Oh What A Time... - #51 Selection Box (Bonus episode!)

Episode Date: September 15, 2025

OWAT returns properly on Monday 29th September 2025, so to fill the gap over the next couple of weeks we're dropping a few old subscriber episodes onto the feed.And today with have a special little selection box of a few things we desperately wanted to talk about; there’s a bit more on gangs, a bit more on weather and (quite possibly the main event) a bear that joined the military.Now would the Rolling Stones have caught on if Tom was the lead singer? Would Van Gogh’s famous Sunflowers have been surpassed by Chris’? And could Elis have been bigger than the Beatles? We don’t have the answers, but do you? If so: [e-mail] can also follow us on: X (formerly Twitter) at @ohwhatatimepodAnd Instagram at @ohwhatatimepodAaannnd if you like it, why not drop us a review in your podcast app of choice?Thank you to Dan Evans for the artwork (idrawforfood.co.uk).We'll be back soon!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Wondery Plus subscribers can listen to episodes of Oh What a Time early and ad-free. Join Wondry Plus in the Wondry app or on Apple Podcasts. Hello and welcome back to Oh What a Time. We're kind of on holiday a little bit over the next couple of weeks. A new series of O Water Time starts on Monday the 29th of September. But if you're a subscriber, there are new episodes on the feed, including one on Stonehenge, which dropped yesterday I think it is. So do check that out.

If you want to subscribe and become an O Water Time full-timer, You get two bonus episodes every month, and there's this whole range of bonus content to be enjoyed. All your options are at oh what a time.com. However, today we have for you number 51, which is a selection box milk tray special, first broadcast in June 2024. Enjoy this one. We're back properly on Monday the 29th of September, marketing your diaries. Let's crack on with this show, though. Hello and welcome to O Watertime, the history podcast that tries to decide that if you could go back to a pre-Beatles age with all of the songs that Paul McCarty and John Lennon and George Harrison Row and deliver them as your own, or maybe further that, could you go back to a pre-Picassosso age or a pre-Mone age, a pre-Vongophage, and deliver all of those paintings as your own?

would people hail you as a genius who was ahead of his time, or are you so uncharismatic that the critics of the age ago actually is rubbish. I've met him and he's a wanker. Could you justifiably come across as a genius, realistically, or would people just dismiss you out of hand? That's what we're trying to ask. My name's Alice James. I'm Chris Scholl. I've got a question.

Just imagine for a moment that Tom Crane went back and befriended Keith Richards. Would the Rolling Stones had caught on if it was Tom Crane fronting that band instead of Mick Jagger? Well, the reason I asked that question initially was there's a Richard Curtis film, isn't there? Yeah.

Where... Yes, it's called yesterday. Yeah, where the Beatles somehow hadn't existed, but one bloke has heard all the songs and he knows how to play them. So he goes back and tries to pass off Hey Jude and, you know, something and all these classics as his own.

And obviously he's hailed as a genius. There's far more to it than that. I've not seen the film, but it was a real alchemy, isn't it? It wasn't just the fact that it was the songs. It was, you know, teenagers who weren't being threatened with, I mean, to fight in a world war, or the general charisma of the group anyway. There's all, there's this sort of alchemy to great art and artists. Absolutely.

And I think what you'd end up with would be a sort of slightly half-remembered approximation of a book or a song. You've got, it's like 60% of the way there and it just lacks all of the joy or colour that the original ones now. Yes, you'd be like, we all live in a, is it a boat or submarine? I've got another question.

If you mentioned Van Gogh, you go back, you're trying to replicate the works of Van Gogh. Are you lopping off the ear as well? That's not what I thought you were going to say. I thought you were going to say that Van Gogh, one, get the process, but it's quite it's really skilled isn't it like the way he uses color yes i think we can take

that as a good as a good as yes yes i don't think i couldn't go back and you heard it here first recreat the sunflowers like my sunflowers would look like a fucking four-year-old did it you yeah he it wasn't great because he was the only person to have decided to paint sunflowers that's this is what would happen okay you'd get out the pot of sunflowers you'd put it on the table and someone else would say that's going to be such a boring picture you go just you wait and then you'd draw it and of course it doesn't have any of the skill or wonder of his and they'll go yeah i told you it's just a really crap picture of some sunflowers oh forget but you know like it's even i would say it's it's hard to go back and faithfully recreate any art

because even if I had all of the world's music that I know, like I can't really play an instrument. So it's all going to sound shit. Once it's played through the medium of myself, everything will be crap. You see, I can play Beatles songs, but I just don't think I could pass them off as good. Just not quite as well as the Beatles. Now, let me present one thing to you.

