Futility Closet

Futility Closet episodes:

• 11.29.2021

  365-Lateral Thinking Puzzles

  For this final episode of the Futility Closet podcast we have eight new lateral thinking puzzles — play along with us as we try to untangle some perplexing situations using yes-or-no questions. Intro: Sears used to sell houses by...

  
• 11.22.2021

  364-Sidney Cotton's Aerial Reconnaissance

  One of the most remarkable pilots of World War II never fired a shot or dropped a bomb. With his pioneering aerial reconnaissance, Sidney Cotton made a vital contribution to Allied planning. In this week's episode of the Futility...

  
• 11.15.2021

  363-The Lambeth Poisoner

  In 1891, a mysterious figure appeared on the streets of London, dispensing pills to poor young women who then died in agony. Suspicion came to center on a Scottish-Canadian doctor with a dark past in North America. In this...

  
• 10.25.2021

  362-The Leatherman

  In 1856, a mysterious man appeared on the roads of Connecticut and New York, dressed in leather, speaking to no one, and always on the move. He became famous for his circuits through the area, which he followed with...

  
• 10.18.2021

  361-A Fight Over Nutmeg

  In 1616, British officer Nathaniel Courthope was sent to a tiny island in the East Indies to contest a Dutch monopoly on nutmeg. He and his men would spend four years battling sickness, starvation, and enemy attacks to defend...

  
• 10.11.2021

  360-Haggard's Dream

  In 1904, adventure novelist H. Rider Haggard awoke from a dream with the conviction that his daughter's dog was dying. He dismissed the impression as a nightmare, but the events that followed seemed to give it a grim significance....

  
• 10.04.2021

  359-Stranded in Shangri-La

  In 1945, a U.S. Army transport plane crashed in New Guinea, leaving three survivors marooned in the island's mountainous interior. Injured, starving, and exhausted, the group seemed beyond the hope of rescue. In this week's episode of the Futility...

  
• 09.13.2021

  358-The Radium Girls

  In 1917, a New Jersey company began hiring young women to paint luminous marks on the faces of watches and clocks. As time went on, they began to exhibit alarming symptoms, and a struggle ensued to establish the cause....

  
• 09.06.2021

  357-Scenes From an Earthquake

  The San Francisco earthquake of 1906 is remembered for its destructive intensity and terrible death toll. But the scale of the disaster can mask some remarkable personal stories. In this week's episode of the Futility Closet podcast we'll describe...

  
• 08.30.2021

  356-A Strawberry's Journey

  The modern strawberry has a surprisingly dramatic story, involving a French spy in Chile, a perilous ocean voyage, and the unlikely meeting of two botanical expatriates. In this week's episode of the Futility Closet podcast we'll describe the improbable...

  
• 08.23.2021

  355-The Auckland Islands Castaways

  In 1864, two ships' crews were cast away at the same time on the same remote island in the Southern Ocean. But the two groups would undergo strikingly different experiences. In this week's episode of the Futility Closet podcast...

  
• 08.16.2021

  354-Falling Through a Thunderstorm

  In 1959, Marine pilot William Rankin parachuted from a malfunctioning jet into a violent thunderstorm. The ordeal that followed is almost unique in human experience. In this week's episode of the Futility Closet podcast we'll describe Rankin's harrowing adventure,...

  
• 08.09.2021

  353-Lateral Thinking Puzzles

  Here are six new lateral thinking puzzles -- play along with us as we try to untangle some perplexing situations using yes-or-no questions. Intro: Lili McGrath's 1915 "floor polisher" is a pair of slippers connected by a cord. Eighteenth-century...

  
• 07.26.2021

  352-A Victorian Hippopotamus

  In 1850, England received a distinguished guest: A baby hippopotamus arrived at the London Zoo. Obaysch was an instant celebrity, attracting throngs of visitors while confounding his inexperienced keepers. In this week's episode of the Futility Closet podcast we'll...

  
• 07.19.2021

  351-Notes and Queries

  In this week's episode of the Futility Closet podcast we'll explore some curiosities and unanswered questions from Greg's research, including a novelist's ashes, some bathing fairies, the mists of Dartmoor, and a ballooning leopard. We'll also revisit the Somerton...

  
• 07.12.2021

  350-Symmes' Hole

  In 1818, Army veteran John Cleves Symmes Jr. declared that the earth was hollow and proposed to lead an expedition to its interior. He promoted the theory in lectures and even won support on Capitol Hill. In this week's...

