Citation Needed - Captain Thomas Moore

Episode Date: January 7, 2026

Captain Sir Thomas Moore (30 April 1920 – 2 February 2021), more popularly known as Captain Tom, was a British Army officer and fundraiser. He made international headlines in April 2020 when he raised money for charity in the run-up to his 100th birthday during the COVID-19 pandemic. He served in India and the Burma campaign during the Second World War, and later became an instructor in armoured warfare. After the war, he worked as managing director of a concrete company and was an avid motorcycle racer. On 6 April 2020, at the age of 99 during the first COVID-19 national lockdown, Moore began to walk 100 lengths of his garden in aid of NHS Charities Together, with the goal of raising £1,000 by his 100th birthday on 30 April. In the 24-day course of his fundraising, he made many media appearances and became a household name in the UK, earning a number of accolades and attracting over 1.5 million individual donations.

Hello and welcome to citation needed, the podcast where we choose a subject, read a single article about it on Wikipedia and pretend we're experts because this is the internet and that's how it works now. I'm Noah and I'm going to be circling around this week's subject, but to do it right, I'll need some people to exploit me. First up, a Brit and a guy America would be happy to hand over in an exchange, Marsh and Eli. Okay, yeah, sorry, we do not want him. Eli once stayed in the UK for an extra week by mistake and the hotel to Manchester just started sending him. in random guests into his room to flush him out. True. Jokes on them.

I just tried to turn it into a sex thing. I was like, hello. And also joining us tonight, two men more American than apple pie, because that comes from England, Heath and Cecil. It's such an overrated pie. Right.

Well, it was either pie or universal health care. You're welcome, America. And before we get going, I want to take a second to thank our patrons. Patrons, confess up front that this whole crowdfunding thing can be a little shaky, but some people who use it don't suck, I promise. And if you want to give you a chance to prove that, stick around to the end of the show to find out how you can give us money. And with that other way, tell us Cecil,

what person plays, think causes a phenomenon or event what we'll be talking about today? Today we're going to be talking about Captain Tom Moore. Okay. So Marge, you chose this topic, so are you ready to explain to the listeners why you chose to do a tomless episode about Tom Moore? Well, it's because it's about an old guy named Tom who needs help to walk, and I didn't want to be too Ghost of Christmas future on it. Jesus, right. All right, so paint us that word picture, why don't you?

Okay. In the early days of 2020, the world, wherever you happen to be, quite understandably, lost its collective mind. Civilization pausing viruses come around mercifully and frequently, and this particular game of past the pandemic parcel just so happened to have seen the music stop when some of the least capable government's imaginable

held power all around the globe. From Boris Johnson here in the UK to Bolsonaro in Brazil and for you guys in the US it was the final year of the political nadir that was President Donald Trump. That admittedly, that was a nadir your nation would soon revisit

in your double-dip intellectual recession. We went from nadir to native. diced, yeah. Well, I'm looking forward to you guys swearing in Tommy Robinson as Prime Minister from your glass fucking house, Marsh. Yeah. And we're not going to be able to bail you out again.

With Marine Le Pen in France, D-Day 2.0, it's just going to be like a Nazi gala and a boat party party. So, we are Sally Mech came in second place again. Just a Trump boat drives into both of them and they all sink. It'd be amazing.

So, yeah, in 2020, fixations and frenzies flourished, and while the collective obsessions with banana breads and sourdell starters and Tiger Kings, those are well-trodden ground by this point. There were plenty of pockets of mania that were geographically specific and culturally bespoke and locally contained enough that they haven't yet been fully mined for all of their pandemic-provoked absurdities. And here in the UK, few things embody the full heights of weirdness that COVID-19. wrought on society, than the sight of an elderly war veteran, trunching slowly back and forth across his extensive driveway, carrying the hopes and healthcare of a nation atop his NHS-iss-issued walking frame. And that man was Captain Tom Moore, and things were about to get incredibly weird. Yeah, here in America, we very decidedly did not hear about old people during COVID.

So we let him get the vaccine first. Gosh. Well, except when Eli was faking, like, asthma, pink eye or whatever the fuck, he jumped the line. Marsh said I could. We cared about two old people. It was Captain Tom and the queen, and they're both dead now. So, you know, draw all the essence. You need to. Captain Tom was this 99-year-old veteran of the Second World War and was a complete unknown when on the 6th of April 2020, he decided he was going to turn his upcoming 100th birthday into a fundraising challenge to raise money to support the NHS. Or, you know, more specifically. to support NHS charities together, which is an organisation that supports NHS staff, volunteers and patients. So this wasn't going to like NHS actual healthcare. This was kind of like the stuff around that.

