County first witness strange lights in the sky over, Lima Township.

00:57:32:17 – 00:57:56:10
Rob Kristoffersen
And they chased these lights for a period of time. But, they were outmaneuvered every single time they tried. And throughout the week, people in Washtenaw County reported seeing similar objects in the sky. Some went on to report them as resembling like a spinning top. But the culmination of these sightings occurred two nights, later that week, on March 20th.

00:57:56:12 – 00:58:20:06
Rob Kristoffersen
Frank Manor of Dexter Township reportedly saw a strange object in the swamp behind his home. He described it resembling a pyramid with a porthole on it, from which this bluish green light was emitting. And then the next night, at nearby Hillsdale College, over 80 female students witnessed a strange light rising and falling in a swamp near their dorm.

00:58:20:09 – 00:58:49:28
Rob Kristoffersen
Hynek was sent to investigate that case and was basically forced to conduct a rushed investigation. He didn’t have a lot of time and, was forced to give a press conference. One of the witnesses in that case had mentioned that at first, because they ended up witnessing what the girls did at the college dorm room in Hillsdale believed it to be at first swamp gas, which is a real phenomenon.

00:58:49:28 – 00:59:45:07
Rob Kristoffersen
Basically, what happens in a swamp is when vegetation is dying, it will release methane into the air. And sometimes, you’ll basically see like a, short flash of light that it creates. So Hynek basically was forced to say that what happened in Dexter Hillsdale was swamp gas, and he was ridiculed heavily for it. And in fact, it was his determination on that case that really shuttered Project Bluebook toward the end, because what happened was, I believe he was governor at the time, Gerald Ford, he was not happy with the determination that Hynek came to and basically ordered for a panel and an independent panel of people to investigate UFO sightings.

00:59:45:07 – 01:00:17:04
Rob Kristoffersen
And this led to the Condon Committee, a, group of scientists out of the University of Colorado that studied UFOs for a couple of years and ultimately determined that, UFOs were not a threat to national security. In fact, they couldn’t determine what they were at all. And, that was the end of Project Blue Book. So the swamp gas thing is essentially Doctor Hynek probably most fumbling move during his time at Project Blue Book.

01:00:17:06 – 01:00:48:07
Dan LeFebvre
Going back to the TV show, the Nixon investigation that we see when I was when I was watching this, it really started to turn the entire series a little more sinister in my mind. It gave the idea that the military is trying to cover up some psychological tests that they’re doing on their own soldiers. We see a group of Army soldiers who got a UFO attack on the platoon on film, and we’re watching this.

01:00:48:09 – 01:01:11:20
Dan LeFebvre
Doctor Hynek is watching this, and the and the military is watching this. And that’s kind of the what kicks off the investigation. But then in the end, we find out that the soldiers were shell shocked from experiences in World War Two. And at the end of the episode, there’s a scene where the two generals, Harding and Valentine, are upset that the Secretary of Defense has been testing chemical weapons on their own.

01:01:11:20 – 01:01:15:15
Dan LeFebvre
Soldiers. How much of that actually happened?

01:01:15:18 – 01:01:52:09
Rob Kristoffersen
This incident is based on testimony from a private first class named Francis P wall during the Korean War. This is like one of the most harrowing tales that, you will ever hear. And there’s some really messed up stories from, soldiers during a war about UFOs and such. And, while was stationed near shore, one which, is was roughly 60 miles from Seoul, and his regiment was prepared to bombard a nearby village with artillery.

01:01:52:09 – 01:02:22:22
Rob Kristoffersen
And right before the attack was set to take place, this UFO appeared in the sky right above the village, and, they just started firing off. Artillery burst after artillery burst and, there were shells that exploded right next to this object, but it didn’t seem to take a hit. And, at the time, the object was emitting an orange light and it just was hovering over the village.

01:02:22:24 – 01:02:51:24
Rob Kristoffersen
That’s when wall basically asked his commander for permission to fire at this thing. And when permission was granted, everybody opened fire. The object changed to a blue green color. And it started to make these eerie arcs in the sky. And then it started to shoot beams at these people. They all reported feeling a burning and tingling sensation as the beams of light were shown at them, and were all forced into underground bunkers at the time.

01:02:51:24 – 01:03:24:28
Rob Kristoffersen
They had to take refuge from what this whatever this thing was, most of the men were trucked out by ambulance. They were actually too weak to walk. And doctors, once they got back to a hospital, noted how all of their white blood cell counts were really high. So, they never explained what happened to these men. Some have pointed to, like, a Soviet weapons test, but even that’s kind of out of the realm of possibility, even for me.

01:03:25:00 – 01:03:46:06
Rob Kristoffersen
As far as we know, it wasn’t a government chemical weapons test, but I wouldn’t put it past the government to have done that at any point in history. Like the the government has done some shady stuff in the past. If you want a, a good example of that, there’s a, book that came out, last year.

01:03:46:06 – 01:04:17:11
Rob Kristoffersen
It’s called Poisoner in Chief, and it’s all about a, one scientist’s work during, a project called MK ultra. He was basically tasked with, seeing what if they could use LSD? To basically as a form of mind control. It was a very is a very dark project for the government. So, I really wouldn’t put it past it at any point for the government to have done tests like that.

01:04:17:18 – 01:04:28:04
Rob Kristoffersen
There was the Tuskegee experiment, which I really don’t want to get into, because it was some pretty sick stuff. But yeah, I, I really wouldn’t put it past the government to have done tests like that at some point.

01:04:28:06 – 01:04:29:12
Sean Jablonski
Wow, wow.

01:04:29:14 – 01:04:52:07
Dan LeFebvre
Well, let’s get back to the show then, instead of getting even darker. But, yeah. So in episode nine, Doctor Hynek and Captain Quinn come across their first abduction case. And this is the case of someone named Thomas Mann, who claims that he was abducted by aliens. And there’s a few key things from that episode of the show that I want to get your insight on.

01:04:52:09 – 01:05:25:20
Dan LeFebvre
First is during this episode is when we see Doctor Hynek hypnotize Thomas to help him remember more about the abduction experience. Now, through hypnosis, Thomas is able to remember things that he couldn’t remember otherwise. When I saw this, it hit me that this is similar to what we talked about when we covered the movie communion. When you were a guest on the show to talk about what these strippers experience, there, and I, I wasn’t sure if Doctor Hynek kind of started that idea.

01:05:25:20 – 01:05:46:17
Dan LeFebvre
We get the when I was watching, Project Blue Book, I got the idea that nobody was really familiar with using hypnosis in that way. When he’s using this on on Thomas Mann. So was Doctor Hynek using hypnosis in his investigations? And was he one of the first to do that for abductees?

01:05:46:19 – 01:06:12:22
Rob Kristoffersen
So this episode is loosely based on the Betty and Barney Hill incident, which is, an incident that we recently covered on, a two part episode. And, essentially this New Hampshire couple reported having a close encounter with a strange object within the White Mountains. At one point, Barney had this dramatic sighting in a field, of this object through a pair of binoculars.

01:06:12:25 – 01:06:47:27
Rob Kristoffersen
He claimed to have telepathic communication with the occupants of this UFO. And they also claimed to have, suffered from missing time during this encounter, too. There was, period of time that they just couldn’t account for. They started to conduct their own investigation almost immediately after coming home. And, they read books voraciously, talked to experts, you know, from scientists to UFO investigators, until they ultimately decided that they wanted to explore their experiences through hypnosis.

01:06:48:00 – 01:07:12:24
Rob Kristoffersen
And they ultimately found this individual named Doctor Benjamin Simon. He was a Boston based hypnotherapist and through their work with him, uncovered an abduction narrative that involved the hills being taken on board a UFO, subjected to medical tests, and then returned to their car. Now, Doctor Benjamin Simon, was, pretty heavy hitter when it came to hypnosis.

01:07:12:24 – 01:07:41:01
Rob Kristoffersen
He set up a hospital, and I believe it was Long Island to treat soldiers coming home. From the war, from World War two with, with, all sorts of, mental problems, basically treating soldiers with PTSD before PTSD was known as anything. And he would use hypnosis to do that. Doctor Simon was the first to hypnotize an abduction witness.

01:07:41:06 – 01:08:07:09
Rob Kristoffersen
Hynek didn’t really do that. He did advocate for it in a couple of cases, but, he was, not a trained hypnotist in any way. The, probably the most infamous person to start doing this within the UFO community was a gentleman by the name of Doctor Leo Sprinkle. And, he used hypnosis on a number of, witnesses.

01:08:07:11 – 01:08:33:04
Rob Kristoffersen
And then later on in the 80s, man by the name of Doctor or not? Doctor, just, Bud Hopkins, he was a, New York based artist. He kind of put abduction cases on the map in the 80s by conducting hypnosis sessions and, working with, experiencers. So, yeah, Doctor Hynek never practiced, hypnosis in.

01:08:33:04 – 01:08:33:29
Rob Kristoffersen
Anyway.

01:08:34:01 – 01:08:54:15
Dan LeFebvre
Something else I want to ask you about with that, episode was when we see Doctor Hynek talk about this, a scale that he’s been working on. How’s it, close encounter. The first kind of close encounter. The second kind. Well, that’s what happened to Thomas. Their abduction, and then close Encounters of the Third Kind being even beyond that.

01:08:54:18 – 01:09:03:23
Dan LeFebvre
And that’s a term that I think we’re familiar with it from nothing else. The movie, was was that a scale that Doctor Hynek invented?

01:09:03:26 – 01:09:28:08
Rob Kristoffersen
Yeah. Doctor Hynek did invent, that scale. It’s what we call the, Hynek scale these days. There were actually six classifications. The first was a nocturnal light, which is basically your mundane sighting of a UFO at night. And then there is what he called the daylight disc, which is a sighting of an object during the day from more than 1000ft away.

01:09:28:10 – 01:09:56:13
Rob Kristoffersen
Then there is a radar visual sighting, which, is primarily, you know, witnessed by civilians and military pilots. It’s basically when a pilot sees something and it’s confirmed by radar data. And then, we get to the heavy hitters, close encounter, the first kind of the sighting of an object from approximately 1000ft away or less, close encounters of the second kind is a sighting, where an object leaves a physical trace of some kind.

01:09:56:13 – 01:10:24:27
Rob Kristoffersen
So in the Florida scoutmaster case, there was the burnt grass. And even in the Betty and Barney Hill case, there was, really strange readings that they got from their car on the back trunk. They noticed these semicircle, these circles, about a half dollar size that they don’t know where they where it came from. And, they ended up testing the trunk with a compass, and they found that it was magnetized.

01:10:24:27 – 01:10:56:22
Rob Kristoffersen
So that was a physical trace case. And then a close encounter of the third kind is when an object is an object is seen in an occupant of that object to scene. So some kind of humanoid being is seen at the same time. And the interesting thing about, the film Close Encounters of the Third Kind is that, when Steven Spielberg was working on that and he wanted to use that title, he actually had to go through J.L. and Hynek because that was his copyrighted title.

01:10:56:22 – 01:11:04:09
Rob Kristoffersen
So JL and Hynek ended up consulting on, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, and he even has a cameo at the end.

01:11:04:12 – 01:11:11:20
Dan LeFebvre
Oh, nice. Nice. I’ll have to watch that again and and look for him. I don’t remember, because I don’t know that I would be able to pick him out without finding a photo, but.

01:11:11:22 – 01:11:18:00
Rob Kristoffersen
Here’s, here’s the, hint that I’ll give you look for the man with the healthy Van Dike. You will notice him.

01:11:18:02 – 01:11:20:23
Sean Jablonski
Okay.

01:11:20:25 – 01:11:21:28
Sean Jablonski
Nice.

01:11:22:00 – 01:11:43:04
Dan LeFebvre
Okay. Well, at the very end of episode nine, in the TV show Doctor Hynek gives, he’s he’s given a head up by that mysterious fixer guy that something’s going to happen in Washington, DC. So he flies there just in time to see a show of lights over DC. Now, in the show, this happens in the middle of the day.

01:11:43:06 – 01:12:05:24
Dan LeFebvre
And then later, Defense Secretary Fairchild, he was the one who was, doing the chemical testing on the soldiers, that we saw in an earlier episode. He’s killed as his car burst into flame just before he’s about to reveal the truth to the world. And then meanwhile, we see that lights come back and the military scrambles some Sf90 force to respond.

01:12:05:26 – 01:12:31:22
Dan LeFebvre
They have trouble keeping up with the objects as they’re flying around Washington, DC. And at the very end of the episode, which is the end of the season, Doctor Hynek tells Captain Quinn that he’s come to the realization that the only way they’ll be able to find the truth is to keep the jobs that give them access to information in more cases, but to convince the government that they don’t believe because that’s clearly what the higher UPS wants.

01:12:31:22 – 01:12:50:27
Dan LeFebvre
They’re given this cover up. So we get the sense that Doctor Hynek is pretty much just going to play the game and keep trying to find the truth. So how well did the TV show explain the lights over Washington, DC and what happened to Doctor Hynek and Project Bluebook after this?

01:12:51:00 – 01:13:19:09
Rob Kristoffersen
So 1952 was a big year for UFO sightings in the United States. Three incidents covered in the first season of the show happened in 1952 the flatwoods monster case, the Florida Scoutmaster case, and the most significant of them, which was a pair of incidents that came to be known as the Washington merry go round, as, Edward Pelt would call it.

01:13:19:12 – 01:13:48:03
Rob Kristoffersen
In July of that year. And over the course of two weekends, objects were seen by numerous eyewitnesses over and kind of outside Washington, DC. The first major incident took place on July 21st, just outside the city. Pilots and radar personnel, reported objects nearby. A pilot by the name of Casey Spearman of Flight 807 described the object resembling a falling star without a tail on it.

01:13:48:05 – 01:14:13:26
Rob Kristoffersen
And then on the 28th, objects were sighted again over Washington, D.C. this time, the Air Force scrambled jets to chase them down, but the objects outmaneuvered them very easily, and Rupert was summoned at the time by president Harry Truman for an explanation, but hadn’t been able to conduct an investigation at that point, and he didn’t have answers for them.

01:14:13:26 – 01:14:42:19
Rob Kristoffersen
So, ultimately, they rushed to call a press conference and quickly quelled all the excitement. The government blamed it on, weather. Yep. That’s right. Weather. But it’s basically because of this incident that the Robertson panel, which I mentioned previously, led by the CIA, was convened and then ultimately decided that UFO reports had to be downplayed.

01:14:42:21 – 01:15:11:00
Rob Kristoffersen
Edward Bruce Pelt would leave a Project Blue Book by the end of 1953 because of it. And, he ended up retiring. He wrote the first, really landmark book about his time, on Project Sign and Project Blue Book. It was called The Report on Unidentified Flying Objects. He actually died very young, at the age of, I believe, 37 of a heart attack.

01:15:11:00 – 01:15:39:17
Rob Kristoffersen
So, yeah, it’s, I think they did a good job of playing up the hysteria aspect. That’s the government was generally operating under the nature of cover ups when it comes to this phenomenon. And when it comes to the UFO history, it’s this question of, you know, you’re tackling this question of whether they downplayed reports to keep the public calm or because the government was hiding something that they had.

01:15:39:19 – 01:16:01:08
Rob Kristoffersen
And it’s never really ever been cleared up. But I’ve always leaned towards the government was just trying to keep the public calm. I don’t think the government really has any, definitive information about this stuff, but you never know. It could be wrong. The government could come out and say, you know, we got aliens hanging out at area 51.

01:16:01:08 – 01:16:02:24
Rob Kristoffersen
I don’t know, you never know.

01:16:02:26 – 01:16:04:18
Sean Jablonski
You never know. Yeah. Yeah.

01:16:04:20 – 01:16:30:04
Dan LeFebvre
Well, in that episode, which is episode ten, when we see in the show his name is Secretary Fairchild, the defense secretary, when he dies of very suspicious circumstances. That led me to think that maybe there was it was based on somebody that might have died in similar circumstances that they showed that. So, so plainly, there was that based on something that actually happened.

01:16:30:07 – 01:16:59:00
Rob Kristoffersen
Secretary Fairchild is based on the first Secretary of Defense, James V Forrestal. Forrestal died in 1949, well before the Washington merry go round. But he died under very mysterious circumstances. He was receiving treatment at the Bethesda military Hospital in Maryland for a mental breakdown, and his body was found having fallen from a great height from his hospital room.

01:16:59:03 – 01:17:42:02
Rob Kristoffersen
It’s unclear if he committed suicide or if he was actually just thrown from the window, but his death has been lumped into, conspiracies involving a group that most likely didn’t investigate UFOs, but was an actual group within the government. And, they were called majestic 12. Most point to majestic 12 as a group that essentially were studying the effects of radiation after bomb tests, but many have lumped them into this government conspiracy where, they were essentially trying to keep, the proof of extraterrestrial life from the public.

01:17:42:02 – 01:17:56:12
Rob Kristoffersen
And many believe that Forrestal was killed, because he wanted to come forward until the public about, extraterrestrial life being real and having visited us. So.

01:17:56:14 – 01:17:58:03
Sean Jablonski
Kind of darker.

01:17:58:03 – 01:18:03:11
Rob Kristoffersen
A little darker in the, in the real sense of, what happened to Forrestal here?

01:18:03:13 – 01:18:24:12
Dan LeFebvre
Well, one thing that we didn’t get to cover that I just want to ask you about real quick, is a storyline that goes throughout the entire show, and that’s the character of Susie Miller. And, in the show, while Doctor Hynek is off on his investigations, it cuts back to home life with with Mimi, his wife, a lot.

01:18:24:15 – 01:18:44:25
Dan LeFebvre
And we get this sense that the character of Susie is a Russian spy of some sort. We hear some, her speaking in Russian over the radio to someone with her quote unquote husband, which we know is not really her husband. We get the feeling that it’s not really her husband, but that’s what she introduces him as.

01:18:44:28 – 01:18:59:16
Dan LeFebvre
And we get the overall idea that they’re probably Russian spies trying to infiltrate Project Blue Book through Doctor Heinrich’s wife. Was there any truth to that side of the whole show?

01:18:59:19 – 01:19:39:14
Rob Kristoffersen
Not really. There was no real, indications that the Russians were trying to infiltrate Project Blue Book. But interestingly enough, Andy Jacobson, who wrote a book about area 51, has this theory that the Roswell crash was a Russian craft designed to basically cause mass hysteria. And what she points to is that, her source claims that, Joseph Stalin really got a kick out of, the Orson Welles War of the worlds broadcast.

01:19:39:14 – 01:20:14:16
Rob Kristoffersen
And so he, he has said, her theory is that he essentially wanted to cause mass hysteria in that kind of way. Of course it didn’t pan out that way. Roswell was the case that was shuttered for over 30 years. So before anybody really started to know, that anything had crashed in Roswell, New Mexico. So, yeah, not not really there there was no real, attempt by the Russians to infiltrate this program.

01:20:14:19 – 01:20:18:18
Dan LeFebvre
Interesting. I never heard that, that possible theory about Stalin there.

01:20:18:20 – 01:20:20:00
Rob Kristoffersen
It’s a wild one, man. It’s a.

01:20:20:00 – 01:20:21:26
Sean Jablonski
Wild one.

01:20:21:28 – 01:20:32:14
Dan LeFebvre
Nice. Well, is there anything from the show that, as you were watching this, first season that you just wish that they had put in their.

01:20:32:16 – 01:20:37:06
Rob Kristoffersen
Listen, Hynek needs a van. Dike. Somebody get a van dike on Aidan Gillen.

01:20:37:06 – 01:20:38:04
Dan LeFebvre
We need it. There you go.

01:20:38:08 – 01:20:41:13
Sean Jablonski
Okay. Awesome.

01:20:41:15 – 01:20:57:03
Dan LeFebvre
Well, thank you so much for coming on to chat about Project Bluebook. I know we didn’t cover season two that much on this episode as we’re recording this, the season is still ongoing, but you’ll have to come back on once that season is over and chat about whatever the events are that we see there.

01:20:57:05 – 01:21:00:00
Rob Kristoffersen
Oh, absolutely man, I’d love to.

01:21:00:02 – 01:21:20:11
Dan LeFebvre
In the meantime, if you’re listening to this, Rob has an awesome podcast that covers a lot of UFO related events in history. Go open up the app that you’re listening to this on and subscribe to Rob’s podcast called Our Strange Skies. Can you give us a little bit of an overview of your podcast and some of the great stories that you cover over there?

01:21:20:13 – 01:21:41:18
Rob Kristoffersen
Sure. So, for a long time I had the impetus to cover, singular UFO stories, and I had seen that nobody really did it. And a lot of podcasters just kept coming to me for, like, content. They just were like, hey, what’s a good UFO case to cover? And I’m like, I’d usually give them something, but I’m like, why don’t I just make a.

01:21:41:18 – 01:21:42:16
Sean Jablonski
Podcast of my own?

01:21:42:16 – 01:22:18:09
Rob Kristoffersen
So I, I created the Strange Skies podcast and we’ve been through a couple of transformations, but right now what we do is, we devote singular episodes or if, some require multi-part episodes to, UFO stories throughout history, from the United States, we’ve covered stories from Brazil and, a few other places, but, we just covered the Betty and Barney Hill incident, the Leilani Suborn incident, which is, another famous, New Mexico UFO sighting.

01:22:18:11 – 01:22:38:19
Rob Kristoffersen
We covered the first abduction case, which was occurred in 1957, in Brazil. And, there’s a lot of great episodes over there. So, yeah, if you want to know more about UFOs, come on over to the, our Strange Skies podcast. We got plenty for you.

01:22:38:21 – 01:22:42:00
Dan LeFebvre
Awesome. And you started a new show recently, too, right?

01:22:42:02 – 01:23:11:02
Rob Kristoffersen
Yes. It’s called the Coda, a music podcast. And every other week I’m joined by my buddy Brian Hastie of the Double Density podcast, and we discuss music news. And, we generally have a main feature or main topic where we discuss something from music. We’ve talked about our favorite opening tracks to an album. We’ve talked about our best albums of 2019, and we recently had a couple of guests on to talk about, a new album that they dropped.

01:23:11:02 – 01:23:17:11
Rob Kristoffersen
So, if you’re interested in music, talk, check out the The Coda, a music podcast.

01:23:17:13 – 01:23:19:22
Dan LeFebvre
Awesome. Thanks again so much for your time, Rob.

01:23:19:24 – 01:23:29:20
Rob Kristoffersen
Well, thank you.

01:23:29:22 – 01:23:47:06
Dan LeFebvre
We have a lot more to go. But I do want to point out that even though Rob was talking about his podcast are Strange Guys that’s not actively in production. Remember that chat with Rob was in 2020? You might still be able to find it online now if you want to go through the archives. If it is available, I’ll be sure to add a link to it in the show notes so you can check there.

01:23:47:08 – 01:24:13:20
Dan LeFebvre
Before we move on to season two of Project Blue Book, let’s find out the answer to our Two Truths and a lie game for season one. And as a quick refresher, here are the two truths and one lie again. Number one, Project Blue Book was the first time the government investigated UFOs. Number two, former Nazi Verner von Braun teamed up with Walt Disney to promote the U.S. space program after World War two.

01:24:13:23 – 01:24:26:23
Dan LeFebvre
Number three, the term Foo Fighters was used by World War II two pilots who saw unexplained phenomena. Did you figure out which one is a lie? I’ve got the answer in the envelope, so let’s open that up.

01:24:26:25 – 01:24:52:24
Dan LeFebvre
And the lie is number one. While Project Blue Book is typically the most popular investigation, the US government had into UFOs, as we learned from Robert, was actually a follow up to Project Sign and Project Grudge. So even though there were a lot of the same people involved in these different government projects, Project Blue Book was not the first time the US government investigated UFOs or what people these days called UAP.

01:24:52:29 – 01:25:21:25
Dan LeFebvre
Unidentified aerial phenomena instead of unidentified flying objects. Okay, now let’s set up another game of Tetris in line for season two of Project Blue Book. Are you ready? Okay, here they are. Number one. In the 1950s, the U.S government illegally experimented with LSD on unwitting U.S. citizens. Number two, the phrase little green men comes from a close encounter in Kentucky.

01:25:21:27 – 01:25:48:02
Dan LeFebvre
Number three, Project Blue Book was commissioned by JFK. All right, I’ll be back after the season two discussion with Rob to see if you got it right. And now here is the remastered version of my 2020 chat with Rob Kristofferson about season two of Project Blue Book.

01:25:48:04 – 01:26:17:15
Dan LeFebvre
All right, well, then, let’s dive into the second season and the first episode of the second season. We’re introduced to the Roswell incident. If there’s one name that just about everyone knows it’s connected to UFOs, it’s Roswell. But that doesn’t mean everyone knows the details of what happened there. According to the show on July 5th, 1947, there was a major storm around Roswell, New Mexico, and then the next morning, a rancher by the name of Mike Connors found a field covered in strange metal.

01:26:17:18 – 01:26:44:19
Dan LeFebvre
By the end of the day, his neighbors were collecting pieces of the debris, and he wasn’t really convinced that it was manmade. So he contacted authorities. They swooped in, but someone leak the story out, it hit the wire. And then it started to run worldwide. Newspapers in Europe even ran with this story. The show doesn’t really say how the authorities shut the story down, but it does say that once Harding got involved two days later, Connors bought himself a brand new car and the town stopped talking.

01:26:44:23 – 01:27:08:11
Dan LeFebvre
So I’m going to assume that they were paid off. The wreckage was flown to Texas, where Harding held a press conference explaining the saucer was nothing more than a weather balloon. Now, I know we could have an entire episode, entire podcast just dedicated to the Roswell incident, but in a nutshell, how? What did the show do depicting the events of the Roswell incident?

01:27:08:13 – 01:27:37:14
Rob Kristoffersen
Well, with this particular episode, the bare bones are there. You know, some details have been changed, but, the storm in question, that starts the episode occurred on the night of July 2nd, 1947. And the man in question, they call him Mike Connors in the show. Well, his real name was Mac Brazel. And on that night, Brazel claimed to hear a strange sound that didn’t quite sound like, thunder and lightning.

01:27:37:14 – 01:27:59:13
Rob Kristoffersen
So, he was the foreman of a sheep ranch owned by a man named JB foster. And the next morning, when he woke up to get started, he discovered a debris field outside. It was about, three quarters of a mile long by about, I think, like 20ft wide or so. So this was a really remote area.

01:27:59:13 – 01:28:20:11
Rob Kristoffersen
The closest town to the Foster Ranch is, a town called Corona, which is about 30 miles away. But, he showed the debris to his closest neighbors, which were Floyd, and were at a proctor who owned the ranch themselves. And, they tried to cut it, and they tried to burn it, but they were not successful in doing so.

01:28:20:13 – 01:28:55:09
Rob Kristoffersen
So, the doctors urged Mac Brazel to report the debris to the authorities. And Brazel ultimately did four days later. It’s not exactly clear why he waited as long as he did. It could have been a combination of the July 4th holiday and the hesitation on Brazil’s part to do anything with it. But, on Monday, July 7th, he brought the debris to the Chaves County Sheriff Department, who in turn notified the Roswell Army Airfield, which is, known today as the Walker Air Force Base.

01:28:55:12 – 01:29:18:10
Rob Kristoffersen
The base dispatch two officers, Major Jesse Marcel Senior and Captain Sheridan Cavett, to actually retrieve the material. They Brazel escorted them to the ranch, and, they actually ended up spending the night there before they headed back into town. They gathered up as much as they could, and they also tried to cut it. They tried to burn it.

01:29:18:12 – 01:29:49:09
Rob Kristoffersen
They also tried to hit it with a sledge hammer, and they found that they couldn’t make a dent with it. So it wasn’t until long after they brought it back that the military swarmed the place. And before Jesse Marcel junior there. Jesse Marcel senior. Sorry, actually brought it. To the, airfield. He brought it home. Where, his son, Jesse Marcel Jr and a few of his other family members claimed to have actually seen the wreckage.

01:29:49:12 – 01:30:18:00
Rob Kristoffersen
Some of them, some of the pieces, Jesse Marcel Jr claimed had, these, like, weird hieroglyphic writings on them that were in, like, this purple kind of script. But he said that it was more closely resembling metal. It’s kind of one of those things that gets debated a lot. But, the, military just swarmed the place and, they actually sent out a lot of this wreckage.

01:30:18:00 – 01:30:44:05
Rob Kristoffersen
It was ultimately going to be flown to, Wright Field, which, later became, Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, which is where Project Blue Book was, stationed out of. But, in the meantime, while they were collecting all this stuff, the military decided to send out a press release. And, and the man that made that decision, was a man named Colonel William Blanchard.

01:30:44:07 – 01:31:07:22
Rob Kristoffersen
And he informed the base’s information officer, Lieutenant Walter Hot, to, send a press release into town. And like, he, hot physically brought these press releases to, like, the Roswell Daily Record and a few other places in town, which, seemed kind of odd for the times, considering that they could just send it, you know, via wire.

01:31:07:24 – 01:31:35:04
Rob Kristoffersen
But that’s, like one of the weird parts about this case, one of the tiny, weird things, but, they you that, ends up making the paper, the date, like, later that day saying, you know, Roswell Army Airfield recovers flying saucer. So, yeah, while this was all happening, Major Jesse Marcel, junior, he made a stop at Carswell Field in Denton, Texas.

01:31:35:04 – 01:32:04:20
Rob Kristoffersen
As he was accompanying this wreckage to right field and a gentleman by the name of, Roger Ramey, who was general. He, had Jesse Marcel senior pose with pictures of what, they were claiming was a down weather balloon. And ultimately, the next day, they would, retract their initial headline saying that they recovered a flying saucer and saying, no, it was all just a weather balloon.

01:32:04:23 – 01:32:27:13
Rob Kristoffersen
Now, Jesse Marcel Senior attested to the to the effect that it wasn’t the same stuff. He was saying that, they kind of made up this, mock weather balloon, had them pose with it, but it was not the actual wreckage that made its way to right field. And he went to his grave saying the same thing.

01:32:27:13 – 01:33:15:16
Rob Kristoffersen
Same with, Jesse Marcel senior. What’s interesting about this case is after it was retracted in 47 people, in the UFO community, by and large, forgot about this case for about 30 years. Wasn’t until 1978, when, independent researcher named Stanton Friedman was actually told, while he was conducting an in radio interview that he should talk to Jesse Marcel senior and from there, Roswell has become this big household name when it comes to UFOs and, you know, not trusting the government because the government has changed their mind as to what was recovered on multiple occasions.

01:33:15:16 – 01:33:19:14
Rob Kristoffersen
And, yeah, it’s just this big cultural touchstone now.

01:33:19:16 – 01:33:37:04
Dan LeFebvre
Wow, wow. So the I mean, I’ve seen the, the picture of him kind of, I’m assuming Marcel at on the front page of the paper he’s got holding something in his hand that would then be what they kind of staged as the weather balloon, not the necessarily the material that was actually recovered.

01:33:37:06 – 01:34:04:23
Rob Kristoffersen
Right? Yeah. That’s, that’s what Jesse Marcel both Jesse Marcel claimed is that it was not the same stuff. It was, swapped out. You know, they were trying to keep this thing, you know, on the down low, covered up. And that’s really why Roswell is as big a thing as it is. Because given that the, Air Force has changed their mind as to what it was on multiple occasions, now, nobody really trusts their explanation.

01:34:04:23 – 01:34:39:28
Rob Kristoffersen
So you have a ton of explanations out there. Now, there’s, a book called, area 51. It was written by a woman named Andy Jacobson. And she proposed at one point through one of her sources that what the Roswell wreckage was was a Russian craft that, had been sent over into American territory to cause hysteria because apparently Joseph Stalin was a big fan of, George Orwell’s or, sorry, not George Orwell.

01:34:40:00 – 01:34:40:29
Dan LeFebvre
Orson Welles, the,

01:34:41:03 – 01:35:01:09
Rob Kristoffersen
Orson Welles, for the War of the worlds broadcasts. Apparently, he was a huge fan, according to her source, and that this was a mock thing, dreamed up by the Russian government. That’s probably like the low end of believability on this. But, there are a lot of interesting theories when it comes to Roswell, I think.

01:35:01:09 – 01:35:23:21
Dan LeFebvre
I don’t remember if it was in episode one, but I do remember the the show actually mentioning that very, very briefly. I think that the two generals are talking to each other, and one of them talks about how, the things that Doctor Mengele did to those children and, you know, and the saucer was Soviet propaganda or whatever.

01:35:23:21 – 01:35:46:18
Dan LeFebvre
Like they just kind of imply that that’s what it was was it was Soviet. And then, of course, Doctor Mengele, the, the Nazi, doctor doing something to the bodies to kind of make them look like aliens or whatever it was. I just remember that very, very briefly in, in the TV show. So it sounds like maybe that that’s where that comes from.

01:35:46:20 – 01:35:59:18
Rob Kristoffersen
There are, you know, other theories like that out there. There’s, there’s some that get really, really dark, but, yeah, yeah, it seems like everybody has a theory on Roswell these days.

01:35:59:21 – 01:36:38:14
Dan LeFebvre
Well, heading back to the show in episode number two, it’s the part two of the Roswell incident. And during this episode, we find out about a resident in town named Duncan Booker. And he crashes a massive UFO into the center of town to try to draw attention to what he says is the real story. General Harding agrees to go on TV with Booker to tell the world that this was nothing more than a hoax, but once they go live, Booker’s friend at the TV station starts playing footage of an alien autopsy, and then Doctor Hynek comes to the rescue and he realizes that, oh, you look the studio lighting in the footage is the

01:36:38:14 – 01:36:59:15
Dan LeFebvre
same. This is this footage is a hoax. But then Booker insists that, yeah, they recreated the footage, but it was actually from something that they actually saw. And I thought I remembered something about some alien autopsy footage that showed up quite some time ago, but I don’t remember if it was supposed to be from Roswell or related to that or not.

01:36:59:18 – 01:37:04:23
Dan LeFebvre
Is that real footage, and was it tied to the Roswell incident like the show implies?