I mean, this may seem slightly arrogant. Do you think in 100 years' time, or a thousand years' time, future people will come back in time and try and replicate the work of, oh, what a time, podcast, will there be trying travellers or try to pass off our brilliance? I love that you prefaced that comment with, this may sound a bit arrogant

but in a thousand years live forever. I'm just saying, you know, this show's got a charm. There's no getting around it. A podcast that lives as long in the memory

as like any of the great works of the sort of dark ages a thousand years ago. I don't know. Exactly. Yeah, I just, I think if I turned up in a sort of club and played in 1960 and played Hey Jude and I am the Walrus and Pippabut writer, I think people just go, no, not really for me. I can't see this catch you. I think I've actually had an experience somewhat akin to people thinking have written a great song, which is that when I got married, I sung with our mutual friend Will Briggs.

on guitar, I sung a song by Father John Misty called Chateau Lobby No. 4, which is a wonderful song. But people at the wedding thought I had wrote it and were saying, really? And I was like, thank you. So now I'm saying this, I'm like, if people thought I'd written that song, surely that... No, this sounds like a lie, Chris, but to listeners,

when I sang Seals Kiss Moreau's at Josh Whitakam's wedding, did you think I'd written that? Sorry, who's Seal? A Seal? That is a talented It must be in London zoos This song was written by a seal That's what everyone was saying at the wedding

So what's Tom Crane's rolling in it Does he own the seal? Is it his seal? How does Tom Crane on his songwriting seal? So, shall we talk about what this episode's going to be? I am Tom Crane by the way Just to chuck my name into the mix Now as you will know regular listeners. Each week on the show, we look at a brand new historical subject. Well, today's show is going to be a selection box episode, or as we are now going to be describing these episodes, a milk tray special. Or should that be an oh, what a time, milk tray special? I think that's probably better. An oh, what a time milk tray special, three random subjects that we think could be really fun to chat about. So this week, what we're talking about, boys.

We're doing a bit on gangs on the weather and a bit on a bear that join the military. Quite hard to categorise that last one. Yeah, Tom prepare this, and I don't know anything about it. Can't wait to hear this. It's blown my mind this story, and I think people will love it, hopefully. That reminds me. I saw a tweet, which I screen grabbed, because I couldn't really believe it.

It was a historical tweet that I screened around. I was like, I would have to talk about this. Hang on, where is it? Okay, yeah. This is a bit of a viral tweet the other day. I don't know if anyone noticed this. A guy tweeted, what the hell did Europe eat before the new world foods were introduced?

every time I turn around I'm learning about something I most associate with specific Euro cuisine but it didn't exist there prior to the 1600s and people saying that basically it was just dirty old vegetables that grew in the ground

That's most vegetables That is the sort of classic There's a sky swede over there Yeah Where are you getting your carrots from You get your hover carrots Where are you getting them from? Completely never

I don't think of potatoes as a dirty old I mean, in many ways that is a classic They are, they are very much mud dwellers That's the classic one of happy But we were, we were eating Like just cabbage and just It's quite a fascinating topic that Because I think again

We should do food, absolutely That's a really interesting one It just demonstrates once again That like the cuisine of medieval times Was fucking awful Yeah Still fascinated by your description Dirty old potato

I don't know what you think Have you ever seen a potato knot in a shopper on your plate? No, you mention it. Do you think they grow in the plastic bag? Completely shiny and fresh. My son's growing some strawberries at the moment. He's all that's a bit fucking dirty. The old strawberries will go near them.

Exactly. Right, before we crack into some fun history, shall we look at some correspondence? There's one that leapt out of me. this week, which I really enjoyed, is from a guy called Jake, who says, A mundane one-day time machine. Now there's a great title. Hello chaps. On the face of it, I should just say, this is quite a long email, but it's a good one. On the face of it, my choice for a one-day time machine may seem a bit mundane and unimaginative. However, it is something that I've often pondered and been curious about. So, to what fascinating

part of history would I travel to, the Battle of Hastings, the JFK assassination, to find out what really happened to the dinosaurs? Well, no, not exactly. Long before this podcast even existed, if we can imagine such a time, and therefore the idea of the one-day time machine, I have always wanted to travel back in time to just one random, nondescript school day from childhood. I am 41 years old now, so let's say I pick a random date, say 22nd November, 1996, where I would have been 14. To my knowledge, nothing important or special. happened on this day historically or in my personal life, I could not tell you a single thing about that day. And even if something world-changing happened on that day, I would not be that