That gets lost amongst all of this very, very frequently. This challenge he was going to take on would be to complete 100 trips across his 25 metre driveway by the time of his 100th birthday. And in doing so to raise £1,000. It's a long-ass driveway. It was a modest ambition, though, 100 of those 25 meters, and it was a modest goal of £1,000, and in any normal time, it would have been the and finally story at the end of the

news roundup. But these were far from normal times, and his story was just perfectly placed to go stratospheric. Man, I can't believe that during the pandemic, I would just spin for hours in my office chair for free, like a sucker. That's a good thing that you didn't have travel restrictions, or Heath would have shown up, beating him to 100 and demanded the money or something. No rule. So this was in the clap for the healthcare workers era of the pandemic,

where people would spend their Thursday nights on their doorsteps banging pots and pans in recognition of these sacrifices of frontline workers. Yeah, we care pot banging enough, not pay raise enough. Yeah, that's how much we care. Certainly not be equipment. Huh? Clank, clank. And then while in the generally, okay,

we're a culture that's a lot less built around. around the veneration of veterans than you guys are in America. Anything to do with either of the World Wars is a huge exception to that, as the outbreak of poppy-themed merchandise every single November in this country will attest. So Captain Tom's modest stroll around his quite nice garden caught the imagination, and his fundraising soon rocketed past this initial very modest goal. And that's when Marsh was like, oh, this guy's going. Damn.

Right, because, okay, so far, so commendable. It's a nice old man, did a nice thing, and people did a nice thing in supporting him, and everyone gets to feel good about themselves. But this was a story that was perfectly shaped to capture a nation that was confined to their homes, and bored and scared in equal measure. And coverage of Captain Tom was just inescapable for weeks, genuinely.

He appeared on TV and radio talk shows everywhere, news bulletins gave regular updates on his growing fundraising total. and also give updates on his daily walks across his garb. Come on, because he wasn't doing 100 of the 25 on his birthday. He was doing it over the course of the month before his birthday, a couple of the time. What to pace it out. His bespectical face smiled out from every single newspaper. One analysis found he was covered in more than 72,000 news items across the international press.

Each one heaping more superlatives onto him than the last one. Eh, until you have a Rule 34 page, you're simply aiming for fame, Marshal. Okay, Marsh, you said it was perfectly shaped to capture a nation, but like, but just the one, right? So no other nation would have given a show. You guys are uniquely boring in this respect. Oh, yeah, yeah. We are the only lock that key would fit, 100%. We would have found a way to shot it.

But this wall to walls. Also, doing it in pieces shouldn't count. That's not that. Exactly. It's not that fun. That's like, I've done 100 pushups. Yeah, like over my life. Yeah.

And it's your garden. It's your garden. Let's long walk this shit, Captain Ton. Are you in it to win it or not? So put in obstacles, people trying to check him into the boards the whole time. It's a whole thing. The dark man's just the one black guy in Britain.

If you read the novel, that's a great joke. All right, go on, Marsh. We're explaining the offensive jokes how we now are you like, because that will come up later in this essay, I'm assuming. Thank you. The wall-to-wall saturation of coverage. just more and more public figures jump on this bandwagon. Live TV hailed him as the man who lifted Britain's spirits and as the living embodiment of British values. Which one?

Walking. And then right-wing columnists, they delighted in binging up his military service. They likened his latest walk, this walk, which again, he was doing it about 250 meters per day along the length of his extensive patio, they likened that walk to a form of national service. Piers Morgan never won to miss an opportunity for publicity, publicly pledged to give £10,000 to the Captain Tom campaign. And that campaign flew past the initial goal of 1,000, the revised goals of 5,000, and half a million, even past a million. Donations just poured in from all over the world. And by the morning of his 100th birthday, he'd raised 30 million pounds. She's a national hero.

Wow. Eventually everyone in England donated and it just reverted back to being the National Health Service again. It's actually really disappointing. Just Bernie running Widen Sprints here in the States. Now can we have it? What the fuck do you people want? By the time of his final leg of his walk.

