Lore - Episode 142: Reflections

Episode Date: May 11, 2020

There’s a lot that science has explained away. Mysteries that left us cowering in fear. Events that challenged our feelings of security and control. But even after all that progress, there are still some unexplained stories that left to haunt us. ———————— Lore Resources:  Episode Music: lorepodcast.com/music  Episode Sources: lorepodcast.com/sources  Lore News: www.theworldoflore.com/now  Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com Access premium content!: https://www.lorepodcast.com/support See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The gods had abandoned them. At least that was how the ancient Greeks interpreted the signs in the sky. Earlier in the day, everything had seemed normal and fine, but hours later the sun had grown dark, as if covered by a great disk. The Greeks referred to this as a great abandonment when their greatest fears had come to life. The gods had forsaken them. It was a sign that great disaster was about to arrive, either from war or disease or even the death of their king.

And the word for it, eclipo, is still with us today. We just call it an eclipse. The Greeks weren't alone in how they interpreted rare natural events. Over 4,000 years ago in China, the royal astronomers failed to predict an eclipse, and the emperor had them executed for the error. Why? Because the ancient Chinese believed that an eclipse happened when a dragon ate the sun, and predicting it meant having a chance to get ready.

Interestingly, the earliest word for eclipse in Chinese is shi, which means to eat. And the list goes on and on. In ancient Egypt, the event signified a battle between Apep, the serpent of death and chaos, and Ra, the sun god. Thankfully, Ra always won, and the sun would return. In the mythology of a number of Native American tribes, an eclipse happened when a little boy trapped the sun in a fishing net. It was only freed when wild animals chewed the ropes away.

For thousands of years, humans have built deep superstition around rarity. When something happened so infrequently that its occurrence felt otherworldly, stories would be crafted around it. These rare occurrences were miracles, after all, at least in the minds of those who witnessed them. When they happened, it had the potential to be a frightening, life-changing event. And few outliers captured that reverence and fear more fully than when it happened right in our midst, when the very people who told the stories experienced those miracles firsthand.

As folklore wasn't always an invention of the mind, just some clever story invented and then passed along. Sometimes it was more tangible, more physical, and more real. Because in the world of the unusual and unexpected, nothing was more powerful than the birth of twins. I'm Aaron Mankey, and this is Lore. Those that visit the village are always struck by its beauty. Tucked away in the southeastern tip of England in the wheeled of Kent, the village of Binden

is a snapshot of another time. Lattice windows adorn ancient Flemish cottages, field stones and thatched roofs, and whitewashed plaster cut up by blackened oak beams. Honestly, it's a crime how stereotypical the place looks, and I'm not going to fault them for it at all. It is a thing of beauty, but that's not all that's wonderful about Binden. It seems that every year on Easter, the local church gives out food to the most needy in the region.

It is often a meal of tea and cheese and loaves of bread. Funding for that ongoing charity comes from the revenue earned by a plot of farmland now known as the bread and cheese lands. Land. That was a gift from a set of conjoined twins. Mary and Eliza Chulcourst were born to wealthy parents in the year 1100, but passed away in 1134. In their will, they deeded 20 acres of land to be used as a source for future charity.

And ever since, the sisters have been sort of the patron saints of the town. In fact, the cakes that are given out each year, now known as Binden cakes, bear their image, the figure of two women, literally joined at the hip. But it's not the only town to revere twins. In southwestern Nigeria, there's a group of people known as the Yoruba. One of the things that sets this group apart from a lot of others is their definition of what a family is. For them, it's more than just parents, children, and siblings.

And because of that flexibility, each clan can often grow to over 100 members. The biggest aid to that growth, however, just might be their people's almost supernatural ability to give birth to twins. While it's still a relatively low percentage, the Yoruba's ratio of one set of twins out of every 20 births puts them at the top of the list across the globe. And when those twins arrive, the people there practically worship them. They refer to them as spirit children, believing that their births hint at great power, either for good or for evil.

But that reverence isn't anything new. For thousands of years, twins have been capturing the imagination of cultures all around the globe. In fact, we can see it in their foundation stories, like the Egyptian tales of Isis and Osiris, or the Greek mythology of Castor and Pollux. Twins are also found in the ancient stories of the Norse, the Jewish, and the Chinese, among many others. And everywhere we find them, these stories highlight just how much twins were both feared

and respected. In Greek mythology, for example, Artemis and Apollo were powerful twins, one being in charge of the sun, and the other, the moon. Roman mythology claims that it was a set of twins, Remus and Romulus, who founded Rome itself. Though it should come as no surprise that, when the pharaoh Cleopatra and her husband, the Roman general Mark Anthony, had twins roughly 2,000 years ago, they named them appropriately – Alexander Helios for the sun and Cleopatra Selene for the moon.