interested in that. I'm more interested. Now, I love this than the idea. It's quite fascinating philosophical idea. I'm more interested to go back to that day, to live out my day exactly as it would have been, while I have the knowledge of what I know now, I can't change anything, I just relive that day. So no modern gadgets, social media, etc. The thing is, here's the big bit. Would I remember anything at all about that day? And if so, at what point in the day, day, would it kick in? Would it be a slow, ah, yes, I remember this day, realization? Would I be able to remember any specific small details of the day or what was coming next? Would it be rather than just a fleeting moment of deja vu, like we all have sometimes, a day long sense of

deja vu? That's a really interesting idea that. I do think that's a fascinating one. If you drop back in just a moment from your teenage life, would you remember that day? I love that. I love Do you? See, I think you would, Ellis, because you've got such a clear memory for names, moments from your childhood. I just don't remember anything. I've got a mad memory for everything I did up to about the age of 21. Yeah. Really? Yeah. And now I don't remember anything.

I always say that about West Ham games. I could tell you almost every result up until about 2004. I'm exactly the same. And then it's a struggle. It's so weird. And then whole, like, five. year periods in the history of swans all merge into one. But I could tell you exactly what I was doing

and when I was for every Wales International in 1997. And when my teenage years, I think I was probably very sensitive and so I just took everything on board. And I think that now I'm emotionally dead and I don't know or understand or react to anything somehow. Okay. So I think... I think my problem is I smoked a lot of them,

for two years when I was about 22, and it screwed my memory. So I cannot remember... Basically, I can't remember anything. I can't remember anything. I was going to try and add more to that, but that's literally it. I can't remember it.

I did have a friend of mine. He claims not to remember anything until he's about 11. He's basically got no memory primary school at all. Like it didn't happen. And nothing dramatic happened to me. He just didn't take it in. I'll tell you what I have, Elle, which is different to you. I think I have a triggered memory.

So something can happen, and someone will mention something very specific. And I'll go, oh, wait a second. Oh, yes, I remember that. Yeah. But I don't have this reservoir that I can lean back in and scoop something out of, whereas you just have everything there. It's just all there for you. Up to 2001.

And then, I've not made a single memory since then. Absolutely terrifying. So I'm going to talk to you now about the Los Angeles flood of 1938. Okay. Have you ever experienced a proper flood? Let's start by asking that. Or like high water. Have you ever really experienced it?

Yeah, I mean, the River Toey and Kamar then has burst its banks several times where you think where like entire, and also there's a sort of floodplain in command the chair, a friend of mine's farm, his farm was flooded really badly. So I do, I have seen it. Not like Somerset Levels sort of standard, but I have seen it, yeah. Yeah, so this is my, that's my experience, how weirdly, you mentioned that, because I grew up on the edge of Bath and my primary school was by a canal and near flood plains, and there's a place called Bathampton Weird that would consistently flood. And if that happened, you just couldn't get to school. Yeah. So it was like, weirdly, my relationship.

relationship with flooding is like, hey, it's a day off, like heavy rain. I've still got that sort of, it taps into something as a child. I'm quite exciting when it happens. It's going to like, oh, it's good mean I don't have to go into school. It's kind of, it's weird. It has this place in my memories. It is scary though. When you see really bad flooding, you realise how powerful water is and how powerful age is. And it's just really, really frightening. Which is exactly the case with Los Angeles in 1938. Sorry, Chris. Well, I'm just going to bring up my old Austin Metro again. Once, I was driving round locally and like a sewage drain had blocked and like a road near my house which I'd never seen blocked before was probably three or four feet deep with water and I just ploughed my Austrian Metro into it thinking it would just be like a little bit of it and it went right up over the bonnet and completely conked out the car and I was halfway through the road like in the water and it started seeping in the car doors.

And then basically a bloke popped out. Well, I was like thinking what to do. It was probably there five minutes. I don't know what to do. And then a bloke came out in like a high-vis, unclogged the drain, and then I was just sat there in a broken-down car in the middle of a, with no water in the road.

Also, when the rainwater will have dried, that car would have stunk. Yeah, it was pretty vile. Because my mum's car, the car I learned to drive in, the Ford Fiesta Kingfisher, had a hole in the bottom, and it would let rain in.