  
• 07.05.2021

  349-The National Hotel Disease

  In 1857 guests at Washington D.C.'s National Hotel began to come down with a mysterious illness. One of them was James Buchanan, who was preparing to assume the presidency of the United States. In this week's episode of the...

  
• 06.28.2021

  348-Who Killed the Red Baron?

  In 1918, German flying ace Manfred von Richthofen chased an inexperienced Canadian pilot out of a dogfight and up the Somme valley. It would be the last chase of his life. In this week's episode of the Futility Closet...

  
• 06.21.2021

  347-The Cottingley Fairies

  In 1917, two young cousins carried a camera into an English dell and returned with a photo of fairies. When Arthur Conan Doyle took up the story it became a worldwide sensation. In this week's episode of the Futility...

  
• 06.14.2021

  346-A Desperate Winter in Antarctica

  In 1898 a Belgian ship on a scientific expedition was frozen into the sea off the coast of Antarctica. During the long polar night, its 18 men would confront fear, death, illness, and despair. In this week's episode of...

  
• 06.07.2021

  345-Climbing Mont Blanc

  In 1838, Frenchwoman Henriette d'Angeville set out to climb Mont Blanc, the highest mountain in the Alps, against the advice of nearly everyone she knew. In this week's episode of the Futility Closet podcast we'll follow d'Angeville up the...

  
• 05.24.2021

  344-Martin Couney's Incubator Babies

  For more than 40 years in the early 20th century, Martin Couney ran a sideshow in which premature babies were displayed in incubators. With this odd practice he offered a valuable service in an era when many hospitals couldn't....

  
• 05.17.2021

  343-Operation Cowboy

  In April 1945, a group of American soldiers learned that hundreds of Lipizzaner horses were being held on a farm in western Czechoslovakia -- and set out to rescue them before the Red Army could reach them. In this...

  
• 05.10.2021

  342-A Slave Sues for Freedom

  In 1844 New Orleans was riveted by a dramatic trial: A slave claimed that she was really a free immigrant who had been pressed into bondage as a young girl. In this week's episode of the Futility Closet podcast...

  
• 05.03.2021

  341-An Overlooked Bacteriologist

  In the 1890s, Waldemar Haffkine worked valiantly to develop vaccines against both cholera and bubonic plague. Then an unjust accusation derailed his career. In this week's episode of the Futility Closet podcast we'll describe Haffkine's momentous work in India,...

  
• 04.26.2021

  340-A Vanished Physicist

  In 1938, Italian physicist Ettore Majorana vanished after taking a sudden sea journey. At first it was feared that he'd ended his life, but the perplexing circumstances left the truth uncertain. In this week's episode of the Futility Closet...

  
• 04.19.2021

  339-The Baron of Arizona

  In 1883, Missouri real estate broker James Reavis announced that he held title to a huge tract of land in the Arizona Territory. If certified, the claim would threaten the livelihoods of thousands of residents. In this week's episode...

  
• 04.05.2021

  338-A Point of Law

  One dark night in 1804, a London excise officer mistook a bricklayer for a ghost and shot him. This raised a difficult question: Was he guilty of murder? In this week's episode of the Futility Closet podcast we'll consider...

  
• 03.29.2021

  337-Lost in a Daydream

  In 1901, two English academics met a succession of strange characters during a visit to Versailles. They came to believe that they had strayed somehow into the mind of Marie Antoinette in the year before her execution. In this...

  
• 03.22.2021

  336-A Gruesome Cure for Consumption

  In the 19th century, some New England communities grew so desperate to help victims of tuberculosis that they resorted to a macabre practice: digging up dead relatives and ritually burning their organs. In this week's episode of the Futility...

  
• 03.15.2021

  335-Transporting Obelisks

  In the 19th century, France, England, and the United States each set out to bring home an Egyptian obelisk. But each obelisk weighed hundreds of tons, and the techniques of moving them had long been forgotten. In this week's...

  
• 03.08.2021

  334-Eugene Bullard

  Eugene Bullard ran away from home in 1907 to seek his fortune in a more racially accepting Europe. There he led a life of staggering accomplishment, becoming by turns a prizefighter, a combat pilot, a nightclub impresario, and a...

  
• 02.22.2021

  333-Stranded in the Kimberley

  Crossing the world in 1932, two German airmen ran out of fuel in a remote region of northwestern Australia. With no food and little water, they struggled to find their way to safety while rescuers fought to locate them....