And that ancient fascination with twins has never really gone away. In fact, as we've grown in our understanding of human biology, that obsession has only deepened. A lot of that can be traced back to an English scientist named Francis Galton. He was the first to publish a paper back in 1875 on how physical traits were passed down from generation to generation, but it opened the door for more questions. One of the age-old debates in psychology has always been nature versus nurture, the question of what makes us who we are.

Is it our biology and the traits we inherited genetically from our parents, or is it more about the world we grew up in and the behavior and attitudes that were modeled for us? According to one study that wrapped up in 2015, one that looked at nearly 18,000 traits, not just things like eye color and personality type, the line fell right down the middle. The answer to the question, nature versus nurture, seemed to be both. But whether it's ancient cultures treating twins as if they're powerful beings, or modern scientists looking for truth in the human genome, these quests can only take us so far. As the centuries have gone by, twin studies have yielded us just as many questions as

answers. And they've taught us something else. There are some things that science can't explain. It's easy to make assumptions. It's something humans have been very good at for a very long time. If a culture can assume that the sun went dark because a dragon ate it, then the birth of identical twins when only one child was expected must seem even more magical. And if they look the same, surely they must act the same.

Of course, you and I know that every person is unique, no matter how much they look alike. I personally know twins and triplets, and even if they all dress the same, you would just need to spend about 30 seconds in their company to realize that they are each very unique individuals. But still, we allow appearances to fool us. Of course, there are those who buck that trend. Take the Grimes brothers, for example. Ray and Roy were born in Ohio in 1893, and both of the men started careers as Major League

Baseball players in 1920. Ray played for the Boston Red Sox, and Roy for the New York Giants, decades before that team moved to San Francisco. Things weren't all the same for them, though. Ray played six seasons in the major leagues, but his twin Roy only managed the one. And then there were the Kray brothers. Ronnie and Reggie were born in October of 1933 in London's East End, but rather than excel at sports, these twins were good at something else, organized crime.

In fact, no gang in the 1950s or 60s was more powerful than their own, affectionately named The Firm. Over the course of their career, these twins worked together to commit all sorts of crime. In the public eye, they were the rough owners of a London nightclub, a club that put them in contact with superstars like Judy Garland and Frank Sinatra. But in the shadows, they were the puppeteers behind murder, assault, and armed robbery. But few twins in history shared as much in common as one pair, and honestly, this is the stuff that science just can't explain, and it all started in Ohio in 1940.

That was the year that an unknown mother gave birth to a set of twins, and then placed them both up for adoption. When a young couple named the Louises arrived at the hospital three weeks later, they said that they didn't want two infants to care for, so they only took one home. They named him James, and raised him in the city of Lima, Ohio, in the northwestern corner of the state. James, who went by Jim, grew up with a dog named Toy, and seems to have done alright in school.

He hated spelling, but he loved math and woodworking, and it was a passion that he would carry with him into adulthood. By the time Jim Louis was discovered in the 1970s, he had a laundry list of quirks. He drove a Chevy to work every day, where he was a deputy sheriff. He married a woman named Linda earlier in life, but they divorced years later. After that, Jim married Betty, and together they raised his son, James Allen. The family would even drive south to Florida each year and spend their vacation on the beach, which must have been a wonderful thing.

It was a normal life, and one that sounds like countless others. On the surface, at least. But Jim Louis's mother had occasionally mentioned that when he was adopted, there was a twin brother. And as Jim grew older, he started to wonder if that twin was out there somewhere, maybe even looking for him. So in 1979, at the age of 39, he called the courthouse that had his adoption records, and asked for more information.

What he learned was that a family named the Springers had taken his twin brother home that very same week. After digging around some more, he managed to find a phone number for that family. And I can't pretend to know what Jim Louis was thinking, or how he felt. He was about to make contact with a long-lost sibling, and that had to have felt exciting and frightening all at the same time. But what he discovered was something more unbelievable. You see, the Springers had taken their infant boy home and named him James, and James, who

also went by Jim, grew up with a dog named Toy. He hated spelling in school, but did all right with math and woodworking, a hobby that he still dabbled with in adulthood. And every day, he climbed behind the wheel of a Chevy and drove to work, where he served as a deputy sheriff. Jim Springer married a woman named Linda, but they divorced after a number of years, and he eventually remarried to a woman named Betty. Together they raised their son, James Allen, and took annual family vacation trips to a