And the carpets of the car would dry, and then it would smell and my mates used to refer to that car as the Scotch Eggmobile because it just it was just disgusting did you clean it enough to get rid of the eggy smell

or just couldn't you would have needed a new carpet so you just I just used to drive around for the winters down this is my lot now ladies now it's worth briefly mentioning before we begin properly that LA had experienced heavy flooding before

most notably in 1914 and 1934, and this is important. For political reasons, they've never improved the flood defences. Spending money was seen by some as unnecessary. And so, as you'll see, they basically had little in place to deal with this crazy storm that came. Okay, so one month before the flood of 38 hit, on the 1st of February, readers of the Imperial Valley Press in California were informed that stormy weather was gripping the west coast. Diego to Seattle, there were high seas, gales, rain was bringing disruption. And then a week later, headlines ran, floods rage in coastal cities as communities further south and closer to LA, so it's getting closer, started to find themselves cut off and deluge by muddy torrents. In fact,

in mid-Feb, local press reported that rain fell today in northern California for the 16th consecutive day. So that's, think about that. Breaking the old US, weather bureau record of 15 days established in February 1936 and by the 14th of February 50,000 acres were underwater. So just non-stop rain. That must be just so depressing like that non-stop rain. God. Like obviously if you live in a farming community you'll be thinking oh wonderful it's great for my crops but in a city you're just like oh this is just awful. So already not ideal. I think we can agree that 16 days of non-stop rain. And then at the end of the month, the storms land on Los Angeles. Okay. So on the second of March, four people were

reported killed. Hundreds were evacuated immediately. Houses were crushed. Street intersections in metropolitan LA were turned into lakes and a million dollars of damage was inflicted. This is just immediately at the beginning on the second of March, the very beginning of this storm. I think it's quite interesting because it's strange to me. I think cities feel like a sort of safe place when it comes to that sort of thing. Yeah, I know what you mean. Yeah. Have crime and their problems in that

sort of way. You become, you accept that danger, I suppose. That just becomes normalised, although it's, you know, danger is to exaggerate the experience of living in a city, but you know what it mean.

It is something that's present in your periphery, at least. But the idea of weather events really causing problems... It's because cities have infrastructure. Yes. So, for instance, to give you a Welsh example,

in around 2005, I was attending On behalf of ESWC, the Welsh Language, Channel 4, I was covering a funk gig that was happening in Tavarbach-Pon-Shan, which is a tiny village a few miles away from Llandestu, right? It's a very rural and quite remote. And the funk had ended, and there was a massive fight, okay? Like a proper wild west.

Because the funk had ended. People were living. That was your first mistake. And now I'm in a funk. Never-ending funk. And there was a proper, like, sort of Wild West-style brawl on the dance floor. And I'll never forget this. The barmaid rang up the police.

And the copper for Devao's Police said, hello, Dewebos Police. And she said, there's a massive fight happening in Tavernbach-Pon-Shan, not far from Klunders, and you went, ah, right, fight in, eh? She went, yes. Fight in, eh? Where are you again? I said, I'm in Cardigan I'm an hour away

And she was like, you're going to come He was like, yeah, I'd be there I'd be there as quick as I can Good hour now See you in about an hour She's a bit of fighting now An hour Sorry, but I'm in Aberteevy

So sorry And she was like Okay And then that was it What is And that is that I think Is what makes cities Feel different

Yeah, completely Completely So this flooding hits L.A. and it's just, it's horrendous, okay? The very next day, so this is so early in the storm, on the 3rd of March, the press announced that raging torrents had cut off L.A., basically, that large parts of the centre of L.A. were just cut off from the rest of America, basically. You couldn't get to them anymore. If you lived there, you were stranded. And it was the worst flooding for half a century. And this is the most amazing stat. A year's worth of rain fell in 3rd. days, a year's worth of. And by the end, the flood had caused the equivalent of, now here we go, here's an amount of money for one city to be dealing with,

$1.7 billion of damage to the city. Is that adjusted for inflation? That is the equivalent today. Oh, that's a relief. The equivalent to $1.7 billion today. 5,600 houses were completely destroyed.