01:37:04:25 – 01:37:45:28
Rob Kristoffersen
So the, alien autopsy video was huge. It was a real video that, came out in the, mid 90s. During that time, that’s where UFOs were kind of hitting their cultural balloon. This was when Roswell had really blown up in popular culture, and it was actually all thanks to Unsolved Mysteries. Unsolved mysteries was the first show to really give that case its do so by by this time, aliens and and UFOs are big and they’re appearing on a lot more television shows.

01:37:45:28 – 01:38:20:23
Rob Kristoffersen
And, one of the networks that really ran with it was Fox in the, in the 90s. And, they ran a program in 1995 called Alien Autopsy Fact or Fiction, and it was hosted by, Jonathan Frakes of Star Trek The Next Generation fame. And, a man by the name of race until he came forward saying that he found footage of an alien autopsy and he had at the time been looking through a retired military cameraman’s footage searching for, actually, footage of Elvis for, like, some documentary.

01:38:20:23 – 01:38:57:23
Rob Kristoffersen
And, he claims that he stumbled upon this autopsy of an alien being that he says was one of the bodies at Roswell. So the Fox airs this special, and it is huge. So much so that they re-air it a couple months later and, it kind of just dies down for about a decade. When in 2006 recently claimed that the footage was a recreation of footage that he had seen in 1992, it a degraded so bad that he couldn’t actually save it.

01:38:57:23 – 01:39:35:03
Rob Kristoffersen
So instead he he has this convoluted explanation that, in fact, he actually reshot the footage, recreated everything, in order to like, you know, bolster his claims. But, you know, it’s it definitely didn’t help his case. But, in 2018, a filmmaker named, Spiro Smulders revealed that he was actually the creator of the film, and he claimed that he created the alien sculpture using foam and stuffing the insides with, basically animal parts.

01:39:35:03 – 01:40:02:00
Rob Kristoffersen
So, this video footage kind of keeps, like, reappearing every now and then. There was a, leaked government document, about, I want to say maybe, late last year in which two guys, one of them was a, a high ranking military member. The other had been a consultant with the government saying that this footage was real.

01:40:02:00 – 01:40:06:09
Rob Kristoffersen
But, nobody at this point buys that. It’s actually really.

01:40:06:11 – 01:40:23:03
Dan LeFebvre
Well, it sounds like the show is is taking that concept, but there I mean, this is happening in the. Well, I remember Roswell being in 47, but then, you know, this happening after the fact in the 50s and stuff like that. With the as far as the TV show timeline, it kind of bounces back and forth. But none of that.

01:40:23:03 – 01:40:33:13
Dan LeFebvre
It sounds like if it surfaced in the 90s, it sounds like they’re taking something from decades later and kind of throwing that in there just to add to the narrative.

01:40:33:16 – 01:41:02:13
Rob Kristoffersen
Yeah, pretty much, you know, there’s always been like UFO hoaxes. They’ve always been prevalent. The first UFO hoax goes back to 1947, in these kids, and I forget exactly what town they lived in. I think it was called Woodworth, and they ended up at, this is when, Kenneth Arnold had his famous sighting. It was shortly after that, and sometime in July.

01:41:02:15 – 01:41:21:19
Rob Kristoffersen
And these kids mocked up this UFO, and they put it on this one lady’s lawn. And the reason that they put it on that one lady’s lawn is because she was known as the town gossip. And she knew and they knew that, word would get around really quickly. And to the point where the, National Guard actually ended up coming to town and these kids got in trouble.

01:41:21:19 – 01:41:30:10
Rob Kristoffersen
So, I mean, there’s always been hoaxers and there’s always been people trying to make a buck. And, I mean, recently probably made a killing selling video tapes.

01:41:30:14 – 01:41:50:13
Dan LeFebvre
So I wanted to ask you about something that the show has. And when they’re investigating on the show, Hynek and Quinn, they come across a soldier who was at Roswell, and soldiers name is Stuart Terry. He tells them that there wasn’t just one crash site, but there was a second one. And at that second site, Terry talks about how he shot something.

01:41:50:15 – 01:42:08:02
Dan LeFebvre
Later, he recovered the remains buried in his land. And then Hynek and Quinn go to where it was buried, and they find some skeletal remains. But then I think there was a mention as well, where someone mentions how the authorities asked for five child sized coffins. So maybe there was more than just the one being that we see, shown on the actual TV show.

01:42:08:02 – 01:42:16:29
Dan LeFebvre
But what about this concept of two crash sites at Roswell where there were there actually two crash sites with multiple being supposedly found?

01:42:17:02 – 01:42:46:16
Rob Kristoffersen
There have been a few different narratives concerning, you know, the crash saucers at Roswell, one being that the craft in question was hit by lightning over the Foster Ranch, and it created this debris field, and that the actual saucer crashed 150 miles away in a place called the Plains of Saint Augustine in the late 70s, early 80s. As Stanton Friedman was researching this case, he learned of a story through a second hand and third hand sources.

01:42:46:16 – 01:43:18:27
Rob Kristoffersen
A lot of people came forward saying that this guy named Barney Barnett discovered the crash saucer and alien bodies at this place called the Planes of Saint Augustine. And Friedman was never actually able to talk to him directly. He had died, about a decade before he started researching it. But a lot of people came forward, I want to say like maybe 5 or 6 people came forward and said, oh, yeah, Barney Barnett, he told me the story about how he saw these, alien beings in this crash saucer all the way in this at the site.

01:43:18:27 – 01:43:42:27
Rob Kristoffersen
And there was also, allegedly an archeology class that had walked up upon it at the same time that he did. Now, there’s also speculation that what had happened was that there were two saucers that crashed, and one ended up at the planes of Saint Augustine, and the other allegedly crashed 2 to 3 miles away from the Foster Ranch.

01:43:42:27 – 01:44:18:18
Rob Kristoffersen
But nobody’s ever really been able to like and, you know, pin it down to one. And again, that’s what makes Roswell this like narrative that has been built on, over and over again upon time. The child sized coffin portion of this comes from a man named Glenn Dennis. He was a part time assistant at the local funeral home, the Ballard Funeral Home, and he claims to have received a call from the Army Air Force, inquiring about the availability of child sized coffins.

01:44:18:18 – 01:44:42:23
Rob Kristoffersen
He claims to have delivered 3 or 4 of them to the base, and, he also claimed to have ran into a nurse on the base who had witnessed the alien bodies, and even drew a sketch of them on a napkin, of which, Dennis actually recreated. I don’t think like there are photos if you Google Glenn Dennis, you know, alien sketch, you’ll see.

01:44:42:23 – 01:45:03:08
Rob Kristoffersen
You’ll come upon like this. There’s like, four small images on what looks like, you know, a piece of, like, white stationery. I think he ended up recreating it, but his testimony has been called into question, simply by the fact that they’ve never been able to confirm who this nurse was. At the Roswell Army airfield.

01:45:03:08 – 01:45:17:14
Rob Kristoffersen
So, Yeah, these, these are, this just attests to the reason why, Roswell is this, like, ambiguous mound of, testimony at this point, while.

01:45:17:14 – 01:45:38:17
Dan LeFebvre
Moving right along. We’re in episode number three now, and Project Blue Book has a case at area 51. It involves two soldiers, Willingham and Miller. And they were doing a routine patrol when Miller was abducted by a UFO. When Hynek and Quinn get to the site of where it happened, you can see the sand there was turned to glass.

01:45:38:20 – 01:45:52:24
Dan LeFebvre
Other than Roswell, of course, everyone knows about area 51 and how it relates to UFOs and top secret cover ups and things like that. But was Doctor Hynek ever there to investigate an abduction like we see in the show?

01:45:52:26 – 01:46:19:00
Rob Kristoffersen
Abductions were something that Project Blue Book tried to distance themselves from. And we really didn’t get, our first abduction account until 1961, when Betty and Barney Hill had their experience, you know, which we briefly talked about in episode 153. It was the inspiration for one of those episodes, and they tried to, explain away certain portions of their sighting.

01:46:19:02 – 01:46:42:19
Rob Kristoffersen
So, for instance, the only parts that they investigated were the sighting and the actual craft in the sky, which they claimed was, I believe, like an advertising search later, an advertising like plane or something like that flying at like midnight or whatever, which was a really ridiculous explanation. It’s a great time to realize.

01:46:42:22 – 01:46:45:03
Sean Jablonski
Yeah.

01:46:45:06 – 01:46:52:06
Rob Kristoffersen
It’s a great, great time. Let’s advertise to that. That single folk, you know, the single couple that are just driving on the highway, they.

01:46:52:06 – 01:46:54:01
Dan LeFebvre
Call that targeted advertising. That’s that.

01:46:54:01 – 01:46:57:03
Sean Jablonski
One. Yeah.

01:46:57:06 – 01:47:51:14
Rob Kristoffersen
Absolutely, absolutely. But, the only abduction investigated through, like, the guise of Project Bluebook was the abduction of a police officer named Herbert Schirmer in 1967. And it wasn’t exactly investigated by Project Blue Book, personnel, but by an independent body that had been brought in to study the phenomenon called the Condon Committee. And, this arose this committee arose in 1966 after a series of sightings in Michigan to which, Doctor Hynek, probably made the biggest, what many would consider career suicide at that point by, labeling a UFO sighting as the, product of swamp gas, which is where that that term came from.

01:47:51:17 – 01:48:03:05
Rob Kristoffersen
These, sightings occurred in, Dexter Hillsdale in the Dexter Hillsdale region of, Michigan. But this,

01:48:03:08 – 01:48:33:19
Rob Kristoffersen
Shurmur’s case is, is kind of fascinating because he’s a, he’s a police officer with the a, Ashland, Nebraska police Department. He was fluent in multiple language. He was a very intelligent man. And, in this on December 3rd, 1967, he was on a routine patrol. He was, on a rural road when he saw a light, which he assumed to be, a vehicle having trouble.

01:48:33:21 – 01:49:04:06
Rob Kristoffersen
And when he drove up on it, it was a UFO. And he stopped his car. And in the next moment, he appeared to be missing time. But, through the Condon Committee, he was subjected to hypnosis. It was later revealed that he had, been taken on board this UFO been shown around by some really interesting looking aliens, and he was ultimately returned.

01:49:04:06 – 01:49:31:09
Rob Kristoffersen
But, this case, like, caused such an uproar to the point where, Sherman was driving to Colorado, the University of Colorado, where this project was being handled. And during one trip, a group of people actually ended up destroying his car for, no real reason. I still don’t understand it. To this day. It was, it caused it seemed to cause some kind of uproar.

01:49:31:09 – 01:50:03:16
Rob Kristoffersen
But, Shermer ended up serving for a little while longer in Ashland, Nebraska. And then he ultimately moved to the Pacific Northwest, where he, died in 2017. But, there’s actually a really cool graphic novel created about his sighting. It’s called December 3rd, 1967, an alien counter by a guy named Mike. Jessica, and Shermer claimed that, yeah, he he eventually read it before he died.

01:50:03:16 – 01:50:32:13
Rob Kristoffersen
And he claimed that, he had come to see his see his sighting in kind of a religious sense. So, that’s really the only abduction case that Project Blue Book ever gave the light of day. Most of them really went unreported, until the 80s, when, you know, more and more people started to come forward. Before then, you had scattered incidents.

01:50:32:13 – 01:51:02:19
Rob Kristoffersen
Most of them would be, you know, relegated to the, UFO journals and such. But, abductions just weren’t something that Project Blue Book wanted to handle. And really, any incidents involving sightings of alien beings, they would downplay, they would, only investigate certain portions of it, especially when it came to like the UFO sightings itself.

01:51:02:19 – 01:51:09:28
Rob Kristoffersen
But when it comes to animate beings, Project Blue Book said, no, we’re out. We’re done with this.

01:51:10:00 – 01:51:31:24
Dan LeFebvre
Well, it sounds like they’re almost the TV show is almost doing something similar to what they did with the autopsy footage, where they’re finding an excuse to, in this case, bring in area 51, because everybody knows what area 51 is. So we need to have a reason for Doctor Hynek and Captain Quinn to to be there to basically have area 51 on the show because it’s a show about UFOs.

01:51:31:24 – 01:51:33:24
Dan LeFebvre
And so you have to have area 51, right?

01:51:33:27 – 01:52:00:22
Rob Kristoffersen
Area 51 is just kind of the hot gossip around town. And it wasn’t until a, journalist named George Knapp, he started talking to a guy named Bob Lazar and Bob Lazar. He his credentials have never fully been proven, but that has not stopped him from speaking on the record many times, saying that, he had, worked briefly for the government.

01:52:00:28 – 01:52:15:18
Rob Kristoffersen
He had worked like, maybe less than two months, 2 to 3 weeks or so. Reverse engineering. This, UFO, which he, affectionately called the sport model, which, it’s always been kind of funny.

01:52:15:18 – 01:52:19:24
Dan LeFebvre
Oh, cool. They have, like, SUVs and the sport coupe versions and.

01:52:19:24 – 01:52:20:23
Sean Jablonski
Yeah.

01:52:20:25 – 01:52:27:23
Rob Kristoffersen
Yeah, I would assume so. You know, like, there’s got to be a caravan somewhere in there. And area 51, I was. Yes.

01:52:27:25 – 01:52:51:01
Dan LeFebvre
Of course you travel in style. I wanted to ask you about something with area 51, because the show kind of gives the indication that, there’s more than just the base there. I think there’s, there’s a scene where we see Doctor Hynek and Captain Quinn. There’s like this massive, complex, massive doors opening in the side of a mountain.

01:52:51:01 – 01:53:06:01
Dan LeFebvre
And Quinn says something to the effect of what we saw back there at the base with just the cover. This is the real area 51. Is there any evidence to suggest that the base that everyone knows is at Cream Lake is just a cover for some sort of massive hidden base nearby?

01:53:06:03 – 01:53:45:15
Rob Kristoffersen
Bob Lazar claimed that he didn’t exactly work at area 51. He worked at a portion of Groom Lake nearby that they called S-4, and S-4 was supposedly this huge underground complex went down for miles, and that’s where they were storing all of these, UFOs that had crashed and that the government was trying to reverse engineer. And they also housed apparently aliens that worked with the US government in the evening, like there are many places, many bases that, people claim aliens work with the government on technology and stuff like that.

01:53:45:22 – 01:54:15:06
Rob Kristoffersen
So, really that extends from Bob Lazar and his claim to work at, S-4. And the interesting thing is, is that George Knapp, in the introduction to, Bob Lazar’s autobiography, which came out late last year, he claims that he called up Nellis Air Force Base and said, is there a nest for, anywhere out there? And the guy’s like, yeah, there is.

01:54:15:06 – 01:54:21:17
Rob Kristoffersen
So it’s like, well, if if George Knapp can call up and ask if there’s an S-4 out there, why can’t anybody do it?

01:54:21:18 – 01:54:23:24
Sean Jablonski
Like, come on.

01:54:23:26 – 01:54:27:02
Dan LeFebvre
I was going to say, is that all it took somebody just picking up the phone and making a.

01:54:27:02 – 01:54:29:19
Sean Jablonski
Call. So it just.

01:54:29:19 – 01:54:41:10
Rob Kristoffersen
Seems to be. That seems to be it like, all you need is a phone and, you know, some in some, you know, liquid courage. And they’ll tell you that S-4 does.

01:54:41:10 – 01:54:43:02
Sean Jablonski
Exist.

01:54:43:05 – 01:55:08:03
Dan LeFebvre
If we head back into the TV show. Episode number four covers an event in Hopkinsville, Kentucky. According to the show, Jimmy J. Shoemaker is in the woods near his house when he sees a UFO fly over and at the house, his entire family sees creatures in the woods. We can see a shot where, his family’s all lined up with rifles, and they’re shooting through through the walls of the house at the creatures outside.

01:55:08:05 – 01:55:30:18
Dan LeFebvre
Shoemaker tells Hynek and Quinn when they get there, that aliens landed there and tried to kill them all. And then later, we find that Shoemaker happens to run a circus. He has monkeys, he has costumes for them, and a green glaze to make it look like alien handprints on the trees we saw. So Project Bluebook determined that this was all a hoax, even though again, we have the same sort of theme.

01:55:30:18 – 01:55:44:06
Dan LeFebvre
Shoemaker is claiming that he was just recreating the things that actually happened. It’s similar to what we saw with Duncan Booker in the Alien Autopsy a couple episodes earlier. So how well did the show do depicting this event in Hopkinsville?

01:55:44:08 – 01:56:10:03
Rob Kristoffersen
The Kelly Hopkinsville incident is one of the most fascinating UFO related incidents. Since the 50s. It’s, kind of one of those cultural touchstones to the point where it inspired a, a character, a Pokemon. So I mean, it’s, it’s one of those cases that, you know, it perks up a lot of people’s ears.

01:56:10:03 – 01:56:36:01
Rob Kristoffersen
So, you know, they got, there’s there’s the bare bones there. It occurred in the hamlet of Kelly in Kentucky on August 21st, 1955, and it occurred on the farmstead of the Sutton family at 7 p.m. that evening. A friend of the family, the the guy’s real name was Billy Ray Taylor, claimed to see a UFO with this colorful exhaust.

01:56:36:03 – 01:57:01:11
Rob Kristoffersen
It passed over him. It hovered near some trees nearby and it came down. And this was as he was going outside to collect some water. Now, these folks, they did not have electricity. They didn’t have running water. They had an outhouse. You know, this is rural life to the fullest. So Billy Ray, he comes inside and he tells everybody, oh, I saw this UFO.

01:57:01:14 – 01:57:27:21
Rob Kristoffersen
You know, it came down, it’s out back. And, nobody believed him. But an hour later, he and, his friend, the one lady was there to visit Lucky Sutton. He lived in the house. They went outside when, their dogs just started to bark uncontrollably. And at first they saw what they believed to be a strange glow coming from behind their property.

01:57:27:24 – 01:57:53:22
Rob Kristoffersen
And as it moved closer, they were able to make out small humanoid creatures about 3.5ft tall. They claimed that its head was, it was oversize, it was round in it, and it had really large ears, which was one of the more curious features of this creature, because you don’t often see ears reported on aliens. But, in this case, we do.

01:57:53:24 – 01:58:21:09
Rob Kristoffersen
And their arms were almost as long as its entire body. They they hung really low and, its hands had talons on them, of all things. So this thing is scary as hell. They had eyes that glowed, pale yellow color. And the, the two men immediately went inside, grabbed firearms, and pointed it toward the this creature that was coming toward them.

01:58:21:11 – 01:58:53:08
Rob Kristoffersen
And this creature had its hands raised as if it’s saying, don’t shoot at me. But they fired anyway. This creature did a flip. It fled under the cover of darkness and disappeared. Now, mind you, there are 11 people living on this farmstead at this time, and it’s really in a small three room shack. So you have eight adults and three children, and many of them saw creatures appearing at the window after this.

01:58:53:08 – 01:59:18:03
Rob Kristoffersen
So it was about maybe a half hour to 45 minutes later that one of these creatures appeared at the window. They fired again and again. This creature just flipped and fled into the trees. So it fully escalated. After Billy Ray Taylor stepped out the front door and had his hair pulled by one of the creatures who had climbed up on top of the roof.

01:59:18:05 – 01:59:43:22
Rob Kristoffersen
So the family, they all packed inside their house. They holed up for a few hours, listening to the footsteps on the roof, until they eventually fled to their cars and drove to the police station. Now, the officer that accompanied them back, he claimed that these are not the kind of people that would go to the police to solve their problems.

01:59:43:24 – 02:00:14:10
Rob Kristoffersen
So they were really, scared. They were shook up, and they accompanied them back to their house, but all they found were some spent shell casings. There were holes in the, screen windows. But after the police left, the creatures actually came back, and it was so dead. Approximately 2:30 a.m., the matriarch of the household, miss, Glennie Lankford, saw one of the creatures near her bedside window, and it put a hand on the window screen.

02:00:14:10 – 02:00:18:05
Rob Kristoffersen
And I would be scarred for life if I saw it.

02:00:18:08 – 02:00:20:12
Dan LeFebvre
I mean, I’ve seen horror movies that start this way.

02:00:20:12 – 02:00:22:10
Sean Jablonski
This is.

02:00:22:13 – 02:00:46:08
Rob Kristoffersen
Yeah, exactly. This. This is a horror movie movie in the making. It’s happening in real time. So it was about 530 when these creatures backed off and they were never seen again. And, the family’s ordeal made national news headlines. And because of the way this case was portrayed in the news, there were a lot of details that were blown out of proportion.

02:00:46:08 – 02:01:14:04
Rob Kristoffersen
Like they, a lot of papers said that there were like, up to 11 of these aliens when, the family claimed that they only saw three of them. But, it’s from this case that, the term little green men is something that, entered the vernacular. And it’s something that kind of exists still today because, if you look at many of the popular images of, alien heads, they’re usually green.

02:01:14:04 – 02:01:39:27
Rob Kristoffersen
And it’s, because of this case, according to documents, Project Blue Book never took an official interest in this case, though Hynek did later write about it in one of his books. But, this, this is definitely, I would say the, the real true to life case is a little more interesting than the way it, was displayed in Project Blue Book.

02:01:39:27 – 02:02:00:00
Rob Kristoffersen
I think the the problem that, they have with Project Blue Book is, there really isn’t a lot of mystery left over when you start to explain everything away. And, you know, I think that’s, one of the fatal missteps of the second season is they just start to explain things more and more.

02:02:00:02 – 02:02:13:18
Dan LeFebvre
One thing they did mention in this episode was, program in the CIA called MK ultra, and they’re supposedly doing some work with precognition. Is there anything about MKUltra, like, was that an actual program?

02:02:13:20 – 02:02:51:28
Rob Kristoffersen
Oh, yeah. Project MKUltra was a real project. It was a CIA funded study pertaining to mind control through the use of LSD and other psychological measures. MKUltra is a whole other can of worms, and like, you could probably do, I could go on for ever talking about it, but, I want to direct people to a few different resources because it is one of the more, it’s one of the darkest, kind of portions to the work the CIA has ever done.

02:02:51:28 – 02:03:22:29
Rob Kristoffersen
But our friends at the Not Alone podcast did a three part series back in 2019 on, MKUltra and just the, the, extent that, that project went to. There is another great podcast that just, made a five part series, on, a Canadian physicians part in that program. It’s called, madness. And that’s from the, the podcast Endless Thread.

02:03:22:29 – 02:03:39:24
Rob Kristoffersen
And it’s a really great series. And, one book I’ll recommend to that just came out last year because more and more people are starting to take an interest in this case. And it’s, a lot of it has to do with the death of a man named Frank Olson, which was the subject of a Netflix series called Wormwood.

02:03:39:27 – 02:03:57:13
Rob Kristoffersen
But, there’s a book that came out last year called Poisoner in Chief by, Stephen Kinzer, which is a really fascinating book. So, yeah, if you really want to see, like, the dark end of some of the, CIA’s research, go check out those things.

02:03:57:16 – 02:04:20:17
Dan LeFebvre
We’ll we’ll leave those for there. And, after the show, if we head back to the TV show and episode number five happens at a place called Maury Island. And according to the show, it happened on June 21st, 1947, two weeks before the Roswell incident. A man, a fisherman by the name of Ernest Reed, was out on Puget Sound checking his traps.

02:04:20:20 – 02:04:41:29
Dan LeFebvre
After about an hour, something appeared overhead. He described it as round. There’s, silver craft with holes in the middle and there were bigger than his boat. There were multiples of them. We see kind of a recreation of it and on the show, and they’re hovering less than 100ft over his boat. But there’s no noise. And then something seemed to go wrong.

02:04:41:29 – 02:05:01:18
Dan LeFebvre
We couldn’t tell if one of the ships was breaking apart or if it was trying to bomb him on purpose. But there’s pieces falling all over hitting his boat. And that’s when he called in a mayday, claiming that he was under attack from alien ships. But then, soon after the event, Reed recanted his story and said he was just trying to get some insurance money for fire damage on his boat.

02:05:01:20 – 02:05:18:13
Dan LeFebvre
And then the show says that this was the first time that, quote unquote, men in black hats were reported. When they showed up to silence the town. How much of that happened? And was this the first time that anyone saw the Men in Black?

02:05:18:16 – 02:05:49:28
Rob Kristoffersen
So this is, the the Maury Island incident is, one of the more controversial UFO cases. But as the story goes, that the gentleman’s name was, Harold Dahl. He was recovering logs in the Puget Sound on June 21st, 1947. That’s when he noticed, six donut shaped objects that were heading in his direction. And one of the objects appeared to struggle maintaining altitude.

02:05:50:01 – 02:06:15:11
Rob Kristoffersen
It dropped to about 1500 feet, and it floated directly over Dahl’s boat. And it started to drop what he claimed was slag like metal down into the sound. And some of it ended up hitting his boat. The debris ended up hitting his son Charles, breaking his arm, and some of the slag actually killed their dog too. Dahl claimed to take a photo of the craft, though.

02:06:15:11 – 02:06:55:06
Rob Kristoffersen
No, it’s never surfaced. Nobody’s ever seen this thing. So, you know, that’s, sketchy, sketchy as hell. But, he showed it to his supervisor, which was a man named Fred Christman. Christman didn’t believe him, though, and he went to investigate it for himself and claimed to have seen a UFO while he was out there investigating. So the next morning, a man wearing a black suit showed up at doll’s house and escorted him to a diner, and he proceeded to recount Dahl’s experience the day before as proof that he knew all about his experience.

02:06:55:08 – 02:07:24:06
Rob Kristoffersen
So Dahl was told by this man, don’t ever speak of it. Don’t ever tell anybody. Otherwise bad things are going to happen to you. So eventually, I mean, Dahl ended up telling his story to to a lot of people, but he eventually recanted his story. But it was investigated by two people. Kenneth Arnold, who I, you know, previously mentioned he was kind of the first, like, independent UFO investigator.

02:07:24:06 – 02:08:01:14
Rob Kristoffersen
And I think people looked to him just because he had a sighting and he was accompanied by a number, another man named captain EJ Smith, who had witnessed a UFO while piloting a passenger plane, sometime in July. They didn’t believe Dahl or Christman, though. The alleged debris that they had, they they had, I believe it was Kenneth Arnold had talked to a couple of, Army intelligence officers who ended up coming down.

02:08:01:14 – 02:08:32:04
Rob Kristoffersen
They were going to escort some of this, debris back to have it analyzed. And shortly after takeoff, their plane actually did go down in the Pacific Northwest. And, there’s been a lot of conspiracies that have come up, because of that. But, the reason this story and the Men in Black Angle itself was popularized was because of a book written by a man named Gray Barker called They Knew Too Much About Flying Saucers.

02:08:32:06 – 02:08:59:07
Rob Kristoffersen
The book featured the Murray Island case and a handful of and a handful of others in which individuals had contact with shady men wearing black suits, telling UFO witnesses not to talk about what they saw. And I think the interesting thing here is that after Dul kind of talked about his experience, he, his work, which was on the Puget Sound, kind of started to dry up.

02:08:59:07 – 02:09:45:22
Rob Kristoffersen
And his son went missing for a period of two weeks and was discovered working in a diner in Montana. And he had no clue how he got it, how he got there. And we know that portion of the story is true because there was an FBI file, opened on it. So there are some elements of this story, which are true, but, I think they’re used to fuel, like the more sensational aspects of this case because, I do believe at one point, Harold Dahl’s wife also attempted to stab him, because of all of the, controversy revolving around the case, you kind of just wanted to cut it out,

02:09:45:22 – 02:10:13:17
Rob Kristoffersen
but, yeah, almost stabbed him. But, this is like, one of the more controversial cases in that not a lot has been proven. And if I recall correctly, Fred Crispin was one of it was actually one of the people subpoenaed by the, Warren Commission when they were investigating, the assassination of JFK. And he has had ties to, the military and I think maybe the CIA.

02:10:13:17 – 02:10:23:23
Rob Kristoffersen
But, don’t don’t quote me on that. Exactly. But, yeah, it’s, it’s a kind of a whole can of worms. The the Maria Island incident.

02:10:23:25 – 02:10:42:13
Dan LeFebvre
Speaking of can of worms, I want to ask you about something else. About the the men in Black, because during this episode, we learn more about someone from season one. And in that season, he was simply known as The Fixer. In this episode in particular, we find out that his name is William and he used to be part of a remote viewing program for the CIA.

02:10:42:18 – 02:11:10:02
Dan LeFebvre
But then he left that program and joined a group simply known as the Men in Black. The idea that I got from this show was that the Men in Black isn’t a part of the CIA or the military, but they still seem to have powerful resources. And after I watched the, the show, this episode and kind of how they explained it, I still really, really wasn’t sure if William left the CIA to start The Men in Black on his own, or if he just joined the already existing group.

02:11:10:02 – 02:11:23:18
Dan LeFebvre
Somehow. I’m sure Men in Black can be, again, entire series by itself, but how well do you think the show did? Just explaining kind of the men in black themselves and who they’re supposed to be.

02:11:23:21 – 02:11:53:00
Rob Kristoffersen
There are a lot of different theories when it comes to The Men in Black. That’s definitely one that these are kind of government agents. Some believe that they are, independent agents that work of their own accord. Some believe that they are actually aliens as, when, during the, Mothman, series of sightings which you’ve covered with, our good friend Sam Fredrickson.

02:11:53:03 – 02:12:18:18
Rob Kristoffersen
They the people had encounters with men in black, and they would act as if they didn’t know what random mundane items were like. Pens. Like, there was one, case in which, the, maid reporter of the town, her name was Mary Hier. She was kind of the woman who led the charge on, reporting the Mothman sightings in the paper, printing the the reports.

02:12:18:18 – 02:12:44:01
Rob Kristoffersen
And she ended up having an encounter with, the strange man who, when he came into her office, he started asking strange questions like, what do you think John Keel would do if I. If, they told him to stop talking about the Mothman and stuff like that. And, at one point he reached for a pen and he was holding it as if he didn’t know what it was.

02:12:44:03 – 02:12:51:27
Rob Kristoffersen
And, Mary Higher said that, you know, he could have the pen, at which point he turned around and laughed and ran out.

02:12:52:02 – 02:12:54:15
Sean Jablonski
So like that. Yeah.

02:12:54:15 – 02:13:21:23
Rob Kristoffersen
There’s a lot of weird stuff around the Men in Black. There is even one theory that, guy named Paul Cornell who wrote this, this comic series called Saucer Country. And in it, his, take on the Men in Black was that, they were actually Air Force agents that would, as part of a hazing ritual, go and harass UFO witnesses that, their reports ended up in the news.

02:13:21:26 – 02:13:45:08
Rob Kristoffersen
So they’d show up on their door, you know, pretending to act like government agents and stuff like that. It’s, you know, there’s a lot of takes on, the, Men in Black and, they never cease to amaze me. Here’s another interesting account from this woman who claimed to be a remote viewer who said, at one point she was going to review remote view.

02:13:45:10 – 02:14:21:18
Rob Kristoffersen
The, Men in Black. So, like, remote viewing is kind of like, it’s sending your, like, body or out into the world to like, kind of like, see things from a distance, you know? So, this woman claimed that, these beings were, extradimensional beings from a different dimension. They, they kind of kept balance, you know, making sure that, evil, aliens didn’t interfere in human affairs.

02:14:21:20 – 02:14:24:00
Rob Kristoffersen
And they also had a ton of paperwork to do.

02:14:24:00 – 02:14:30:18
Dan LeFebvre
Well, it sounds like at least the at least the show is going off one of those theories, even though there’s a lot of them.

02:14:30:20 – 02:14:58:16
Rob Kristoffersen
Yeah, there’s so many there’s so many angles that they, had to, work with on this and, they could, you know, go a million different places. And, you know, I’d say I’d say Project Blue Book went to the more mundane route. Now, I had a I had a conversation with, with my buddy Rich Hatem, the guy who wrote, the screenplay for The Mothman Prophecies.

02:14:58:23 – 02:15:21:13
Rob Kristoffersen
And he said that, when they were first, pitching this idea for Project Blue Book, he actually went in, and he was trying to, pitch himself as a showrunner for Project Blue Book. He didn’t get it, obviously, but, you know, it would have been it would have been fitting, seeing as how, you know, he’s, he’s well versed in this stuff.

02:15:21:16 – 02:15:46:25
Dan LeFebvre
Speaking of the show, if we head back, we’re in episode six now, and this is where we learn about the Robertson pal, as well as someone named David Dabrowski. The storyline in the show suggests that there’s a battle between control over UFO investigations between the U.S. Air Force and the CIA. The CIA puts the Air Force on trial with the Robertson Panel, which looks into the validity of Project Blue Book’s work and the hearing.

02:15:46:25 – 02:16:15:18
Dan LeFebvre
It seems no one is interested in really diving into the reports from Blue Book. They pretty much just skim them and then close them as if they already have the answer that they want. And this is just a formality. But that’s when David Dabrowski comes to the story. He convinces Hynek and Queen to let him talk to the panel, where he says that he was directed to be there by beings from another planet, planet Ventus, which is two galaxies beyond ours, and he leaves the room.

02:16:15:18 – 02:16:29:22
Dan LeFebvre
And then Quinn says, we’re doing our part by stopping people like Dabrowski from inciting panic around the nation, from people who might actually believe that they’re telling the truth. How well did the show do depicting this? Did any of that happen?

02:16:29:24 – 02:17:02:09
Rob Kristoffersen
So, the Robertson panel was a real panel. It was led by the CIA. And that did, in fact change Project Blue Book’s mission from, like, an open minded investigation to skeptical debunking. But it didn’t really happen. It didn’t really go down like this. Robertson panel was led, by the head of the CIA’s Office of Scientific Intelligence, and they saw the potential hysteria that these sightings could cause.