Stop laughing me, Elizabeth. Where he'd walk the final 250 meters on his 100th birthday. No. He had a full military guard of honor from the army. He had fly pass. from the Royal Air Force, which is a tribute that is typically reserved for national heroes and for royalty. And that flypast was broadcast live on television, and the Ministry of Defense encouraged the public that they should watch from home to avoid breaching lockdown. And then the BBC threw together a TV tribute, Captain Tom, we salute you.

And then the other channel, ITV, they countered with their own documentary Captain Tom's War, which was narrated by Kenneth Branagh, because he was in the war. And it aired on VE Day. Captain Tom was appointed as an honorary colonel of the Army Foundation College. In July 2020, three months after he first hit the headlines, he was nominated for a knighthood by Boris Johnson. Just three months after he was in those headlines. And he was knighted by the Queen in her first official engagement since the start of lockdown. She knighted him by Zoom. And then a month later, ITV released a second documentary about him about his love of motorcycles. So they knighted a motorcycle.

I say you should have to do the yard laps again, but this time in like a suit of armor. I would watch that time. Along the way, the BBC broadcaster and singer Michael Ball, who he actually interviewed Tom early on in the fundraising journey. So he released a version of the inspirational football anthem, You'll Never Walk Alone, with Captain Tom speaking the words of the chorus, while a Zoom call of nurses did that hard thing with their fingers? Come on. The single, it earnestly made it to number one in the UK charts. The videos have 2.6 million views on YouTube, only half of which are me hate watching it.

March can't stand this guy. Marsh made a reaction video several new slurs for old people that were completely new to me. And because this got to number one, Captain Tom could now add oldest recording artist ever to have a number one single to his class. of records with the media using that achievement as the basis for yet another round of earnest and sickly sweet tributes. Gal Godot jumps in the middle of the video and starts singing Imagine by John Lennon before she's like, shoot away. Get out, get out, it's not your sketch, it's not your sketch.

And that still wasn't the height of it. Captain Tom Fever by this point was gripping the UK arguably more virulently than COVID ever did. Great Western Railway named a Class 800 train after Captain Tom, complete with image on the side and the fundraising total displayed on the front of the train. Do you guys get the impression that Marsh tried to do something like this and it didn't make any money and he's super mad about it? Trust me. Stick with me here. Right. Local bus companies, hospital gardens.

Even police dogs and police horses were named after him. The Royal Mail issued a special postmark for all post in the country during Captain Tom's birthday week. Come on my man. Which read on every stamp, happy 100th birthday, Thomas Moore, NHS fundraising hero 30th of April 2020. He was given... I'd say whether they should we cut that down a bit? Not a word goes. I'll shoot you in the back of the head.

He was given the freedom of London, the city that during its spectacular fireworks demonstration on New Year's Eve, opened 2021 with a drone display, depicting Captain Tom waving his thumbs up from his warmth. This is so amazing. Marsh has put an image in the... in the show notes and it looks like fucking like Jesus

with a crown of thorns in a vintage 1990s MC Hammer like pants and suit outfit. It's amazing. Okay. I see Hillary Clinton. Okay. You always see Hillary Clinton. Let it go. Let it go. She's not going to win. Every time he closes his eyes.

Let's unpack for me. Also for the Americans, freedom of London is kind of like a key to the city thing. Just in case you were worried there was sort of a free use fiat situation going on with a one. 100-year-old man, he couldn't take advantage of. And look, it wasn't even just a formal institution that were losing their collective minds over this. On his birthday, he received over 150,000 birthday cards from the public.

So many that the Royal Mail had to establish a dedicated sorting office at a nearby school to where he looked like Santa Claus. But, you know, don't worry at the height of COVID, they were still able to find volunteers who would spend thousands of hours opening and displaying all of those cards. Other people, they painted murals of Captain Tom, or they wrote. terrible poetry dedicated to it. Marsh has included one of these murals in our notes here, and I would like to bet

that a lot of these mural painters wish Major Tom looked less like Hitler escaped and changed his name. It's given real alternate timeline vibes this one picture. If you're going to have

the just mustache, you've got to go wide. You got to go wide. You got to go wide. You're going wooden chops. You mentioned Major Tom. There are at least a dozen versions of David Bowie's

Space Audit Reward to celebrate Captain Tom and his NHS walk and every one of them is more cringeworthy than the last. I watched one of these. Jesus fucking Christ, this is clearly the most cringy fucking thing I've ever seen and I larked before.