beach in Florida. The very same beach, in fact, that the Louises visited each year. Twins separated at birth, and raised by two very different sets of parents, and yet their path through life was practically identical. The same jobs, the same names for all their spouses, and even their sons, the same car and cigarette brand and vacation spot on paper without their last names, Jim and Jim, were essentially the same person. But as difficult as it is to believe, the Jim twins are not the oddest case of twins

on record. No, that honor goes to an unusual pair of siblings who gave a whole new meaning to the phrase nature versus nurture, and if the details of their story are completely true, they bring us face to face with a frightening realization. There are some bonds that even death can't break. It was a parent's worst nightmare. John and Florence lived in the little town of Hexham in Northern England, where they ran a service delivering milk and other groceries to customers all over town, and their two

daughters, Joanna and Jacqueline, spent their time either in school or in the care of their grandmother. But on May 7th of 1957, all of that changed. That's when a tragic car accident took both of their children from them forever. It seems that a local woman had lost control of her vehicle at the very same moment that Joanna and Jacqueline were walking to church, and they were both struck and instantly killed. I'm not going to pretend to understand what John and Florence went through as a result of their loss.

As a parent myself, this is one of those topics that's difficult to comprehend and touches on very deep fears, but I think any parent would feel the same. But it's essential to our story today to explain what they went through because it helps the road before them make more sense. Clearly, this was the sort of trauma that puts a strain on a marriage, and John and Florence dealt with a lot over the coming months. From what I've been able to find, Florence understandably retreated deeper and deeper into depression, while John looked for peace through religion.

But they worked through it all as best they could, and in early 1958, they received happy news. They were pregnant. In October of that year, John and Florence went to the hospital expecting to deliver a healthy baby. The heartbeat had been strong all through the summer, and they were both excited for a new beginning. But there were surprises in store for them.

Somehow the doctors had missed a second heartbeat, and now suddenly, they were the parents of twins. But not just twins, but twin girls, and for John, who had been looking for hope and some sort of sign that life could return to normal, this was it. These daughters had returned. Florence, though, didn't share in her husband's belief. Either way, they had two brand new babies to take care of, and life very quickly became busy.

Shortly after the twins were born, the family moved out of Hexham to Whitley Bay, a coastal town about 50 miles to the east, and then life flew by. Before long, the twins were talking, and that's when the first mystery occurred. Even though the girls had never seen the old dolls that were in a box in the attic, Christmas gifts that had once belonged to the sisters they'd never met, they began to ask for those dolls by name. So John and Florence brought the toys out of storage and gave them to the girls. Amazingly, within moments of the box being opened and dumped on the floor in front of

them, the girls separated them into two groups, groups that their parents recognized as the division between Joanna's toys and her sister Jacqueline's. And when one of the toddlers said the words, Santa's gifts, it sent a chill down their parents' spines. And the oddities continued from there. The twins, Jennifer and Jillian, apparently showed a dislike for the same foods that Joanna and Jacqueline had hated. They shared similar gestures and physical behavior with their older sisters, and as they grew

older they even began to look like them, which was odd considering Jennifer and Jillian were identical twins, and yet Jillian grew tall and slender like Joanna, and Jennifer was more stout like Jacqueline. The most frightening of all for John and Florence was the innate fear both girls seemed to have for cars. The sound of an engine, or a quickly moving vehicle, were all it took to cause deep anxiety for the young girls, who would reach out for each other until the noise was gone. Once, Florence overheard the girls discussing a car accident.

She peered into the room to see Jennifer laying with her head in Jillian's lap, who was whispering, the blood, it's coming out of your eyes. And there was simply no explanation for that behavior, considering Florence and John had never told the girls about that accident, let alone the specific details like that. When the twins were four, John and Florence decided to take a trip back to Hexham for the first time since their older daughters had been killed. But when they arrived, Jillian and Jennifer made it clear that they knew their way around town.

They were both able to name specific locations, like the school and shops in the downtown area. They even told their parents they wanted to play at the park, and then began to lead them in the correct direction. Taken as a whole, the coincidences were more than eerie. It was beyond explanation, and yet John and Florence watched things like this happen every day. Eventually, the girls were taken to a child psychologist to see if there was something the parents were missing, but those sessions only revealed more unusual connections to

the past. For whatever reason, though, as the girls grew older, those connections began to fade. By the time the twins were five years old, very little of those echoes of the past remained with them. Maybe it was a result of their world getting bigger every day, or the beginning of life at school and all the lessons that came with it, or perhaps time had a way of putting more distance between them and the sisters they had never met. By the time the twins were in their 20s, all of those unusual memories were gone.