02:17:02:09 – 02:17:46:27
Rob Kristoffersen
Life magazine at the time was claiming that, the evidence of alien life was around the corner. They were, you know, pretty, they they believe that alien life was going to show up at any second. And, and in the last episode that I was on, there was a pair of, dramatic sightings, during two consecutive weeks over Washington, DC, that I talked about, that, really got the government a little worried, to the point where they, the CIA felt like they needed to step in and kind of gauge Project Blue Book and dictate its mission.

02:17:47:00 – 02:18:17:01
Rob Kristoffersen
The, number of UFO reports in 1952, right before the Robertson panel came in, went up dramatically. Most years after 1947, they would get like maybe 30 reports a year, 30 to 50. That year they got over 130. So they saw this as a huge concern. And they thought it could be used as, kind of like psychological warfare tactics.

02:18:17:03 – 02:18:45:09
Rob Kristoffersen
So they recommended educating the public on debunking sightings. And, and, you know, this isn’t to say that Dabrowski s character didn’t exist in the UFO, world. In the UFO culture, there were a number of people that were dubbed the contacts who claimed to have contact with Venusian aliens, who wanted mankind to basically get rid of its nuclear weapons to protect the environment.

02:18:45:11 – 02:19:01:24
Rob Kristoffersen
So, yeah, it’s, didn’t really go down the way it did on the show, but it’s, it’s close. I mean, the Robertson panel’s there, but, I as far as I know, there were no contacts that were led in front of the Robertson panel to testify at any one point.

02:19:01:26 – 02:19:28:11
Dan LeFebvre
Okay, well, that was I want to ask you about that, because in the show, the Borowski character, he is claiming that aliens directed him to go help prove the validity of Project Bluebook. But if aliens wanted to prove the validity, couldn’t they just like, show up to the hearings themselves? I think there is even a line in an earlier episode where Captain Quinn says something like, why are all these sightings happening way out in the woods?

02:19:28:11 – 02:19:39:20
Dan LeFebvre
Couldn’t they just come to like, Times Square? Why? Why do they have to be so cloak and dagger about everything? Are there any examples of stories where the the logic like that just kind of doesn’t make sense?

02:19:39:22 – 02:20:10:01
Rob Kristoffersen
So many contacts, especially in the 1950s, had stories like this, and they would also use that kind of similar logic to, in fact, pretty much all of them did. When it comes to these stories, like they’re never truly about going to the government with, this information, it’s usually about like, proving the validity of their own sightings.

02:20:10:01 – 02:20:45:03
Rob Kristoffersen
But I pretty much every single one of them, the Georgia Dembski, who was one of the most well known, contacts of the 1950s, basically, you know, reported the same things. There was George Van Tassel or Lucci, even during the the the Mothman stuff. Woodrow Darren Burger was that type of individual. And, despite the fact that Woodrow wasn’t coming to the government to say, you know, to kind of with the nuclear stuff.

02:20:45:06 – 02:21:07:04
Rob Kristoffersen
A lot of them did, a lot of them did, and a lot of them faked evidence to bolster their claims. And a lot of them made money doing it. So, in the 50s, that seemed to be the contact kind of thing, you know, make money claiming that you had contact with the aliens, that they’re peaceful, but they just want us to cut it with the nuclear crap.

02:21:07:06 – 02:21:28:29
Dan LeFebvre
Back in the show where it episode number seven now, and it is the Curse of the skinwalker. This case takes place at a ranch in Utah owned by the Chapman family. One night, their son, Billy is sleepwalking outside when three orbs of light fly over. And then they fly into the ground, forming a creepy sort of shadow monster or something of some sort.

02:21:29:02 – 02:21:48:18
Dan LeFebvre
The family runs away, of course, because that’s creepy. And, Bluebook is called to investigate. Our heroes are looking at the case. Hynek and coin are told the story of the skinwalker. As legend goes, the Ute nation used to abduct Navajo and sell them on the New Mexico slave market. So the Navajo put a curse on them.

02:21:48:18 – 02:22:14:04
Dan LeFebvre
And the land. And that land happens to be where the Chapman’s ranch is now. Skinwalker is the name of the that the Navajo gave to a medicine man who’s chosen to take the form of an animal in order to inflict pain and suffering on others. The explanation that the show gives for all of this is that the scientists at an Air Force base some ten miles east of the Chapman Ranch, are drilling down in the caverns under their ranch.

02:22:14:06 – 02:22:39:15
Dan LeFebvre
They’re using a high powered water mixture into the fault line, and these release pockets of ethylene gas that can give people oral and visual hallucinations. So it’s quite a connection from the skinwalker to just being a hallucination. But was Bluebook involved in Skinwalkers and this idea that they’re just a hallucination like the show indicates?

02:22:39:18 – 02:23:15:08
Rob Kristoffersen
The basis for this episode is an actual ranch in the Ute Valley of Utah. And, it’s it’s called Skinwalker Ranch. It was owned by a couple named Terry and Glenn Sherman, and they claim to have experienced rather large wolves, strange UFOs, portals, poltergeist like phenomenon, and a variety of other phenomenon on their property. The skinwalker, has kind of become this concept appropriated by from like Native American culture.

02:23:15:08 – 02:23:41:28
Rob Kristoffersen
And it’s largely because of a book called hunt for the skinwalker, which was, chronicled the Sherman’s time on the ranch. It’s safe to say that Project Bluebook never investigated this case and never really would have, either. It wouldn’t be in their wheelhouse at all. They were really more concerned with investigating, like single sightings as opposed to like long term areas and stuff like that.

02:23:41:28 – 02:24:13:16
Rob Kristoffersen
But, yeah, in many ways, this episode seems like a plug for the new show that they had started that was airing after Project Blue Book. The season finale. It was called, The Secret of Skinwalker Ranch. It’s a Brandon Fugal show. It’s, it’s definitely a moment to cash in. That sighting didn’t come. Well, the property didn’t really come to the forefront until, the mid 90s.

02:24:13:16 – 02:24:28:19
Rob Kristoffersen
And really, it didn’t come to the public conscious until about 2006, ten years later. But, yeah, it definitely seemed like more of a money grab. And, Project Blue Book wouldn’t be, investigating a place like this.

02:24:28:19 – 02:24:29:21
Sean Jablonski
Yeah, yeah.

02:24:29:23 – 02:24:52:09
Dan LeFebvre
Well, if we head back to the show, we’re on episode number eight, and it introduces another concept that is familiar with, UFOs. And that would be hangar 18. Hynek and Quinn are told about it by a mechanical engineer named John. He explains that hangar 18 looks more like a storage building than a hangar, but the real lab is six floors deep.

02:24:52:12 – 02:25:09:03
Dan LeFebvre
That’s where they reverse engineer Soviet technology. But this time, John says they have something that’s not Soviet. The suggestion they’re being that it’s extraterrestrial. What is hangar 18? And are there reports of reverse engineering UFOs there?

02:25:09:06 – 02:25:41:02
Rob Kristoffersen
The idea of hangar 18 is actually connected to the Roswell crash, and in particular to a few pilots who claim to have flown wreckage and alien bodies to Wright-Patterson Air Force Base. One of them is a man named, Oliver Henderson, who, told his story to a number of, Roswell investigators, claimed that, he actually flew the, the child sized coffins, all the way to, Wright-Patterson.

02:25:41:04 – 02:26:08:05
Rob Kristoffersen
And there’s a World War two flying ace named Marion Black. Mack Magruder, who, also claimed to actually see living alien beings walking around in this, fictional hangar. There is really no hangar 18. It’s just kind of been this myth that has been propagated ever since, like the Roswell investigation. But, I mean, it did inspire a megadeth song, so I that’s that’s got to be worth something.

02:26:08:05 – 02:26:11:01
Dan LeFebvre
It’s gotta be worth something. Yeah.

02:26:11:03 – 02:26:11:12
Sean Jablonski
There you.

02:26:11:12 – 02:26:26:11
Dan LeFebvre
Go. What about the idea that Hynek was there? Because we see in the show that Hynek actually gets there. Is there anything to suggest that Hynek himself was at any place like that?

02:26:26:13 – 02:26:47:03
Rob Kristoffersen
No, no, there’s, Yeah. There’s nothing. It’s, Hynek was really close with his secretary, and he seemed to tell his secretary pretty much everything. There might have been some secrets that Hynek, you know, kept to himself, but, Yeah, I don’t think Hynek visited any kind of facility like that.

02:26:47:05 – 02:27:07:20
Dan LeFebvre
Well, back in the show now we’re at episode number nine, and this case is a Soviet bomber carrying a nuclear bomb that gets cut into by a UFO over Canadian airspace. And Bluebook is called in because the Canadian Air Force doesn’t have a UFO program. So Hynek and Quinn make their way to a small logging community in a place called Hartley Bay.

02:27:07:23 – 02:27:25:26
Dan LeFebvre
Way out in the middle of nowhere, they find the plane along with the two pilots that survived. One is just called Alex, but the other pilots given a full name, Lieutenant Colonel Yuri Alinsky. And that makes me think that maybe Alex is made up, but maybe Yuri is real. How much of this case really happened?

02:27:25:28 – 02:27:55:24
Rob Kristoffersen
So the the actual case that this episode is based on is, it’s a little, it’s honestly a little more terrifying than, than the one on, this, this particular episode. So, on the night of November 23rd, 1953, the U.S Air Defense Command near the US Canadian border detected a blip on radar over Ristic and over restricted airspace above Lake Superior.

02:27:55:26 – 02:28:26:26
Rob Kristoffersen
The Air Force scrambled an F 89 C Scorpion jet from Kinross Air Force Base, piloted by First Lieutenant Felix Moncler and Second Lieutenant Robert Wilson, and from the start, Robert Wilson had trouble tracking this thing once he got in the air and it kept changing course, like, really quick. But with the aid of, ground control, they were eventually able to kind of get a lock on this object, and they pursued it for over 30 minutes, getting closer and closer.

02:28:26:29 – 02:29:03:21
Rob Kristoffersen
Eventually, Michael and Wilson were guided down from 25,000ft to about 7000ft. They watched, the radar operators watched as the, you know, one radar blip chased the other, and a short while later they lost radio contact with Montclair and Wilson, and the witnesses there claimed to see on radar. These two objects merge into one and fly off. Now, Monreal and Wilson have never been seen again.

02:29:03:24 – 02:29:28:27
Rob Kristoffersen
Nobody knows what happened to them. Wreckage from their plane has never been found. They just disappeared. And, you know, there have been some like hoaxers coming forward. There was 1 in 2006. He claimed to be from a company called the Great Lakes Diving Company. They claim that, they walked up, they found something like, you know, a plane in Lake Superior.

02:29:28:27 – 02:29:48:03
Rob Kristoffersen
There was never it was ruled a hoax. But like Moncler and Wilson have never been seen since. And if you look at, McCullough’s, tombstone, his memorial, it’s, it’s explicitly states that he died while in pursuit of a UFO.

02:29:48:06 – 02:29:54:29
Dan LeFebvre
What about the idea? In this episode, we see Doctor Hynek actually neutralize an atomic bomb. Did he ever actually do anything like that?

02:29:55:01 – 02:29:57:10
Sean Jablonski
Probably not.

02:29:57:12 – 02:30:18:06
Rob Kristoffersen
You know, he was, he had worked with rocketry, but I don’t think he had worked with the atomic bomb specifically. And, you know, maybe in a situation, he’d be able to know how to disarm it. But I don’t know. What I love about this show is like, they they kind of treat JL and Hynek as if he’s like a jack of all trades.

02:30:18:09 – 02:30:22:18
Dan LeFebvre
He’s the hero of the show. So of course he’s going to save the day no matter what.

02:30:22:21 – 02:30:23:06
Sean Jablonski
Yeah.

02:30:23:06 – 02:30:25:14
Rob Kristoffersen
Yeah, absolutely.

02:30:25:16 – 02:30:56:07
Dan LeFebvre
Well at the end of that episode, episode nine, Doctor Hynek and Captain Quinn get to meet Senator John F Kennedy when he stops by the Project Bluebook office. And the case from Kennedy takes place during Operation Main Breaks. This goes into episode number ten. There’s, massive multinational military exercise. It involves some 200 ships, 80,000 men. And if anything happens during a war exercise that size near Russian territory, it could spark World War three.

02:30:56:10 – 02:31:23:13
Dan LeFebvre
So Heineken, Quinn, investigate aboard USS Wisconsin in the North Atlantic near Norway. They find out that this UFO experience that this, sighting that’s happened, it’s not coming from the sky like all the others, but it’s actually coming from under water. But there’s something else about this. There’s a fishing trawler that was there. It left Shanghai some 11,000 miles away just two days ago, and the fuel tank is still almost full.

02:31:23:15 – 02:31:44:02
Dan LeFebvre
Needless to say, that’s impossible. And at the end of the episode, Quinn takes a mini sub underwater to where the flying crafts are coming from. But the admiral orders depth charges dropped anyway, and the last we see of him is a massive explosion outside his sub. We assume he’s dead, except Doctor Hynek believes maybe he’s not. Maybe he was transported somehow.

02:31:44:02 – 02:31:49:21
Dan LeFebvre
Like that boat from Shanghai. Did any of that happen?

02:31:49:24 – 02:32:18:06
Rob Kristoffersen
Operation Main Brace itself was a real operation. Like the sensational part, you know, definitely didn’t didn’t happen. But, Operation Main Brace at the time, was composed of dozens of NATO organizations that, had sent ships to participate. At the time, it was the largest peacetime military exercise since World War two. And it was meant to, simulate a mock attack on Europe.

02:32:18:09 – 02:32:57:12
Rob Kristoffersen
It was involved, 200 ships, a thousand planes and over 80,000 men. And during this exercise, UFOs were spotted. The first sighting came on September 13th, 1952. The crew of a Danish destroyer spotted a triangular shaped object with blue lights on it, moving through the night sky at high rates of speed. Seven days later, aboard the USS Franklin Delano Roosevelt, a reporter named Wallace Litwin claimed that several pilots and flight crew members saw a silver colored sphere in the sky.

02:32:57:14 – 02:33:23:11
Rob Kristoffersen
Following behind the fleet. There is an actual photo of this object as well, though. Many have tried to debunk it as a weather balloon. It doesn’t appear to be a weather balloon. And, the only, places that it could have been launched from have, denied launching weather balloons around this time. It was also moving way, way too fast to be a weather balloon.

02:33:23:13 – 02:34:03:08
Rob Kristoffersen
An object had been seen the day before of that sighting, on September 19th, as a British meteor jet was returning to an airfield after conducting exercises in the North Sea. And, the pilot of that flight claimed to see a strange silver circular craft following the meteor. They described its movements as that of a falling leaf from a tree, which, is a common, thing reported in a lot of UFO sightings, is that some of these objects appear to be like, doing this slow, the slow falling pattern at times.

02:34:03:10 – 02:34:24:19
Rob Kristoffersen
The objects stopped in mid-air, rotated, and then took off fast away from everybody else. But, yeah, maybe this was a real exercise. They saw some UFOs. I don’t know that Kennedy really played a part in it, but, it is, pretty fascinating. Set of sightings.

02:34:24:21 – 02:34:28:15
Dan LeFebvre
Was Kennedy associated with Project Blue Book at all?

02:34:28:17 – 02:34:54:21
Rob Kristoffersen
No, he was not. There have been, theories that people have suggested, claiming that Kennedy knew alien secrets that he had told them to Marilyn Monroe and that that’s why the both of them were assassinated. But there’s really no, truth behind those statements at all. It’s just, conspiracy theory.

02:34:54:24 – 02:35:16:18
Dan LeFebvre
Yeah, I think the this show kind of alludes that it was, I think at the end of episode number eight, there was a brief line of dialog with Daniel Baker in the CIA talking to General Harding, saying, when it comes to the CIA, no one is untouchable, right? It kind of tie in my mind ties. Okay. It’s something with the JFK assassination as a CIA plot somehow tied to Blue Book.

02:35:16:20 – 02:35:51:05
Rob Kristoffersen
Right? Right. And that’s the thing. And that’s also like the ambiguity that the, assassination of John, John F Kennedy is kind of, lended itself to the Warren Commission, really didn’t do a good job explaining themselves and explaining, everything that happened. But, yeah, it’s just it seems like with some conspiracy theories, and the longer that they are around, the more they get added to and the more people come out of the woodwork saying, well, you know, this happened or that happened.

02:35:51:07 – 02:35:59:10
Rob Kristoffersen
Yeah. It’s always it’s always interesting to read them sometimes, but, yeah. So I don’t put a lot of stuck.

02:35:59:12 – 02:36:17:10
Dan LeFebvre
Well, that makes sense. I did want to ask about, I think was in episode three, there was a scene where we saw Heinecke and Queen in a Jeep and a big UFO flies over light, shine down. And then by the time the camera focuses on the Jeep again, Heinicke and Queen are gone, giving the impression that they were both abducted.

02:36:17:12 – 02:36:20:13
Dan LeFebvre
Was Doctor Hynek ever abducted himself?

02:36:20:15 – 02:36:54:18
Rob Kristoffersen
No. You. He was never abducted. He, He. When he came to, present his theories and stuff like that, he was very guarded. He was always very, skeptical. He was never rash to point to one thing. He had his theories and and he had his leanings. But when it came to a case by case basis, he, he would never he would never go there, per se and say, you know, that this is true or that is true.

02:36:54:18 – 02:37:11:19
Rob Kristoffersen
And, given that, Hynek even disputed the one UFO sighting that he claimed to have while looking through a telescope. So, yeah, he’s always been that skeptical kind of guy. But, as far as I could tell, and through all the research, he has never been abducted.

02:37:11:23 – 02:37:34:14
Dan LeFebvre
But we have talked about a lot of different concepts and things that they put into the show, things like area 51 and, and Skinwalker Ranch and these other elements. If you were in charge of this season of Project Bluebook, was there anything that you wish would have made it onto the show that they left out? I think there.

02:37:34:14 – 02:38:03:28
Rob Kristoffersen
Are a lot of other interesting sightings that they could have really gone to. And and like I say with, especially with the Skinwalker Ranch episode, you look at that and you see that it’s, you know, just, kind of a walking advertisement for another show that’s, that’s coming out. But, I’m glad that they included things like the the Kelly Hopkinsville incident.

02:38:03:28 – 02:38:07:18
Rob Kristoffersen
If I could,

02:38:07:21 – 02:38:52:05
Rob Kristoffersen
Trying to think, what would I have them include? I think the Herbert Shermer sighting is fascinating in the fact that we’re talking about a police officer that, claims to have been abducted by aliens. I think that would have been a more interesting case to present. In. That means there’s a case known as the, RV 47 case, and it’s kind of a the one case that many have put up as, like, the best scientific evidence for a UFO because it it literally involved a UFO following a, radar plane in the sky over, like, hundreds of miles.

02:38:52:06 – 02:39:11:25
Rob Kristoffersen
It’s, it’s a pretty fascinating case. Really, I think they did the best that they could with the season, but, Yeah, the. I can’t think of any other cases off the top of my head right now, but, those two are, I think would have made for interesting episodes.

02:39:11:28 – 02:39:18:18
Dan LeFebvre
Well, thank you so much for your time to come on to chat about Project Blue Book season two. I’ve learned a lot. It’s been it’s been a fun chat. Yeah.

02:39:18:18 – 02:39:29:26
Rob Kristoffersen
Thank you again for having me on this. Been so fun.

02:39:29:29 – 02:39:48:19
Dan LeFebvre
And that brings us to an end of the two seasons of the History Channel’s Project Blue Book. But stick around because we still have the chat with Project Blue Book’s creator, David O’Leary and showrunner Sean John Belinski to get another angle of the whole show that’s coming up right on the other side of our Two Truths and a lie game for season two.

02:39:48:23 – 02:40:16:08
Dan LeFebvre
And as a quick refresher, here are they two truths and a lie for season two of Project Blue Book number one. In the 1950s, the U.S. government illegally experimented with LSD, an unwitting U.S. citizens. Number two, the phrase little green men comes from a close encounter in Kentucky. Number three, Project Blue Book was commissioned by JFK. Did you figure out which one is a lie?

02:40:16:10 – 02:40:38:00
Dan LeFebvre
Again, I’ve got the answer in the envelope, so let’s open that up. And the lie this time is number three. As rat pointed out, President Kennedy was not associated with Project Blue Book at all. There has been some speculation that maybe he knew about alien secrets, but there really hasn’t been any proof of that. Okay, now I’ve got one more remastered episode for you today about Project Blue Book.

02:40:38:00 – 02:41:00:04
Dan LeFebvre
Coming up soon will be my chat from 2021 with the creator of Project Blue Book, David O’Leary, along with the showrunner, a Project Blue Book, Sean Job Lynskey. But first, let’s set up one final game of Two Truths and a lie for that episode. Number one, they wrote a season three, a Project Blue Book telling stories beyond the United States.

02:41:00:07 – 02:41:26:11
Dan LeFebvre
Number two, the Roswell Incident was made famous by Project Blue Book number three. David and Sean have both had unexplained experiences. Okay, now let’s hear from David O’Leary and Sandra Belinsky about creating Project Blue Book.

02:41:26:13 – 02:41:49:03
Dan LeFebvre
Or UFO mention either they just won’t believe what you say, or they’ll simply watch it to find a way to tell you that you’re wrong. I can only imagine how difficult that is when you layer that on to the normal difficulties of trying to pitch and create a show that’s based on UFOs. So my first question is simply why Project Blue Book?

02:41:49:09 – 02:41:59:13
Dan LeFebvre
Why did you decide to create a show around UFOs when you could create a show that doesn’t have nearly as much controversy surrounding it? David, as the creator, want to start with you?

02:41:59:15 – 02:42:23:25
David O’Leary
Yeah. Sure thing. And, hey, everybody’s there. And, Dan, thanks for having us. Thanks for having us on. Yeah. You know, I mean, listen, for me, and for Sean as well, I, I, we like UFOs have been sort of a life long obsession interest. I’ve always, always had a deep interest in the subject matter going all the way back to when I was a kid.

02:42:23:28 – 02:42:45:15
David O’Leary
I’m not sure why, but I just, like, was always. You know, fascinated with the unknown. And it always rang true to me. I would watch, you know, Unsolved Mysteries in the 1980s or scare the hell you know, scare the crap out of myself and read Whitley Strivers Communion when I was like 9 or 10 years old. And it just it always felt authentic and true.

02:42:45:15 – 02:43:08:24
David O’Leary
So like especially, you know, some of the more famous cases in terms of, in terms of bluebook, you know, I, I, you know, as I became an adult and moved out to LA and pursued a career in writing and all that kind of stuff, I wanted, you know, this was sort of right before I, you know, to enter 2017 and, like, UFOs kind of really hit the news again.

02:43:09:01 – 02:43:48:01
David O’Leary
And there wasn’t actually, frankly, a lot of UFO stuff on TV. X-Files had sort of come to its end and I become a bit of, of, of a UFO history buff. And Project Blue Book always just felt like such an interesting, ripe sort of world for TV in that it was period. You know, it had all these other interesting elements in the 1950s in terms of the Cold War and the rise of the atomic age and all that kind of stuff, and then just a plethora of like incredible pieces and then really just a focus on the characters who who sort of led that effort with doctor J and Hynek and, Captain

02:43:48:01 – 02:44:10:10
David O’Leary
Ed Peltz, sort of the first director of Project Bluebook boat who basically shifted sides and, and, and became these, you know, adamant believers that there was something worthy of rigorous scientific study here. So, I think it began with that idea of, of could retell, could we tell a story, you know, sort of historical drama through the lens of these characters?

02:44:10:13 – 02:44:34:22
David O’Leary
And, I was fortunate that, like, I guess there wasn’t a lot of UFO stuff at the time. And, I think Project Bluebook presented a certain, certain natural engine with sort of a, a kind of a different case every week with a really interesting sort of backdrop of getting to kind of tell it in this sort of noir 1950s, sort of shadowy sort of way.

02:44:34:22 – 02:44:46:21
David O’Leary
And, and we were just very, very fortunate that, you know, it took some time, but that eventually, it found a home, with eight studios and, and and history.

02:44:46:24 – 02:44:48:04
Dan LeFebvre
How about you? How did you.

02:44:48:09 – 02:45:16:28
David O’Leary
Kind of get involved in this? So I came a little later. You know, once David had, you know, sort of researched and written the script and had connected with, Robert Zemeckis, and I think they had had a series order by that point. And, you know, I’ve been in the television business for it’s like 25 years plus at this point, I think, and so I’ve, you know, every TV show needs to have a showrunner at some point.

02:45:16:28 – 02:45:38:11
David O’Leary
And David is talented as he is. Had not been in that position before. And so if you’re going to start any business, you’re generally going to want somebody who has that experience to sort of be in there and help help guide the process and understand what’s coming up in front of you and how to run a writer’s room and just, just all of the things you’re not going to know if you haven’t done it.

02:45:38:12 – 02:45:59:02
David O’Leary
So, I essentially interviewed for the job, which began with, meeting with David at a diner. And we realized very quickly that, like him, I, I’ve kind of been obsessed with UFOs my whole life. It’s been something that since I was a kid, I remember seeing one when I was ten years old that. Swear to God.

02:45:59:04 – 02:46:17:04
David O’Leary
And so it’s just something I’ve always been fascinated with. So we were trading stories to the point where we stayed so long. I got a parking ticket. And then, of course, you got to go. You got to go through the gantlet of meeting the studio and the producers and the network and all that stuff, and it just felt like such a very sort of natural, match.

02:46:17:06 – 02:46:47:15
David O’Leary
And then we just sort of move forward from there that, you know, we really connected on having the same passion, you know, in terms of that. But, so I’m just happy to have had the opportunity, to meet, you know, someone who shares that, and, you know, in terms of how I look at just even the phenomenon and want to tell those stories, I feel like, I mean, it’s very much in vogue right now for, for people to be talking about UFOs in a very serious way.

02:46:47:18 – 02:47:11:21
David O’Leary
And I think, like any new science and it is a bit of a science now because we’re just starting to discover it, because we have sort of the minds that are being applied to it and the science and the technology, and the, credibility of the people who’ve come forward. But for people to go back to your earlier point, for people who can, you know, when you talk about is there controversy around UFOs or why stir that up?

02:47:11:21 – 02:47:28:19
David O’Leary
Or when people say that, you know, my first question is like, well, what do you know about UFOs? I would ask, like, what do you know about the history of UFOs? Because a lot of people want to throw it off as something, you know, tinfoil hat wearing silly. Like, if they were here, they’d be landing on the front lawn of the white House and blah, blah, blah.

02:47:28:20 – 02:47:52:01
David O’Leary
But when you really understand the history, and the amount of cases and the amount of credible people that have come forward, physical evidence, you know, visual evidence, all of this, it is without a doubt something that exists. And I count myself as a true believer. And the second question I would ask somebody is, what do you believe about it?

02:47:52:08 – 02:48:11:16
David O’Leary
What do you have to believe to believe that it doesn’t exist? You know, and oftentimes people will sort of stumble and go, well, I just think that this would happen if there would be this, that the aliens would have said something by now. And then when you dig into that, you realize it’s just sort of a, a belief people have that sort of based on an like on a feeling.

02:48:11:19 – 02:48:28:23
David O’Leary
Right? Which is just like, oh, I don’t know. I just feel like it wouldn’t happen this way, blah, blah, blah. And it’s like when you sort of dig into that, it’s, I would imagine the way people would have felt before, I don’t know. We discovered bacteria when we didn’t have a microscope. You know, it’s demons inside your body.

02:48:28:24 – 02:48:45:29
David O’Leary
You know, that’s what it’s got to be. And then when the science caught up and we were able to see what was actually going on, there’s still a bridge that has to happen where people have to get on board and understand that the facts that are there and the people that are studying it are not crazy, and then all of this stuff gets borne out.

02:48:45:29 – 02:49:13:22
David O’Leary
So I feel like that’s a very important, pursuit right now, especially in a world where truth is such a, malleable concept. And so I love the idea that David and I, you know, again, I think found, a path and the passion towards wanting to get those ideas out there that it’s, it’s it’s be part of that notion of getting the truth out to an audience.

02:49:13:24 – 02:49:22:10
Dan LeFebvre
What was your interest kind of starting with that? You said you had an experience that at ten, it was that kind of when your interest in UFO started?

02:49:22:12 – 02:49:43:05
David O’Leary
100%, I, I was in, I was in New York City, which, where I grew up and saw lights in the sky moving, you know, silently information. There were these long sort of hexagonal type lights. And I remember very clearly, I can still see it very clearly. The moment where you look up and I’m like, am I seeing what I’m seeing?

02:49:43:07 – 02:49:58:28
David O’Leary
Could it be what I think it is? It has to be something like just this. You go through this whole range of emotions and, and of course, I was a kid, you know, but I still remember it very clearly to this day. So. Yeah, I mean, that’s where it had to start for sure.

02:49:59:01 – 02:50:01:27
Dan LeFebvre
David, have you ever had an experience?

02:50:01:29 – 02:50:25:21
David O’Leary
So I so I had something weird happened to me much later. And it was actually after I sold the, the show, but before the show got picked up to series and I actually, like, didn’t share it for a while, except with like, my wife and like basically I was walking home. It was I was walking home, I lived, I lived, then I lived, kind of near the grove for people living in Los Angeles.

02:50:25:24 – 02:50:40:28
David O’Leary
I was walking home through my neighborhood, and I was weirdly, I had a park a couple blocks away because of street parking, which was sort of a rare thing, and it was a quiet night. It was kind of late. And then the other strange thing was I was actually on the phone at the time, late with a friend of mine, which was also kind of just not use it.

02:50:40:28 – 02:51:04:11
David O’Leary
But I’m so glad I was that I wasn’t by myself, because I think I would have freaked out even more. And I saw what looked like a teardrop shaped sort of self luminescent, almost like a green kind of Chinese lantern emerge from out of the trees, like 25, 30ft above me. And I stopped and I did exactly what Sean does.

02:51:04:11 – 02:51:29:27
David O’Leary
And with so many UFO witnesses do and sort of be like, is that a drone? What is that? I’m not hearing anything like worrying, then I don’t know if this happened or not, but it felt like it started. It sort of stopped and it was kind of flickering and it sort of started to move towards me. And, I panicked and I, I’m on the phone with a friend of mine, and he sort of black, and he doesn’t understand what’s going on.

02:51:29:27 – 02:51:49:05
David O’Leary
I’m like, dude, I’m like. And I duck under it. And then it just sort of like continued on, kind of floating over the, sort of the, like the air I lived in in a sort of two storey house. So it’s just like, you know, like 30, 40ft in the air just over the houses and continued behind, behind, you know, some line of trees and stuff.

02:51:49:07 – 02:52:09:18
David O’Leary
Other than, like, talking to my wife about it, I didn’t share it for like a year. Because I, I don’t know, like, I, I, I like, didn’t want to be the guy with, like, a UFO show who, like, suddenly had this weird UFO variant, but, I eventually, did sort of talk about it because I also realized served to Sean’s point, too.

02:52:09:18 – 02:52:27:13
David O’Leary
And just like in terms of getting the truth out, like, I don’t know exactly what it was. And hey, maybe it was a drone and I was just like, I freaked myself out or something, but it was very oddly shaped, and it was very weird and sort of how it moved. It was sort of like a balloon, like a lit up balloon.

02:52:27:16 – 02:52:49:22
David O’Leary
But, you know, so that that was sort of the, that’s the only time I think I’ve seen something where I really couldn’t identify it, you know? And then I think so much about UFOs is sort of how it makes you feel. It definitely felt strange. Like it felt. It felt like something as opposed to just like, oh, that’s, you know, I just I couldn’t place what that would be.

02:52:49:24 – 02:53:06:23
David O’Leary
Especially because it was like, in the branches of trees and sort of like, you know, and then later on, like, actually when we were doing the show, like we found out there are like, you know, these cases of green fireballs, we even did an episode on them. And that’s a little bit of what it I didn’t actually know that at the time.

02:53:06:23 – 02:53:13:29
David O’Leary
And that’s sort of like what it came out like to me. So I don’t know. I don’t know what that was. Yeah.

02:53:14:00 – 02:53:17:06
Dan LeFebvre
You don’t usually don’t try to fly a drone through the trees.

02:53:17:10 – 02:53:27:27
David O’Leary
Yeah. Right. Yeah. It was very weird. It almost looks like it came out of the tree. Like it was very like I saw it in the branches and kind of emerged from, like. It was very sad. Wow.

02:53:28:01 – 02:53:44:23
Dan LeFebvre
That’s weird. Well, go back to the show. You’ve both worked on shows that are not based on true events as well as, of course, Project Bluebook, which is what are some of the differences in the ways that you approach a show when it’s based on true events compared to a completely fictional story? Sean, me let’s start with you this time.

02:53:45:00 – 02:54:03:29
David O’Leary
Sure. I, I’m going to steal a quote, and I don’t know who to credit it to, but, I you know what I think it was? Mark Twain is like, never let the truth get in the way of a good story. And I think you find that out right away. Now, I’ve had the the the. I tend to love historical pieces.

02:54:03:29 – 02:54:27:03
David O’Leary
I’ve done a few development wise, you know, over the years, Tesla and Edison, the Bonaparte’s. There’s been a couple other in there, and it’s been a bit of a learning curve trying to apply storytelling to what actually happened. And, whether it is the network exec saying, I don’t care, we need better television. And what exactly happened in that moment?

02:54:27:05 – 02:54:31:28
David O’Leary
Or just an instinct from a storytelling point of view? You know, look.

02:54:32:01 – 02:54:33:18
Sean Jablonski
It.

02:54:33:20 – 02:54:56:11
David O’Leary
Taking history and making a story of it. You can do a documentary right there. That’s why they exist. Because and a lot of times there’s great history that you couldn’t write this stuff. But when you’re trying to make a television show and you need to sort of hit your brakes and you need to engage an audience and you want to give your characters an emotional arc, you kind of have to.

02:54:56:11 – 02:55:16:24
David O’Leary
And it sounds like simple, but it’s actually kind of hard. You have to sort of really give yourself permission to, expand on it. Because otherwise you’re sort of I, I remember feeling almost, you know, I definitely had a lot of deference to the history and the people, and you never want to mess with that.