Okay, I watched this too. My favorite part is when the lyrics are doing, Can You Hear Me Captain Tom? And they're showing Captain Tom here and he's 100. So it's just like, can you hear me, Captain Tom? What? That's what I'm seeing.

I don't know. It's telling me I have to download an app. And then children dressed as Captain Tom to do their own fundraising walks. Oh, complete with inflatable walkers. It's fucking amazing. It looks like a four-inch PVC walker with duct tape on it. Like way to accentuate this dude's handicapped.

It's huge, man. Yeah. It's like a costume of me with a giant inflatable. anxiety thought bubble. Says comedy ballast. He sees inflation. Marsh, why did England already have inflatable walkers? Right?

I mean, I agree. That's a great gag, like, in theory. Yeah. I mean, the answer is bachelor parties. Genuinely, bachelor parties. Genuinely that. Let him talk. Sorry, I'm going to need you to explain that.

Making the groom walk around with a walker on his stagging from pub to pub to pop. Yeah. It's a great joke. A hilarious joke. No explanation needed. Say no more. Every time. Okay. Asked an answer. Hey, Heath, I'm sorry. I shot out all those ideas you had for my hatchland party. Turns out you were just tingling.

And then, then we come to the scarecross because for some reason that I genuinely never understood at the time, people decided the best way to honor this trudging centenarian would be to create deranged effigies of him in their yards using just what materials they had. to hand and whatever arts and craft talent, they didn't have to hand. Podcast listener, you can't see it, but Marsh has included four full Google Docs pages of Major Tom Scarecrows in our notes. And I would like to congratulate him on them starting terrifying and somehow getting more terrifying as they go. Yes. Yes, absolutely. So, you know, when you like display your dead enemies to be like scary or whatever, they look like warning signs like that that say like, keep out, we crucify old people here, stay away, old people. It's so scary.

Especially the ones that are tied to street lampals by the neck, like very clear. Like, very clear cornered around the neck. They lynched him as a warning to others. That's the thing is that like, why would you do this if you weren't burning him in effigy, right? That's what all of these look like. My favorite is the one that's kind of reclining sexily on a park bench where his head looks like he's a Futurama like Frausonville.

head. Straw spilling from his wrists. There's a real, a real wicker man vibe happening. So one particularly popular cartoon of Captain Tom and his Walker bore the inspirational caption, Some superheroes don't wear capes.

They wear medals. Which is objectively stupid because a medal is already meant to be a recognition of someone's heroism. So that's practically tautological. They don't wear that indication of being a hero. They wear a different indication of being a hero, but still in the conventional symbol region.

Soon, that cartoon was available as a T-shirt for people to buy because you better believe there were commercial tie-ins here. I just want to cut to a superhero with a cape, like pushing a planet, destroying alien missile off course, and a kid goes, well, that's almost as cool as walking a hundred times across a modest front lawn. Over the course of a month, yeah. Yeah, absolutely. Not all at once, though.

With the help of his family, he released at least three books. There was, Tomorrow Will Be a Good Day, My Autobiography in September 2020, which is named after one of the catchphrases he said in one of his TV interviews. There was also April 2021's Captain Tom's Life Lessons, Above All Be Kind, which both of those made it onto the Sunday Times bestseller lists for that year. Also on that bestseller list was his children's book in the same. which was in the Little People Big Dreams series, but that series therefore placed it

alongside other books in the series on Charles Darwin and Frank and Nelson Mandela. I'd like to circle the one that doesn't belong. Thank you.

Also, it's good that British people didn't make Mandela scarecrow's in their yard. I'm right. Pretty sure some did. Pretty sure some did. The 80s was

Rock Hatcher was not a fan. Captain Tomol was admitted. Actually, I'm going to do that sentence again with a slight less at frivolity. Captain Tom Moore was admitted to hospital in January 2021 after taking ill. She couldn't help her. You didn't do it with less frivolity. I'm just

letting it. Absolutely. He didn't. You laugh. Thanks, Cronkite. Captain Tom Moore was admitted to hospital in January 2021 after taking ill to the order. This is all in, man. I can hear you smiling. December 3rd, 1947. Look, he was on holiday with his family in Barbados. He took ill. That was a trip that had been generously gifted to them by British Airways, and he was diagnosed with COVID-induced pneumonia, and he eventually died on February 2nd. COVID, oh no.

