Futility Closet - 282-Helga Estby's Walk

Starting point is 00:00:00 Welcome to the Futility Closet podcast, forgotten stories from the pages of history. Visit us online to sample more than 11,000 quirky curiosities from reversible kidneys to a persistent building. This is episode 282. I'm Greg Ross. And I'm Sharon Ross. In 1896, Norwegian immigrant Helga Estby faced the foreclosure of her family's Washington farm. To pay the debt, she accepted a wager to walk across the United States within seven months. In today's show, we'll follow her daring bid to win the prize and its surprising consequence.

Starting point is 00:00:46 show will follow her daring bid to win the prize and its surprising consequence. We'll also toast Edgar Allan Poe and puzzle over a perplexing train. And just a quick programming note, we'll be off next week, so we'll be back with a new episode on February 10th. The economic depression of 1893 closed 15,000 U.S. businesses and 500 banks. Seven of those banks were in Spokane County, Washington, and the wave of foreclosures there particularly threatened the family of Helga Estby, a Norwegian immigrant who had recently moved there from Minnesota with her husband Ula and their eight children. In the wake of the crash, demand had dried up for Ula's services as a carpenter, and a horse accident had left him unable to do heavy physical work, so he couldn't develop the farm. Even before the panic, the Esbys had fallen into a cycle of debt, taking out new loans to pay old ones.

Starting point is 00:01:40 With their income now diminished, they borrowed another $1,000 in July 1894 and were in danger of losing the farm altogether when Helga learned of a unique opportunity. Many of the details have been lost to us now, but it appears that a wealthy Eastern woman connected with the fashion industry had offered $10,000 to the first woman who walked across the United States. Newspapers of the time claimed that no unescorted woman had ever accomplished this. It seems that the sponsor wanted to demonstrate women's physical endurance in an era that still considered them frail and dependent. Helga was 36 years old, and crossing 12 states on foot was a daunting prospect,

Starting point is 00:02:18 but the family were desperate, and Helga decided to try it, walking with her eldest daughter, Clara, who was 18. The sponsor sent them a contract that laid out the terms. They could take with them only $5 a piece at departure. They'd have to work to pay for their food, lodging, and other expenses. They were required to visit state capitals along the way to meet political leaders and collect their signatures. And when they reached Salt Lake City, they had to begin wearing a new outfit, a flannel costume with a short skirt that fell several inches below the knee, designed to suit the bicycle craze of the 1890s. At that

Starting point is 00:02:50 time, women were still wearing full-length dresses or skirts that hid their ankles, a Victorian style that hampered their movements, and it seems that the wager's sponsor wanted to promote a new garment that allowed them more freedom. Under all these constraints, they would still have to reach New York City in seven months. To maximize their chances, Helga and Clara planned their trip carefully. To avoid getting lost, they would follow railroad tracks from city to city, and at each destination they'd visit the local newspaper office to tell their story in the hope that sympathetic readers might offer them work such as sewing and cleaning. The mayor of Spokane agreed to give them a letter of introduction

Starting point is 00:03:23 to present along the way. They also planned to give talks about the journey and sell souvenir photographs of themselves, and Helga planned to keep a diary so that she could write a book to increase their income. Though she was doing this to save the farm, Helga faced enormous disapproval from her family and friends, many of whom thought what she was doing was outrageous. Her neighbors in the little Norwegian enclave of Micah Creek described her as a determined woman who achieved what she made up her mind to do. But they considered this task impossible and actually immoral. A mother's place was in the home taking care of her family and leaving them to go on an adventure, even to earn money, was unseemly and irresponsible. But Helga could see no other solution to their troubles,

Starting point is 00:04:03 so on May 5, 1896, she and Clara set out from the office of the Spokane Daily Chronicle, headed for the office of the New York World, more than 3,000 miles away. They carried, among other things, two Smith & Wesson revolvers, a map and compass, some medical supplies, a lantern, some photographs to sell, a curling iron, and a gun that sprayed cayenne pepper to fend off highwaymen and wild animals. Even with some food, their bundles weighed less than eight pounds each. The start was inauspicious. They walked south for ten days through rain and sleet, a continuation of the worst winter the Northwest had seen since 1882, and arrived in the Scandinavian town of La Crosse