  
• 02.15.2021

  332-Princess Caraboo

  In 1817 a young woman appeared in the English village of Almondsbury, speaking a strange language and seeking food and shelter. She revealed herself to be an Eastern princess, kidnapped by pirates from an exotic island. In this week's...

  
• 02.08.2021

  331-The Starvation Doctor

  In 1911 English sisters Claire and Dora Williamson began consulting a Seattle "fasting specialist" named Linda Burfield Hazzard. As they underwent her brutal treatments, the sisters found themselves caught in a web of manipulation and deceit. In this week's...

  
• 02.01.2021

  330-The Abernathy Boys

  In 1909, Oklahoma brothers Bud and Temple Abernathy rode alone to New Mexico and back, though they were just 9 and 5 years old. In the years that followed they would become famous for cross-country trips totaling 10,000 miles....

  
• 01.25.2021

  329-The Cock Lane Ghost

  In 1759, ghostly rappings started up in the house of a parish clerk in London. In the months that followed they would incite a scandal against one man, an accusation from beyond the grave. In this week's episode of...

  
• 01.18.2021

  328-A Canine Prisoner of War

  In 1944, British captives of the Japanese in Sumatra drew morale from an unlikely source: a purebred English pointer who cheered the men, challenged the guards, and served as a model of patient fortitude. In this week's episode of...

  
• 01.11.2021

  327-The Misplaced Tourist

  In 1977, West German tourist Erwin Kreuz spent three days enjoying the sights, sounds, and hospitality of Bangor, Maine. Unfortunately, he thought he was in San Francisco, on the other side of the continent. In this week's episode of...

  
• 01.04.2021

  326-The Recluse of Herald Square

  In 1931, a 93-year-old widow was discovered to be hoarding great wealth in New York's Herald Square Hotel. Her death touched off an inquiry that revealed a glittering past -- and a great secret. In this week's episode of...

  
• 12.28.2020

  325-Lateral Thinking Puzzles

  Here are eight new lateral thinking puzzles -- play along with us as we try to untangle some perplexing situations using yes-or-no questions. Intro: In 1940, the Venezuelan post office was said to deliver love letters at half price....

  
• 12.21.2020

  324-The Bizarre Death of Alfred Loewenstein

  In 1928, Belgian financier Alfred Loewenstein fell to his death from a private plane over the English Channel. How it happened has never been explained. In this week's episode of the Futility Closet podcast, we'll describe the bizarre incident,...

  
• 12.14.2020

  323-The Blind Traveler

  When a mysterious illness blinded him at age 25, British naval officer James Holman took up a new pursuit: travel. For the next 40 years he roamed the world alone, describing his adventures in a series of popular books....

  
• 12.07.2020

  322-Joseph Medicine Crow

  Joseph Medicine Crow was raised on a Montana reservation in the warrior tradition of his Crow forefathers. But during World War II he found himself applying those lessons in very different circumstances. In this week's episode of the Futility...

  
• 11.30.2020

  321-The Calculating Boy

  George Parker Bidder was born with a surprising gift: He could do complex arithmetic in his head. His feats of calculation would earn for him a university education, a distinguished career in engineering, and fame throughout 19th-century England. In...

  
• 11.23.2020

  320-John Hornby and the Barren Lands

  John Hornby left a privileged background in England to roam the vast subarctic tundra of northern Canada. There he became known as "the hermit of the north," famous for staying alive in a land with very few resources. In...

  
• 11.16.2020

  319-Friedrich Kellner's Opposition

  In the 1930s, German civil servant Friedrich Kellner was outraged by the increasing brutality of the Nazi party and the complicity of his fellow citizens. He began to keep a secret diary to record the crimes of the Third...

  
• 11.02.2020

  318-Peace Pilgrim

  In 1953 Mildred Norman renounced "an empty life of money and things" and dedicated herself to promoting peace. She spent the next three decades walking through the United States to spread a message of simplicity and harmony. In this...

  
• 10.26.2020

  317-Lateral Thinking Puzzles

  Here are six new lateral thinking puzzles -- play along with us as we try to untangle some perplexing situations using yes-or-no questions. Intro: Stonewall Jackson recorded 14 precepts for good conversation. Ben Franklin offered four "rules for making...

  
• 10.19.2020

  316-A Malaysian Mystery

  In 1967, Jim Thompson left his silk business in Thailand for a Malaysian holiday with three friends. On the last day, he disappeared from the cottage in which they were staying. In this week's episode of the Futility Closet...