02:55:16:24 – 02:55:38:09
David O’Leary
But at the same time, you have to again, do your job and and sell it to an audience. So, I feel like I’m rambling a little bit, but I just think you have to have the courage to kind of get out there and really tell the story that you’re wanting to tell and have respect for the people in the material.

02:55:38:12 – 02:55:57:28
David O’Leary
But be a little fearless in how you do it. Otherwise, you know, you’re never going to you never going to cross the boundary and just say, nobody’s ever going to say what? What a really wonderfully factually accurate television show. Do you know what I mean? And get you get yourself ratings and an audience. And I even know, like, something like the Queen.

02:55:57:28 – 02:56:21:23
David O’Leary
I mean, how much can they have been in those rooms where those people were talking and understand what was said? And, lastly, I had a really good mentor. I grew up under basically Tom Fontana, who was sort of my mentor into the business, and he said, if you’re going to do something historical, look for those, look at the history, and then find the moments in between that might not necessarily even be written about.

02:56:21:26 – 02:56:45:00
David O’Leary
Get in there and use your writing ability to figure out what could have happened, what could have connected those dots, how could have, though? How could those characters have moved from point A to point B? That’s not being written about, you know? And thankfully, audiences are very forgiving these days. And I, I have to say like, Quentin Tarantino was a big inspiration in a weird way.

02:56:45:00 – 02:57:03:05
David O’Leary
When I saw Inglorious Bastards, I went, wait, you can’t kill Hitler in a theater? That never happened. And yet at the same time, I remember as an audience thinking, this is the most exhilarating thing I’ve seen because it felt like he was having the courage to go. I want to tell the story that’s going to get people excited.

02:57:03:05 – 02:57:27:05
David O’Leary
And I think if you set the table for your audience that way and say, look, this is inspired by true events, we are not telling that, you know, accurately. We’re inspired. You know, we’re inspired by it and doing it. I think you’re okay. Yeah, exactly. I mean, I think we, we we quickly realized is exactly what Sean said, that we needed to put entertainment and emotion first.

02:57:27:12 – 02:57:46:02
David O’Leary
You know what I mean? Like, people are going to tune. Otherwise you’re you’re just going to watch a documentary on Project Blue Book. If you just want to know the facts, you know it’s all there. You can read. There’s wonderful books we have. We’ve read them. What? You know who we need to tell a story that about about people, about human beings going through these events.

02:57:46:05 – 02:58:04:22
David O’Leary
You know, we kind of quickly realize the heart and this, you know, the heart and soul of the show was Hynek and Quinn. That relationship, along with all of our other, you know, sort of six primary leads, the generals, you know, Susie and Mimi, all that stuff. Mimi and Hynek. So, but you know what?

02:58:04:22 – 02:58:33:09
David O’Leary
You what we found a way to do, I think rather hopefully rather well, was take those kernels of truth and, you know, and and put them into and then and then weed them into a narrative yarn that was hopefully enjoyable, entertaining, emotionally evocative, while while having but but also encouraging people to be like, hey, like that. Like every week was a case that really happened, within within an episode, we we’d have little Easter eggs of things that were really going on at the time.

02:58:33:09 – 02:58:59:08
David O’Leary
We’d explore other things that were sort of in the social fabric of the 1950s, bomb shelters and, and, you know, paranoia. And, and you know, this. Yeah. You know, like, people tapping your phones and all that stuff. Russia’s interest, interest in UFOs, all that stuff. So, Yeah, yeah, yeah. Sorry. One other quick thing to we also had Paul Hynek, who was, you know, Jalen Hynek son, as a consulting, producer on the show.

02:58:59:08 – 02:59:18:21
David O’Leary
And, you know, that felt like any time we were, you know, doing something that made us a little squeamish or whatever he was, he would always say, which is wonderful. He’d say, I think my dad would love this, you know? And so that really gave us a lot of, you know, permission. It felt like to kind of run with it and get a blessing.

02:59:18:24 – 02:59:19:05
David O’Leary
Yeah.

02:59:19:12 – 02:59:22:21
Dan LeFebvre
Just for that, that topic. Are you talking about UFO? Was it, you know.

02:59:22:24 – 02:59:23:09
Sean Jablonski

02:59:23:12 – 02:59:31:17
Dan LeFebvre
Unexplained. Right. And then government cover ups where obviously we don’t know a lot of stuff that’s going on there. Did you find.

02:59:31:19 – 02:59:32:03
David O’Leary
Bluebook.

02:59:32:03 – 02:59:40:13
Dan LeFebvre
To be more challenging to fill in some of those gaps, then completely fictional? Because there is just a lot of it that we don’t know.

02:59:40:15 – 03:00:01:28
David O’Leary
Did SAR de. I’ll jump in. Yeah. The thing we talked about very early on was that it’s we’re riding a line between we can never say they exist or the show goes away because the whole idea is they’re searching for the truth. Right. So that was always a hard line to kind of kind of deal with. And something we were very aware of every episode.

03:00:02:01 – 03:00:25:11
David O’Leary
And one of the challenges too, is like, you realize it’s not a, it’s not a cop show where you show up and there’s a body, our guys show up and somebody’s saying, no, no, no, I saw it in the sky. You know what it’s like. So how do you how do you tell those stories? In, in, in give it all of that sort of energy and interest and, and, you know, a revelation, every act kind of thing.

03:00:25:11 – 03:00:48:20
David O’Leary
So that’s right. And, and the thing we realized was that we had to thrust our leads and our audience into the case, you know, we had to thrust them into these events to some degree. So things would happen to Clinic and Quinn as they would investigate a case that would often not start with, you know, a civilian witness or a military witness or multiple witnesses seeing something they couldn’t explain.

03:00:48:20 – 03:01:10:11
David O’Leary
It wouldn’t the case wouldn’t be over. It would lead down a rabbit hole of of more revelations. But as Sean said, it’s exactly right. We would always want to walk that line like we’d always have, like a plausible other, answer, no matter how deep. And we went. I mean, there’s an episode early on where we go to, you know, Operation Paperclip.

03:01:10:11 – 03:01:44:12
David O’Leary
We go into, like, the sin base and there looks that it’s like they’re staring at what looks like an alien. An alien in a tank, you know, but there’s an alternate explanation there that’s given as well, so that there was always this sense of like, you know, am I am I seeing you know, which you know, which truth are you going to are you going to believe, you know, because I think one of our goals, too, was obviously we wanted to attract audience members who were interested in this subject matter, but we also wanted to, you know, we were also very cognizant that, like, half the population, you know, you know, doesn’t

03:01:44:12 – 03:02:06:25
David O’Leary
think there is much to UFOs. And we wanted to make sure that we we presented an interesting sort of like dilemma where both sides could be like, oh, maybe, maybe it was maybe, maybe the, you know, the Lubbock lights were plovers, you know, or like, or maybe it was temperature over inversions. In episode 2 in 110, you know, at the in the season one finale or things of that nature.

03:02:06:25 – 03:02:19:18
David O’Leary
So, so that there was always this balance because like, yeah, as soon as you just say it’s, it’s real definitively it’s the mystery is gone. The truth is, you know, that the quest is, is is Oak.

03:02:19:21 – 03:02:20:27
Dan LeFebvre
Park part of.

03:02:21:00 – 03:02:21:21
David O’Leary
Blue Book like.

03:02:21:27 – 03:02:35:18
Dan LeFebvre
From from history was to come up with some of those stories, some of, some of the plausible explanations for that. Was it can you give an example, maybe of a plot point in there where you, you did depart from the history that they.

03:02:35:21 – 03:02:36:04
Sean Jablonski
That.

03:02:36:07 – 03:02:41:06
Dan LeFebvre
Maybe the example that Blue Book gave and had to kind of come up with your own?

03:02:41:09 – 03:03:15:18
David O’Leary
Oh, God. I mean, listen, you know, I mean, well, there were certain threads that we, you know, as far as we know, the high necks were never infiltrated by a Russian. A Russian email a Russian spy, as Claude would say, I don’t know. I don’t think that ever happened. But, you know, you know, so certainly we were adding certain narrative drama, but but like, what is well documented was that Russia was very interested in, in not only their own UFO programs at that time, but in what America knew about UFOs at that time because they were like, is this top secret, you know, technology, things of that nature, that, you know, that

03:03:15:18 – 03:03:45:13
David O’Leary
we have yet to release and we, we always were excited by the idea that, like, oh, the Hynek family could be a soft target into sort of an intelligence gathering mission from Russia about that. And then things obviously complicated from there because even our, even our sort of Russian spy character is sort of become sort of morally torn about like which side she should be fighting for and all those, all those wonderful things, I think from a case standpoint, though, I think we always tried to reverse engineer what became the official explanation.

03:03:45:13 – 03:04:12:27
David O’Leary
You know, like the plovers, like temperature inversions with the stuff over DC. Even, you know, Hopkinsville where, you know, as crazy as it scene with the there was like a monkey that was dressed up in the space outfit that that’s all based on fact. Actually, they’re one of the got one of the guys in the family worked at a circus, and there was, like, monkey trained monkeys there, like, because in a way that’s almost too absurd to make up.

03:04:12:29 – 03:04:46:12
David O’Leary
I would be embarrassed to like bits that in a room. So I think we always started with something, you know, that, you know, we’d kind of reverse engineer it. And again, to go back to your very first question and try to sort of honor what was the initial, you know, truth of the actual story. Yeah. One of the joys of the, of the show for me was like, when we would air, I would like live tweet the show, and I would beforehand kind of put together the list of all the things, all the cool little, like, you know, truth nuggets that we had, we had sort of pulled from here and there and

03:04:46:12 – 03:05:06:28
David O’Leary
maybe turn them in a bit of a blender to tell a cohesive, compelling drama. But so that but really to invite audience audiences to go like, research this, like, hey, this really was a real thing, or like you wanted this case based off this event, so that there was always these sort of like footings that audiences could had and like, oh, okay, great.

03:05:06:28 – 03:05:26:11
David O’Leary
And then they can go off, they can go off and see the case. And then even at the end of every episode, if you watched it on history, there was like a 2 or 3 minute documentary piece about the case that inspired this week’s episode of Bluebook, and that was sort of conceived from the very beginning. Once we landed at history, to draw a line in the sand so that we could clearly be like, listen, we’re not trying to deceive.

03:05:26:18 – 03:05:46:03
David O’Leary
We want to like, tell a cool story, compelling, compelling narrative. But here’s here and then here’s the route of of where this comes from. Now go off and like, you know, do your own research and come to your own your own conclusions. So it was nice to have that other sort of piece that would help plant it in historical context.

03:05:46:06 – 03:05:48:18
Dan LeFebvre
I like what you said, John, about the, the monkeys.

03:05:48:18 – 03:05:50:20
Sean Jablonski
Being that I mean.

03:05:50:22 – 03:06:03:02
Dan LeFebvre
There and that’s one of the things I love about the, the show that I do, being able to dig into some of that, because knowing that that’s based on fact, like that’s, that’s something that somebody could easily look at and be like, oh, what?

03:06:03:07 – 03:06:05:21
David O’Leary
I mean, that’s that’s kind of happened, but well, yeah.

03:06:05:21 – 03:06:07:23
Dan LeFebvre
Actually some of the crazy stuff does.

03:06:07:23 – 03:06:09:03
Sean Jablonski
Happen.

03:06:09:05 – 03:06:34:25
David O’Leary
Yeah. It’s it’s a yeah. And it’s, it’s you know, I think Chernobyl is probably what like the gold standard in terms of trying to sort of tell like an accurate story based on a historical event. And, you know, we again, had to sort of decide early on that we, you know, there’s there is, there’s got to be a slightly different version of the show and, and also just we knew too, that, you know, and David had put it in there.

03:06:34:25 – 03:06:39:09
David O’Leary
There’s so much family. And so going on to that, we could also sort of lean on that.

03:06:39:11 – 03:06:54:28
Dan LeFebvre
Well, you mentioned a couple of them earlier, some of the, stories that you got to cover, like the Lubbock Lights and Operation Paperclip, area 51 even got, high involvement in Close Encounters of the Third Kind. What was your favorite episode in the series?

03:06:55:00 – 03:07:17:14
David O’Leary
Oh, gosh. I mean, I would say, I would say I’m torn between three. I think both Sean and I share deep, deep love of the Close Encounters upset, which in many ways, in some ways feels almost like the culmination of the show. Like you could almost like, like end it there because like, we end we, you know, we end obviously in a very different way.

03:07:17:16 – 03:07:36:13
David O’Leary
But and I was thinking about that actually this morning. Why that that episode registers so much, I think, for all of us. I mean, some of it was just, you know, the magic of it all coming together, intercutting between two different time periods. But I think one of the things for us, too, is it was one of the one of the clearest departures in tone for us.

03:07:36:13 – 03:08:03:09
David O’Leary
We were a rather conspiratorial, dark, noir tone, which is like, I love that tone, like most of the things I write are like sci fi mysteries, supernatural mysteries, like, I, I can’t get enough of that. But this episode, the case is ultimately has this wonderful sort of positive spin, you know what I mean? Like, it’s so much captures a sense of wonder instead of a sense of of fear.

03:08:03:11 – 03:08:20:22
David O’Leary
It sort of it stands out because that’s the other side of this thing. Like, we don’t want to forget that it’s not just about conspiracies and being deceived and and public denial and disinformation, misinformation, all that stuff. But it is about the wonder of what’s out there. And I think that that episode in some ways encapsulated that, that wonder.

03:08:20:24 – 03:08:41:19
David O’Leary
And then and then the other two episodes, I’m really, I really love I love our like, big finale episode. So like, like one town into town for me also stand out as just like cinematic, like movies. You know what I mean? Like, I think I think Sean and I are both really proud of how those episodes turned out as well.

03:08:41:21 – 03:08:59:05
David O’Leary
But I don’t know. I mean, like, I could go on like, we did two quote unquote bottle episodes. I think Sean wrote them both, which are also some of my favorites. That was abduction in season one. And, I forget where we oh, what lies beneath in in season two, in season two, sort of the revelation of who Susie really is and all that kind of stuff.

03:08:59:07 – 03:09:19:00
David O’Leary
And that’s like, that’s we put all our characters just in a room, essentially, and had to tell it, tell an amazing story there. So, I don’t know, it’s hard. I yeah, I love all of them. I definitely the bottle episodes are fun because it’s so character based and, you know, the challenge of we’re a show that has to go out and look at UFOs.

03:09:19:00 – 03:09:47:22
David O’Leary
How do you actually how do you keep people in the house in order to tell the same show? So yeah, those bottle episodes are great close encounters. Yeah, I mean that and and do exactly what David said. The finale’s just there’s so much fun and and and happened you know, that’s the other thing everyone yet like the the Close Encounters based on George Adamski, who was a guy who was just like that character, who we sort of had in the show, which was so much fun.

03:09:47:22 – 03:10:11:02
David O’Leary
And then, you know, Paul Hynek makes a little cameo as a camera operator in the Close Encounters scene, which was so nice as a way, you know, to sort of in homage to his father. And he was saying just even being on that set was meant so much to him. And and yeah, as David put it perfectly with it, it took a break from the usual town and showed the wonder of it, which was wonderful.

03:10:11:04 – 03:10:31:18
David O’Leary
Paul Heinrich’s cameo in an episode about his father serving as a like. There are so many meta parallels because Paul was a consultant for us on the show, and then we did an episode about his father being a consultant for Steven Spielberg, who’s like, Zemeckis’s close friend. It was just like that for me. I’m just like, oh, wow.

03:10:31:18 – 03:10:42:06
David O’Leary
Like, that’s just like some incredible, incredible miracle that that that we were, like, somehow able to, like, pay that, pay that all off and then do it, do its injustice.

03:10:42:09 – 03:10:45:01
Dan LeFebvre
And I’ll just fits perfectly together. Just.

03:10:45:03 – 03:10:45:13
Sean Jablonski
Yeah.

03:10:45:14 – 03:10:46:15
Dan LeFebvre
Almost right itself there. Yeah.

03:10:46:15 – 03:10:47:28
Sean Jablonski
Wow. Okay.

03:10:48:00 – 03:11:10:03
Dan LeFebvre
Well, if there is one UFO related incident and pretty much everyone is heard of, it is the Roswell incident, and that’s the case. You started season two with with, two episodes covering it. Did you feel it? Because that is so popular. Roswell is so popular that it was more difficult to cover than some of the others on the show, like you had to be more accurate to the story.

03:11:10:03 – 03:11:16:09
David O’Leary
And in a way, it was it was hard to do because Bluebook didn’t investigate Roswell.

03:11:16:11 – 03:11:16:26
Sean Jablonski
Yeah.

03:11:16:28 – 03:11:57:12
David O’Leary
That was our biggest challenge at first. You know, was having to go back and you go, well, how can we tell Roswell when it happened, you know, five years before the book was even born? And so we kind of had to have a Roswell 2.0, but you had to take all the facts from the original, and sort of make it feel current, you know, and so that probably more ironically, more than any other episode had the most kind of, I guess, would you say fiction to it because they never investigated it going back and sort of interviewing those witnesses well, after the fact and then sort of making it feel current.

03:11:57:15 – 03:12:18:15
David O’Leary
You know, it was it was intimidating. But, you know, because we’re such research fans and loved the story so much, we knew right away it was a two parter just because there’s so much information in there and, you know, you’ve added with it’s opening season two, you want to be, you know, a big sort of, you know, a way to sort of come back in which, you know, interesting story.

03:12:18:15 – 03:12:39:04
David O’Leary
We, you know, wasn’t our initial impulse to put Roswell as a season opener and that, you know, gradually true, you know, breaking of story and then input from the network, we got to, a place where it was like, nope, we’re doing Roswell to open season two, which was ultimately the smartest choice. Yeah, as a way to sort of bring the show back.

03:12:39:07 – 03:12:55:07
David O’Leary
Yeah. That’s right. At one point and for a while, actually, we would we really wanted to do more island as, as as our, as our opener. I remember that which we eventually, you know, but it all sort of works out like it sort of reveals itself as you break it. Like we found a much better way to do it.

03:12:55:07 – 03:13:19:14
David O’Leary
You know, ultimately down the line, you know, I think that episode was like, I it’s six or something like that. I think 2 or 5. Yeah. Or 205. Yeah. And, but yeah, I think for us, I cracking the case on Roswell just became about, well, you know, we, we done a bunch of research on Roswell and it just became, well, okay, if a town was really, you know, silenced.

03:13:19:16 – 03:13:42:02
David O’Leary
Yeah. And traumatized in this way, what would be the symptoms of that six years later? And once we saw a real. Well, what if somebody was trying to get the truth out of Roswell and staged, like, you know, like this crazy event in the desert where this where, where a saucer allegedly went down and sort of, you know, held the held the US government kind of hostage, like, I’m going to unleash the truth.

03:13:42:04 – 03:14:06:01
David O’Leary
It created a way for like, our guys to go back in there and then, and then the other thing we sort of had the revelation of it was like, oh, what a great character. A journey we can take with no on his character. And as a general returning to a scene of a crime, something that he’s never fully been able to square, and also delineating, you know, for those who watched the episode between Valentine and.

03:14:06:07 – 03:14:07:29
Rob Kristoffersen

03:14:08:02 – 03:14:32:03
David O’Leary
Oh, I’m like, yeah, thank you. Hardy. In terms of like, who knows what and who might really be in control because for season one we play, you know, we we need to sort of be, you know, the face of it a little bit more. But but then we sort of flipped the script a little bit like, oh, perhaps Valentine, who’s more the veteran, more of the senior is actually sort of hiding some things from, from, from Harding as well.

03:14:32:03 – 03:14:43:14
David O’Leary
So is, you know, it just it gradually reveals itself to us as we find, as we found a way to do it, you know, of like, oh, here’s a way to do it that really is interesting.

03:14:43:16 – 03:14:49:23
Dan LeFebvre
Yeah. It was really interesting that, I because I think a lot of people, when they think of the government cover up, it’s like.

03:14:49:25 – 03:14:51:07
David O’Leary
The government and they’re.

03:14:51:07 – 03:14:52:10
Sean Jablonski
All in it.

03:14:52:16 – 03:14:58:21
Dan LeFebvre
In it together. And as I was watching it, yeah, I definitely got the sense that even these two generals, they don’t even.

03:14:58:25 – 03:15:02:06
Sean Jablonski
They don’t know everything that the other one knows.

03:15:02:09 – 03:15:08:07
Dan LeFebvre
And so you start to get that sense in there as well. Just really, really, really well done to put that together.

03:15:08:10 – 03:15:32:29
David O’Leary
And so what’s not you know, the general that wound up going into Roswell from outside was Twining, who Harding is based on and was credited a lot with, you know, some of those strong arm tactics that were used in and the idea of when Brazel gets brought onto the base, you know, the idea of somebody who had been in charge of terrorizing an entire town.

03:15:32:29 – 03:15:58:07
David O’Leary
And there’s, again, I’d encourage anybody who has even an inkling of curiosity to go to look at it. There are plenty of firsthand accounts of people who were there. And then you know, are you going to choose to believe somebody saying, I was there? My life was threatened by a military official, and I was told if I spoke, I would be killed and go, okay, there’s dozens and dozens and dozens of those witnesses who came forward and said the exact same thing.

03:15:58:07 – 03:16:22:15
David O’Leary
So you have to ask yourself, am I going to choose to believe they’re all crazy? You know, they’re all making this up for the sake of, you know, a story? You know, it’s fascinating. And also with, you know, Valentine, who was based on Hoyt Vandenberg, you know, ultimately, he went on to be part of the Atomic Energy Commission, which was like an ultra super secret, you know, in charge of our nuclear program.

03:16:22:15 – 03:16:39:13
David O’Leary
And I think he was that did he become head of CIA or was brought into the CIA or something? So it again, it felt like we were fortunate enough to find this truth in the history and really try to bring it out in the in the storytelling. Yeah.

03:16:39:19 – 03:16:57:16
Dan LeFebvre
There is a petition going now to bring the show back for a third season. I’ll make sure to add a link to it in the show notes. If anybody wants to sign it. But let’s say that petition is successful and you’re able to make a third season of Project Blue Book. Have you thought about some other stories that you might like to cover that you didn’t get to in the first two?

03:16:57:18 – 03:17:00:04
Sean Jablonski
David, go.

03:17:00:07 – 03:17:28:17
David O’Leary
Okay, only a little bit right here. Well, some of the fans been murdered, but other listeners may not. We actually had a third season writers room that, ended where we basically broke, all of season three. So for us, it’s been particularly hard, I think, to, you know, and then and then basically Covid hit and I mean, literally like the last day of our writers room was like the day like kind of the world world shut down like it was lockdown.

03:17:28:19 – 03:17:50:20
David O’Leary
In 20th March or 2020, mid-March of 2020. So, yes, I mean, we have, you know, listen, we, we, we would love nothing more than to then to continue that journey. So especially because for us it we for in a weird way, the show lives in our heads. Like a season at the end of season, like we kind of knew where we were going.

03:17:50:23 – 03:18:19:00
David O’Leary
We we mapped out a whole past, and that makes it hard to because I know how, excited we, Sean and I are about that season. I mean, that season, that season is like some of our favorite stuff. And like, we the guys to do it like, so. And I mean, we can tease it a little bit too, because it’s, you know, it felt that, it felt like such a natural progression again.

03:18:19:00 – 03:18:48:02
David O’Leary
Also history on our side. There was the great UFO wave of 1953 54 in Europe. Yeah. And so we decided to go, you know, as you know, to sort of make it bigger and, you know, it a lot of it takes place over in Europe. Because that’s where, that’s that’s where the sightings were. It was it went from like, you know, a handful of sightings in Europe to thousands a day.

03:18:48:02 – 03:19:07:24
David O’Leary
All of a sudden it was like off the charts. And when you dig into the history of Europe and the history of some of those cases, again, it for us it felt like this is what the show is. It is about the phenomenon. And it’s not just an American phenomenon, it’s a worldwide phenomenon. And so we we got to explore some seminal cases.

03:19:07:24 – 03:19:31:02
David O’Leary
And, it really I mean, like anything, it felt like we were hitting our stride and we we broke every single episode. So. Yeah, but there’s some wonderful. Yeah, England, France, Italy, Italy, Russia. Roswell. Yeah. Like it was just like we. Yeah, we it was, it was, you know, heartbreaking. Yeah. It was heartbreaking. Utterly heartbreaking. I don’t really.

03:19:31:02 – 03:19:31:25
Sean Jablonski
Heartbreaking.

03:19:31:27 – 03:19:55:19
Dan LeFebvre
Well I hope hopefully we’ll get to see some of that in the future. But, I wanted to ask you about, Doctor Heinrichs perspective on UFOs, because in the real Project Blue Book, he kind of started pretty skeptical. And then his position changed as he was investigating these. So as you were researching and writing and putting together this, did your opinions change at all?

03:19:55:19 – 03:20:01:22
Dan LeFebvre
I know you were both big into UFOs beforehand, but did it change at all as you were creating the show?

03:20:01:24 – 03:20:41:03
David O’Leary
What changed for me was doing research on Hynek and realizing how smart he was in terms of hypothesizing the multitude of answers that might exist. Right? Even in like, his book, you know, I think, like, you know, the UFO experience or, you know, his numerous books, he, he would hypothesize, you know, like, especially with some of these cases that delve into, like, you know, Close Encounters of the Third kind or, you know, seeing, seeing actual occupants or entities or whatever you want to call them, you know, I mean, he he Hynek entertained every theory under the sun from the day, you know, interdimensional in some way, like the planet is also theirs.

03:20:41:03 – 03:21:21:09
David O’Leary
Somehow today, our interplanetary spacecraft do. They are us in the future today are like I. I remember like you spoke a little bit about sort of the robotic nature of that of the how these creatures are described. Like, are we dealing with artificial extraterrestrial artificial intelligence, right. Like, on and on. And I think that that, that, I mean, I, you know, you know, just I always love that the notion that, like, maybe, you know, the answers could be as complicated, complicated as the questions we could be dealing with a multitude of, sort of phenomena happening simultaneously.

03:21:21:09 – 03:21:43:17
David O’Leary
We’re just not we’re just not sure, you know, what what sort of the answers are. But, that was the shift for me. Was like, you know, don’t hang your hat on. Really? Any one theory, because it could be. It could be something else. It could appear one way, but actually, I actually did something else. I always love that, you know, I would say of anything to that.

03:21:43:19 – 03:22:04:29
David O’Leary
To that end, there’s like it only expanded. I mean, I was already having had knowledge of it sort of, you know, believed in the phenomenon. And, you know, I, I couldn’t profess to have the answers, but had certainly done the research. But if anything, it just expanded it expanded the scope of what was possible, like, especially with interdimensional beings.

03:22:04:29 – 03:22:33:25
David O’Leary
AI from alien civilizations. Are they even here? You know, old that stuff. The biggest thing for me that I found doing this was the, sort of how the sightings ticked up right after an around the time of our, you know, us basically getting nuclear capabilities. There are so many incidents of UFOs in and around nuclear missile sites turning the missiles on and off.

03:22:33:27 – 03:22:57:20
David O’Leary
And, you know, in and around Los Alamos at once. We got the bomb. This. That’s when everything shut up. That’s really when that’s what really when Roswell happened. And that is one of the most fascinating stories to me, because to me, it’s the clearest evidence yet. And this is coming from high ranking military officials who’ve testified in front of Congress about this.

03:22:57:20 – 03:23:21:20
David O’Leary
Again, this this stuff is all available to go. You can watch it, you know, and decide for yourself. Yeah, yeah, decide for yourself if like the, you know, the high ranking colonel who said I was in the missile bunker when the this, you know, object came and basically cut the power then turned it back on said our missiles to launch and we couldn’t do anything, then took it away.

03:23:21:22 – 03:23:48:14
David O’Leary
Yeah. And you can decide if this guy just decided to make it up and ruined his entire career. But to me, that’s the clearest evidence. It’s one thing for a civilian to see something dark across the sky and go, I saw something I can’t explain. It’s another thing for military personnel who are overseeing our nuclear weapons to have these objects come in and around and and basically control them, because to me, that’s communication, right?

03:23:48:14 – 03:24:06:18
David O’Leary
I know what that is like. It’s it’s them saying, we can do this to you. And now it’s up to us to go. Are they benevolent? Are they they or are they saying they can destroy us or they trying to start a war? Like what is happening? It’s not just like, oh, I saw something. I don’t understand it.

03:24:06:18 – 03:24:30:02
David O’Leary
They’re communicating in a way and have the ability to affect our world. That phenomenon blew my mind. And if you go down that rabbit hole and look at all the instances not just in America, but in Russia at the same time, it’s it’s fascinating. It’s really fascinating. And it goes all the way back, all the way back to the beginning of this, of this phenomena.

03:24:30:05 – 03:24:53:04
David O’Leary
I mean, Ed repels in his book, talks about it, how they would expect to see UFO sightings over like, like, atomic detonations in the South Pacific on top secret military, sort of weapons testing programs in the 40s and then late 40s and the 50. So it’s it’s it’s it’s it’s a fascinating, sort of aspects of this.

03:24:53:12 – 03:25:02:16
Dan LeFebvre
Yeah. That’s a really interesting point to bring up, because if you put it kind of in a historical context, World War Two had just happened. So there was a lot of.

03:25:02:19 – 03:25:03:18
Sean Jablonski
Explosions.

03:25:03:21 – 03:25:06:09
Dan LeFebvre
Going on, you know, and that didn’t.

03:25:06:09 – 03:25:08:07
David O’Leary
Bring anything out.

03:25:08:10 – 03:25:14:23
Dan LeFebvre
But it but the nuclear side of it does it just interesting that World War Two didn’t seem to really.

03:25:14:25 – 03:25:40:18
David O’Leary
You had the Foo Fighters in World War Two really that, that, that that, that was a very a sort of a big thing back then. All the pilots describing what these objects were. And we touched on that, I think a little bit in the first season. And historically, it’s not like UFOs began right then they you Columbus talked about UFOs, you know, so but there was a clear, like explosion of sightings, you know.

03:25:40:21 – 03:26:05:14
David O’Leary
Well, maybe pun intended. Right around the time we got the bomb, that is when the wave just took off. And it’s also where the military, you know, had really, you know, gotten involved. And again, you know, the really it began with, you know, why am I forgetting his name? The sort of, you know, first thing, flying saucers in Oregon.

03:26:05:16 – 03:26:06:16
Sean Jablonski
Yeah.

03:26:06:18 – 03:26:28:06
David O’Leary
And the army. Arnold. Yeah. In 1947, which happened literally three weeks before Roswell. And one of the things in Roswell that that, is interesting. They did nuclear tests in and around there, but that was also the Roswell was the home of the final ninth Bomb Squadron, which was the squadron that dropped the Enola Gay was in Roswell.

03:26:28:08 – 03:26:46:06
David O’Leary
That’s what dropped the bomb on, you know, Hiroshima and all those all in and around their the White Sands missile base, the Allen Knoll, I can’t remember the other one, but all those nuclear testing things were around there, and the the amount and saucer sightings were just off the charts.

03:26:46:08 – 03:26:52:09
Dan LeFebvre
Wow. That’s fascinating. I, I guess I never had put it together that the Enola Gay was there in Roswell.

03:26:52:11 – 03:27:13:24
David O’Leary
When people think of Roswell, they always think of it as a kind of a sleepy desert town, kind of random, small thing. It’s got it had huge Roswell Army Air Force airfield had huge, huge sort of, military significance at that time. It was very important. And in that whole area, that was it was a massive testing ground for for top secret weaponry and stuff like that.

03:27:13:24 – 03:27:22:12
David O’Leary
So it’s not a I don’t think it’s at all, you know, for shrines to transport in any way a coincidence that this was a hub of sort of UFO activity at the time?

03:27:22:15 – 03:27:30:25
Dan LeFebvre
Well, I know I asked you about your your favorite episode. It’s hard to pick a favorite, but do you do you have a favorite story from the set as you are creating the show?

03:27:30:27 – 03:27:46:28
David O’Leary
I have to, and I’ll tell I’m really briefly. One is in abduction, which Shawn wrote, but he unfortunately was, for whatever reason, not able to be on set for. But I got, I got to be up for like nine and ten or maybe he, he was up for a little bit, but I don’t think he was up there for this part.

03:27:47:01 – 03:28:07:27
David O’Leary
When the character is recalling his sort of abduction experience, because it was what’s called a bottle episode, we had to do it. We couldn’t rely fully on VFX as we were trying to keep the but the budget down. That’s what a bottle episode is. And our director, Alex Graves, had this brilliant idea of like, he’s supposed to be levitating in a ship, right?

03:28:07:27 – 03:28:31:01
David O’Leary
And like, sort of finds himself in this alien environment. So they really strung up, the actor’s name, I think, is Malcolm. Good, good, win or good will forgive me if I. It’s. Yeah. And they strong him up and they shined all these shimmery lights on on him in the background on a screen and they, they blasted the entire sort of soundstage with, with, with smoke.

03:28:31:04 – 03:28:50:03
David O’Leary
And it was this magical alien kind of like experience come to life. But you could not see in front of you. The camera guys are like, you know, all the crew was so quiet and it was it just it looked incredible. You’re like it felt like you’re watching a VFX shot happen in front of your eyes. You know, it was like a portal open to another dimension.

03:28:50:07 – 03:29:16:12
David O’Leary
If you are looking at what we were actually filming. So that was incredible. And then I, you know, I mean, obviously all the like, fun kind of anecdotal moments with the cast are amazing too. But the other thing was in 110 we blew up a car and that was that was up just like we we all sat around and like literally had popcorn and like blew it up on our wound up in a, in a sort of an outside in an amphitheater, kind of an environment against a green screen.