The only time visions of the past returned to them were in occasional dreams, but even those grew less and less common over the years. But what hasn't faded is the fascinations surrounding their story. Was it an eerie case of reincarnation, as their child psychologist proposed in the years after their meetings, or was it something in their genetic code, a memory of lost siblings and a deep awareness of their parents' unspoken grief? They are challenging questions, and ones we may never be able to answer. It's clear, though, is a simple truth that most of us probably don't need pointed out

to us, that we, as humans, are part of a larger community. One that extends outward around us, yes, but also backwards in time. We are a product of those who came before us. But our unique identity is also somehow communal, a reflection of our family, our clan, and our culture. And so it's one of the rare moments when our intuition matches perfectly with years of scientific study. Are we a product of nature or of nurture?

The answer, it seems, is perfectly clear. Yes. There's magic in the unexplainable, isn't there? I know it feels uncivilized to hear stories about ancient cultures dreaming up wild explanations for natural events that we've all grown used to, but those stories make a powerful point. The unexpected and unusual has always been attractive to us, and I think it always will. I know that we've conquered a lot of it over the centuries. Through science and exploration, we've put the earth into a proper perspective.

We've broadened our understanding of the universe, and we've gained a deeper appreciation for the world we live in. But no matter how far and wide we search, there will always be things that defy our assumptions. And that's what's so alluring about the story of the twin girls raised by John and Florence Pollock. Despite no prior knowledge of the sisters who lived and died before they were born, these twins seem to break the mold. It wasn't so much about what they had in common with each other, as we might expect, but what

they had in common with the past. And that commonality has caused researchers to scratch their heads for decades. At the center of much of that research was the child psychologist that the Pollocks hired back in the early 60s. Dr. Ian Stevenson visited the family at home on numerous occasions and spent hundreds of hours with the girls in an attempt to find the logical explanations behind their eerie connection to the past. He even studied them later in life, after they'd grown into adulthood.

For the course of his career, he would go on to study many more children who demonstrated similar characteristics. He dove deep into the world of reincarnation and published at least a dozen books on his research before his death in 2007. And to this day, the final chapter is still unwritten. The explanation he had searched for is still alluding us. But he did uncover one unique bit of information during his time with the Pollock twins. It seems that in the larger conversation about behavior and words and memories of places

or toys the girls had never experienced before, Stevenson went looking for proof that was more tangible. And he found it. You see, for a long while, Gillian and Jennifer were thought to be physically identical. Same hair color, same eye color, same smile and laugh and everything else you would expect from monozygotic twins, that is twins born from the same egg. They were, as they should be, mirror images of each other. But not quite, because Dr. Stevenson noticed something that John and Florence had failed

to point out. A small birthmark just outside Jennifer's right eye, and another around her waist. They weren't visible on Gillian, but they did have a connection to another member of her family. They were the very same locations on the body, where her sister Jacqueline received her mortal wounds. The world of twins is a fascinating, mysterious place, and I hope you've enjoyed your brief tour through some of the more unexplainable parts of it.

But we're not quite finished. There's one more tale of the intertwined that I think is a wonderful addition to our journey so far. And if you stick around after this brief sponsor break, I'll tell you all about it. I'm going to be upfront with you. You've probably heard parts of this tale before. It's fascinating, and unusual, and the sort of story that kids love to read. But I promise you, there's more to it than you might expect.

And I think a little journey is in order. In 1824, a British merchant named Robert Hunter was traveling in Thailand, although back then it was known as Siam. According to his retelling of the events, he was out near the water around sunset, watching the locals go about the last tasks of their day, when he noticed a group of children playing at the water's edge. And that's when he saw it. Well, it was the best he could do at the time.

According to Robert Hunter, what he spotted from a distance looked like an unknown creature, at least to his untrained eyes. After he moved in for a closer look, he realized that he had been way off-target. It wasn't a strange animal after all. It was a pair of twins, brothers permanently joined at the side. Now, we have to be honest about what happened next. Hunter didn't see human beings so much as profit. He would later spin the story by telling people that the king of Siam had ordered the execution

of these brothers, and that what he did next was an effort to save them. But all you really have to do was read about the years that would follow to understand Hunter's true purpose, whether or not the king had actually done that. Hunter worked at it for five long years, but eventually managed to secure the brothers for a journey out of the country. Maybe he had to get their parents' permission, or perhaps he had to win the king over. But soon enough, the 17-year-old brothers, Chang and Aang, were on their way to America. Upon arrival in Boston, the conjoined twins were presented to a collection of physicians

who spent time examining them. Local newspapers published articles about them, and then, after putting plans together, Hunter took them on tour. These tours worked as you might expect. The route would be planned out, and then ads would be placed in newspapers of all the towns they planned to stop in. Then, Chang and Aang would board a train, and city by city they would get a small tour of America, while giving America a glimpse of themselves.