Starting point is 00:04:40 Junction to find that the Norwegians there considered their project scandalous and refused them food or lodging. They took shelter that night in their wet dresses in the cold waiting room of a railroad depot. But as they went on, their plan seemed to come into its own. At each new town, they went to the newspaper office and presented a card that read Mrs. H. Estby and Daughter, Pedestrians, Spokane to New York, and the publicity helped them sell photographs and find work. The walking seemed to improve their health and, Helga said, gave them appetites like bears. The greatest dangers they faced were bitter cold in the high passes of the Blue Mountains of Oregon and a tramp who followed them for several days and finally accosted them near La Grande. They protested, but he wouldn't leave them alone, and finally Helga had to shoot him in the leg with

Starting point is 00:05:24 her revolver. From there, they passed into Idaho. After 30 days on the road, they'd covered more than 450 miles through the wettest spring in 33 years. Their plan of following the rails served them well, and in fact, when they tried to make a shortcut, they paid the price for it, spending three days lost in the Snake River lava beds without any food. They were saved when they spotted the distant headlight of a Union Pacific train, which led them back to the tracks, and they followed these diligently into Utah. In Salt Lake City, Helga told a reporter that they hoped to stop for a week to rest up and earn some money. She said, thus far we have had a pretty hard time.

Starting point is 00:05:58 The journey is not what it is cracked up to be, and I can assure you that when the trip is over, I will never undertake such a trip again. According to their agreement, they put on the bicycle skirts here and would wear them assure you that when the trip is over, I will never undertake such a trip again. According to their agreement, they put on the bicycle skirts here and would wear them for the remainder of the trip. Because we don't know the sponsor's identity, we don't know her reason for making this requirement, but there was a rational dress movement at the time that objected to the confining and impractical clothing that prevented women from advancing their fortunes. One reformer said, until woman is allowed to have ankles, there is no hope for her brains. Did these costumes that they had to wear require corsets or allow them to dispense with corsets? I was actually wondering if they were

Starting point is 00:06:34 trying to walk all this distance while wearing a corset. That I don't know, but corsets were considered irrational according to this movement. Sure. I don't think so today uh especially as women started to practice medicine around now they were learning all the horrible things corsets could cause damage to the liver displacement of organs atrophy of abdominal muscles and constriction of the chest and ribs there are all kinds of deleterious health effects that no one was paying attention to yeah i mean it's my understanding that women used to sometimes just pass out from lack of oxygen right i mean so i was just wondering if they were trying to, I mean, it would be hard enough to walk wearing a very long confining skirt, but I was wondering if they're trying to wear corsets too.

Starting point is 00:07:11 I hope not for their sake, but there are all kinds of reasons. I mean, again, we don't know anything about the sponsor of this wager, but she could well have had that motive among others, perhaps. From Utah, they passed into Wyoming, where a mountain lion as big as a man followed them for 12 miles. Helga later told a reporter, being acquainted with the animal's traits, we knew they never attacked from behind and never except by running and springing upon a victim. We kept up a steady pace and kept the animal about 10 feet behind us. At night, they lit a huge fire and stayed awake with guns in hand. Near Laramie, they had to walk across the Union

Starting point is 00:07:45 Pacific's highest bridge, the Dale Creek Trestle, and they found that summer storms had washed away bridges near the Laramie Mountains, so at one point they had to walk six miles through water two feet deep before they could climb onto the opposite bank of a river. But as news of their venture spread among railroad men, they began to find bottles of water left for them along the tracks. Their good health held out until Denver, when Clara fell on some rocks and sprained her ankle, which cost them 10 days while she recuperated. That would turn out to be a fateful setback. In Omaha, she also fell sick with food poisoning, and that cost them several more days,

Starting point is 00:08:22 but the contract made allowance for illness, so Helga revised their expected arrival date. They crossed the Mississippi into Illinois and were approaching Chicago when they were accosted by hobos who followed them for three quarters of a mile. Helga and Clara were forced to walk backward, pointing their revolvers at them, and in the end, Clara shot them in the face with the pepper gun, and they begged for mercy. I would like to pause to comment on the amazing effectiveness of this pepper gun. From what I understand, it was a box of insect powder that they had filled instead with cayenne pepper. I don't know whether this was their own idea or whether it was just something people did in 1896. They'd been accosted by a highwayman in Colorado, and Clara had sprayed him with pepper and rolled him down a