03:29:16:15 – 03:29:42:21
David O’Leary
And, that was that. It blew up a nice 1950s car to boot. And that was just a fun, a fun, a fun day to see all that happened to. I have a zillion photographs that I’ll just say briefly. I think it was literally day one of episode 101. We showed up on set and it was the, you know, it was, the farm that what played for the farm house in the, in the first episode.

03:29:42:21 – 03:30:08:12
David O’Leary
And it was early morning cold Canada, and there was this fog that had just blanketed the entire area. And with this sun piercing through, it was some of the most dramatic looking landscape I’d ever seen. And it was the arrival of our characters through this fog. You know, up to this farmhouse, I it’s like, I don’t think we could have gotten we couldn’t have wished for anything better.

03:30:08:12 – 03:30:24:13
David O’Leary
And it was day one. So it’s just basically everybody’s connecting, everybody’s, you know, come in with their A-game. And so excited to be there. And it felt like, you know, felt like the gods were smiling on us saying this is the right way to begin. So we talked a.

03:30:24:13 – 03:30:35:16
Dan LeFebvre
Little bit about, potential season three. But in the first two seasons, was there anything that you wanted to add in there but you couldn’t for one reason or another?

03:30:35:19 – 03:31:12:10
David O’Leary
Oh, gosh. Well, we had like whole episode ideas that for one reason or another, we had we had to scrap, you know, I mean, there was all all kinds of like, you know, periods where I mean, there were sort of like UFO cold spots popping up in there in the early 1950s. And like, we thought about doing an episode that sort of explored that idea about sort of like how people how people might sort of use this arrival of this sort of new phenomena into the public consciousness, towards their own sort of self-serving ends and how people could get kind of roped into that to that kind of thing with, you know, gosh,

03:31:12:10 – 03:31:43:05
David O’Leary
I mean, there was all, you know, there’s always things there’s even within episodes, there’s scenes we had to kind of course, or little moments like for what timing purposes? We’re like, we just can’t. We can’t. We got to pick and choose. I’d say to David, you know, you’re his very first, his early draft of the script, you know, and it was always described as, you know, X-Files meets madmen because he had a really wonderful touch with the soap that was in there and is in it again, it was as much about personal life.

03:31:43:05 – 03:32:01:06
David O’Leary
And Joel, who was the kid, there was even a storyline with him. And, you know, it’s through the natural process of any TV show creation, development, you know, where the rubber meets the road. You got to start leaving, pushing things aside in favor of, you know, the engine of the series, which is our two guys in the cases.

03:32:01:06 – 03:32:17:21
David O’Leary
And I think we tried hard to make sure that we, you know, with like Susie and, and, Mimi and all of that to kind of create, you know, another world that we could go into that reflected the Cold War era times. But, I mean, for me, you know, I, I, I loved as much the character stuff as anything.

03:32:17:21 – 03:32:37:02
David O’Leary
And I thought there was certainly more stories to tell with, you know, me, me and Susie, and to have a female perspective as well as a home perspective, and to see what’s really going on, you know, during the Cold War, back home, you know, we tried a little of that with the bomb shelter early on in season one, you know, which was a real thing.

03:32:37:05 – 03:33:03:02
David O’Leary
You know, they would put ads in the newspapers for that stuff and how the kids would feel at school and bomb shelter. Yeah. Buy your own bomb shelter. Reminded me of we. Yeah, we had it. We came up with this whole storyline with Joel as, like, this 1950s boy kind of stand by me as sort of storyline with, like, he had a crush on his, like, neighbor, either on the radio or and then like, but then they and you get to sort of explore the fear of Russia and the Cold War through the lens of children.

03:33:03:04 – 03:33:23:24
David O’Leary
The irony being, of course, that they’re like while they’re like sitting while Joel’s at his neighbor’s, there really is a Russian spy next door having dinner at his house like all this, like wonderful stuff that like a just, you know, you got to pick and choose or a UFO show. So it was like, you got gotta, you know, but it would have been nice to, you know, to do some of those things as well, you know.

03:33:23:25 – 03:33:27:26
Sean Jablonski
Yeah, I forgot about all that.

03:33:27:28 – 03:33:37:25
Dan LeFebvre
Thank you guys so much for coming on to chat about Project Bluebook. I know until there’s a season three, hopefully there’ll be a season three, but until then, can you share a little bit about what you guys are working on?

03:33:37:27 – 03:34:04:27
David O’Leary
Sure. Well, I mean, you know, again, it’s it’s a you know, the world is such a passion for us. David and I are working on something right now that we’re we’re, you know, don’t want to say too much because we’re, in the early stages of, let’s say, negotiations. But, it’s back in the UFO worlds, and, we look forward to bringing, you know, those stories back to television, hopefully in the, in the coming, in the coming year, I should say.

03:34:04:27 – 03:34:23:10
David O’Leary
So, you know, if Blue book. What? Our appetite. We’re excited to serve it. Another meal coming up soon. Yeah. We just wanted to also give, you know, in regards to the safe Blue Book campaign, you know, a huge shout out to Carson who has led that effort. I know we created a website called Save Blue Book Comm, which is amazing.

03:34:23:17 – 03:34:46:08
David O’Leary
And just a wonderful way that he’s collected so many, you know, artifacts from the show and imagery from the show and, and all of our fans who, you know, remind us that the show mattered to them because that that is the most important thing. And that’s why we that’s why we did it. So we’re forever grateful we we never give up hope.

03:34:46:10 – 03:34:56:19
David O’Leary
You just never know. You just never know what’s going to happen. So we have a season three ready when, When? When? As soon as someone’s ready to take it on, so, you know. Thank you to all the fans.

03:34:56:21 – 03:34:59:21
Dan LeFebvre
And thanks again so much for your time, guys.

03:34:59:23 – 03:35:20:10
David O’Leary
Yeah. Thanks. You’re wonderful. Thanks so much, Dan. Thanks, everybody.

03:35:20:12 – 03:35:41:24
Dan LeFebvre
This episode of based On a True Story was produced by me, Dan Lafayette. What did you think of this huge mega episode about the History Channel’s Project Blue Book? Let me know if you’d like to see more of these style longer episodes in the future. We’ve got one more answer for teachers and allies to uncover. And as a quick refresher, here are the two truths and one life from my chat with David and Sean.

03:35:41:27 – 03:36:08:28
Dan LeFebvre
Number one, they wrote a season three of Project Blue Book, telling stories beyond the United States. Number two, the Roswell Incident was made famous by Project Blue Book number three. David and Sean have both had unexplained experiences. Did you figure out which one is a lie? Here’s the answer in the envelope. So let’s open that up. And the lie this time is number two.

03:36:09:03 – 03:36:30:01
Dan LeFebvre
Even though the History Channel’s Project Blue Book starts off season two with the Roswell incident in The True Story, the US government’s Project Blue Book did not investigate the Roswell incident like we see in the TV series, and that’s mostly because of the timeline. The Roswell incident occurred in 1947, but it wasn’t until the 1950s that Project Blue Book itself became a thing.

03:36:30:01 – 03:36:58:27
Dan LeFebvre
Remember, there was Project Sign and Project Grudge, and then really, it wasn’t until the 1970s, I believe it was 1978, that Roswell started to get popular after an interview with ufologist Stanton Friedman, and he interviewed a then retired U.S. Air Force officer named Jesse Marcel. Marcel was one of the soldiers who helped take the debris from the ranch in Roswell, and then he stated that the official explanation that it was a weather balloon was a cover story, and he actually believed it was extraterrestrial.

03:36:58:29 – 03:37:21:02
Dan LeFebvre
From there, the stories and theories started to swirl. So throughout the three episodes today, we played three separate games of two tours in A lie and the lies were one, three, and two respectively. How’d you do? Did you get all three correct? Head on over to based on a True Story podcast.com/discord and let me know how you did.

03:37:21:04 – 03:37:40:09
Dan LeFebvre
As always, you’ll find that link in the show notes with all of the other links for this episode, as well as on the show. Is home on the web over at. Based on a True Story podcast.com/376. Until next time, thanks so much for spending your time with Rob and David and Sean and me today, and I’ll chat with you again really soon.

 

00:00:01:08 – 00:00:20:12
Dan LeFebvre
Since we’re talking about Donald Rumsfeld in three different movies today, let’s start with a twist on the historical letter grade that we usually do. So this time the grade is not for the entire movie, but just how the movie portrays Rumsfeld. And our first movie today is 2018, vice, which you and I have talked about before. It’s episode 335.

00:00:20:12 – 00:00:31:14
Dan LeFebvre
If anyone wants to queue that up to listen to after this. But in vice, Donald Rumsfeld is played by Steve Carell. What letter grade does vice get for how Rumsfeld is brought to the screen?

00:00:31:16 – 00:00:35:17
William Cooper
I would say a D minus.

00:00:35:20 – 00:00:51:28
William Cooper
I think vice is a good movie and an entertaining movie. I love Steve Carell and Christian Bale’s awesome. In terms of accuracy, I thought it was just really,

00:00:52:00 – 00:00:54:14
Dan LeFebvre
Hard, just not.

00:00:54:15 – 00:01:04:11
William Cooper
Even approaching, one element of accuracy. Just kind of way out there on that particular character.

00:01:04:14 – 00:01:07:14
Dan LeFebvre
Donald Rumsfeld was a real person, and that’s it.

00:01:07:16 – 00:01:22:06
William Cooper
It’s about right. Yeah. No, it was, again, good movie, great actors. The whole crew involved in that movie. You know, very talented people. Accuracy wise, it was not very good.

00:01:22:08 – 00:01:35:12
Dan LeFebvre
Well, after vice, we’ll chat a little bit about Rumsfeld in 2008, w about George W Bush and that movie. Donald Rumsfeld is played by Scott Glenn. What letter grade does he get for his portrayal of Rumsfeld?

00:01:35:14 – 00:01:37:18
William Cooper
C minus.

00:01:37:20 – 00:01:38:24
Dan LeFebvre
Okay, a little better.

00:01:38:27 – 00:02:10:18
William Cooper
A little bit better. A little bit more. At least not whole cloth in that one. I felt like, but still really not at the aim there was not again, I didn’t feel like the aim or the ultimate product was about accuracy. I think it was more about entertainment. And it in some ways was really the both movies were about the focal point, Cheney advised.

00:02:10:18 – 00:02:21:29
William Cooper
And and Bush and W so it’s understandable that maybe Rumsfeld was used to add some flourish as opposed to be accurate.

00:02:22:01 – 00:02:46:25
Dan LeFebvre
Well, I’m really curious about the next one, because finally, we’re going to wrap up our discussion today with 2013, The Unknown Known. And that’s actually documentary interviewing Donald Rumsfeld himself. So there’s not an actor portraying him. But for that one, let’s shift back to the overall letter grade for how accurate the documentary is, because I know we all like to think that documentaries are entirely accurate, but I think we’ve all seen documentaries that can stretch the truth a little bit.

00:02:46:27 – 00:02:57:21
Dan LeFebvre
The example I like to give is Ancient Aliens, that some claim to be a documentary, but that’s a topic for another day. So, what does the unknown known get for its historical letter grade?

00:02:57:24 – 00:03:24:08
William Cooper
I’d say a minus, maybe even an a I I’m a huge fan of our old Morris. The predecessor documentary that he did about Robert McNamara is one of the most powerful films of any, any genre, in my opinion, is unbelievably powerful, movie. And I felt like the Rumsfeld movie was a follow on sequel to that.

00:03:24:08 – 00:03:49:04
William Cooper
In a way, I thought it was great. I thought it was well done. I will say documentaries can be extremely misleading. So I the higher grade is not simply because it’s a documentary. I actually thought it was a really good production and not misleading and not unfair. And in fundamental ways. And of course, you got a lot of raw material that was stripped from the historical record.

00:03:49:06 – 00:04:09:16
Dan LeFebvre
Well, I’m glad you pointed that out, because, yeah, sometimes people think, movie is entertainment, documentary is truth. And I know that’s what it’s supposed to be, but that’s not always what especially is talking about something political to where, you know, politicians tend to stretch the truth sometimes too.

00:04:09:18 – 00:04:32:22
William Cooper
Absolutely. Documentaries can even be worse because people are can be lulled into the so false confidence that something is true because it’s the documentary and then through omission, it can tell a totally different story, or amplifying the things that maybe weren’t as big of a deal. But I thought the the Rumsfeld documentary was really good, and I learned a lot.

00:04:32:22 – 00:04:48:29
William Cooper
I’d already knew a lot about Rumsfeld by that point in time is something somebody I’ve always been really fascinated by and interested in, and I actually learned a fair amount and was surprised about it. And, it was fascinating.

00:04:49:01 – 00:05:09:19
Dan LeFebvre
Now it’s good. Well, with the letter grades done, let’s start digging into a little more detail starting with 2018. Vice. That movie tells a little bit about Donald Rumsfeld before his political career. For example, it mentions that he was the former captain of the Princeton wrestling team. He was an elite Navy jet pilot before becoming a congressman.

00:05:09:21 – 00:05:21:26
Dan LeFebvre
But as you mentioned before, vice is more about Dick Cheney. So we don’t get a lot about Rumsfeld himself. So can you fill in some more history that we don’t see in the movie about who Donald Rumsfeld was before he was in politics?

00:05:21:28 – 00:05:51:18
William Cooper
Yeah, I think the movie takes some snapshots of Rumsfeld that are accurate. He was a wrestler, and that was a big part of his upbringing. And a lot of people think that his background as a wrestler sort of embodies his approach to politics and business being very aggressive and, confrontational. Even so, they got that right. He was, entered politics in his 20s, so there’s not a ton before politics entered politics in his 20s.

00:05:51:18 – 00:06:15:21
William Cooper
He was 29 when he was elected to Congress for the first time in district, just outside of Chicago, was in Congress for a number of years, worked for Nixon for a number of years. Was prudent. It’s it’s it’s a question about whether it was luck or prudence or a mix of the two. But he was in Nixon’s administration and in kind of a lower tier post.

00:06:15:23 – 00:06:45:29
William Cooper
And then right before Watergate exploded, he left to be the NATO ambassador in Brussels. So what everything was going for of the floor came out from underneath the Nixon administration. Rumsfeld had just gotten to Brussels and and was focused on other things. And his reputation, I think, was, preserved in some ways. There’s no evidence he was involved in the Watergate scandal or that he was in the machinations with Nixon and others.

00:06:46:01 – 00:07:09:01
William Cooper
But I think for anybody who was actually there on the ground in the administration, it was a tough time, and Rumsfeld was able to get out of it. He came back when Ford took over because Ford was a big fan of Rumsfeld. They were good friends from their time in Congress. And then shortly after Rumsfeld arrived to help Ford, he brought Cheney and who he’d met during the Nixon administration as one of his deputies.

00:07:09:09 – 00:07:30:29
William Cooper
So that’s how that all worked together. Then Nixon became, excuse me. Rumsfeld was, Ford’s chief of staff. Cheney was his deputy. And then Rumsfeld went and became secretary of defense for the first time, and Cheney was elevated to be chief of staff before it. And that’s how the two of them really got started.

00:07:31:01 – 00:07:39:22
Dan LeFebvre
That’s the kind of thing that I mean, the timing of that is very coincidental, but sometimes coincidences actually do happen too.

00:07:39:22 – 00:08:05:08
William Cooper
So yeah, they did, and I think, Rumsfeld was pretty astute. I mean, my view of Rumsfeld is a mixed picture of positives and negatives. The novel really tries to paint that full picture of somebody who’s not just, oh, good or evil, but a mixture of things. And one of Rumsfeld’s strengths, politically at least, he’s had a good nose for this.

00:08:05:08 – 00:08:27:25
William Cooper
Earlier on in his career. The good news for controversy and when to avoid it. As he got older and came back into politics, some might argue he ran to the controversies. But at least early on in his career, he really tried to avoid them and had a pretty good instinct for it. And that that was the the prime example of that getting out of Washington at the right time.

00:08:27:27 – 00:08:48:26
Dan LeFebvre
Well, if we go back to the movie after Rumsfeld is elected to Congress, the movie’s dialog suggests that Rumsfeld was a little different than other congressmen. And there’s a line of dialog from the movie I want to quote here. It says, quote, most congressmen use their power like an ax best and brightest. Rumsfeld, on the other hand, use his like a master of the butterfly knife.

00:08:49:02 – 00:08:58:21
Dan LeFebvre
And like any master, if you got in his way, he would cut you. Does vice do a good job explaining how Rumsfeld wielded his political power?

00:08:58:23 – 00:09:23:13
William Cooper
I think it’s really simplistic. Again, entertaining, good movie, but very simplistic. And it exaggerated. I don’t think that there were a lot of people who disagreed with Rumsfeld, but I don’t think he, you know, in the Ford administration, in Congress and in the 60s and 70s, I don’t think he was stabbing people in the back, left and right.

00:09:23:13 – 00:09:53:11
William Cooper
One of his chief rivals politically during that time was Henry Kissinger, especially with Ford. Rumsfeld and Kissinger were two really strong voices, and they had some disagreements. Rumsfeld was much stronger on the Cold War, wanted to take a much harder stance against Russia than Kissinger did. Kissinger’s philosophy was more, strategic co-existence with Russia, where Rumsfeld really wanted to be more confrontational.

00:09:53:13 – 00:10:19:15
William Cooper
And they, after they left government, ended up being very good friends. Rumsfeld writes in his biography that he and Kissinger had been very close for quite some time and, and really good friends. So there were rivalries and there were certainly a lot of political maneuvering going on, like you would expect from a politician. But I don’t think he was stabbing people in the back or doing, you know, really, underhanded sort of deceitful thing.

00:10:19:16 – 00:10:22:14
William Cooper
I think that was more of an exaggeration.

00:10:22:16 – 00:10:44:06
Dan LeFebvre
Okay. Yeah. I mean, that makes it politicians will disagree. That’s kind of part of their job. But, you know, the stabbing in the back part, that’s mentioned in the movie or it doesn’t say specifically stabbing in the back, but it gives that impression. And so yeah, that’s I’m glad you clarified that though, because that was definitely the impression I got was basically my way or the highway.

00:10:44:09 – 00:11:06:10
William Cooper
Well, it certainly intellectually was could be like that. He could be my way of the highway in the sense a very strong views and wasn’t prone to compromise intellectually with what he wanted. He’s very deferential to the president, very deferential to the chain of command. So if the president gave him an order, he would follow it.

00:11:06:12 – 00:11:32:27
William Cooper
And he I think he would do so in a straightforward way. But he was very opinionated and very confident in his views and very, very and one of his biggest flaws of them all was not listening to the critics, not listening to other people. And I think that was one of the reasons he made such a big mistake with the Iraq War, was not listening to other, other opinions.

00:11:33:00 – 00:11:58:20
William Cooper
So in some sense he was very strong minded and he was my way or the highway, but I don’t think he was doing things that were, you know, extreme. I don’t think he was he was, you know, blackmailing his opponents or lying to the president or committing crimes to get things done. So I think there was some exaggeration in the movie, even though he was a very strong personality.

00:11:58:23 – 00:12:26:03
Dan LeFebvre
Okay. Well, you mentioned friends and throughout the entirety of vice, it’s not Kissinger, but it’s pretty clear that Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney have a very close working relationship. It’s Rumsfeld who seems to give Cheney his big break in politics, working under him during the Nixon presidency. Then later in the movie, when Cheney becomes vice president, the impression I got was that it was Cheney who convinced President Bush to appoint Rumsfeld as the secretary of defense.

00:12:26:05 – 00:12:31:09
Dan LeFebvre
How much of that really happened? And can you unravel the working relationship that Cheney and Rumsfeld had?

00:12:31:11 – 00:12:56:16
William Cooper
Yeah, that’s pretty accurate and broad strokes. They Rumsfeld and Cheney, were always very close. The, agreed on a lot of things. There were some differences between them. Dick Cheney was a little bit more conservative, the Rumsfeld a little bit more hawkish in certain ways and foreign policy. But in general, they got along very well, really close allies.

00:12:56:19 – 00:13:25:19
William Cooper
And absolutely true that Cheney played a big part in Rumsfeld getting the job as secretary of defense under George W Bush. And it was interesting because Rumsfeld was a political rival of George W Bush, his father. So during the Ford administration, Rumsfeld and Herbert Walker Bush were rivals, didn’t get along well. Rumsfeld didn’t respect Bush’s intellect. Bush thought rummy was kind of, his nicknames.

00:13:25:19 – 00:13:55:23
William Cooper
Rummy. That’s what everybody calls him, throughout his career. So I sometimes do, too. But but Bush thought that that Rumsfeld was, you know, always jockeying for Ford’s attention in ways that, you know, weren’t really fair. Not again, not deeply mysterious or anything, but not fair. So they were real rivals. And Cheney convinced Bush to hire Rumsfeld as the right person for the job as secretary of defense, even though they had that history.

00:13:55:25 – 00:13:59:28
William Cooper
And even though Bush’s father wasn’t a big fan of Rumsfeld.

00:14:00:00 – 00:14:11:22
Dan LeFebvre
Was did the younger Bush not really have much of a, a beef with Rumsfeld then? They were not opponents necessarily, I guess. Then I was just his father, right?

00:14:11:24 – 00:14:27:04
William Cooper
Correct. Correct. So younger Bush and Rumsfeld never had any issues, didn’t know each other well prior to Rumsfeld joining the administration. But the younger Bush was certainly aware that Rumsfeld and his father had this rivalry.

00:14:27:07 – 00:14:35:29
Dan LeFebvre
Okay, okay. Before we move on to the next movie, is there anything about Donald Rumsfeld from the movie vice that we didn’t get a chance to talk about that you would like to mention?

00:14:36:01 – 00:14:57:19
William Cooper
I think I think he did a good job teeing it up. And, you know, I’ll just reiterate it. I thought the performance was great. And it made sense within the context of the film on the discrete question of accuracy, which is not the main question for movies all the time. I thought it was a low grade, but I did like the movie.

00:14:57:21 – 00:15:29:17
Dan LeFebvre
Okay, well, you know, for entertainment, it is entertainment. It’s not documentary. Right? Well, shifting gears to a different movie, we’re going to 2008, which is a biopic about George W Bush, and there’s a scene in that movie I wanted to ask you about with Dick Cheney, who was Bush’s VP at the time. And while Bush is having lunch, Cheney brings something for Bush to sign that will allow the US to use, as the movie puts it, interrogation techniques against unlawful enemy combatants with maximal effective persuasion.

00:15:29:20 – 00:15:54:22
Dan LeFebvre
Cheney goes on to say, it’s not torture, but it includes authorization for U.S. citizens if they’re aiding and abetting terrorist organizations. Now, we don’t see Rumsfeld in that part of the movie, but the impression that I got from the movie is that Cheney was the one behind some controversial things. And since we already talked about Cheney and Rumsfeld having a very close relationship, there’s kind of an implied involvement for Rumsfeld as well in the movie.

00:15:54:22 – 00:16:04:06
Dan LeFebvre
Two do we know how much influence Cheney or even Rumsfeld had over Bush’s policies in general?

00:16:04:08 – 00:16:09:10
William Cooper
And for policies, do you mean that interrogation or the policies in general?

00:16:09:12 – 00:16:27:26
Dan LeFebvre
Well, the scene was about the interrogation, I guess specifically, but I guess I would assume that because that that was something that’s would be seen as more controversial, like if he wasn’t already influencing policies and such, I guess I would just assume that they wouldn’t start with something very controversial.

00:16:27:28 – 00:16:57:28
William Cooper
That’s a good, good point. Yeah, I think that’s right. And Cheney and Rumsfeld were very influential with Bush, Cheney in particular. So Rumsfeld was over at the Pentagon running the Defense Department, and Cheney was much closer to Bush, much, much closer confidant to Bush. Although Bush and Rumsfeld had a good, strong relationship, it deteriorated some at the end.

00:16:57:28 – 00:17:31:09
William Cooper
But it was a good, strong relationship for many years. And they held great sway over Bush. But it wasn’t the simple caricature of the movies. I think Bush really respected Cheney and really respected Rumsfeld, and he gave their opinions a lot of weight. Now, it wasn’t static either. I think it changed over time. So the key initiative for both Cheney and Rumsfeld, their biggest initiative was the Iraq war.

00:17:31:11 – 00:18:11:06
William Cooper
And they really drove I think both of them maybe Cheney the most. But but Rumsfeld, certainly, as well, really drove the push for regime change in Iraq and played a big role in convincing Bush to do it. Others in the administration were more ambivalent. Colin Powell, Condoleezza Rice and others weren’t as hawkish as Cheney and Rumsfeld, but over time, in large part because the Iraq War didn’t go well and didn’t go the way Cheney and Rumsfeld actually suggested it would, I think Bush lost trust in them.

00:18:11:09 – 00:18:36:10
William Cooper
Cheney gave a speech. It’s it’s a scene in the novel. He gave a speech in Tennessee where he says verbatim in quotes, Saddam Hussein definitely has weapons of mass destruction. There is no doubt that was in the lead up to the war. And he said that to the whole world, the whole world was watching, he said. There is no doubt.

00:18:36:12 – 00:19:00:03
William Cooper
And he certainly was saying things like that to the president. And Rumsfeld was saying things like that, the president as well. And when it turns out Saddam Hussein doesn’t have weapons of mass destruction, the erosion of trust is inevitable. And I think it really did happen. And by the time Bush was in the latter part of his second term, Rumsfeld had left the Pentagon.

00:19:00:03 – 00:19:25:11
William Cooper
He resigned, and Bush and Cheney’s relationship had frayed dramatically. So there’s a huge difference between year one of the Bush administration, where Cheney and Rumsfeld hold great sway, and year eight of the administration, where Rumsfeld’s God Cheney holds little sway. And there was a, you know, sort of a gradual decrease. It wasn’t linear, but a gradual decrease over time.

00:19:25:14 – 00:19:29:25
William Cooper
In between those, polar ends of the continuum.

00:19:29:28 – 00:19:53:21
Dan LeFebvre
Would some of that be what you were talking about before, where, intellectually at least having, you know, my way or the highway type approach to it where, well, but you also mentioned that Rumsfeld was very big on, on following command. So, that like the chain of command. So would that my way or the highway mentality still work for the president?

00:19:53:23 – 00:20:27:14
William Cooper
So. So Rumsfeld, very forceful interviews. If Colin Powell, his co-equal in the administration as secretary of state in the first term, disagreed with him, Rumsfeld would charge ahead and give little weight to the disagreement. He was very, very confident in his own opinion and his own opinion about what was true, his own opinion about what to do. But when the president of the United States would say, here’s what we’re going to do, here’s my decision.

00:20:27:17 – 00:20:54:18
William Cooper
Even if it went against what Rumsfeld wanted, Rumsfeld would follow that order. He respected the chain of command. And when he was secretary of defense, the only person above him was the president. That’s who you reported to. So the whole world, it was my way or the highway with the exception of the president. And certainly Rumsfeld had people at the Department of Defense and Cheney and others that he got along with well and respected their opinion.

00:20:54:18 – 00:21:09:14
William Cooper
So it wasn’t like he was disregarding every opinion that anyone ever gave. But in general, he was very, very convinced he was right. And the people that disagreed with them were wrong. But he would respect the chain of command. At the same time.

00:21:09:17 – 00:21:32:01
Dan LeFebvre
Well, you might have already answered my next question, but in the movie, if we’re to believe that movie’s version of history, Cheney and Rumsfeld were basically the reason why Bush went to war with Iraq over the WMDs of weapons of mass destruction, then at the end of the movie, we find out that they what they thought were WMDs turned out to be photos of watering holes for cattle.

00:21:32:03 – 00:21:44:13
Dan LeFebvre
So can you fill in a little more historical context around that situation? And then I’m assuming, based on what you said before, the movie is correct, to suggest that Rumsfeld and Cheney were incorrect about the WMDs in Iraq.

00:21:44:15 – 00:22:11:06
William Cooper
Yeah. Cheney, Rumsfeld were driving the driving force behind the invasion. I think they were the two leading figures behind it. And, one of the things that they talked about was that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. I don’t think Rumsfeld ever said it as categorically as Cheney or Cheney did say it unequivocally, even though there was disagreement in the intelligence community at the time, he still said it.

00:22:11:13 – 00:22:40:11
William Cooper
He still said there’s no doubt Saddam has weapons of mass destruction. So they were very vocal and they were leading the push for regime change. They also talked about other issues as well. Wasn’t just WMD, so they talked about the threat that Saddam posed in other ways to the United States and its allies. They also talked about the need to transform Iraq into a democracy, which in retrospect, was much more difficult than they assumed.

00:22:40:14 – 00:22:59:03
William Cooper
But that was one of the things they talked about. It. If I could turn into democracy, that could change the region, that could be a model for other countries in the region to move towards democracy as well. So it was a mixture of of things. But WMD were were very high on the list and that resonated with the American people.

00:22:59:03 – 00:23:26:19
William Cooper
So it was something that they focused on in terms of trying to get public opinion in support of regime change. Over time, we learned, that Saddam Hussein never had weapons of mass destruction at the time. Now, you can always say, well, just because we didn’t find them doesn’t mean they didn’t exist. But there were obviously a lot of eyeballs in Iraq after the invasion for many, many years.

00:23:26:19 – 00:24:02:19
William Cooper
Nobody ever saw them. I think it’s safe to assume they didn’t have weapons of mass destruction, and they were wrong. And that’s a really striking thing to have happen again. Rumsfeld was a mix of positives and negatives, pluses and minuses. It was a bit of a smart man. He was very dedicated to his country. I think his intentions were in the right place and a lot of what he did, but it’s a huge mistake to go out to the public, to the world, to the president and say, we need to get rid of Saddam Hussein because of these weapons of mass destruction.

00:24:02:21 – 00:24:30:02
William Cooper
And for that to be wrong. So W embellished it a little bit, made it more of a Hollywood movie, you know, exaggerated way of unfolding, as you would expect in a movie. But it’s, it’s it’s a good, fair, important criticism because they said there were weapons of mass destruction. We went to war, which is the biggest decision a sovereign nation can make.

00:24:30:04 – 00:24:32:26
William Cooper
And it wasn’t true.

00:24:32:29 – 00:24:55:15
Dan LeFebvre
Looking back on it through a historical lens, do we know why they were so positive? And, you know, with that saying, without a doubt that he has them when they don’t know for sure, because obviously they didn’t, so they couldn’t have known for sure that they did. So why would they say that? I mean, was it just to try to go to war to.

00:24:55:22 – 00:25:03:16
Dan LeFebvre
I think I remember living through those times, and there was a lot of people who were like, oh, we just want their oil or something like that.

00:25:03:18 – 00:25:29:07
William Cooper
I don’t think it was that simplistic. I’ve never seen evidence that they did it just to put money in their pockets, and that that’s an incredible accusation. But we’re going to go destroy a country and have a huge number of casualties, just so that my stock in an oil company goes up when I’m already very rich. So, yeah, I don’t think Cheney and Rose were motivated by enriching themselves.

00:25:29:10 – 00:25:59:14
William Cooper
I think their motivations were complicated. They weren’t identical, either. And I think what you have really are two people that had very strong views about foreign policy, extraordinarily high confidence in themselves. Right? Cheney. Rob. So they’re very confident in their own judgment. And they wanted what they wanted. And Rumsfeld in particular, they wanted to show that the United States was strong and a force in the world and that there were consequences.

00:25:59:16 – 00:26:24:29
William Cooper
I think they thought that during the Clinton administration, there were a lot of lines drawn in the sand, and then Saddam and other people would cross those lines, but there’d be no consequence. And I think for for Rumsfeld, he thought it was really important to make a statement that if you’re a dictator, if you are doing things like Saddam’s doing shooting at our planes, tried to assassinate George H.W. Bush, he invaded Kuwait.

00:26:25:01 – 00:26:38:04
William Cooper
If you’re a dictator doing all of these things, there’s going to be consequences. And and I think Rumsfeld wanted to make that statement, thought it was really important to make that statement.

00:26:38:06 – 00:26:54:13
Dan LeFebvre
Okay. Okay. Yeah. That makes that makes sense. I guess it’s just interesting that, you know, you he’s still. Well, I guess you said it was Cheney that was still. So, saying it publicly like that is well, I guess, as you also said, a mistake.

00:26:54:16 – 00:27:21:00
William Cooper
A big mistake, a huge mistake. I think both men, Cheney and Rumsfeld, got a lot of unfair criticism throughout their tenure for a variety of things. A lot of decisions they made were very difficult decisions, and there was a lot at stake. But they deserved the onslaught of criticism and the historical condemnation. They deserve it because they said they had weapons of mass destruction.

00:27:21:02 – 00:27:50:01
William Cooper
That was a huge basis for why we went to war and it wasn’t true. And that is a very, very major offense for a politician entrusted with the security of our country. Frankly, the United States military is entrusted with the security of the whole world and a lot of lives. If you’re going to go to war, the ultimate step that you can take of it wasn’t just a bombing campaign, wasn’t just discrete attacks with cruise missiles coming in.

00:27:50:01 – 00:28:13:29
William Cooper
It was a war, and they did it in large part on the basis of something that wasn’t true. And they exaggerated the position at the time. So they exaggerated what they actually thought. There was doubt. Cheney knew there was doubt. There was doubt exaggerated. And then they turned out to be wrong. That’s a big deal. Not something you can sweep under the rug.

00:28:14:02 – 00:28:30:24
William Cooper
Even if you’re a trying to be fair minded and recognizing their strengths and weaknesses. Lots of criticism. And w the movie highlights that in a way that has some flourish and resonance with people. And I think helps people understand that.

00:28:30:27 – 00:28:36:02
Dan LeFebvre
Did it actually turn out to be watering holes for cattle, like the movie shows, or is that just a Hollywood embellishment? That was.

00:28:36:02 – 00:29:03:21
William Cooper
Hollywood. Okay, there was a lot of there was a so had to to be a little more granular about it there. There was a ton of evidence that Saddam had used weapons of mass destruction. There’s a ton of evidence that he would do so again, there was a ton of evidence of infrastructure, of weapons, of mass destruction. And it was fair to say Saddam Hussein could get weapons of mass destruction.