Hunter, of course, made money every step of the way. From what I can tell, tickets to see the brothers typically cost a quarter, equivalent to about $7 today. Their shows made heavy use of Asian stereotypes and clothing, and, of course, highlighted the physical uniqueness that the brothers shared. And for just about everyone, it was the first time in their lives they had ever witnessed conjoined twins firsthand. Chang and Aang did alright for themselves, too.

They didn't earn as much as Hunter, of course, but they saved up. A decade after their tour began, they settled into the American Dream. Well, the American Dream of the South in the decades before the Civil War. They bought neighboring farms in North Carolina, and while their bodies were permanently joined together, they managed to divide their time between the two homes. They also married, to a pair of sisters, in fact. Not twins, mind you, but honestly, that might have been a bit too on the nose. And between the two of them, they fathered 21 children, which, of course, opens up a

lot of questions, but I'll let you ponder those on your own. In 1860, the brothers signed a deal with legendary promoter P.T. Barnum. The tour he took them on was brief, though, because the rumblings of war were beginning to spread throughout the nation. Soon enough, the Civil War erupted, and when it was over, Chang and Aang's lives were in disarray. Part of it was simply the economy. War had brought much of the country to a standstill for years, and it made it hard for farmers

everywhere. But the bigger problem that the brothers faced was the same one that thousands of others did across the South as well. You see, they had operated their farms through slave labor. And when the war was over, that forced help was gone. Desperate to rebuild their fortunes, they went on tour again and even traveled to Europe to see new audiences. But they were older by then, and the traveling life was a lot harder on their bodies, even

more of a challenge because of their unique condition. So after about a decade of touring, they headed home to call it quits. But it was on that trip home from Europe that Chang suffered a stroke, and as a result, he found himself completely paralyzed, which is a challenge for anyone. But when you're permanently joined to your brother's side, that's a bigger problem. And then problems began to compound. In January of 1874, he contracted bronchitis and was put on bed rest. But that meant that Aang was right there with him for it all.

Still, they were brothers, and while they didn't always get along, they faced challenges together as a team. So Aang patiently waited for Chang to recover, spending most of that time at Chang's farm. On January 15th, feeling much improved, the brothers made the short trip to Aang's house and spent their first night there sitting upright in front of the fire. The following night, Aang convinced his brother to sleep in the bed, and the pair dozed off. But when morning arrived, it was discovered that Chang had passed away in his sleep. He had been 62 years old.

Aang would hold on for a couple more hours, but soon passed away himself. It said that upon learning of Chang's death, Aang sighed and declared, Well, then I am going too. And that he did. But even in death, the journey wasn't over for the brothers. It seems they had one last tour to take. Thanks to the freezing temperatures of January, their bodies remained intact long enough for the College of Physicians in Philadelphia to secure permission to conduct their autopsy.

So they were placed on a train and set north, arriving in the middle of February. And that autopsy answered many questions. It provided doctors with enough evidence to suggest that the brothers might have survived separation, although in the 1870s, that surgery would still have been pretty risky. And they learned that it was a blood clot that had taken Chang's life. But what they weren't able to learn was what ultimately killed Aang. The brothers shared a liver, and the prevailing theories centered around that, and the risk of blood poisoning when a living person is connected to decaying tissue.

And nothing definitive was ever nailed down. Chang and Aang Bunker were superstars, but they were also brothers. And in the end, that's the preferred explanation for Aang's death so soon after Chang's. They spent 62 years together, side by side, every step of the way. They went everywhere together. And apparently, that included death. This episode of lore was written and produced by me, Aaron Mankey, with research by Michelle Muto and music by Chad Lawson.

Lore is much more than just a podcast. There's a book series available in bookstores and online, and two seasons of the television show on Amazon Prime Video. Check them both out if you want more lore in your life. I also make two other podcasts, Aaron Mankey's Cabinet of Curiosities, and Unobscured. And I think you'd enjoy both. Each one explores other areas of our dark history, ranging from bite-sized episodes to season-long dives into a single topic.

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