Starting point is 00:08:56 hill, and she told a reporter that one spray of pepper was as good as a whole police force. I guess that's good to know. Yeah, I suppose you could still do that today. By the time they reached Chicago on November 7th, they had one dime left and their clothes were in rags, but they earned money by modeling their bicycle skirts and made enough to buy new outfits and shoes. Indiana and Ohio were cold, but relatively small and well populated after the wide western states. In Canton, Ohio, they stopped to meet William McKinley, the nation's new president-elect, but by now they were worried about the deadline, and so they hurried on, putting in 38 miles in one day, trying to make up lost time. They crossed Pennsylvania without trouble,

Starting point is 00:09:34 and though bad directions in New Jersey took them 45 miles off course, they found their way again and finally set foot on Manhattan Island shortly after one o'clock on December 23, 1896. They had traversed 3,500 miles in 7 months and 18 days and worn out 32 pairs of shoes. But it still wasn't clear whether they'd won the wager. They had lost 10 days when Clara had sprained her ankle in Colorado, but they'd made up 6 of those days. The question was whether the sponsor would allow them to count the remaining 4 days as an illness. There seemed good reason to hope for this, but now somehow all their good fortune turned bad. After only four hours in New York, they lost the pocketbook that contained all their money and most of Helga's travel diary. And then on Christmas Eve, they learned that the sponsor refused to

Starting point is 00:10:18 honor the contract or even to pay them for a train ride home. Again, here we know basically nothing about the sponsor, so we don't know if her reason was that they had technically overshot the deadline, which is valid, or whether this was considered so difficult. Everyone but Helga seemed to think this was impossible, so it's possible the sponsor had offered the wager without expecting that anyone would actually try it or fulfill it. Nobody knows. I guess we'll never find out.

Starting point is 00:10:45 That left them destitute and stranded in New York. They moved to Brooklyn and managed to support themselves through the winter and spring of 1897, but they couldn't earn enough money to buy rail tickets back home. At the time, women earned only about half as much as men for similar work. And much worse news soon reached them. Back on the farm, 15-year-old Berta and then 9-year-old Johnny came down with diphtheria. Ula had been making barely enough to feed and clothe the children,

Starting point is 00:11:10 and Helga wasn't managing to send any funds from New York. Ula moved the healthy children to a shed while he tended to the sick ones to prevent the spread of the illness. But despite his best efforts, Berta died on April 6th and Johnny four days later. When she heard of Berta's illness, Helga pleaded for public assistance to help her get back home. She was turned down, but the New York railroad titan Chauncey DePue learned of her case and gave her a free pass on his railroad line. And before they left New York, it appears that she and Clara negotiated a deal with the wager sponsor, by which they'd received $10,000 after they'd published a book about their adventure.

Starting point is 00:11:45 That might still have redeemed the trip, but in the end, Helga never wrote the book. After a 13-month absence, she returned to Micah Creek to find herself shunned. She had left her home, and now two of her children were dead. Worse, the cause of Detheria wasn't understood, and many felt that poor housekeeping was a contributing factor, which again reflected badly on Helga. And in deciding that she needed to make her journey in the first place, she had humiliated her husband by indicating publicly that he was unable to provide for his family. In the face of all this, Helga didn't

Starting point is 00:12:13 write her book or give the illustrated lectures that she'd planned, and the walk became a taboo topic among her family, who never forgave her for what had happened. With time, despite these hard feelings, the family's circumstances began to improve. The farm was foreclosed in 1901, but by that time the economy was improving. The family moved to Spokane, where Ulla was able to find carpentry work, and he started a contracting business with his son Arthur, and eventually built the family a fine two-story home on Mallon Street. Clara went to business college and began a lifelong career in the financial world, and Helga

Starting point is 00:12:45 became involved in the suffrage movement, attending meetings and marching in the city's demonstrations. Willa died in 1913, and sometime after that, Helga began quietly to write her memoirs of the trip. She covered hundreds of pages of yellow foolscap paper with her memories of the journey across America, but it's a measure of the family's resentment that when Helga died in 1942, her daughters burned the manuscript. With that, the story of Helga's journey was obliterated almost entirely. It was rescued only because her daughter-in-law, Margaret, discovered a scrapbook containing two long news articles that had been published in Minnesota as the women made their way back home. Margaret saved these articles and passed them on to Helga's granddaughter, Thelma,