00:29:03:21 – 00:29:31:11
William Cooper
He could use them again. They just didn’t qualify it. And so when they went in, they we there were all sorts of infrastructure and things related to weapons were discovered. It wasn’t like Saddam only had rifles and and a few tanks. I mean, he did have a lot of infrastructure in place. It just wasn’t operational. And that’s a fine distinction in a way.

00:29:31:14 – 00:29:42:06
William Cooper
But at the end of the day, to say there’s no doubt you had weapons of mass destruction, was, a big mistake.

00:29:42:09 – 00:29:46:18
Dan LeFebvre
Well, is there anything else about the movie that you wanted to point out before we move on to the next one?

00:29:46:20 – 00:30:03:01
William Cooper
No, just another one where I think that the, a lot of respect for for that movie, I think is really entertaining. And I think does make some interesting points. But ultimately, you know, if you’re trying to really understand what happened, that’s not the place to look.

00:30:03:03 – 00:30:23:20
Dan LeFebvre
Well, our final movie to talk about today is the documentary called The Unknown Known. And at the beginning of that movie, Donald Rumsfeld himself mentions dictating some 20,000 memos in just the last six years at the Pentagon, and how there must have been millions of them over the course of his career. Then, of course, it goes on to use those memos as the basis of the documentary.

00:30:23:22 – 00:30:42:27
Dan LeFebvre
And in the documentary, when the filmmaker asks Rumsfeld if he knew that they would produce a vast archive from his memos, Rumsfeld laughs and says never crossed his mind. And that even he didn’t know what he was going to do next. So I have two questions about this. First, is it normal for a politician to have that many memos that are archived somewhere, presumably for the public to see?

00:30:42:27 – 00:30:54:06
Dan LeFebvre
Maybe. I don’t I don’t know the doc. We didn’t really point that out. But then and then also, do you get the impression that Rumsfeld was basically making it up as he went along? He kind of implied there.

00:30:54:09 – 00:31:27:05
William Cooper
So Rumsfeld, for on the first question, Rumsfeld wrote, these snow, they’re called snowflakes because they fell all over the federal government. And he it was before email, if there was email and if there was email at the time, Rumsfeld, would have been one of those people that sends, you know, hundreds and hundreds of that. But what he it highlights strength and and again, I think it’s important if you want to be accurate to there’s a podcast about how accurate is a movie compared to reality.

00:31:27:05 – 00:31:50:07
William Cooper
So I think accuracy is important if you want to be accurate about Rumsfeld, you need to recognize his strengths. And he was incredibly smart, man. Part of the big conundrum for me with Rumsfeld is how could somebody so smart be so wrong about Iraq and not just the weapons of mass destruction, but what he thought he could do with the country turning it into a democracy?

00:31:50:10 – 00:32:22:09
William Cooper
That was he was clearly wrong about that. But he was a very smart man, and he was extraordinarily hard worker. I mean, if you look at the things people say about Rumsfeld, he, you know, almost everybody that talks about him says he’s the hardest worker I’ve ever seen. One of his friends that he grew up with, guy named Janetta, who, has talked and in giving interviews about him, he said this is the most productive human being that’s maybe ever existed.

00:32:22:09 – 00:32:46:14
William Cooper
Like, he will he will wake up in the morning, and by the time he goes to bed, he will have done things that ten people couldn’t do. So he was just unbelievably, you know, feverish. And his work is productivity. And he didn’t just work all the time. He was really smart about it. He went when he left the Ford administration the first time he was secretary of defense, he took over JDS Searle.

00:32:46:16 – 00:33:16:09
William Cooper
He was the CEO of a pharmaceutical company. They made NutraSweet. He took it from this fledgling crappy old legacy corporation to a total juggernaut. And the stock went up like tenfold in just a few years. So he did prodigious with his work ethic, its ability to get things done, and the snowflakes, which were very, very accurate and very real, I think reflect that just the way he was able to get so much done.

00:33:16:12 – 00:33:37:10
William Cooper
The problem with being that productive is if you’re if the ships pointed in the wrong direction, it’s a big problem. And the Iraq Initiative, you put a lot of work into that. And we would have been better served if he had had other, focus of his energies during that time in terms of the archive. We put them on the web.

00:33:37:15 – 00:34:09:24
William Cooper
So rumsfeld.com, they’re all up there. It’s a great, great resource. You get all his memo or at least a huge percentage of his memos. I don’t know if it’s all of them, plus a lot of memos from other sources. So it’s all first hand. So if you want to actually dig into the the core of what was actually happening at that time and what people were saying, a lot of source material there that’s really, really valuable and interesting and is snowflakes were a big part of that.

00:34:09:27 – 00:34:18:29
Dan LeFebvre
So is more, work related memos, not necessarily like a journal or keeping a diary type, you know, just recordings and things like that. It was all for work purposes.

00:34:19:01 – 00:34:38:27
William Cooper
It’s memos, you know, from Donald Rumsfeld to Colin Powell, from Donald Rumsfeld to Dick Cheney, that sort of thing. And it’s actually and it’s the actual workings of government. Like, yeah, you can do orders from there. You can give your positions. So it’s it’s not it’s not a summary of something else. A lot of the time, a lot of time.

00:34:38:27 – 00:34:47:04
William Cooper
It’s the actual the memo is the events. And it’s, it’s really good history.

00:34:47:06 – 00:34:52:27
Dan LeFebvre
It sounds like with his work ethic, his work memos basically are his diary, his journal.

00:34:52:29 – 00:35:15:09
William Cooper
Yeah, that’s a good point. Yes. When you work 16 hours a day or more, you’re. That is your. Yes. You’re. And, it’s funny. That’s a good way to think about it. Yeah. A lot of really busy people there. Their email inbox and outbox is their diary. But yeah, I think it’s a good point.

00:35:15:11 – 00:35:31:03
Dan LeFebvre
What about that? The line that he had in the documentary where he’s like, he didn’t even know what he was going to do next, was were there did you ever get the impression, I guess, that he was making things up as he went? Or. I mean, you said he was very smart. So I would assume that he was have a little forethought.

00:35:31:05 – 00:35:54:14
William Cooper
He had a lot of forethought. He knew what he was doing. And he was aware of of his legacy in this future. I mean, by the time he was in the Bush administration, he was in his late 60s. He was born in 1933. So he was in his late 60s when it started. And and into his 70s as he served as secretary of defense for the second time.

00:35:54:17 – 00:36:16:16
William Cooper
So he wasn’t positioning himself to go into the private sector or get this job or that job or or, you know, run for president someday. He did run for president unsuccessfully in the 80s. It was very brief. But so he wasn’t positioning himself in that sense. He wasn’t thinking about, his next move from a professional standpoint.

00:36:16:16 – 00:36:41:10
William Cooper
When he stopped serving as secretary of defense, he did what I’m sure he assumed he would do. He wrote books. He participated in conferences and think tanks, speeches and things like that. But, but yeah, he was a smart man who read history his whole life and was aware that in his way, he was making history and there was a part of him.

00:36:41:10 – 00:36:45:06
William Cooper
I’m sure that was quite cognizant of that.

00:36:45:09 – 00:37:17:11
Dan LeFebvre
The whole concept of the movie’s title, The Unknown, known as Rumsfeld, explains, it is basically the things that you think you know, but it turns out you did not. In the documentary, he uses the example of the attack on Pearl Harbor and says that happened because of a failure of imagination, that the attack could even happen. Then, of course, as we all know from history, it turns out that Rumsfeld himself must have failed to imagine what could have happened because the world was shaken on September 11th, 2001, and Rumsfeld case shaken quite literally because he was at the Pentagon when one of the hijacked planes crashed into it.

00:37:17:13 – 00:37:47:02
Dan LeFebvre
But then the reaction to that attack was the US going to war with Iraq because of supposed connections to Al-Qaeda, even though in the documentary, Rumsfeld himself says he doesn’t think the American people thought Saddam Hussein was connected to Al-Qaeda. But then the documentary shows a clip, a news clip from February 4th, 2003, when Rumsfeld was secretary of defense and a reporter asks him to respond to Saddam Hussein, saying Iraq does not have weapons of mass destruction, and they also have no relationship with Al-Qaeda.

00:37:47:04 – 00:38:11:11
Dan LeFebvre
And in that news clip, Rumsfeld’s response was, And Abraham Lincoln was short. Then he goes on to call Saddam Hussein the local liar, which to me is pretty obviously suggesting that he believes Iraq does have WMDs, as we’ve talked about, as well as a relationship with Al-Qaeda, even though in the documentary he claims to deny it. Do you think Rumsfeld was purposely manipulating his words so the U.S. could have a reason to go to war with Iraq?

00:38:11:11 – 00:38:14:19
Dan LeFebvre
Or did I misinterpret what he’s trying to say there?

00:38:14:21 – 00:38:20:04
William Cooper
I think what happened with Rumsfeld’s public statements.

00:38:20:06 – 00:38:49:24
William Cooper
My sense and in a. Read and followed this really closely, is that Rumsfeld really wanted to go to war with Iraq. He really wanted regime change. He wanted Saddam out of there, not for oil money, not for bloodlust, but because he thought it was good for the world to get rid of Saddam Hussein and try to make the middle East more of a democratic region.

00:38:49:26 – 00:39:20:10
William Cooper
So he was very convinced that that was the right thing to do, and his public statements would be exaggerated or embellished to help that happen. And one narrative that resonated with people, because when you’re going to war, and especially in democracy, you want public support. You don’t want 90% of the people against the war, and then you go to war that it’s really important to have public support, to have political support.

00:39:20:10 – 00:39:45:27
William Cooper
And if Congress behind you and our constituents behind you. So they were they were doing a marketing campaign for a year or two before the Iraq War. And one of the things Rumsfeld would do with respect to this, and also respect to connections, al-Qaida is exaggerate, embellish, wink, wink, nod, nod.

00:39:45:29 – 00:40:12:22
William Cooper
So he wouldn’t outright lie in some grand way. Yeah, we know for sure that Saddam Hussein is in the process of selling WMD to Al-Qaeda. He wouldn’t say that, but he would. He would move the discussion in that general direction. And there were some connections between Saddam Hussein and Al-Qaeda, but they were tenuous. They weren’t. They didn’t suggest that they were cahoots together.

00:40:12:25 – 00:40:39:12
William Cooper
But there were some connections between them. And then I also think Rumsfeld genuinely felt like Saddam Hussein. If he does get weapons of mass destruction very easily, if not likely, would sell them to terrorists. Right? He wants to cause problems to the West, to the United States. So the prospect of him selling them to terrorists, whether it’s al-Qaida or whether it’s another terrorist organization, is a very real threat.

00:40:39:14 – 00:40:46:26
William Cooper
So his views would be in his statements, would be consistent with that overriding impulse.

00:40:46:28 – 00:41:09:15
Dan LeFebvre
Was it almost like a means to an end, like if he has it in his mind that he has to get rid of Saddam Hussein? Almost. Not that you can say anything, you know, because obviously we talked about you not doing anything illegal or anything like that, but also trying to persuade people and trying to get people to follow along, then, yeah, maybe we can stretch the truth a little bit here and there.

00:41:09:15 – 00:41:14:23
Dan LeFebvre
Or do you know things like. Yeah, and Abraham Lincoln was short, you know, that kind of that kind of quick.

00:41:14:25 – 00:41:45:15
William Cooper
It’s a good way to put it. Then he wasn’t outright lying in a obvious way. He’s a smart guy. So he knew that if he lied, you know, in a really obvious way, he would get called out on it. Unlike our politics of today, outright lies back then were, harder to get away with. But but he wanted he knew what he wanted to do, and he was trying to say things that would achieve that goal.

00:41:45:18 – 00:42:09:16
William Cooper
And in that sense, he would exaggerate things and embellish things, but not outright lying. Or, you know, going forward in some fraudulent way with evidence, things of that nature. You didn’t he didn’t do that. He definitely was trying to be a good PR spokesman for what he wanted to get done.

00:42:09:18 – 00:42:26:18
Dan LeFebvre
You mentioned, him thinking that, you know, Saddam Hussein might sell WMDs to terrorists was part of his motivation. Then, part of his reason for wanting to get rid of Saddam Hussein, basically to not have another nine over 11.

00:42:26:21 – 00:43:05:21
William Cooper
Yes, I think that was part of it. I think he legitimately feared I think 9/11 hit him very hard. When you’re the secretary of defense and the largest attack in him in the country’s history on our on our shores occurs. You’re in charge. The Pentagon gets hit. He was in the Pentagon at the time. I think it had a very dramatic impact on him that a lot of civilians, particularly people looking back on it, decades later, it’s now over two decades later, don’t feel the same urgency and fear that he felt.

00:43:05:23 – 00:43:28:02
William Cooper
So I think it really did hit him very hard. And one of his concerns, I think it was a concern about Saddam Hussein, but I think it was also a concern about the region in general. Iran was a a bad actor with respect to the United States at that time. There were terrorists, al and other terrorists as well.

00:43:28:05 – 00:43:56:24
William Cooper
I think he had a just an overriding concern about terrorism and not wanting to have another 911. I think that drove him very strongly. And when that fed into the overall basis for for wanting to get rid of Saddam because he he saw a real scenario where Saddam could and Saddam was a terrible dictator. He had tortured his people, invaded his neighbors.

00:43:56:27 – 00:44:27:21
William Cooper
He was extremely dangerous person. And so Rumsfeld felt like he was a threat. How far fetched is it to think that that would actually happen if we had not gotten in and taken Saddam out? Would he have gotten WMD and gotten him to terrorist hands? It it’s very hard to assess that, but I think that that threat was a one of several factors that drove Rumsfeld to want regime change in Iraq.

00:44:27:24 – 00:44:53:15
Dan LeFebvre
Something else that Rumsfeld says in the documentary that kind of sounded like a contradiction to me is when he says the U.S. doesn’t assassinate the leaders of other countries. But then he immediately goes on to talk about Dore Farms, where the U.S. tried to kill Saddam Hussein. And that sounded like a contradiction, because on one hand, Rumsfeld says the U.S. doesn’t assassinate leaders, and then he instead calls the Dora Farms incident an act of war, implying it’s not assassinating leader if it’s war.

00:44:53:17 – 00:45:16:07
Dan LeFebvre
But then, just a minute or so later in the documentary, he says that the U.S. wanted to kill Saddam Hussein to avoid going to war with Iraq. So maybe it’s just me, but it sounds like Rumsfeld is trying not to use a specific word because the U.S. doesn’t assassinate world leaders. But apparently the U.S. does launch a war against one person that just happens to be the leader of the country, so they can avoid going to war with the entire country.

00:45:16:09 – 00:45:22:05
Dan LeFebvre
What really happened with the Dora Farms incident and what, if any, involvement did Rumsfeld have?

00:45:22:07 – 00:45:49:27
William Cooper
I actually don’t know the detailed history there. I do know that Rumsfeld was pretty darn good about not getting caught saying things, but occasionally he would, and I thought that I thought the documentary on that point. Yeah. It’s hard to reconcile those various statements. And so, yeah, I think it was just it wasn’t being consistent was the takeaway that I got.

00:45:49:29 – 00:46:16:12
Dan LeFebvre
All the movies that we talked about today are mostly about other people, about President Bush with Scott Glenn playing Rumsfeld, vice about Vice President Cheney, with Steve Carell playing Rumsfeld. Then, of course, there’s the documentary, too, but there hasn’t really been a biopic about Donald Rumsfeld himself yet. So let’s say you’re put in charge of directing it. Who would you cast as Donald Rumsfeld in your movie, and what period of Rumsfeld life would you want to focus on?

00:46:16:15 – 00:46:41:12
William Cooper
That’s a great question. Well, you’ve asked the author of a biographical fiction novel about himself. If it becomes a movie, I’ll be very happy based on my book. Although that’s that’s hard. But I haven’t thought about that. Who would play him? That’s a really good question. I’m. I’m not skillful at casting Josh Brolin. Seems like maybe he could play.

00:46:41:13 – 00:46:53:00
William Cooper
And Steve Carell did a good job. I would want him to take a different tact, but. But he did a good job, I don’t know, what do you think, Dan? Do you have any any. Oh, wow.

00:46:53:01 – 00:47:00:23
Dan LeFebvre
Who, throwing it back. I mean, that’s I didn’t even think about answering my own question there.

00:47:00:26 – 00:47:02:06
William Cooper
It’s a tough question.

00:47:02:08 – 00:47:12:21
Dan LeFebvre
Josh Brolin would be good. I mean, he was, but when he was George W Bush and W, so it would be interesting to see him playing a different character in that same time period.

00:47:12:24 – 00:47:34:14
William Cooper
Yeah, yeah, I’m trying to picture somebody playing Rumsfeld. You have to be on the shorter side. Rumsfeld was five seven. He’d have to be able to slick his hair back. Really? Well, because Rumsfeld did that, I feel like Brolin might be the best, but yeah, you’re right, he was. He was Bush. But maybe that would be a good thing.

00:47:34:14 – 00:47:37:18
William Cooper
Maybe that would keep the keep the same going.

00:47:37:21 – 00:47:43:14
Dan LeFebvre
Yeah. There you go. And then you can have Christian Bale play, George W Bush in the movie. It’s a side character.

00:47:43:16 – 00:47:46:15
William Cooper
Hey.

00:47:46:17 – 00:47:48:21
William Cooper
I’m in. I’m watching that.

00:47:48:23 – 00:47:53:28
Dan LeFebvre
Yeah. Me too. We do have you back on to see what changes they made from from what actually happened.

00:47:54:01 – 00:47:56:07
William Cooper
Yeah.

00:47:56:10 – 00:48:13:20
Dan LeFebvre
Well, this isn’t a political show. Obviously. We are talking about a political figure from recent history. So no doubt what Rumsfeld did in his career impacts our country today. What’s 1 or 2 of the biggest things that you think Donald Rumsfeld’s political career had on today?

00:48:13:23 – 00:48:48:15
William Cooper
Well, the Iraq war was very consequential. It essentially because it near universal agreement that it was a big mistake and did not go well. But the premise of the war with respect to WMD, but also the idea that we could go in there and transform Iraq into a democracy in retrospect, people recognize was was a real mistake and a real misunderstanding of what’s capable, what we’re capable of in the Middle East.

00:48:48:18 – 00:49:31:09
William Cooper
And so I think there’s been a profound bipartisan recognition from the Iraq War that the United States, despite all of our power, needs to be more restrained in foreign affairs. And it’s one thing to target militias with bombs. It’s one thing to go after nuclear facilities in certain countries and things of that nature. But the idea of a full scale mobilization around a smaller country that can’t really defend itself, like Iraq, I think is essentially off the table at this point.

00:49:31:12 – 00:49:55:04
William Cooper
It’s just not something that the United States has a stomach for. And I think that’s a response to Iraq. And we learned that lesson. It’s really hard. You’re going to going into the Middle East and bombing a country to smithereens, and then building up a democracy from the rubble is just not something that we can do. Even if even if it sounds like a noble goal.

00:49:55:06 – 00:50:30:25
William Cooper
So I think that’s really his legacy politically is just being a part of of that initiative, how it went and how it’s reshaped our politics. And then his personal legacy to me is one, that’s very fascinating. I touched on it earlier, and I really one of the main things I try to bring out about him in the novel is he’s a really complicated guy who was, on the one hand, really, really smart.

00:50:30:27 – 00:50:55:04
William Cooper
And he was famous for recognizing you mentioned it earlier in the documentary, Dan talking about tears of knowledge, right, and understanding the limits of our own knowledge. There’s no knowns. There’s known unknowns, there’s unknown unknowns. And he articulated that framework in a in a really smart way. And he was right about about the way he laid that out.

00:50:55:04 – 00:51:19:20
William Cooper
So he’s sort of this character, this person, this historical figure who on the one hand is famous for articulating a framework of understanding human knowledge and our limits. And then, on the other hand, the Iraq Initiative was one of the most notorious violations of the very framework he set in place because he went beyond what he knew. He thought Saddam had weapons of mass destruction.

00:51:19:23 – 00:51:40:18
William Cooper
He thought it was a no no. He was wrong. He didn’t have them. He thought that we could transform Iraq. And he couldn’t. We we couldn’t as a country. And so I think his legacy is going to be, you know, that complication of how does somebody so smart make such a big mistake?

00:51:40:21 – 00:52:03:18
Dan LeFebvre
To paraphrase or to borrow I should say, from another movie, with great power comes great responsibility. And, sometimes you know, that’s. Yeah, we learned the lesson, as you said. Well, well, this is a topic we could continue to talk about forever. But thank you so much for coming on to talk about Donald Rumsfeld in the movies. You do have a new novel that you’ve talked about a few times.

00:52:03:18 – 00:52:13:22
Dan LeFebvre
It’s called The Trial of Donald Rumsfeld, and there’s a link to it in the show notes for my listeners to get their own copy right now. But before I let you go, can you give my audience a peek into your new book?

00:52:13:24 – 00:52:49:24
William Cooper
Yeah, it’s, it’s an alternative history. So it’s the trial of Donald Rumsfeld, and it Rumsfeld in the novel, after the Iraq War, through a series of scandal and tragedy, becomes president of the United States. So it’s historical, it’s historical fiction novel and an alternative history. And then as president, really, you get to see Rumsfeld’s full personality and character on display, and he makes some really big mistakes and ends up on trial at the International Criminal Court at the International Criminal Court.

00:52:49:24 – 00:53:07:26
William Cooper
And that’s where the book gets its title, The Trial of Donald Rumsfeld. The actual trials around his activity in the Iraq war. And so if you like historical fiction, legal political thrillers, it’s worth checking out.

00:53:07:28 – 00:53:11:08
Dan LeFebvre
Fantastic. I’ll make sure I add a link to that in the show notes. Thanks again so much for your time.

00:53:11:08 – 00:53:18:29
William Cooper
Well, awesome. Thank you Dan, really appreciate it. Love the podcast. And really, thank you for letting me come on again.

 

00:00:00:21 – 00:00:14:17
Dan LeFebvre
Before we talk about some of the details in the movie, let’s take a step back and look at the movie overall. So if you were to give Young Guns II a letter grade for its historical accuracy, what would it get?

00:00:14:20 – 00:00:39:23
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
I think I’d probably go with C+. It’s not the most historically accurate movie ever made. It is probably more accurate than a lot of the other Billy the Kid movies, and I think they really, like, captured the essence of Billy the Kid is personality, just kind of the way he was. This is mischievousness, I guess. So for that alone, I’m going to give it a c-plus.

00:00:39:26 – 00:00:53:13
Dan LeFebvre
Okay. Yeah, that’s pretty good. Especially being a sequel as well. Sometimes that well, well throw because they’re kind of tied to the inaccuracies of the first movie and then yeah, tying ins. I’ve had that be an issue before too. So I see plus it’s not bad actually.

00:00:53:15 – 00:01:12:27
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
And it’s one of the better sequels that have ever been made. You know, a lot of times the sequels are pretty lackluster. The young guns, too, definitely lived up to the, the legacy of Young Guns one. So and I grew up with these movies, man. I used to play Young Guns at recess in, elementary school. So I was all about young guns.

00:01:12:29 – 00:01:17:19
Dan LeFebvre
Yeah. Yeah. Nice. I’m sure that helped influence what you’re doing now.

00:01:17:21 – 00:01:39:05
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Oh, yeah. Yeah. I mean, there’s a few works of art, I guess that definitely. If it wasn’t for. If it wasn’t for the book Lonesome Dove, and if it wasn’t for Young Guns one and two, I probably would not be doing this podcast. It really instilled in me just a love of history in general. All was history. And with young guns.

00:01:39:09 – 00:01:52:20
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Billy the Kid, man, he he’s just the guy I keep going back to out of everybody I cover on my show. All the mountain men and gunfighters and outlaws. Billy the Kid is just the guy I keep coming back to.

00:01:52:23 – 00:02:07:03
Dan LeFebvre
Well, if we go back to the movie at the very beginning, a Young Guns two were introduced to an older man going by the name of Brushy Bill Roberts, and he claims to be Billy the Kid. And he’s proving his claims by telling the story to a lawyer. And that story is basically the plot of the entire movie.

00:02:07:03 – 00:02:26:26
Dan LeFebvre
So we’ll be talking about that throughout just our discussion today. And then, of course, we’ll circle back to Brushy Bill himself when we see him at the end of the movie. But one of the most common things for movies to do is to just make up characters. So for those of us who have only seen the movie, is it true that there was someone named Brushy Bill who claimed to be Billy the Kid?

00:02:26:29 – 00:02:48:14
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Yes, that is absolutely true. Brushy Bill Roberts, his real name was Oliver Roberts, but he did come forward in the 1940s claiming to be Billy the Kid. And he wanted that pardon? Just like he says in the movie at the beginning. The main difference I would say the movie, it looks like they filmed it at White Sands, New Mexico.

00:02:48:14 – 00:02:58:12
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
I’m not entirely sure about that, but that’s what it looks like to me. That’s not how the meeting went down. It actually occurred at Roche’s house in Hiko, Texas. Okay.

00:02:58:13 – 00:03:03:02
Dan LeFebvre
Other than that, yeah, it was kind of a weird location just in the middle of the desert. Yeah, the side of the road.

00:03:03:04 – 00:03:17:15
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
I guess it they they were kind of going for the effect of, you know, he was still, a wanted outlaw, just a desperado living in the desert. But now, at that point in time, Brushy Bill Roberts was definitely living in just a normal Texas town.

00:03:17:18 – 00:03:35:29
Dan LeFebvre
Okay, interesting. Yeah. Well, we’ll circle back to him, but, if we go back to the 1800 storyline in the movie, we get introduced to some other characters as the members of Billy the Kid’s gang. So, I’ll list off the four who I consider the four main characters. Feel free to add more if you’d like, but there’s Doc Scurlock.

00:03:35:29 – 00:03:55:07
Dan LeFebvre
He’s played by Kiefer Sutherland, Arkansas, Dave Ruta by who’s played by Christian Slater, Chavez Chavez, played by Lou Diamond Phillips. And then someone that, is pretty popular. Pat Garrett, another one of those popular ones, he’s played by William Petersen. Were those characters based on real people who rode with Billy the Kid?

00:03:55:09 – 00:04:21:12
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Yes, with a couple of asterisks. So Pat Garrett never actually rode with Billy the Kid as far as outlaw activities or anything like that, that’s they they really kind of strayed from the truth in that aspect. In the movie, Pat Garrett and Billy were friends. Pat. Pat was a buffalo hunter in Texas. He moved to New Mexico. I’m not exactly sure of the exact year.

00:04:21:15 – 00:04:41:16
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
And he settled down, at Fort Sumner, New Mexico, and he just ran different businesses. He had, he was a bartender for a little while. He had, like, a butcher shop for a while, and he and Billy would hang out whenever they were together. They would gamble together. They would dance with the senior items, all that stuff.

00:04:41:19 – 00:05:09:12
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
We we can kind of circle back to how close their friendship was later on. But yeah, Pat Garrett absolutely was a real person. He he was involved in Billy the Kid’s life, but there’s really not much evidence that he participated in outlaw activities. Now, everybody stole horses back in those days. Everybody stole a few cows. Every now and then, even the most respectable of people, you know, had a few stolen, some stolen livestock in the past.

00:05:09:15 – 00:05:33:00
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
There are allegations that Garrett was selling stolen livestock out of his butcher shop. He himself may have gone and rounded up a few had here and there. I wouldn’t doubt it. But as far as him going out and, you know, killing bounty hunters with Billy the Kid or, just basically doing any illegal activities with Billy other than maybe possibly buying and selling stolen livestock.

00:05:33:06 – 00:05:59:29
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
There’s really no indication as far as, the others docs Gerlach and Jose Chavez each others, those are both real life people. They were more involved in Billy’s life. If anybody’s ever seen Young Guns part one, where they basically cover the Lincoln County War, that’s when Scurlock and Chavez were riding with Billy the Kid. They were. They were Lincoln County regulators.

00:06:00:01 – 00:06:24:28
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
After the Lincoln County War, they kind of drifted apart. Chavez stayed down in Lincoln County for a while. He would end up going to prison later on. Doc Scurlock, he would settle up at Fort Sumner. So he and Billy still remain close. But doc started distancing himself. By the time the events unfold that we see in Young Guns, too, Doc Scurlock was already living in Texas.

00:06:24:28 – 00:06:49:14
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
You left the whole thing behind. He got buried, he settled down, became an honest man. Dave Rude, a bore also very real person. He was never known as Arkansas Dave, though historically, I’m not really sure where that nickname comes from. There are stories that I’ve been unable to corroborate that he may have stolen cattle in Arkansas years prior.

00:06:49:16 – 00:07:08:09
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
I actually reached out to John Fusco. This was a few months ago. John John Fusco was the guy who wrote and directed Young Guns one and two. He’s done a lot of great movies, and I thought maybe he had a source on that that I wasn’t familiar with. So I reached out like, hey, man, where did you find this information about him being called Arkansas?

00:07:08:09 – 00:07:31:04
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Dave, is that something you just made up? According to him, he could be completely pulling my chain, but he says he just made it up. He said it sounded you had a better ring to it than dirty. Dirty Dave. Rude about what he was actually known as, believe it or not. So I guess Arkansas Dave sounds cooler than Dirty Dave, but, any even that dirt, even that Dirty Dave nickname I.

00:07:31:06 – 00:07:47:28
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
I may be mistaken here, but I believe it only comes from one source. At one point, Dave was arrested and taken to Las Vegas, New Mexico. And, there was a journalist there. A local paper published an article saying that he was wearing the same clothes that he had been wearing the last time he was in Vegas.

00:07:48:00 – 00:08:06:03
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
So I guess that’s where the dirty thing comes from, whether or not he was unhygienic, I honestly don’t have any idea. But, yeah, he was the real deal. He was really more of an accomplished outlaw than any of these guys. He was a few years older than Billy the Kid. He had, he had been, caught robbing a train in Kansas.

00:08:06:05 – 00:08:27:00
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
He spent time, like I said, in Las Vegas, New Mexico, sort of as a crooked lawman. And he eventually, participated in the killing of a jailer. So by the time him and Billy link up, Dave was wanted for murder. But, yeah, all these guys were real. The other two members of the gang that are that you see in Young Guns, too.

00:08:27:00 – 00:08:45:09
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
You got Tom Foley or. Oh, weird. Depending on which version of his last name you want to go with. He too was a real life person. He wasn’t a 14 year old kid like they show in the movie, but he was real. He was a member of Billy’s gang. The other guy you see, Henry French, he’s sort of a composite character.

00:08:45:14 – 00:08:54:18
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
There was a real guy named, Henry Newton French that Billy rode with.

00:08:54:20 – 00:09:18:26
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
They I guess they just kind of made, like, a composite character out of a few different people. But in all reality, in the events that we see in Young Guns to Billy, the kids main core group was Dave Root of Ball, Tom folly, and two other guys named Billy Wilson and Tom Pickett. Those seem to be his main outlaw buddies at that time.

00:09:18:28 – 00:09:45:21
Dan LeFebvre
Maybe it’s just me, but when you have a nickname like Arkansas Dave, I assume that either he’s from Arkansas or he made a name in Arkansas before joining Billy the Kid. And I guess throughout the movie, he’s also kind of trying to he, he’s trying to be the one that everybody knows who he is. So I’m was just assuming that he made a name for himself in Arkansas somewhere as a, as an outlaw beforehand or something.

00:09:45:24 – 00:10:06:18
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
And, you know, Dave was Dave got around, man. Dave. Dave knew he rub shoulders with a lot of famous people from the Old West, like Wyatt Earp and Bat Masterson and Doc Holliday. He knew all those guys. So, I, how, you know, I’ve heard people say that Ruta Ball was the only man that Billy the Kid feared.

00:10:06:25 – 00:10:30:23
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
I don’t know if that’s true, but like I said a minute ago, he was a few years older than Billy, so I’m not sure how much of it was just him. Just straight up taking orders from a 19 year old rather than them just working together, you know what I mean? But yeah, he’s a really interesting guy. If anybody’s interested in learning more about him, I, I do have a full episode just on Dave Root about.

00:10:30:26 – 00:10:47:03
Dan LeFebvre
Oh, awesome. Yeah, I’ll make sure to add a link to that in the show notes so people can check that out. If we go back to the movie, New Mexico Governor Lew Wallace convinces Billy the Kid to testify against the Murph and Dolly faction who murdered, Murphy Dolan, I should say faction who murdered John Tunstall in exchange for a pardon.

00:10:47:03 – 00:11:06:18
Dan LeFebvre
That was kind of the context of the first movie, but then. So Billy the Kid and this one, young guns to Billy the Kid agrees and allows Wallace to arrest him so Wallace can protect Billy from anyone who wants to kill him before he can testify. But then Billy’s double crossed when the prosecuting attorney sides with the Irish politicians running Lincoln County.

00:11:06:26 – 00:11:29:14
Dan LeFebvre
Instead of going along with the pardon, he intends on taking Billy to trial, where he will surely be hanged. And while the movie doesn’t really mention it here, the impression that I got was this is the pardon that the older Brushy Bill mentioned wanting at the beginning of the movie. Is there any truth to the movie’s storyline around the pardon for Billy the Kid being offered?

00:11:29:16 – 00:11:51:25
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Yes, that that’s also based on a true story. Billy was offered a pardon from Gov Jim. Governor Lew Wallace a little bit different. What they show in the movie, Billy actually reached out to him, as opposed to Wallace reaching out to Billy the Kid at that time, mostly due to the Lincoln County War, that area was in complete disarray.

00:11:51:25 – 00:12:17:28
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Like matter of fact, whenever Lew Wallace was, was made governor right around the same time, then president it was Rutherford because he, gosh, what do they call it when you you martial law. What did he something martial law. Anyway, he he, Gosh, I’m I’m blanking on the word. He imposed martial law on Lincoln County.