Broad swathes of the nation were plunged into mourning. Prime Minister Boris Johnson called for the nation to give a collective applause in his honour on the day after his death, with a minute's silence that was observed in both houses of parliament. TV personalities campaigned on air for him to have a full state funeral, which again is something we only give to royals, but to have permanent statues erected in Trafalgar, and Westminster Abbey. In the end, he had a small private funeral, which was televised live to the nation,

as per the wishes of his family. And that family were about to take center stage for the remainder of his story. Okay, a full minute moment of silence. Have you ever tried to do a full minute of anything? Like, it's crazy. It's a lot of fucking time. 10 seconds max.

Yeah, they should have done one second a day over the course of a month. They would have gotten to them. There you go. There you go. All right, well, if you thought a children's book that compared his daily yard toddles to the travails of Anne Frank was crass, just wait till you see what's on the other side of apropos of nothing. Their bodies still haven't been recovered. And up next, before the turn of the hour, looks like we found our very own Major Tom here on this side of the ocean.

Bubba Thuncle turns 100 this week. He's using his birthday as an excuse to help out those less fortunate. Diane, what can you tell us? That's right, Ted. Baba Thuncle, a Vietnam war veteran, is turning triple digits this week, and the only thing he's more full of than life is wisdom. Isn't that right, Bubba? Hey, that's right, Diane.

I was born in the year 1920, and I can't believe I'm still kicking the old tires. I bet. You sure have seen a lot of American history. I sure have, Diane. and I was just 19 when I went down to the docks to see the AMS St. Louis. Huh, isn't that the ship that had a bunch of Jews on it fleeing the Holocaust? A way, it sure was, but we threw cans and bottles at them till they just turned tail and ran. Didn't all those people die?

I don't know. I don't read newspapers. Right. Well, um... Now, what I never could understand is why we miscegenated the schools. I mean, whites and cards going to the same school, that kid's good. Right. Sorry, Ted. I just remembered that we're in America and the notion of Captain Tom is absolutely impossible. So back to you. You got it, Diane.

Blur. Dude. Sometimes I just use that word for fun. Faster, Ted, faster. Hey, podcast listener. I'm Eli Pazek. And I'm Michael Marshall. You know, with Marsh choosing to use our platform to a platform to a attack a national hero and media darling, now seemed like a great time to remind you about fabric from Gerber Life. Seriously? That's right, Eli.

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Okay, but what about Hollywood Shrampshire? Nope. Hey, again. Marsh, I refuse to apologize. Hey, guys, what's going on? Ely wants to start eating better, and Marsh tricked him into ordering a bunch of fake British foods. Whampum's crafting sounded so real. Well, Eli, if you want to really eat well in the new year, why don't you try Factor?

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All right, Noah, thanks. Guess I should have known when he suggested a food called Bubble and Squeak, huh? No, that one's real. Really? Yeah, bubble and squeak. Come on. Delicious. What?

And we're back when we last left off. A nation was so bereft of people to admire that they elevated an old man with a modest charity gold to messianic status. And then he died. So assuming that there's no resurrection incoming, where could the story possibly go from there, Marsh? To truly tell the full story of a hundred-year-old man who raised 30 million pounds for charity by walking around his sizeable patio. We need to talk about his daughters, Lucy and Hannah. In Lucy's case, there isn't much to say, other than that I, by happenstance, was already familiar with her work before Captain Tom became a household name, because in 2019, in my day job

working for the Skeptical Charity Good Thinking Society, I was investigating homeopaths who believed they can eradicate the vaccine injuries that cause autism using a form of homeopathy called cease therapy. And one of those anti-vaccination homeopaths, who we reported in the newspapers for claiming that vaccines contain glyphosate was Lucy Texiera, daughter of Captain Tom. Oh, come on. And I swore then that I would take her father down for her transgressions. Okay. I tried so hard to do, like, I was trying beforehand to do your accent, like do an impression of you for that joke. I was like, no, no, it's not. But I do understand Captain Tom a lot better now, right? What's that dear? Oh no, I'd love to hear about how you're pulling the COVIDs out of people

with your water pills, but I have to wander the garden in the desperate hope that you're only given a certain amount of steps per lifetime. And so, look, I'm just going to present to you three true statements. Number one, Captain Tom had a daughter who was an anti-vaxxer and a homeopath. Number two, Captain Tom, the nation's most famous pensioner, died from COVID-induced pneumonia. And number three, Captain Tom's family have said he wasn't vaccinated against COVID. Those are all true statements, and you can draw whatever inferences you want from there. Marsh killed Captain Tom. Okay, maybe not whatever you inferences you want.