Starting point is 00:13:23 who said, I was amazed when I read the clippings because Grandma never once mentioned the trip. If Margaret hadn't saved these, the story would have been lost forever. Thelma's eighth-grade grandson eventually published an essay titled Grandma Walks from Coast to Coast for a Washington State History Day contest, and it came to the notice of the writer Linda Lawrence Hunt, who then invested years in digging up the remaining available resources and finally published Helga's story in a 2003 book called Bold Spirit. Hunt wrote, my hope is that Helga's story, once shrouded in silence, now can be linked with other voices to contribute to a fuller American history and to contribute to a growing dialogue on the causes and costs of silencing the story of a life. In his eighth grade essay, Helga's great-great-grandson Doug Barr had written, I do not know if this story matters to others outside the family,

Starting point is 00:14:10 but no matter what adventures the future may bring for me, I know I can always count upon the determination, courage, and talent that is part of my heritage. Zach Shepard, who thought I could likely manage his name without pronunciation tips, and hopefully he was correct, sent us some follow-ups to a couple of older episodes. I'm proud to say that, a year since I started listening regularly, I finally worked my way through your full back catalog, at first going backwards in time until I hit all of your warnings around the 150s to listen to the older episodes chronologically. This means, I hope, that I can report two updates I found to some of your earlier stories without fear that they might have already been covered at some point. And Zach's first update is to the story that we covered back in

Starting point is 00:15:09 December 2014 of how for decades a mysterious figure would appear each year at the grave of Edgar Allan Poe in the early morning of January 19th, the date of Poe's birthday, to drink a toast of cognac and leave behind three roses. The ritual ended after 2009 with no one knowing who the person had been or just why they'd done this. Zach said, When you covered the Poe toaster in episode 37, the story ended on the uncertain note that the new toaster was not quite living up to the original toaster's legacy. I followed up to see if the toaster had reformed or not in the years since, and I am sad to report the answer there is no. As this article from the Baltimore Sun notes,

Starting point is 00:15:55 Jeff Jerome, the former curator at the Poe House and the guardian of the toaster tradition, said in 2011 that it was time to let the ritual die a noble death if the original practitioner did not return. However, as the article is actually announcing, the good news is that the Maryland Historical Society had, at least as of 2016, organized a competition to find a worthier inheritor to the title and reinstated the tradition. I can't find any coverage for the years since then, though, so I'm unsure whether it was a one-off event or whether the tradition is now ongoing once more. So that's an interesting update. In Greg's story about this in episode 37, he has a quote from Jeff Jerome from 2013. The real Poe Toaster didn't show up, but six imitators did.

Starting point is 00:16:37 Two of them almost bumped into each other and a third nearly impaled himself on the fence. I think we should let the tradition die a dignified death. impaled himself on the fence. I think we should let the tradition die a dignified death. If someone wants to pay tribute to Poe, they should come visit his grave during the daytime on his birthday, or read one of his poems. And it seems like they kept something like that in mind when they tried to resurrect the tradition in January 2016, rather than trying to strictly stick to the original ritual. So the Poe Toaster of 2016 performed to an audience in the afternoon, arriving after a dramatic reading of one of Poe's works, instead of in secret in the early morning dark. He also played Danse Macabre on the violin, another change from the original ritual. But he

Starting point is 00:17:17 did toast the writer with cognac and leave the roses, and from the description in the article, it all sounded rather appropriately dramatic for it being Poe. That's a tricky thing to set up, I guess. I mean, it's got to be something that someone could reliably do every year if it's going to be a proper tradition. Yeah, and I guess that's what we don't know. Because similar to Zach, I was also unable to find any newer articles than the one he'd sent from January 2016. So if anyone lives in or near Baltimore and has a way to find out more about this, whether they've kept this up or not,

Starting point is 00:17:47 please do let us know. Zach also included a follow-up to the story that we covered in December 2016 about a series of events in 1944 in the small town of Mattoon, Illinois, where several people thought they had been assaulted with some kind of gas in their bedrooms by an unknown assailant.