00:12:18:00 – 00:12:37:09
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
I mean, there was a there was a lot of outlaw tivity going on at that time, a lot of lawlessness. But also at the same time, Governor Lew Wallace sort of issued a blanket amnesty for people on both sides, as long as they didn’t have any active indictments against them, which that didn’t apply to Billy. He was wanted for murder.

00:12:37:09 – 00:13:00:17
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
So were several of his close friends. So I guess he wanted in on a little bit of that amnesty action. So that’s why he reached out to the governor. They did meet in Lincoln like they show in the movie. They met in secrecy. They sort of hammered out the details and yeah, Billy left that meeting convinced that he was going to receive a pardon, and he agreed to testify.

00:13:00:19 – 00:13:24:14
Dan LeFebvre
I mean, I guess it’s that’s why they call it the Wild West, right? I mean, just, you know, everybody’s got some sort of crime that they’ve done, like you’re talking about before. So I don’t know what what what was just the general public opinion of these pardons being offered, like because Billy the Kid at that point was he, well, like a well known outlaw that then offering a pardon to him would have affected.

00:13:24:20 – 00:13:37:02
Dan LeFebvre
I’m trying to think of, you know, politicians today offering a pardon and the public reaction to who they offer the pardon to. Was that kind of a thing back then, too, or is is am I projecting today’s, politics back then?

00:13:37:05 – 00:14:03:04
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
You know, I’m not sure how that applied to, at the at the time frame when Billy and Governor Wallace agreed on the pardon, I’m not really sure what the public sentiment was. Billy was nowhere near as famous in his lifetime as he is nowadays. I mean, a lot of these famous figures from the Old West, their fame comes from bestselling novels and movies that followed the books later on.

00:14:03:07 – 00:14:35:01
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
He wasn’t a he was notorious. He was well known in, in that area of New Mexico, certainly. And as his fame grew, you know, he would be reported on papers as far away as New York City or even Paris, France, you know, but he wasn’t necessarily a household name, I can tell you that. Spoiler alert, when he when he was killed later on, there were so many grateful people that the guy that killed him ended up receiving several thousand dollars just in donations, just from people that were glad to be rid of Billy the Kid.

00:14:35:01 – 00:15:01:18
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
So as far as the public sentiment, you know, I’m not entirely sure that the public was aware that he was being offered a pardon. That’s another thing. There’s there’s not really any anything written down in black and white saying Lew Wallace absolutely guaranteed ability to get a pardon. It was more of an agreement. You know, there’s some people that think maybe the Billy read more into Wallace’s words than he should have.

00:15:01:21 – 00:15:11:18
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Maybe he put a little bit too much faith into Wallace. But as far as I’m aware, this was not excuse me, this was not a known thing that was just reported on the newspapers.

00:15:11:21 – 00:15:14:06
Dan LeFebvre
Okay, okay. More of an under the table type.

00:15:14:09 – 00:15:26:15
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Right. And, you know, when they arrested Billy, they had to stage an arrest so that they he didn’t just, you know, walk in one day, they arrest me. They had to stage an arrest to make it look legit.

00:15:26:18 – 00:15:37:05
Dan LeFebvre
Yeah. The movie kind of alludes to that. I don’t remember actually seeing it happen in the movie, but it alludes to, oh, we gotta stage this to put on the appearance that we’ve actually caught you. Yeah.

00:15:37:07 – 00:15:39:02
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Right. Right. Yep.

00:15:39:04 – 00:15:58:24
Dan LeFebvre
Well, after he realizes in the movie, after he realizes he’s not going to get the pardon, Billy slips out of his handcuffs. Thanks to, as the movie puts it, a historical and biological fact that he had small hands and big wrists. Then he proceeds to escape and comes back, pretending to be part of a lynch mob. He there they have faces covered.

00:15:58:26 – 00:16:15:04
Dan LeFebvre
Law enforcement just hands over Doc and Chavez, assuming that they’re going to get killed by this lynch mob. But then, of course, the real vigilantes show up and there’s a huge shootout before Billy and his gang can escape. Did this escape from the Lincoln County Courthouse really happening the way that we see in the movie?

00:16:15:07 – 00:16:37:28
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Absolutely not. You know, it was nothing like that. Billy was not in chains. He was not locked behind bars. He was basically under voluntary house arrest during that period. So there are kernels of truth in there. You know, they show everybody being thrown into like a pit in the ground. That was a real thing. There was a pit jail in Lincoln, New Mexico.

00:16:38:01 – 00:16:59:21
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
I a matter of fact, Billy had been thrown in that pit, back at the very beginning of the Lincoln County War. So he had actually spent time in there. I may I may not be, I’m not exactly sure about this, but by the time he comes back to Lincoln, I think they may have had an actual jail at that point, but, no, there was no gunfight with a lynch mob.

00:16:59:21 – 00:17:23:09
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Nothing like that. Billy stuck around, and, you know, they gloss over a few things. Billy did testify in real life. He, he testified in quite a few trials against a lot of his old enemies. And, he spent. Man, I want to say 2 to 3 months there in Lincoln, basically under a voluntary house arrest. And once he figured out that pardon wasn’t coming, he just got on a horse and rode out.

00:17:23:12 – 00:17:27:09
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
That was it. No gunfight, no dramatics, nothing like that.

00:17:27:11 – 00:17:33:21
Dan LeFebvre
Oh, okay. Well, that wouldn’t be as fun in the movie.

00:17:33:24 – 00:17:55:09
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Oh, yeah, I know, I know, you know, one thing you touched on was the big wrist and tiny hands. I’ve never I’ve always struggled with this because I’ve never seen anybody with wrists bigger than their hands, you know what I mean? But it is an undeniable fact that Billy was able to slip out of his chains on multiple occasions.

00:17:55:11 – 00:18:06:28
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
He was able to slide out of them. So he may have had abnormally tiny hands. I really don’t know. But that is a true fact. In this instance, though, he was he was not shackled or in chains or anything like that.

00:18:07:00 – 00:18:28:10
Dan LeFebvre
I touched on it briefly too, but the movie does make a point to say that there’s one thing an outlaw feared in New Mexico Territory, and that’s lynch mob justice. And that to me, as I was watching the movie, it implied that they didn’t necessarily fear law enforcement, though. So is it true that outlaws in the Old West feared vigilantes wanting to lynch them rather than actual law enforcement?

00:18:28:13 – 00:18:53:00
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Yeah, they feared both. So vigilante justice was a very real problem in the Old West, particularly in places like around that area of Lincoln, New Mexico. And part of it came from the law enforcement officials themselves being just as corrupt as the outlaws. So a lot of times they would just arrest their enemies as opposed to the people that were really committing the crimes.

00:18:53:03 – 00:19:20:28
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
So on one hand, you had sheriffs and town marshals that weren’t doing anything about the crime. So the only recourse for justice in a lot of situations were these lynch mobs. And at the same time, if you were arrested, you know, I’ve covered a lot of these guys, man. So many times, I can tell you there would be is the stone cold killer like John Wesley Hardin or King Fisher Clay Allison, and they would gun somebody down in cold blood.

00:19:21:00 – 00:19:43:04
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
They would make it to trial and they would get off, and they would just get off with a plea of self-defense or something like that. Nine times out of ten, if you made it to trial without being lynched by vigilantes, you would just get off scot free. So that was another reason why the vigilantes were so prevalent. They knew, if you know, this guy actually goes before a judge, he’s just going to get a slap on the wrist.

00:19:43:04 – 00:20:05:20
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
And most so if we want justice be served, we’re going to have to do it ourselves. Unfortunately, that meant a lot of innocent people also got lynched. No due process, you know, no, jury of your peers or anything like that. So it was not a good situation. Billy would have definitely been afraid of mob justice. He knew all about mob justice.

00:20:05:22 – 00:20:26:21
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
In fact, I mentioned a moment ago they had a staged arrest. He was very particular in who he was going to allow to arrest him. And he was basically worried that if the wrong people arrested him, air quotes, then he would get shot in the back while once again attempting to escape. You know, and you know him and his buddies.

00:20:26:21 – 00:20:51:00
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
They did the same thing during the Lincoln County War. They murdered a couple of guys who they claimed later on were attempting to escape. More than likely, it was just an execution. He knew the same thing happening to him would be a very real possibility, but if it was a legitimate if it was like a legitimate sheriff that arrested him, that was half ass honest, he would have been all right.

00:20:51:00 – 00:21:01:09
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
He just didn’t want any of his enemies to. A lot of his enemies also wore badges because they would have killed him in a heartbeat. No doubt about it.

00:21:01:11 – 00:21:09:15
Dan LeFebvre
Yeah, it sounds like the justice system wasn’t really great back then and then serving justice.

00:21:09:18 – 00:21:28:10
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
You. Well, you know, I, I, I’ve thought about that before. I was you know, it almost seems like they aired on the side of justice, almost like, okay, we’re not going to convict this person unless we know without a shadow of a doubt that they’re they’re guilty, right. So a lot of times I think people think of Old West justice like it was very harsh.

00:21:28:13 – 00:21:38:26
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
You get caught stealing a horse and you’re going to be executed. Nah, they would just send them to jail for a little bit or let them go. If a lynch mob didn’t get them, they were just fine.

00:21:38:29 – 00:21:56:21
Dan LeFebvre
So then is it maybe that they did? It just wasn’t proof. I mean, everybody didn’t have phones and be able to take pictures and video and stuff like that. So it’s pretty much it sounds like a lot of he said, she said type, evidence. And so if it’s really hard to prove, then they could get away with it.

00:21:56:23 – 00:22:15:02
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Yeah. I mean, if you if you get in a gunfight with somebody in a saloon and enough of your buddies are willing to say that the other person drew first, you’re fine, you’re going to get by with it. And that’s that’s what I’ve seen happen time and time again with a lot of these guys. They just had really good lawyers and, some pretty good friends to testify under oath.

00:22:15:04 – 00:22:32:24
Dan LeFebvre
If you go back to the movie after escaping, Billy and his gang plan to go to Old Mexico. But they need some money first. So they go to the richest man in New Mexico Territory, John Chisum. And the movie sets it up that John Chisholm was the financial partner for Tunstall and McSween, which makes him a friend of Billy the Kid.

00:22:32:26 – 00:22:52:02
Dan LeFebvre
But once Billy gets there, he demands $500 and Chisum refuses to pay. So instead Billy kills a couple of Chisholm’s men, and that basically turns Chisolm into an enemy. So then Chisum decides to use his money to finance the hunting of Billy the Kid. Was that really how Billy the Kid turned John Chisholm against him?

00:22:52:05 – 00:23:15:18
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Yes or no? He didn’t kill his men like they show in the movie. He did try to basically extort money from Chisholm. That much is true. Chisholm refused to pay, at which point Billy started stealing cattle from him. Now, was Billy already stealing cattle from him? Probably. Would he have stolen cattle even if Chisum had paid him the money?

00:23:15:20 – 00:23:36:20
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Probably. Billy. Billy was a thief, man. He stole horses and he stole cattle. That’s what he did. You know, Billy the Kid never robbed a train. He never held up a stagecoach. He never, robbed a bank. Nothing like that. He was just a cattle thief and a horse. The. A lot of people at that time were stealing Mr. Chisholm’s cattle.

00:23:36:20 – 00:23:54:17
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
A lot of people, Billy got the brunt of the blame, though he was the more well known of the people that were out there robbing with both hands. And even there were even certain killings that he was not involved in, that he was blamed for. And then that kind of leads back into what we were talking about earlier.

00:23:54:17 – 00:24:17:22
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
As far as his notoriety goes, as his fame grew, he just got blamed for pretty much everything that occurred in New Mexico Territory at that time. But yeah, as soon as he started stealing cattle from Chisum, that’s when Chisum and there was actually another guy named. Well, we’ll get to him in a minute named Joseph Lila. And they were both a let me correct that.

00:24:17:22 – 00:24:39:23
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
I’m not entirely sure I’m saying his last name correctly, Joseph Lee or Joseph Lee. But, they were both really fed up with Billy the Kid just stealing from everybody. And, but yeah, it was primarily the stealing of Chisholm’s livestock that turned him against Billy the Kid. Now, there is another story. It’s a little bit apocryphal.

00:24:39:26 – 00:25:03:26
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Supposedly, John Tunstall, not John Tunstall. John Chisum showed up at, Fort Sumner one day in the saloon there, in the cantina, and Billy held him pistol, gunpoint and basically demanded, I want $500 right now. Chisum said, hey, I don’t have my checkbook on me. I don’t have any money on me. Let me go back to my ranch and I’ll send you a check in the mail.

00:25:03:26 – 00:25:23:17
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Basically. Billy ended up. Let him go. Now, whether or not that actually happened, I don’t know. Doesn’t sound like something that Chisum would agree to. I think Chisum would have probably told him to go to hell, but the source on that is a guy named Paco. Ennio who? Who did know Billy the Kid. But, you know, sometimes Paco, like, stretched the truth.

00:25:23:17 – 00:25:30:19
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
A little bit. But yeah, as far as the animosity between Billy and, Chisum, that was absolutely true.

00:25:30:21 – 00:25:49:03
Dan LeFebvre
Were they ever allies then? Because when they ride in the movie, when they ride up to Chisum, it gives the impression that, in the events of the first movie, the first young guns that Chisum was an ally of, of Tunstall and McSweeney. So perhaps he and Billy were friends at one point. That’s the impression I got from the movie.

00:25:49:03 – 00:26:07:16
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
At least they probably weren’t friends just because at that time frame, when the Lincoln County War was going on, Billy would have been 17 or 18. Chisum was, you know, a middle aged man by that point, he probably didn’t even know about Billy the Kid during the Lincoln County War, but he would have certainly known about him at this point.

00:26:07:21 – 00:26:30:26
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
And, yeah, Chisum was somewhat aligned with, Billy’s former boss, Tunstall and Tunstall’s partner, Alexander McSween. Chisum really didn’t take part in that conflict, though. But he was he was sort of, you know, the the enemy of my enemy is my friend. Basically, Chisum was kind of opposed to the same people that Tunstall and McSween were opposed to.

00:26:30:28 – 00:26:45:05
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
But as far as any as far as Billy’s claims that Chisum owed him money, I think he like I said, he was basically just trying to extort some money from him, which he would have stolen from him anyway. I’m 100% positive of that.

00:26:45:07 – 00:26:48:28
Dan LeFebvre
And, I mean, it sounds like. Yeah, stealing cattle was a thing.

00:26:49:00 – 00:27:08:05
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Yeah. Oh, yeah. And Chisum stole cattle. Everybody back in those days was a it was a livestock thief. Chisum used to, send his men over to the Mescalero Apache reservation and steal their livestock because he knew they couldn’t do anything about it. No, he’s not exactly, you know, the purest of souls either.

00:27:08:07 – 00:27:30:29
Dan LeFebvre
Wow. Okay. I guess, do unto others as you would have done unto you. And he’s. He. It’s happening. It’s happening, is happening. Well, you might have already, answered this some, but if we go back to the movies, versions of events, at this point, John Chisum decides to hire a thief to catch a thief. So then throughout the movie, we get Pat Garrett going from being friend and riding with Billy the Kid to wanting to settle down.

00:27:31:01 – 00:27:52:23
Dan LeFebvre
And Chisum hears about this and offers Garrett the chance to settle down by making him Sheriff Pat Garrett, giving him $500 cash up front, the men and resources to hunt down Billy the Kid, and then a guarantee of $500 cash. Once Garrett kills Billy and if were to believe the movie’s version of events, Garrett accepts the job offer and the hunt for Billy the Kid begins.

00:27:52:25 – 00:28:03:10
Dan LeFebvre
Does the movie accurately portray this swing in Garrett’s character arc, going from being Billy’s friend to then being hired by Chisum as the sheriff to kill him?

00:28:03:12 – 00:28:23:13
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Well, you know, there’s, there’s a several different caveats there. You know, Chisum had no authority to make anybody a sheriff. So really, all all he did was convince Pat Garrett to run for sheriff. He still had to be elected and all that stuff. He still had to go out on the campaign trail. Excuse me. What happened?

00:28:23:20 – 00:28:49:05
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Garrett got married. I want to say it was in January of 1880. Not long thereafter, he moved, to Roswell, New Mexico, which at that point was part of Lincoln County. Back in those days, Lincoln County was massive. It was it was way bigger than it is nowadays. So Roswell, New Mexico was still Lincoln County, while he was there in Lincoln, he gets buddy buddy with John Chisum and the guy I mentioned earlier, Joseph Leia.

00:28:49:07 – 00:29:15:15
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
And they basically convinced him to run for sheriff. I don’t know where they got the $500 up front and $500 after. I don’t believe that either one of those guys paid Garrett anything to run. You know, he Garrett wanted to become a respectable man. You know, that was, a big goal of his. You. He had spent a lot of time at Fort Sumner, sort of cavorting with people that maybe had a little bit of loose morals.

00:29:15:18 – 00:29:36:27
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
He was a married man. Now he was going to raise a family. He wanted to make a name for himself. And, yeah, they convinced him to run for sheriff. I don’t think they there was any money exchanged. Later on, Billy would have a $500 bounty placed on its head. Maybe that’s where they’re basing it from. But that bounty was never from Chisum or, Joseph.

00:29:36:27 – 00:29:41:06
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Leia. That was actually offered by, the Wallace, the governor.

00:29:41:08 – 00:29:59:22
Dan LeFebvre
In the movie. The impression I got was that Chisum convinced Garrett to to be sheriff, specifically to hunt for Billy the Kid. Was that basically the reason why he became sheriff then? To hunt for Billy? Or was it more that he became sheriff and then. Well, now there’s this this outlaw, and that’s that’s your job?

00:29:59:24 – 00:30:24:24
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
No. Yeah, that was his problem. You’re all right about that. That was his primary reason for running for sheriff. That’s why they wanted him to run for sheriff. And you know, part of it, like you say, it takes a thief to catch a thief. While there’s not necessarily in any indication that Garrett and Billy had rode the hoot off trail together, anything like that, he was still very familiar with Billy’s mannerisms, with Billy’s various hideouts, with his habits.

00:30:24:27 – 00:30:48:23
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
So he was intimately aware of Billy the Kid. Now, as far as their friendship is concerned, this is something that historians still debate about all the time. There’s some people that try to downplay it and say they were. They were just acquaintances, you know, there’s other people that go with, basically the same route they went in the movie that they were just the best of friends, almost like brothers.

00:30:48:26 – 00:31:13:24
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
I think the truth lies somewhere in the middle. If, Paulina Maxwell, she was, one of Billy the Kids gal pals. If what she said is any indication, they were extremely tight. They were very good friends. But that friendship doesn’t really seem to have extended outside of Fort Sumner now. Paul Lita would later, decades later, she would say that when they found out that Garrett was running for sheriff, it came as a big shock to them.

00:31:13:24 – 00:31:27:03
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Like they didn’t think he would turn on on his friends like that. And, that’s basically that basically severed their friendship from that point on. You know, if they came face to face, there was probably going to be some violence.

00:31:27:05 – 00:31:32:12
Dan LeFebvre
Okay. So it wasn’t like Garrett ran with Billy the Kid, though, like we see happening in the beginning of the movie.

00:31:32:14 – 00:31:57:17
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
If anybody can find any historical evidence showing this might. I’m all eyes and ears, but I have never been able to find any indication that they did outlaw activities together. Now, when Garrett won, the matter of fact, Billy actually campaigned against him during the during the election, he would travel out. Yeah, he would travel out to, like, the, local Hispanic communities and tell them, hey, don’t vote for this joker.

00:31:57:19 – 00:32:11:21
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Won enough. Garrett had the backing not just of Chisholm and Leah, but he had, his cronies up in Santa Fe, the Santa Fe ring. They were back in his play. Now, interestingly enough.

00:32:11:23 – 00:32:34:16
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
You know, it was just like, nowadays you can win an election, but you’re still not going to take hold of that office until the following year, right? So if you’re elected in November, you’re not going to take office until January. February. It was the same thing with Pat Garrett. However, the guy who was the sheriff, the incumbent, the guy that he beat in the election, he was a he basically went ahead and deputized Garrett and in step back.

00:32:34:16 – 00:32:56:02
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
So for all intents and purposes, Garrett was sheriff in just he was basically sheriff at that point as soon as he won the election, he may not have been sheriff in name, but he was a deputy with the power of the the Lincoln County sheriff. He also received a commission as a deputy US marshal is Fort Sumner where Billy the Kid like to spend time?

00:32:56:02 – 00:33:05:05
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
That was not in Lincoln County. So even a sheriff, he would not have jurisdiction up there. But with that marshal’s badge, now you can go in anywhere.

00:33:05:07 – 00:33:17:20
Dan LeFebvre
Oh, ink. So maybe maybe that’s kind of in the movie because they hand him the badge right away. So maybe that was kind of a nod to that of, pretty much becoming a sheriff. Right away. It sounds like, even if it’s not official by title, but.

00:33:17:22 – 00:33:28:01
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
And he did I mean, as soon as he as soon as he got that badge, he went on the hunt. That was that was his primary goal. Not necessarily to kill, but to arrest Billy the Kid.

00:33:28:04 – 00:33:43:15
Dan LeFebvre
In the movie, after he becomes sheriff, we see Pat Garrett hiring, journalists to tag along and record the hunt for Billy the Kid. So then he can turn it into a book. And then at the end of the movie, there’s some text on screen saying it. The book was called The Authentic Life of Billy the Kid, and it was a failure according to the movie.

00:33:43:22 – 00:33:47:19
Dan LeFebvre
Did he really write that book and was it a failure or was it any good?

00:33:47:21 – 00:34:06:07
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Yeah, it was a failure at the time. But yeah, The Authentic Life of Billy the Kid was published, I believe it was in 1882. So very, very soon after the events that are portrayed in the movie. And the guy that you see there, Ash Upson, he was hired by Pat Garrett basically to be a ghost writer.

00:34:06:14 – 00:34:23:28
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
So as far as his, you know, I have a love hate relationship with that book. You can tell the parts that Ash Upson wrote, and you can tell the parts that Pat Garrett wrote. Ash ups him. He was he was a little full of it. He never let the truth get in the way of a good story.

00:34:23:28 – 00:34:47:03
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Right? Ash Upson even went so far, he didn’t know Billy the Kid’s actual birth date, so he just substituted it with his own birth date. Like stuff like that. You know, he would just make stuff up. You can kind of sorta tell where ash ups and stops writing and Pat Garrett takes over, because the parts were where Pat’s talking about, especially towards the end of the book.

00:34:47:05 – 00:35:05:10
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
There’s a lot more accuracy there. So it’s one of those sources that you got to take with a grain of salt or a grain of salt. You definitely need to corroborate a lot of the stuff in the book with other sources, but it’s, to me, it’s a must read for anybody who’s a fan of Billy the Kid history.

00:35:05:12 – 00:35:23:11
Dan LeFebvre
Yeah, yeah, it sounds like there’s well, I guess like movies. They they they, you know, never get the truth, get in the way of a good story. It just sounds like that’s the case, too. There. Well, in the movie, while they’re on the run, Billy and his gang end up in the town of White Oaks at a brothel run by Jane Greathouse.

00:35:23:13 – 00:35:48:01
Dan LeFebvre
And she’s. She’s played by junior, right, in the movie. And she seems to be an old friend of Billy’s. And then that night, a mob of townspeople carrying torches started to burn the building down. If Billy the Gang don’t give themselves up, a local lawman guy named Deputy Carlyle goes inside, tries to talk to Billy, tries to get him to come out peacefully, but instead Billy tricks Carlyle into putting on Travis’s hat and coat and then pushes Carlyle out of the front door and the mob is waiting there.

00:35:48:01 – 00:36:06:07
Dan LeFebvre
They just open fire and kill him, thinking that it’s Chavez. But of course it’s not. And then when they realize their mistake, the town scatters. And that’s how Billy gets out of that one. Even though the older Brushy Bill says that he got pinned with Carlyle’s death, how much of that event really happened?

00:36:06:09 – 00:36:09:20
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Some of it.

00:36:09:22 – 00:36:12:10
Dan LeFebvre
Never left the truth anyway.

00:36:12:12 – 00:36:32:24
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Never let the truth. And, you know, I, I used to love that scene when I was a kid. I had the biggest crush on Jenny right at that time. But, yeah, she never existed in real life. Jane. Great. Else was actually. Jim. Great house. It was a man. They call him Whiskey Jim because he used to illegally sell alcohol to Native Americans.

00:36:32:27 – 00:36:52:05
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
He ran a roadhouse. It wasn’t actually in White Oaks. It was about 40 miles to the north. And it was. It wasn’t necessarily a, House bill repute. It was basically a place where you could go and get a meal, a couple of drinks and a place to sleep for the night. Whether or not he had any soiled doves working for him, that I can’t say.

00:36:52:05 – 00:37:09:04
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
I’m sure he did, but I honestly don’t know about that. But it was sort of a hangout for Billy and several of his buddies. There’s a lot of people that think that that’s where Billy first met Dave Root. The bar now on the on the day in question, it was Billy the Kid, Dave Root of Ball and Billy Wilson.

00:37:09:07 – 00:37:31:19
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
So Chavez and Scurlock and the others that you see in the movie, they were not there for this. But yeah, they they were surrounded by a posse. Deputy Carlyle. He wasn’t like an he wasn’t like a full time deputy. He was a blacksmith, believe it or not. He was just deputized to be part of this posse. And, the reason he went inside is because he knew some of those guys.

00:37:31:19 – 00:37:56:08
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
He was on friendly terms with them, so they sort of swapped it out. So, Jim, great house. He goes outside and he’s basically the posse’s hostage while Deputy Carlyle is inside trying to talk everybody into surrendering. Well, Billy’s not going to surrender to a lynch mob, so he’s steadily pouring whiskey down. Deputy Carlisle’s mouth gets him stumbling drunk.

00:37:56:11 – 00:38:18:04
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
The posse outside keeps tossing out ultimatums. They finally they say, we’re going to give you five minutes. If you don’t come out and surrender, we’re going to kill Jim Greathouse. There’s a shot, and he gets fired. Supposedly, Billy the Kid would later claim the shot was fired from the outside, at which point, drunken Carlyle freaks out, jumps through the window.

00:38:18:07 – 00:38:40:07
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Okay, so as he jumps in the window, he’s gunned down by his posse. That’s according to Billy the Kid. Later on, gave root a ball, allegedly told somebody that he, Billy Wilson and Billy the Kid, that all three of them shot Carlisle in the back when he jumped through the window. Where the truth lies, I don’t know.

00:38:40:09 – 00:38:59:23
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
However, just like they show in the movie, Billy the Kid would definitely get the blame for that particular killing. And, you know, that kind of, that kind of lost him a lot of goodwill to, a lot of people, because Deputy Carlisle was well-liked and well-respected. So a lot of people didn’t appreciate the way he was gunned down.

00:38:59:23 – 00:39:20:14
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Whether or not was the posse or not that did it. Billy still got a lot of the blame for it. And as they show in the movie, Carlisle or not Carlisle, Great Houses Roadhouse was burned to the ground the next day. That is something that did occur. I don’t know that he got on his horse naked and rode out of town, but like, the lady does in the movie.

00:39:20:14 – 00:39:23:15
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
But they definitely did burn this place to the ground.

00:39:23:18 – 00:39:42:19
Dan LeFebvre
I mean, I guess it just from, as you were explaining, the two different versions of what could have happened with Carlisle, I it sounds like maybe both could be true, like they could have shot him as he went in the back, shot him as he went out the window. And then also the posse opened fire on him. And I mean, who knows?

00:39:42:21 – 00:39:51:21
Dan LeFebvre
I mean, yeah, I guess that kind of goes back to I was talking about it could be like, you know, starts to get into he said she said in the evidence and what really happened. And, you know, I don’t know.

00:39:51:23 – 00:40:09:21
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Yeah, yeah. It’s one of those and, you know, come to think of it, you would think that if he was shot in the back as he was coming through the window, somebody would have made note of it, you know? But, I’m not aware if there’s any, contemporary reports that specify where his wounds were. I need to check into that.

00:40:09:21 – 00:40:12:00
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
That’s a that’s a good idea.

00:40:12:02 – 00:40:29:20
Dan LeFebvre
Well, if we head back to the movie’s timeline, Pat Garrett and his men finally catch up to Billy and his gang. And this leads to the big climactic shootout where doc Spurlock is hit badly. He sacrifices himself so everyone else can escape, but it doesn’t really work because Billy finds himself surrounded and captured, and then he’s sentenced to hang.

00:40:29:20 – 00:40:51:00
Dan LeFebvre
But before that gets carried out, Jane Greathouse comes back and she sneaks a gun into the outhouse so Billy can use it to make his escape. In the process, he kills some of the bad guy deputies that we’ve grown to dislike throughout the movie, and he rides off to join the rest of his gang. Once he’s there, we find out that Chavez was mortally wounded, and I know there’s a lot in there, but all of that happens in the movie.

00:40:51:00 – 00:41:04:01
Dan LeFebvre
It’s just like ten minutes of screen time. So it really seems like the movie is rushing through a lot of events to kind of wrap up a lot of these different storylines. Is there any truth to those things that we see happening in that fast paced sequence of events?

00:41:04:03 – 00:41:29:00
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
A little bit of truth in there. So like you said, it’s, they, they gloss over a lot of stuff. So, okay, at this point in time, after the debacle at, White Oaks, Billy’s on the run. Pat Garrett, hunt him down. And, you know, it wasn’t just Pat Garrett that was after him. There was, contingent of cattlemen from the Texas Panhandle who were also on the hunt for Billy.

00:41:29:03 – 00:41:50:04
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
What Billy was doing at this period following the Lincoln County War. Basically, he was still in horses in New Mexico, trailing them all the way up to the Texas Panhandle, selling them to ranchers there. And then on his way back to New Mexico, he was still a bunch of cattle and sell them to people here in are there in New Mexico.

00:41:50:06 – 00:42:11:12
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Sorry about that. And my alarm going off. But, so you had Pat Garrett hunt him down. Believe it or not, there was actually a Secret Service agent who was in New Mexico at that time hunting Billy down together. He was connected to a counterfeiting ring, and, yeah, the cowboys from Texas. So. And even the military was on the hunt for Billy the Kid.

00:42:11:12 – 00:42:31:09
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
So a lot of people were looking for him. His sort of a safe place was Fort Sumner, where you see Fort Sumner a lot throughout the movie. The the part where he’s hanging out with the guy he keeps calling Beaver. That was a real life guy named Beaver Smith. They had a cantina there at Fort Sumner, but, Billy felt safe there.

00:42:31:12 – 00:42:55:11
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
It was a predominantly Hispanic area. He was very friendly with the Hispanics. He got along amazingly with them. He spoke their language fluently, was very assimilated into their culture. So he felt safe there. Well, as soon as Garrett gets the badge, he he ends up linking up with those cowboys from Texas. And they lie in wait at Fort Sumner and set up an ambush.

00:42:55:14 – 00:43:12:02
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
So one day, Billy and the boys are riding up Billy the Kid just so happens to be riding sort of in the rear of the column. When they get right up to the to the gates, Garrett yells out from the halt, Billy’s friend. Tom, follow your goes for his pistol! They blasted out of the saddle. Kill him!

00:43:12:04 – 00:43:17:03
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Billy and the others are able to will their horses around and escape.

00:43:17:05 – 00:43:38:19
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Get bad. A couple of days later and the rest of the what’s called the the Stone house at a place called Stinking Springs wasn’t very far away from Fort Sumner at all. And, it was just an old, abandoned, just tiny one room building made of rocks. Basically. That’s kind of what you see in that scene where, they show Scurlock being gunned down.

00:43:38:21 – 00:44:01:08
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
So basically three days later or may have been four days later, Garrett and the posse track them down to the stone house surrounded in the middle of the night. And the next morning, one of Billy’s good friends got him. Charlie Beaudry steps outside. He’s wearing, a big, sombrero of the kind that Billy the Kid also was partial to.

00:44:01:10 – 00:44:27:19
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
He’s mistaken for Billy the Kid. Garrett gives a signal rifle sound and Beaudry shot the pieces. Charlie Beaudry was a Lincoln County regulator. He did help Billy still in live stock after Gotti wore, but at this point he too, he was kind of pulling a Doc Scurlock. He was distancing himself. He had gotten married. He was trying to settle down.

00:44:27:21 – 00:44:48:14
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
That was the last person they wanted to kill. Garrett. And then it was a it was a complete accident. So in Young Guns two, when you see Doc Scurlock being gunned down, that never happened. Doc, was living in Texas at the time. That is actually, portrayal, pretty accurate portrayal of the death of the very real life Charlie Beaudry.

00:44:48:17 – 00:45:12:18
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
There was a siege. Believe it or not, Garrett actually brought in a wagon. They started cooking breakfast outside to lure the boys out, and it worked. They ended up. They all surrendered. So it was. It was Billy the Kid, Ruta Ball, Tom Pickett and Billy Wilson. All of these guys ended up coming out. They surrendered. They were arrested and taken the Las Vegas in New Mexico and placed in jail.

00:45:12:20 – 00:45:30:24
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Billy was in jail for a while. He was actually tried and convicted for murder during this period. He’s then taken to Lincoln to await, execution. So that all the stuff that you’re saying they glossed over. Absolutely. You know, they you don’t we don’t get to see him. Well, you do see the trial. We do see that in the movie.

00:45:30:24 – 00:45:59:10
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
I forgot about that. The judge says he’s going to hang by the neck until he’s dead. Dead, dead. And Billy tells him you can go to hell, hell, hell. But but yeah, it they did sort of gloss over a few things. It wasn’t Scurlock who was killed. It was actually a guy named Charlie Beaudry. Now, if anybody is not familiar with any of these people and, you’re a little morbidly curious, do a Google image search for Charlie Beaudry, and you’ll find the photo of him and his wife.

00:45:59:10 – 00:46:14:19
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
It was actually taken off of his body. Still has the bloodstains on it. Really cryptic image. But, he was he was a real deal outlaw. Very tough guy. And unfortunately, he was trying to go straight at the time. He was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. That deal.