Okay, I have an inference. The UK's libel laws are too strict. Next up, let me tell you about Wilbur the horse that trotted back and forth in its small yard to raise money for Ivermectin research. Okay, so that was Lucy. Captain Tom's other daughter, Hannah Ingram Moore, was far more involved in her father's fundraising efforts. As a sales and marketing consultant to expensive brands, it was she who first called in freelance PR consultants to get her father's story out to the media. And then it was she who secured a partnership with a gin distillery to release Captain Sir Tom's London Dry Gin, promising that the profits would go to the Captain Tom Foundation and each bottle bearing his catchphrase, tomorrow will be a good day, which Ingram Moore had trademarked alongside 10 other terms. So for his family, certainly in terms of commercial deals, tomorrow really certainly seemed like it would be a good day.

That's such a shitty catchphrase. It's Annie. Little orphan Annie has that catchphrase. That's not yours. It was just a thing he said in an interview once and then they trademarked it and put it everywhere. It's like a little kid who said a sentence and they're like, ah, it's a catchphrase. It's so stupid. Okay, but who doesn't want a destined to be short-lived internet meme on their gym? Just like, oh, a martini for you, Greg? Excellent. Would you like the grumpy cat or the Charlie bit my finger? Could be that. I would also argue that there is no product in the world. world less conducive to tomorrow being a good day than dry gin.

I'm sorry, do you have an alcohol that gives you the feeling of when you're catching a cold, but you don't full on have a cold? Oh, you do. Dry jewell, excellent, wonderful. You're describing alcohol, Eli. Yeah, that is fair. That is fair. That said, it wasn't that they were profiting from that directly, of course, because some of the proceeds from the gin would go to their new charity, the Captain Tom Foundation, which was founded in June 2020, two months, after Tom finished his garden stroll, and the foundation was also an fishery in the deal with a flower retailer, The World of Roses, who developed a signature Captain Tom Rose.

It's just Wilton. Jesus. And those books that Captain Tom penned, the autobiography and the children's books, they opened with explanations that proceeds from book sales would go to this new charitable foundation, which wasn't true, because over 800. thousand pounds of those proceeds went to a private company, Club Nook Limited,

which was set up by the Ingram Moors, and that's the company that owned all of those trademarks. They even negotiated the film rights to the story of his three-week daily stroll across his garden with the profits going to the family specifically.

Oh man, please say that Michael Bay was in the mix to direct this and they had scripted a bunch of explosions. That'd be amazing. Optimist Prime transforms into a walk. Podcast listener, I want you to know from my heart that this is exactly the kind of childishly obvious fraud I would be involved in constantly if Noah and Heath weren't my bosses. I don't know the password to our PureFlix account and this is why.

This right here, this is what I would do. Okay. Would you go this far, Eli, because there were obviously other companies that were keen to align themselves with Captain Tom's posthumous brand. there was an ale from brewer Timothy Taylor's that donated 10 pens per pint to the Captain Tom Foundation. And there was another children's book, 100 Reasons to Hope, which gave one pound to the Captain Tom Foundation for each hard back sold. Then there were t-shirts and mugs and gold-plated poppy pins and masks of Captain Tom's face and bedspreads and knitted dolls of Captain Tom and an ill-advised miniskirt. with Captain Tom's face and blazoned across. Oh my God.

This is the most horrifying miniskirt I've ever seen. His head is so big, but I will say great job on the lip placement on this. I mean, genuinely amazing. To be fair, if your wife bought the Captain Tom bedspread, you owe it to her to buy the masks so she can fuck you. Right? She gave you all the hints you need. Yeah.

Bushavance got this one for the living room. for you guys. It's the bedspread on a couch. Podcast listener, in a startling breach of journalistic ethics, Marsh somehow failed to inform you that the bedspread lists his birth and death year on it and is titled on the website where it is for sale, quote, rip Sir Tom Moore fan art, rest in peace, Captain Tom Moore, tribute poster, essential comfort. It's essential. It's essential. It's absolutely. Absolutely essential. Essential.