Starting point is 00:18:06 Zach said, Following up on your story in episode 132 about the Mad Gasser of Mattoon, I was interested to hear a passing reference on No Such Thing as a Fish, side note, thanks for name-checking them enough that I went and started listening to their show as well, to a similar panic that gripped UK tourists in caravans, or RVs as we call them in the US, in 2014 to 2015. It is fascinating how similar it is to the Mattoon story, given especially that I assume that these UK tourists are mostly not listeners of your podcast and thus are unaware of the identical fear that gripped some US town dwellers 70 years prior. It follows the same

Starting point is 00:18:44 pattern of a few reported and somewhat well-attested incidents, police and press taking it very seriously, community panic, and dismissal is dubious by experts. I found two articles of different panic levels about this at The Telegraph, credulous this is happening, and BBC, one year later, now very dubious. Both articles contain a response from the Royal College of Anesthetists expressing strong doubts that this is even possible. However, it nonetheless set off discussion and fear in the community, which, thanks to the internet, we can all now see preserved forever,

Starting point is 00:19:17 discussing the stories as dubious, sincere this-happened-to-me warnings, and fearful people seeking out sleeping gas detectors for their vehicles. So yeah, the Telegraph article on this from September 2014 begins with the rather dramatic sentence, British families visiting the continent are being warned to fit gas detectors to their caravans after a new spate of attacks by gangs piping sleeping gas into their motorhomes, and then recounts a story told by Hayley Kearns, who reported that she and her family had been attacked overnight while traveling in France, and had awakened groggily to find a window broken and their valuables gone.

Starting point is 00:19:56 Kearns told the Telegraph that the French police had told her that Eastern European gangs were targeting vacationers, and the article states that other British travelers have reported similar attacks and tourists are being warned not to sleep in their caravans at French service stations. Kearns reported waking up during the night and seeing a shadowy figure, but she was unable to rouse her brother before succumbing again to sleep. She then didn't remember anything until the morning when she and the others were completely out of it. She also reported that her parents' dog uncharacteristically didn't remember anything until the morning when she and the others were completely out of it. She also reported that her parents' dog uncharacteristically didn't bark, which made

Starting point is 00:20:29 her believe that the assailants had gassed him too. And she was quoted as saying, we have to have been knocked out. There was a tiny slit in the trailer tent, just big enough to put a pipe through. The police said we were the second or third group to have been done at that service station. And the group were moving slowly south from Paris. The article mentions that other similar incidents had occurred recently and that a manager of a motor caravan and camping center reported that people were now installing gas detectors in their caravans. As Zach noted, the Royal College of Anesthetists was not persuaded, though,

Starting point is 00:21:01 and issued a statement that said, It is the view of the college that it would not be possible to render someone unconscious by blowing ether, chloroform, or any of the currently used volatile anesthetic agents through the window of a motorhome without their knowledge, even if they were sleeping at the time. The statement noted that the more common anesthetic agents would require very large amounts to be sprayed into a room and would need to be delivered in tanker loads of carrier gas by a large compressor. They stated that less common drugs that might work in lower concentrations are few in number and difficult to obtain and would be too expensive for the average thief to use. That's remarkably similar. He's right to the Mattoon

Starting point is 00:21:43 story, which was, as I remember, fanned very much by irresponsible press who sort of took it all seriously. And then experts weighed in and said, this can't possibly be true. I remember thinking

Starting point is 00:21:53 about that one too, as a, why would anybody do this in the first place? Because I don't think anyone is claiming to have been robbed or, you know. Yeah,

Starting point is 00:21:59 in Mattoon they weren't. In this case, they, they were. In this case, it's, the supposed gassings were followed by robberies. So there's some motive. So there was, they were. In this case, the supposed gassings were followed by

Starting point is 00:22:05 robberies. So there's some motive. So there was actually some motive. But yeah, but the experts were extremely dubious and thought it just was almost entirely impossible for this to actually be happening. And then in August 2015, a BBC article questioned, are French burglars really using gas? And recounted the claim that burglars had pumped gas into Formula One driver Jenson Button's home on the French Riviera in order to put Button, his wife, and some friends to sleep while they stole 300,000 pounds or $464,000 worth of jewelry. Apparently, over the previous 15 years or so, there had been various other claims by celebrities or wealthy years or so, there had been various other claims by celebrities or wealthy individuals in France that they had been knocked out by gas while their