00:46:14:21 – 00:46:32:01
Dan LeFebvre
Wow. Yeah. I mean, I guess that kind of goes back to. Yeah, they don’t have I know they wanted posters, but they don’t have, you know, mug shots and photographs and things like that to know what somebody actually looks like. So they’re going it sounds like what you said they were going off Garrett’s recognition of him. Right? Garrett gave the give the shot.

00:46:32:05 – 00:46:41:05
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Or gave it? Yeah. That’s what it seems to be. It seems to be the case to me as well. I mean, Garrett Garrett just they it was a case of mistaken identity, you know?

00:46:41:07 – 00:47:04:12
Dan LeFebvre
Well, throughout the movie, I really felt like it could have benefited from some titles clarifying dates and locations and perhaps that that sequence, there’s perhaps the most obvious at the end, because the whole time they’re talking about going to old Mexico. And there’s one line of dialog after the shootout where Arkansas Dave asks, the a couple of guys nearby if he’s in old Mexico and they simply nod.

00:47:04:12 – 00:47:20:24
Dan LeFebvre
So he seems to think that he’s finally made it. And since the whole gang talked about going to old Mexico, the entire movie, that led me to believe, as I was watching it, that maybe finally they they made it to old Mexico after this big shootout. Can you clarify the actual locations where these events in the movie took place?

00:47:20:24 – 00:47:23:24
Dan LeFebvre
I’m assuming not in near Old Mexico?

00:47:23:26 – 00:47:41:21
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Yeah. You know, there is some indication that Billy was planning on going to Mexico and one of his buddies would would have write a book. Gosh, man, it was one of the Cocos. And he was either Frank or George Coe, who said that Billy was planning on going to Mexico and laying low. He just had to settle some business there.

00:47:41:21 – 00:48:04:23
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Fort Sumner I think. I do think that’s pretty plausible. He just dragged his feet too long about doing it and he got got. But Dave Root Ball would flee to old Mexico like they show in the movie. It wasn’t immediate like that. He would live for several more years. But yeah, he would eventually find his way to Mexico, to a place called Parral, Mexico.

00:48:04:25 – 00:48:32:06
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
And he got crossways with the wrong guys. They shot him dead, and they cut his head off and placed it on a pike so that that part was real. I think, you see him kind of sharpening the machetes and get ready to take care of him. It just didn’t happen. As immediate as they show in the in this in the in the movie, most of the movie is going to take place either in Lincoln, New Mexico or Fort Sumner, New Mexico, maybe.

00:48:32:08 – 00:48:51:15
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Oh, excuse me. The scene where they show Garrett meeting with, John Chisum and being offered the job of sheriff, maybe that’s supposed to represent the capital of Santa Fe or maybe Roswell. I’m not sure, but I know what you’re talking about. It does sort of seem like they’re just on the run towards New Mexico the entire time around.

00:48:51:15 – 00:49:00:01
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Answer I’m sorry, old Mexico, but no, in most of what you’re seeing, there is either taking place at Lincoln or Fort Sumner or the surrounding areas.

00:49:00:03 – 00:49:08:25
Dan LeFebvre
Okay. Yeah, that makes a lot more sense because, yeah, I got the impression that, yeah, they’re trying to trying to make it there, but they never really seem to make it there.

00:49:08:28 – 00:49:13:09
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
The route about did, but, I’m sure at his final moments he wished he hadn’t.

00:49:13:12 – 00:49:30:29
Dan LeFebvre
At the very end of the movie, Pat Garrett is alone when he finds Billy the Kid, and he seems to regret being in the position of killing his old friend, according to the movie. Garrett says this hurts him to do it, but he’s in a place that he can’t get out of and Billy says he’s going to make it easy and then turns his back to Garrett.

00:49:31:01 – 00:49:52:18
Dan LeFebvre
There’s a gunshot, but the movie never really shows Billy getting hit. And then in the next scene, we see a casket being lowered into the ground with Garrett and Chisum, and they’re watching this going on. And then the movie cuts back to the elderly Brushy Bill telling his story to the lawyer from the beginning. So from the movie’s perspective, it seems to suggest that Pat Garrett helped Billy the Kid fake his death.

00:49:52:21 – 00:50:15:07
Dan LeFebvre
And then he lived out the rest of his days as Brushy Bill Roberts. There’s even some text at the end of the movie that says, Brushy Bill went before the New Mexico governor, Thomas Mabry, on November 29th, 1950, and despite identification by several surviving friends of the notorious outlaw Brushy Bill, was discredited. Finally, I’m going to quote this last bit of text from the movie.

00:50:15:07 – 00:50:34:02
Dan LeFebvre
So this is a quote from the movie. It says, quote, whether or not Brushy Bill Roberts was Billy the Kid remains a mystery. End quote. Can you help unravel the history that we know from the movies version of this guy named Brushy Bill Roberts, living in the 1950s, actually being Billy the Kid?

00:50:34:05 – 00:50:53:22
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Yeah. So I’m glad you included that quote, especially the the word mystery. There is a lot of mystery, you know, taking taking Brushy Bill out of the equation for now. There’s a lot of mystery surrounding Billy the Kid’s life. There’s a lot of stuff that we make assumptions about that we don’t know for certain. We don’t know when he was born.

00:50:53:24 – 00:51:17:15
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
We don’t know where he was born. We don’t know how old he was when he died. We don’t know his his father’s name, his mother’s maiden name. There’s so much we don’t know about Billy the Kid. His death is probably the least mysterious aspect of his entire life. So once again, there’s a lot of misconceptions surrounding his death.

00:51:17:18 – 00:51:37:25
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
To be frank, there’s a lot of false information that people put out there. I’m really not sure why, but, one of the things that people seem to, to think is true, that’s not true, is that Garrett killed Billy the Kid without anybody else seeing what was happening, and then buried his body before anybody could get a good look at it.

00:51:37:27 – 00:52:02:18
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
That could not be farther from the truth. So Garrett had two deputies with him at the time, Kit McKinney and John Poe. They snuck into Fort Sumner under the cover of Dark. They and they eventually made their way to the home of P Maxwell. So Fort Sumner used to be a legitimate military installation. A guy named Lucian Maxwell bought the fort from the Army.

00:52:02:22 – 00:52:29:06
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
I want to say, in the late 1860s. Could be wrong about that date. Lucian Maxwell ended up passing away. Everything went to his widow and his kids. His son was Pete Maxwell. So by the time these these events are unfolding, Pete Maxwell basically had to run to Fort Sumner. Lady I mentioned earlier, Paul Lita Maxwell, that was Pete’s sister, and also Billy, the kid’s alleged girlfriend.

00:52:29:08 – 00:52:44:29
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
So if anybody knew where Billy the Kid was, it was going to be Pete Maxwell, right? Pat and his deputies make their way once again to the middle of the night. It’s dark. They kind of sneak their way inside the fort. They go because they want to talk to Maxwell. Basically, they ask him, hey, have you seen Billy?

00:52:44:29 – 00:53:06:23
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Do you know where Billy could be? They were not expecting to find Billy the Kid there. Matter of fact, both. You know, Garrett obviously would write his book, The Authentic Life of Billy the Kid, John W Poe. Decades later, he would write his own book called, The Death of Billy the Kid. And they’re both very clear that they kind of felt like they were on a wild goose chase at this point.

00:53:06:26 – 00:53:31:17
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
They knew Billy was in the area. They just didn’t think he would be, for lack of better words, I guess naive enough to actually be inside Fort Sumner itself when he was such a wanted man by this point. And they definitely didn’t think he’d be at Pete Maxwell’s place. Right. So Garrett goes inside to question Pete Maxwell. He leaves his two deputies outside on the porch.

00:53:31:19 – 00:53:47:13
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
This happened very quickly, like in less than a couple of minutes. Right at that moment, Billy the Kid comes strolling up. He’s he doesn’t have his boots on. He’s in his he’s in his stockings, as they call them. He’s got a pistol in one hand and a butcher knife in the other. He’s going to get a midnight snack.

00:53:47:15 – 00:54:03:20
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
He’s. There was a slaughtered steer. He was going to cut a piece of meat off of it, take it back to a friend’s house. They were going to cook him a midnight snack and he was going to go to sleep. So he wasn’t expecting Garrett either. It was all it was. It was the perfect storm. He’s almost on the deputies.

00:54:03:22 – 00:54:24:21
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
When he notices them, he immediately raises his pistol and starts asking them in Spanish. Once again. You know, it was a predominantly Spanish area. He’s asking them, Kens, who is it? DNS kidnaps as he’s back in. As he’s doing that, he’s backing into Maxwell’s bedroom. The layout of Fort Sumter was a little strange. There’s a lot more involved here, Pete.

00:54:24:26 – 00:54:45:14
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Only he did not have an interior door going to his his room where he where he stayed. It was an exterior door. So Billy just backed into it. He. Pete, who are those guys outside? At the same moment, he sees a shadowy figure standing next to Pete Maxwell’s bed, lifts his pistol again, says kidnaps. And that’s when Garrett shoots him and kills him.

00:54:45:17 – 00:55:04:29
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
So right off the bat, you’ve got an eyewitness and Pete Maxwell. The whole entire town converged on that building. As soon as soon as this happened, he, Maxwell, did not live alone. His mother, his siblings, other relatives all live in that house. They came to his room. They saw Billy the Kid lying there dead. Everybody else was looking in the window.

00:55:04:29 – 00:55:29:24
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
They saw Billy the Kid’s body lying in their dead. Things were so tense that Garrett and his deputies had to follow it up inside of Maxwell’s room for the rest of the night. They were expecting the mob to attack them just to avenge Billy’s. That the attack never came. The next morning, a coroner’s jury was formed. Every single one of the people that were in the coroner’s jury where people who personally knew Billy the Kid, they saw the body.

00:55:29:27 – 00:55:54:24
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
They interviewed Pete Maxwell, they talked to the deputies, they talked to Garrett. They issued a, coroner’s jury report. It was basically the same thing as a death certificate back in those days, describing the entire event and explicitly saying that, yes, Billy the Kid was shot and killed by Pat Garrett. Later on that morning, they released Billy’s body to the citizens of Fort Sumner.

00:55:54:27 – 00:56:17:18
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
He was a very popular figure there. A lot of people loved him. Not everybody loved him, but a lot of people did. They dressed and cleaned his body or they cleaned his body. They dressed it in new clothes. Other people dug the grave. They held a public wake, like there was a literal public wake. So many, many, many people saw Billy the Kid’s dead body.

00:56:17:21 – 00:56:44:12
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
The funeral was attended by nearly everybody in town. According to Polly, the Maxwell. And that was it. And of course, Billy the Kid was never seen again after that happened. So there is a lot of evidence coming from multiple sources that Pat Garrett did indeed kill Billy the Kid. There was no photograph taken. A lot of people are under the false impression that every dead outlaw had their pictures taken back in those days.

00:56:44:14 – 00:57:01:24
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Once again, nothing could be further from the truth. I know what people are thinking of because there are a lot of. I hate to sound say it this way, but a lot of cool photos of dead outlaws from the old West. They would prop them up, take pictures of them, turn them into postcards. That is something that did happen on occasion.

00:57:01:27 – 00:57:24:01
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
But I mean, we only have like maybe 15 to 20 of those type of photos. At the same time, there is probably a thousand outlaws at any given time roaming the West. There’s a lot of people like Dave Root Ball, for example. We don’t have any photos of him while he was alive. Right. And he was a much more accomplished outlaw than Billy the Kid ever was.

00:57:24:03 – 00:57:44:00
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
There was a lot of people that we don’t have photographic evidence of their death. Right. But some people will point to that and say, that’s how we know that Pat Garrett did not kill Billy the Kid because we don’t have a photo. Well, number one, he didn’t have to provide photographic proof. He had all the proof he needed in the coroner’s jury report and all the eyewitnesses.

00:57:44:03 – 00:58:09:02
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
And we know that because he was paid the reward eventually for killing Billy the Kid, and there was no photographer that lived in Fort Sumner. This is a very tiny community. I want to say it was less than 300 people. Yeah. No, no, photographer probably within about 2 or 3 days riding, Fort Sumner. Okay. So.

00:58:09:04 – 00:58:29:07
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Oh, and one more thing historians have been able to identify. At least I always forget on the exact number it was. It’s over two dozen people by name who saw Billy the Kid’s dead body. A lot of these people live for a very, very long time. I’m talking up until the 1920s, 30s. Some of these people wrote books.

00:58:29:13 – 00:58:50:19
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Some of them had had their journals published. Many of them were interviewed by historians and journalists. And, you know, there may be certain details that people get wrong, just like any, you know, if if there’s a carjacking and a police officer shows up, somebody is going to say it happened at 115 in the afternoon, somebody else is going to say, no, no, it was after 2:00.

00:58:50:19 – 00:59:12:18
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Somebody is going to say the guy was wearing a green shirt. Somebody else is going to say, but they all agreed. That guy definitely stole that car, right? It was the same thing with Billy’s death. Not all the details lined up. Maybe not everybody agrees on the timing, but the one thing that they all maintained for literally the rest of their lives, even after Pat Garrett was long gone, was that Garrett absolutely killed Billy the Kid.

00:59:12:20 – 00:59:36:05
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
So there’s a ton of evidence showing that it’s kind of all the all the mystery, the supposed mystery surrounding the kid’s death is pretty much much ado about nothing. By contrast, there is zero evidence that Brushy Bill Roberts was who he claimed he was. It’s a cool story, man. I, I when I was a kid, I believe that Brushy Bill Roberts was Billy the Kid I want.

00:59:36:06 – 00:59:56:02
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
And to this day, if there was a new discovery that definitively that definitively prove that brushy was Billy the Kid, I would be ecstatic. You know, I don’t look up to Billy the Kid as a hero. Like a lot of people, I’m pretty neutral on the people I cover on my show. They were just historical figures, you know?

00:59:56:04 – 01:00:13:01
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
But he is a very sympathetic character, and he’s a very. He was a likable guy when he was alive. He was fun loving. He, if mean, you got in the time machine right now and were whisked back to Fort Sumner, we would be in no danger. Billy the Kid is not just going to shoot you like a dog in the street.

01:00:13:07 – 01:00:36:00
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
He wasn’t a he wasn’t a psychopath. A lot of the people I cover on my show were definitely psychopaths. Billy was a young kid who got caught up with the wrong people. He probably had a little bit of, you know, he aversion to authority, but he wasn’t an evil person. And we don’t like the idea of him just being killed in the dark like that at the hands of Pat Garrett.

01:00:36:00 – 01:00:51:27
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Somebody that used to be his friend is not a it’s not a fairy tale ending. You know, we never get to see Billy the Kid grow up to be Billy the Man, essentially. You know, so I think a lot of people just don’t want it to be true. They don’t want Billy to have been killed the way he was.

01:00:52:01 – 01:01:16:23
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Somebody like Brushy Bill Roberts comes along. It’s a very compelling story. It’s surface level. So people just, you know, they buy hook, line and sinker and now brushy. Like I said, on the surface, it’s very compelling. The story goes that Brushy had all the same scars as Billy the Kid that he had. He he was fluent in Spanish, just like Billy the Kid.

01:01:16:23 – 01:01:34:28
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
He was ambidextrous, could shoot just as well with both hands that he had tiny hands and big wrist, just like Billy the Kid. He knew things about the Lincoln County War that nobody could have possibly known unless they were Billy the Kid, or very close to Billy the Kid. And yeah, I think he sort of touched on this earlier.

01:01:35:01 – 01:02:01:13
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
There were people who knew Billy the Kid that vouched for Brushy Bill Roberts. Sounds very compelling. If any of that that I just said was true, I would be convinced. But if you dig just a little bit deeper, it all falls apart. So we can start with the multiple gunshot wounds. Brushy Bill. Well, let me just. Have you ever known a pathological liar?

01:02:01:15 – 01:02:02:01
Dan LeFebvre
Yeah.

01:02:02:03 – 01:02:28:08
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Unfortunately, a lot of times they don’t know when to stop, so they’ll they’ll they’ll take, a tiny lie and it’ll snowball until it’s just this fantastical, unbelievable fairytale story. Brushy Bill was the same. He, the the stories he told were. If you tried to print them as a fiction novel now, you’d be laughed out of the publishing house like, we’re not going to we’re not going to print this.

01:02:28:08 – 01:02:49:06
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
This is too silly. This would be a comedy story, you know? But. So, Bryce, he didn’t just say that he was shot a couple of times. He had been shot. I want to say 30, 34 times. He claimed he had 34 various bullet wounds and knife wounds over his body. Did he have the same scars as Billy the Kid?

01:02:49:06 – 01:03:12:02
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Well, how many times was Billy the Kid shot when he was still before Pat Garrett killed him? Possibly once. There’s some evidence. He took a bullet to the thigh when they ambushed and killed Sheriff Brady. Even that’s not, like, proven for a fact, because just a couple of days later, Billy was on his feet, participating in a completely different gun gunfight at Blazer’s Mill.

01:03:12:09 – 01:03:30:15
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
So we think he was possibly wounded. It may have been a grazing wound, at one point in his life, but he certainly wasn’t riddled with scars like Brushy Bill. Roberts claimed that he was. So no, he didn’t have any of the same scars. The ability to kill because we don’t know what scars bleed to get. Have number two.

01:03:30:18 – 01:03:51:07
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
There is no evidence that Brushy Bill Roberts had any scars. You know, there’s a lot of photos of Brushy Bill Roberts out there, but neither he or his lawyer ever thought to document any of these supposed scars. A lot of people are under the false impression that there is, autopsy report out there documenting the scars. There’s no autopsy report.

01:03:51:09 – 01:04:13:10
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
He died of a heart attack. You know, when an old man dies of a heart attack, they don’t necessarily perform an autopsy. So the only evidence we have of brushy scars comes only from his attorney, William Morrison. I don’t think I’ve said it yet, but after Brushy passed away in 1950, a couple of years later, Morrison actually published a book sharing brushy story.

01:04:13:10 – 01:04:17:06
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
It’s called, Alias Billy the Kid.

01:04:17:09 – 01:04:38:29
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
As far as the supposed inside information that Brushy Bill Roberts said that nobody could possibly know, there has been nothing that he said that wasn’t already common knowledge. So there was a guy named Walter Noble Burns in the, early 1920s. He kind of made the rounds there in New Mexico, and he interviewed a lot of people that knew Billy the Kid back in the day.

01:04:38:29 – 01:05:03:03
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
He talked to Paulina Maxwell, Billy’s old girlfriend. Another dear friend of Billy’s was a lady named Del Vino Maxwell. He talked to her. You interviewed a lot of people, and he published a book called The Saga of Billy the Kid in 1925 or 26. This book is is one of the main pieces of works that kind of catapulted Billy into superstardom.

01:05:03:06 – 01:05:24:12
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
The book was a huge bestseller. Everybody had it. I need to double check on this. I may be wrong here, but I believe it was one of the first book of the book of the month books or but late book of the Month Club books, right? It was sold. It was such a popular book that it was serialized, and they ran in newspapers all over the country.

01:05:24:14 – 01:05:52:17
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Brushy Bill Roberts definitely read the saga of Billy the Kid, because while it is a very cool book, not everything, it’s historically correct in it. Burns did make quite a few mistakes. Brushy Bill Roberts also happens to make the same exact mistakes, almost word for word, that Burns made. So basically all of his insider knowledge, he was just copying off of other people, and it was information that was that had been known for decades.

01:05:52:19 – 01:06:16:07
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
The affidavits Brushy Bill Roberts and his attorney were able to obtain five signed and sworn affidavits from people that supposedly knew Billy the Kid and boots that Brushy and Billy were one of the same. Once again, you just got to dig a little bit deeper. Out of those five people, three of them never knew the historical Billy the Kid ever.

01:06:16:09 – 01:06:32:24
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
One of them wasn’t even born yet in 1881 when Pat Garrett shot Billy the Kid. So if he wasn’t even alive at the time, how could he possibly know of Brushy Bill? Roberts and Billy the Kid were the same. The best they could do was there were these two old men they had that had, lived in Lincoln, New Mexico.

01:06:32:26 – 01:06:53:13
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
They had allegedly known Billy the Kid when they were young children. I’m talking like 12 years old. They weren’t Billy the Kid’s friends. They weren’t his outlaw buddies. They weren’t Old West lawmen. Nothing like that. These were two old men who, 70 years after the fact, they may have possibly known Billy the Kid and even one of them when he first met up with Brushy.

01:06:53:13 – 01:07:13:27
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
He goes, now you’re way too young to be Billy the Kid for whatever reason, he changed his mind a couple of days later, but that’s the best they could do. So whenever, Brushy Bill proponents will try to say that people who actually knew Billy the Kid vouched for him kind of nothing. None of Billy’s old associates ever vouched for him.

01:07:13:27 – 01:07:37:12
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
None of his Lincoln County regulators ever vouched for Brushy Bill Roberts. Once again, the best they could find were two old guys who possibly knew Billy the Kid when they were very, very young. So every other aspect of Brushy story falls under the same purview. I mentioned earlier that he was kind of he kind of went a little bit too far in his exaggerations.

01:07:37:15 – 01:08:00:11
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
In addition to being the most famous outlaw of all time, he also claimed to have been a Pinkerton detective. He said he was a deputy U.S. Marshal under Hanging Judge Parker. He lived with three different Native American tribes at three different times. He, he fought in Cuba as a Rough Rider with Teddy Roosevelt. He fought as a mercenary in Mexico with Pancho Villa.

01:08:00:13 – 01:08:28:22
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
On another occasion, he survived a running gunfight with 2000 Mexican soldiers. He, chased after horse thieves in Oklahoma. He was a gunfighter in Idaho. He was a professional boxer. He was, rodeo champ toward all over the place. He worked for Buffalo Bill Cody on his ranch, breaking horses. He’s claimed to have had his own Wild West show that toured extensively across the United States, putting on, you know, those reenactments of Old West, events.

01:08:28:24 – 01:08:55:23
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
He caught wild horses in South America. I could go on and on with all the. He was a lookout for the famous lady bandit Belle Starr. There’s a million stories that Brushy Bill Roberts told, and I cannot stress this enough. There’s no evidence for any of it. By contrast, the evidence we do have, which is legion, shows that Brushy Bill Roberts was a toddler when the real Billy the Kid was shot and killed.

01:08:55:25 – 01:09:31:05
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
So Rush’s real name was Oliver Roberts. You can find him on every single census from 1880 all the way to his death in 1950. Every single census. We have marriage certificates, we have divorce decrees. There is a family Bible that shows that he was born in 1879. There’s, there’s even a World War One draft registration. We know what Brushy Bill Roberts did where he lived, what his occupation was, the names of his wives, the name of his parents.

01:09:31:07 – 01:09:52:14
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
We know dang near every detail of his life. And in no point was he allowed law at no point did you live in New Mexico. Like I said he was. He was one and a half, two years old when the real Billy the Kid was gunned down. The, Now, you may be wondering, why do people believe in Brushy Bill’s story if there’s that much evidence?

01:09:52:16 – 01:10:14:05
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
The one tiny thread, the one tiny little string that holds his entire story together? He never gave a date on this, but he claimed that later in life, he, was in Oklahoma and he came across, a couple of law men who had just killed what they thought was a horse thief. Well, it wasn’t a horse thief.

01:10:14:05 – 01:10:48:17
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
It was an undercover police officer who just so happened to be Brushy Bill Roberts cousin, Oliver Roberts. Okay. His much younger cousin, Brushy took his belongings back to Texas, to his family. Oliver’s mother mistook him for Oliver, and he just went with it. At that point on, he kind of slid into that new identity of Oliver Roberts, which is why Brushy Bill proponents will say, well, that’s why he he’s so much younger on all the census data and all the records, because he wasn’t really Oliver Roberts.

01:10:48:19 – 01:11:13:00
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
He just kind of slid into his, identity after he died. Once again, there’s there’s no evidence of any of this occurring. I don’t know about you, but if if my brother died and my cousin returned his belongings, I wouldn’t let my grieving mother think that that was her. Her dead son. You know what I’m saying? Like, there’s just so many fantastical angles to his story.

01:11:13:03 – 01:11:33:02
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
And when you add them all up, they’re just completely unbelievable. You can even just Google pictures of Brushy Bill Roberts. There’s a lot of pictures of him out there, and none of those pictures does he look anywhere near 90 years of age. In all reality, he was 7071 when he dropped out of that heart attack. But yeah, there’s there’s no evidence that he was Billy the Kid.

01:11:33:02 – 01:11:58:16
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Some people will try to tell you that there was a DNA test proving that they were, the same person. No, Billy has never been exhumed. There has never been a DNA test done on Billy the Kid. Never happened. So with. I can tell you, with, you know, there’s a lot of mysteries in the Old West. I can tell you with 110% certainty that Brushy Bill Roberts was definitely a frog, and he hung out with other frogs.

01:11:58:19 – 01:12:20:29
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
There’s another guy that’s, there was also, an old West fraudster named J. Frank Dalton. He claimed to be Jesse James, and he and Brushy were best friends. They would hang out together. They would go to they, they, Billy, Brushy Bill Roberts, I think, attended, J. Frank Dalton’s 100th birthday. So they were thick as thieves and they were just telling lies.

01:12:20:29 – 01:12:22:22
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Man.

01:12:22:24 – 01:12:40:13
Dan LeFebvre
So in the movie, it suggests that the reason why Brushy Bill is coming forward is because he wants that pardon that we, we see happening, to Billy the Kid. And that seems to be the impression that I got was that’s why he came forward near the end of his life. He’s like, I finally want this. This pardon that I’ve been promised.

01:12:40:19 – 01:12:56:27
Dan LeFebvre
Was that really what he was going for? Or was the real Brushy Bill, just as you said, you know, just telling lies and couldn’t stop? And or was he trying to sell his own book or was he trying to make money off of it? Like, what was his motivation? I guess it would be my question.

01:12:57:00 – 01:13:24:07
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
You know, I, I an acronym that I like it’s mice in Missy. So it’s a good way to kind of figure out someone’s motive money, ideology, coercion and ego. I don’t think Brushy Bill was doing this on ideological grounds. I don’t think somebody, somebody was coercing him or blackmailing him into telling these lies. I think it was a mixture of money and ego.

01:13:24:09 – 01:13:46:22
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Now, now, Brushy, had a very long history of telling tall tales, even even before he was claiming to be Billy the Kid. He used to tell people he was like a scout, an old army scout and a frontiersman. There’s even an old newspaper article. Gosh, man, I want to say from the 1920s. So we’re talking decades before he claimed to be Billy the Kid.

01:13:46:24 – 01:14:13:17
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
In this newspaper article, he’s making this wild claim that he saved a group of Texas Rangers from machine gun wielding gangsters. So he had a history of telling these type of stories. I do know that he was he was living in poverty in his later years. So I think money certainly played a role in it. Like I said, he was good friends with J.

01:14:13:17 – 01:14:34:22
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Frank Dalton, J. Frank Dalton was kind of being wined and dined by people. He was living rent free. He was taking trips to New York City. I think maybe Brushy wanted a little bit of that limelight. And he really did meet with the governor. That is, something that occurred. He basically got left out of there. I mean, he he forgot key details.

01:14:34:24 – 01:14:55:19
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
He couldn’t answer very simple questions. And it was just a big joke. And about a month later is when he just fell dead of a massive heart attack. But, you know, I people people will ask me, well, why would he possibly lie about that? I don’t know, man. I don’t I don’t know why anybody would lie about that, but I have known people that told similar lies.

01:14:55:19 – 01:15:15:19
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
I’ve known old men who told similar lie. You know, there was, there was a movie, a few years ago, The Irishman with Robert De Niro, the Scorsese movie. And that was based on, a book called We Paint Houses. I believe this guy, you know, he claimed to have killed Jimmy Hoffa and claimed to have done all this stuff.

01:15:15:21 – 01:15:34:00
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
A lot of the stuff that that guy claimed to have done, we know that he absolutely did not do well. Yet. He was a dying old man, and he still told these stories that were lies. Why? I don’t know, but I do know it’s it’s human nature. It is something that does happen.

01:15:34:02 – 01:16:01:14
Dan LeFebvre
Well, like you said, there are, you know, compulsive liars out there too, that once you get get started on that, I imagine the money part aside, the ego, like just feeling, people asking you these questions and people focusing on you, it’s, I mean, today, you know, it’s a dopamine hit, right? We know that. But that that’s one of those things, I would imagine that he might not have known even why he did it himself.

01:16:01:14 – 01:16:12:23
Dan LeFebvre
Just that I like being Billy the Kid right? I like when people think I’m Billy the Kid. So keep telling those stories to keep more people thinking that, yeah, that’s the only hack I could think of.

01:16:12:24 – 01:16:36:28
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
You know, it’s the same way nowadays. People will lie about stolen valor. People that were never in the military will claim to be Navy Seals and stuff like that. It happens all the time. Why? You know, and especially in Bryce’s day, there wasn’t the internet, so we couldn’t just immediately fact check the guy, right. All of those records weren’t you couldn’t get on Ancestry.com in 1950 and look at all the census records.

01:16:36:28 – 01:16:40:16
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
So there he he probably was able to convince quite a few people.

01:16:40:18 – 01:16:54:23
Dan LeFebvre
Especially if you’re something like you mentioned, you know, with, with the wounds, like, we don’t really know what Billy the Kid wounds were. So how like, how can you how can you how would you know? Maybe he has the same wounds, but we don’t know what Billy the Kid had. So how would you know?

01:16:54:26 – 01:17:18:29
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
And you know, I was talking to, one of my buddies about this the other day. My father. Was it my father? Recently turned 80 years old. He was in the Vietnam War. He was, in a combat intensive unit during the Vietnam War. But he was never wounded. Thankfully, my dad came home and spent the rest of his life raising a family, but he lived kind of a rough life.

01:17:18:29 – 01:17:40:21
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
My dad grew up on a cotton farm. No electricity. I mean, he he grew up pretty rough. If if my dad wanted to start telling stories and say that he has all these war wounds, people would probably believe him because he looks like he has war wounds. He’s missing a a couple of fingers. He, he was in a hunting accident when he was younger and got got shot in the face with a shotgun.

01:17:40:24 – 01:17:59:21
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
He could easily lie and say he got all these wounds in the Vietnam War, which he was in the war, but they were just. These are just injuries that he’s accumulated during that throughout the course of his life. I think Brushy Bill Roberts was a lot was much the same because Brushy Bill, he spent the vast majority of his life as a laborer.

01:17:59:24 – 01:18:17:26
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
He did a lot of blue collar work, farming, you know, I think he was working on oil rigs later on in life. Like this guy, this guy would have definitely been he would have looked rough. He would have certainly have had scars and marks of his own that were most likely work related injuries that he could have. Hey, hey, look at this.

01:18:17:26 – 01:18:37:01
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
This is where I got shot back in 1885. Would really, you know, he he was he got kicked by a mule when he was 12. You know. So I don’t doubt that he did have, markings that may have appeared to be scars, the uninitiated. But as far as him ever getting any type of gunfights and stuff like that.

01:18:37:04 – 01:18:39:23
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Absolutely.

01:18:39:26 – 01:18:57:07
Dan LeFebvre
Well, you mentioned the name, Jesse James and a lot of people are familiar with Jesse James. Billy the Kid, you know, because there’s so many movies that have been made about them. But let’s say you’re given the budget to make a movie about someone from the Old West that hasn’t had a movie made about them yet. Who would you pick and why.

01:18:57:09 – 01:19:20:24
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Is it so hard to choose? Because there’s so many great stories that have gone completely untold. What’s fresh on my mind right now? Because I’m currently doing a series on it right now. But Chief Joseph and in this purse war. Wow. I mean, just you hear a lot of stories about people having their, you know, the indigenous peoples having their land stolen and being screwed over and stuff like that.

01:19:20:26 – 01:19:41:08
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
I’m not sure if there’s as much of a clear, just open and shut case of them being screwed over. As much as the Nez Perce were in the events that led to the Nez Perce War, I mean, these were a very peaceful people. They weren’t raiding the American settlers or anything like that. It just basically came down to, hey, we want your land, so you have to leave now.

01:19:41:11 – 01:20:09:29
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
And by the way, we’re going to kill some of your people until you leave, and they eventually push them to the limit. And the war broke out. But it’s a very fascinating story. And just the the way the Nez Perce, it was basically a 1400 mile running gunfight with the U.S. Army. There was maybe 250 Nez Perce warriors with hundreds of women and children, old and sick, against thousands of U.S. troops.

01:20:10:01 – 01:20:37:00
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
And they still held them off. Time and time again were able to defeat them in battle time and time again. It truly is an amazing story, and it’s a heartbreaking story because it doesn’t end well for the Nez Perce people, but I would love to see something like that. Not necessarily a movie. I, I would love to see that made into like an HBO mini series or something, you know, something that could they could really, you know, put about 8 or 9 hours into telling the story.

01:20:37:02 – 01:20:59:23
Dan LeFebvre
Yeah. Dive a lot deeper into the story for that. Yeah. Wow. Well, thank you so much for coming on the show to talk about the true story behind them, guns, too. For anyone who wants to learn more about the history of the Old West, I highly recommend they check out your podcast called The Wild West Extravaganza. You obviously do a ton of research and do a great job bringing the stories of the Old West to life.

01:21:00:00 – 01:21:04:10
Dan LeFebvre
So thank you. Can you give my audience a peek into your podcast and where they can find it?

01:21:04:13 – 01:21:20:15
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Yeah, I have a YouTube channel, The Wild West Extravaganza. It’s also available wherever else you listen to podcasts, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, audible, or you can go to my website, Wild West extra.com. But yeah, I mean, everywhere where you listen to podcasts.

01:21:20:17 – 01:21:24:24
Dan LeFebvre
Fantastic. I will add all those links in the show notes for this episode too. Thanks again so much for your time, Josh.

01:21:24:27 – 01:21:26:11
Josh from The Wild West Extravaganza
Thank you man. My pleasure.