It's so fucking weird. It's a blanket of a guy dying. He's walking away into like the arch with the rape, but like the end of good place. He's dying on your bet. In fairness, if Jesus Christ died right now, fucking Kyle Christ, his brother, we'd be making shrouds of Turin on his Etsy store.

Yeah. Oh God, he is walking away to his death. You better believe that that was added to later when they added Paddington Bear to it. Because Paddington Bear became this, again, around the same time, Paddington Bear became this weird symbol of a grim reaper ushering any famous celebrity that was loved.

Come on. Yeah. Including the... It was after the queen died. And, yeah, it was... We're a crazy country. We are a crazy country. Marsh, what the fuck is wrong with you? What is wrong with you?

They don't have a god anymore. It got weird. The Walker is at the Bachelor Party is still haunting me a lot. It's a great bit. dead people, Ben spread like, okay,

you know, I can see people getting into that, but the Walker. Now, some of that, some of all of that, that was unofficial merch,

some of it, but some of it was officially licensed. Some products were in charitable tie-in with the Captain Tom Foundation. Others were commercial

partnerships with the family's company. It was a very muddled picture and some would argue deliberately so, depending on the

libel laws where they were. Which is why I'm asking right now, gentlemen, these make sure it is clear that all the proceeds from my memorial bets sheet will go directly to Heath's Scotch fund. I want no million. And then no, we'll have to top it up to cost a full bottles worth, because I'm just saying we might not get a lot from that, Eli.

Through the rush of commercial tie-ins, the Captain Tom Foundation began to draw quite a lot of scrutiny. The charity was set up to raise money for organizations supporting the elderly in the UK and to disperse grants. and it attracted more than a million pounds in donations in its first year. Yet, of that million pounds, only 160,000 pounds made its way to those worthy causes, which was less than Ingram Moore's took out as salaries, the pair of them, and less than they took out as payments to their own companies. Meanwhile, as CEO of the charity, Hannah Ingram Moore was invited to give public appearances at awards ceremonies like the Virgin Media 02 Captain Tom Foundation Connector Awards,

where she received an 18,000-pound speaking fee, which she essentially pocketed, despite being there as an official representative of the charity. The next year, the Ingram Moors tried to more than double Hannah's salary for managing the charity, meaning they tried to pay her 15% of the charity's overall income just for managing the almost nothing that it was doing. None of which we could have known

before we made them the recipient of vulgarity for charity. Now, unsurprisingly, this all triggered a full, full investigation from the charity regulator, and the results of the inquiry into it were damning. The family were found to be profiting financially from the charity, despite claiming they would receive no financial benefit from it, which by law they weren't allowed to be doing. They'd also misled the public about where money from Captain Tom products was going. That deal for the special Captain Tom Gin, which claimed its profits would go to the charity, raised £9,000 for the charity at less than £1 per bottle, and the bottles were selling for

more than 30 quid. Meanwhile, we don't know how much it raised for anyone in the family directly. We've no idea. And the gin was pulled from the market after an investigation, as well as that Captain Tom Rose. Pretty much every time the charity commission looked at commercial deals with the Captain Tom charity all over it, what they saw was the charity getting virtually no cut at all. But that's not even my favorite detail of this, because in April 2021, the Ingram Moore's applied for planning permission for the Captain Tom Foundation. building, which was a £200,000 pound extension to their £2 million

pound private mansion in Bedfordshire. Oh my God. And that £200,000 £200,000 obviously would be paid using charitable donations because they explained the building would be used for the purpose of running the charity that they were legally not allowed to benefit from financially. But nobody else involved in the running

of the charity had any idea that the charity name was being used to secure an extension on their family home, let alone be it's claim to be for use of the charity. And by the time the new building was finished, it had been strategically renamed to the Captain Tom building, removing the name of the charity from it.

Also, it had been retrofitted to have a private spa and an indoor swimming pool. Which the family argued was entirely legitimate because some of the old people who might theoretically be helped by the Captain Tom Foundation might in the future theoretically have access to the spa and the pools that's attached to their private residence. Okay, honestly, I'd be totally fine. with this, if once a year a bunch of old guys who refuse to wear a towel are just resting their old balls on the left of sofas like that. At this point, even the local council could see that a building that building a private spa on the side of a mansion couldn't reasonably be described as a charitable

endeavor and order them to destroy the brand new building they just waited 200,000 pounds of charitable donations to build. And because this was emerging from the charity commission investigations, all of this was now playing out very heavily in the public eye, with the media descending to watch the growing scandal. The newspapers were filled with Google Map illustrations of the mansion and the illicit extension, and TV bulletins had live drone footage of the cranes arriving to tear down the Captain Tom building, not so charitable spa and pool facility. Homeopathy Center, Marsh.