Starting point is 00:22:50 homes were burglarized. The article quotes an operations director for a home security firm that sounds rather confident that these attacks have been occurring using what he termed anesthetic based gas that he suggests would be introduced into the house through air conditioning intake vents. And I should note that someone who runs a home security business might have a little bias in wanting the public to believe that the security of their homes might be in question. The article then quotes a former burglar turned home security consultant who says that using gas in a house would be highly unusual, but he then claims it's much more commonly used in caravans and motorhomes, especially in France and targeting British tourists. A few stories are given of British

Starting point is 00:23:30 tourists who were robbed in their motorhomes while being groggy and unable to wake up, and the Royal College of Anesthetists again weighs in with their skepticism. And if they were skeptical about gassing people in a motorhome, they are even more skeptical about thieves being able to pump in the massive amounts of anesthetic gas that would be required to knock out a house full of people. So what are we to make of all this? As in the events in Mattoon, there are people who appear to believe that this has actually happened to them. And these reports have started from even before the articles from 2014 and 2015, as I was able to find a newspaper article from 2007 about British vacationers claiming they had

Starting point is 00:24:12 been gassed and then robbed in their camper van while in France. And the article cites a spokesperson for the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office as saying that the office had received reports of other similar incidents and had issued advice about it on its website. The spokesperson is quoted as saying, this isn't a new type of incident. We've had calls about this in the past and we warn against this type of crime. And the BBC article refers to cases reported in homes in France going back to about 2000. So these reports have been circulating for some time now.

Starting point is 00:24:43 And overall, I guess it's hard to say with any certainty what really has been happening in these cases. But I would tend to imagine that the Royal College of Anesthetists would have a somewhat better idea of what realistically is or isn't possible than the average layperson might. Yeah, yeah. I guess, too, social media probably exacerbates this kind of hysteria. I hadn't thought about that. Yeah, because that really can spread it much more.

Starting point is 00:25:06 That wasn't a factor in that too. Sure. Thanks so much to everyone who writes to us. We really appreciate getting your updates, comments, and feedback. So if you have any of those that you'd like to send to us, please send them to podcast at futilitycloset.com. And if your name is any harder than Zach's to say correctly, please do me a favor and tell me how you would like it said.

Starting point is 00:25:33 It's Greg's turn to try to solve a lateral thinking puzzle. I'm going to give him a strange sounding situation, and he has to try to work out what's going on, asking yes or no questions. This puzzle comes from Colin Summers. A woman puts some work equipment onto the local train to deliver it to a co-worker at another job site. While the train is reportedly one of the fastest ever built, it takes the equipment over an hour to arrive. The train left on time, made no other stops, and had only a relatively short distance to travel. What is going on? Where to start with that? Okay, that sounded carefully worded.

Starting point is 00:26:14 This piece of work equipment takes an hour to reach its destination. Yes. Does it take the train that long? What a ridiculous question. Yes. Well, no, because, I mean, I don't know. All right, so if a train takes a relatively long time to travel a relatively short distance, then its average speed is low. Is that fair to say?

Starting point is 00:26:31 It's traveling slowly? Right. But the train is one of the fastest ever built. Well, it's capable of high speeds, but it sounds like it's just traveling slowly. Is that right? I'd have to say no to that whole sentence. Okay. By train, do you mean a conventional train?

Starting point is 00:26:50 I'm thinking it was a train that runs on tracks on the ground. Give me one easy question. No. You asked a whole lot of things all in one question. All right. You're putting too many phrases into your sentences. Is this what... Is it the train that runs on tracks along the surface of the earth?

Starting point is 00:27:19 No. It's not a roller coaster, is it? Correct. It is not a roller coaster. it correct it is not a roller coaster that would be a very strange puzzle but it's a train of some sort does it go underground no does it so it's not on surface does it go above does it go into the air in some way it's not on the surface of the earth correct is it in the air you look so cagey about everything I'm asking. Are we in space now? Yes. A train in space?

Starting point is 00:27:50 Yes. So the woman is an astronaut? Yes. On another, on the moon? No. On another planet? No. Is this fictional?

Starting point is 00:27:58 Did this really happen? It's based on a real thing. I mean, not like a real specific incident, but on a real thing that exists. Yes. Okay. So, so there's a woman on another planet? No. So she's just in space?

Starting point is 00:28:12 No. She's on an asteroid. Yeah. No, no. I mean, you would say she's in space, but I mean, she's not like floating in space. Right. But if she... Because she'd probably be dead, right?