Neighbors were interviewed, and they were up in arms about how the family had blocked some of the prettiest views in the village with this ugly new building, and they swore they'd be willing to take a sledgehammer themselves and dare the building down brick by brick. And he always waited to get to this side of the yard closest to my house to shit himself. He was planning it, I know it, I know it, I do. So, facing this public humiliation and knowing she was on the hook for 200,000 pounds, she turned to the wisdom of her generations and started to slowly walk back and forth across three yards.

Eventually, in July 2023, the spa was demolished and with it the entire goodwill of the public towards Captain Tom's family. In the same month, the Captain Tom Foundation stopped accepting donations from the public, and a year later, the Ingram Moors were disqualified from being associated with any registered UK charities. And then in January 2025, the Captain Tom Foundation was renamed to the somewhat less catchy and definitely less legacy defiling, the 1189808 Foundation. The Charity Commission and the charity's trustees have called the call for the Ingram Moles to return the funds that are due to the charity,

but as best as anyone can tell, they've resisted that call to this day. I think the Charity Commission's enforcement is just asking nicely for the money back. So what started out as a sales consultant recognizing the inherent marketability of her non-a-generian father's stroll across his driveway, grew into an intense national mania

before the fever eventually broke and the whole thing fell apart in spectacular fashion. And if you had to summarize what you learned in one sentence, what would it be? That antivax homeopath must be so glad her sister fucked up so publicly, it completely took the heat off her role in all of this. Oh, interesting.

Yeah, yeah, she killed her dad. I almost forgot. Jesus Christ. And are you ready for the... I can say that. Are you ready for the quiz? As long as I get a military guard of honor for the quiz, You have to flyover going now.

You just can't see it from there. Marsh, after his death, they made another movie about his charity shenanigans. What was it called A, the Night Walker, B, Captain Hookline and Sinker, or C, a few dollars more. Oh, more, no, yes. It's got to be a few dollars more. That is excellent. It's C. It's the all the way.

Absolutely, yes. All right, Marsh. So the gin was fucking. stupid. Which of the following is the best idea for the Captain Tom charity beverage campaign that's actually a giant fraud? A. Johnny Walker.

B. 1-877 Cors for kids or C. Modest Meads. I'm going to go modest meads. I think even I'm allowed to call that one a fraud from this side of the pond. So that is innocent until victim statement proven

until read out loud. Dilt. Which already happened. All right, Marsh. What's the real reason you have it out for Captain Tom's family? Oh, no. Legacy. A. You and his daughter dated in college. B. Captain Tom exemplified

the only less useful way to fight the COVID pandemic than the British government. Or C, towards the end, he reminded you of your greatest enemy of all. People with cerebral palsy. or as you call them in private, CPGBs. Okay.

Jesus. I'm going B because the UK government was so bad during COVID and also because the C answer, there are people who don't know me from anything else, Eli, and they don't know where this is coming from. And I will not be known as that guy who hates. I'm one of those people. I don't know where this is coming from. Mars, I totally find it's not going to be in the show, so it doesn't matter.

You've got to do that. It's going to get cut. So say B because C isn't going to be there. You've got to go back 10 years and read an article I wrote about Facilitary communication and then read the comments in that article of people accusing me of hating disabled people and then know my family history of having a sister with cerebral palsy and then wash all of that together in Eli's mind 10 years later and then well I'll do the reading everything except the why Eli's mind part I'm not doing that and after that beep bike I announced that the winner is Eli that's right because the truth will out thank you Noah you're the essayist next week

oh that's my reward okay well for Heath, Eli, Cecil, and Marsha, I'm Noah. Thank you for hanging out with us today. We're going to be back next week, and by then, I'll be an expert on something else. Between now and then, check out our good friend Michael Marshall on Skeptics with a K or hear him team up with Cecil even more on the No Rogan experience. And if you'd like to keep this show going, you can make a per episode donation at patreon.com Or leave us a five-star review everywhere you can.

We'll never pretend to be a charity when we take your money. And if you'd like to get in touch with us, check out past episodes, connect with us on social media or check the show notes. Be sure to check out citationpod.com. I don't know.