Starting point is 00:28:23 If she were doing that? Okay. I'm going to abandon that whole line of question. Okay, there's an astronaut. Yes. Who wants to send a piece of work equipment to another, I guess, another astronaut. Yes. Along, on or aboard what's called a train. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:28:39 That will convey it from one point to the other. That runs on a track, yes. And it normally runs quite fast. Say it from one point to the other. That runs on a track, yes. And it normally runs quite fast. Well, it's one of the fastest ever built, but it takes it a relatively long time to travel a short distance.

Starting point is 00:28:53 And that's the crux. Can you make sense out of those statements? The train is one of the fastest ever built. Yes. But it takes it a relatively long time. To travel a short distance, yes. Are we talking this distance that it travels, is it vertical? I mean, are we talking about actually getting out of it? No.

Starting point is 00:29:12 No, that's a good thought. Out of gravity. Right, that's not it. That's not the key to it. So do I need to know more about the surroundings then immediately? I'll tell you, they're on the International Space Station, if that helps you. Okay.

Starting point is 00:29:25 So we're narrowing it down from all of outer space. So this train is carrying something from one part of the station to another? Yes. One of the fastest ever built, but it takes a long time to accomplish that. Yes. And how can you make sense out of that sentence? Okay. Is it traveling at this high speed?

Starting point is 00:29:45 Is the train traveling at its maximum speed while it's conveying this piece of equipment? Let's say yes. Yeah, so we can say that? Like the whole length of the distance between the two astronauts? Yes. And yet it takes a long time? Is it? Yes.

Starting point is 00:30:00 Okay, that is a good puzzle. And this has nothing to do with relativity or anything like that? That's correct. Oh, does this have to do with time zones? No. Relatively long. All right, so let's just follow her through it. If she puts this piece of, would it help me to know what the piece of equipment is?

Starting point is 00:30:20 She puts that, she's at one end of the. She's at one spot, and she's trying to send something to somebody at another spot. So she puts the equipment on this train, let's keep calling it a train, and starts it going toward the other astronaut. Yes. And it does that. Yes. At a high speed, we said.

Starting point is 00:30:35 At one of the high speeds of which it's capable. No? I'm having trouble answering these. All right. Skip the velocity then. So she sends it going toward the other astronaut. Yes. And it goes the whole distance it has to go and arrives at the other astronaut.

Starting point is 00:30:49 Yes. She does whatever she needs to do with it. But that takes a long time. Yes. Is the train traveling at the same speed during its whole course? Yes. Let's say it is. So if it takes a long time

Starting point is 00:31:05 I can come back to this again if it takes a long time that means its average speed is you'd have to say slow slow yes yes

Starting point is 00:31:12 I will tell you that that NASA has called this both the slowest and fastest train in the universe when you say fast do you mean relative to the earth below

Starting point is 00:31:21 yes because the the station itself is moving so fast. Yes, that's exactly it. Okay. So Colin says, the two are astronauts on the International Space Station. The train is the mobile transporter on the ISS.

Starting point is 00:31:33 The MT moves at a top speed of one inch per second and transports cargo on the outside of the station. But as the space station is orbiting the Earth at 17,500 miles per hour, that makes it both the fastest and slowest train in the universe. And NASA has called it that, the slowest and fastest train in the universe. And Colin sent this puzzle specifically for me to read to you because he said, since Sharon always seems to ask if the puzzle takes place on Earth, this could have been over too quick. So thanks so much to Colin for that out of this world puzzle. And if anyone else has a puzzle for us to try set on Earth or not, please send it to podcast at futilitycloset.com. Just a reminder that we'll be off next week. In the meantime, if you'd like to become one of the

Starting point is 00:32:17 awesome supporters of our show and check out some bonus content like outtakes, extra lateral thinking puzzles, more discussions on some of the stories and peeks behind the scenes, Thank you. curiosities. Browse the Futility Closet store, learn about the Futility Closet books, and see the show notes for the podcast with links and references for the topics we've covered. If you have any comments or feedback for us, you can always email us at podcast at futilitycloset.com. Our music was written and performed by Greg's phenomenal brother, Doug Ross. Thanks for listening, and we'll be back in two weeks.

Futility Closet - 282-Helga Estby's Walk

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