It's completely flattened. So that's 5,000. families who had their lives. Exactly. And for those who hadn't lost their homes, there were other problems to contend with. In some communities, drinking water had been poisoned by flood contamination. There was no gas, no electricity. People were forced to light candles to provide the only illumination they could get. And inevitably, some degree of social collapse was occurring with looting, breaking out in various areas. And sadly, it also cost the lives of many L.A. residents. At Long Beach, the collapse of the Seaside Boulevard pedestrian bridge saw a dozen people

swept out to sea. As one eyewitness told reporters, I saw sightseers hurled into a raging torrent as it empties into the Pacific Ocean. They were all standing at the rail of the span when it collapsed. So these were people watching the storm, and then the storm overtook the bridge and swept them all out to sea. I can't really think of a worse way to go than that. At Riverside, the Santa Ana River over ran a levee and caused such stress on the dam at Fairmont Lake that the damn burst and 10 people reported missing, drowned or buried under the debris there. But amidst the horror, there are also incredible stories of bravery with thousands of rescuers using whatever they could to navigate the floodwaters to make sure people were safe, which is always amazing in

situations. You do have these displays of heroism and heroism. It's kind of, so including they use lifeboats that were just being kept in storage at the MGM studios for shoots. So they were only used for Hollywood movies. That was the idea. People took them out of the MGM lot and used those to go and rescue people in the flood. You would worry that a stunt port wasn't going to be able to withstand the pressures of having to be a real life. The only way to take out you realise it's actually 2D. It's only got a side. Do you want to hear a show of a story on that? No. It reminds me. I worked on had yourself a problem like Maria. Do you remember there was like a BBC One talent show? To find...

Wizard of... I can't remember what it was. It was like an Andrew Lloyd-Weber musical where they were trying to find like the leading lady. And they were... Like one of the ladies was singing a song and she came on stage with a wig on.

And Andrew Lloyd-Weber went, stop, stop, stop! That's a theatre wig, not a TV wig. I was like... What's the difference? Yeah, I was like, what? What's the difference? I just made me think,

like a stunt. boat and a real boat. Like, there's a stunt boat. Yeah. Unless it's like, unless it's like a car in a, in a kids like school production, which case it really is just a 2D drawing of a car on some wood. Stop. That's a pantomime horse, not a real horse. It cannot run in the national. So there were other heroes. There was a milkman called Ray J. Henville who made sure that people still got their milk in the morning by doing his rounds by rowboat. Wow. There were Hollywood stars who got caught up in the mayhem.

One example being front shot Tone, who is most famous for his appearance in Mutiny in the Bounty, the 1935 film. He got stuck on his way to studio, ended up hitchhiking in a bakery van. It's the only way he'd get in, but only on the agreement that he helped deliver the bread to everyone on the way in.

So this huge movie star was being forced to go to people's houses and deliver bread, which I love. And he did it, and that's how he got to, studio, that's how he made it to lot. Well, that's like Steve Boshemey helping out at 9-11, because he had been a fireman, hadn't he? Oh, did he do that? That's incredible.

Yeah, yeah. So he'd been a real-life fireman, and so was able to, like, offer genuine help as opposed to do it, like, as opposed to comparing a charity game. Yeah, yeah, that's amazing. It's better that, it's that way around that he's genuinely being a fireman, rather than turning him and going, guys, I once played a fireman. It's going to be all right. But I was in three scenes in casualty where I played a fireman.

Does anyone need me to dress up as a fireman? If you've got a fake hose, give it to me. But to conclude, some good did come of all of this. And this is the interesting point at the end. In the aftermath of the flooding, L.A. did finally remodel its defences. So despite all this sort of political refusal before, the damage. caused in the 38 storm was basically the final straw. There was no more excuses. So they did at last sort out the defences. And interestingly, this is what's most interesting. It completely altered the

nature of the Los Angeles River, which is a huge river which runs through L.A. So previously, the L.A. River had run a wild course through the metropolis. It kind of frequently changed course. It carried runoff from the mountains down to the city. Sometimes it was stream. Sometimes it was small little riverless, and it would change course constantly. But over a period of 20 years, hundreds of miles of stream, which converged on the Los Angeles River, were encased in concrete, creating kind of a concrete line channel down which the water now flows, are adding to the wider protection of the city. So this river exists in its clearly defined state simply because of this one event. It was previously this sprawling natural phenomenon,

which depending on the seasons would change where it was but now it's channeled quickly down through LA in cases ever happens again and it has happened again the storms did come again in 1969 and 2005 however because of this concrete structure the flooding did not so that is the Los Angeles flood of 1938

Okay, so now I'm taking you back to the In fact of the 16th century in Japan Quite a turbulent period marked by civil wars An overseas invasion, notably of the Korean Peninsula Ultimately, the transition from the Sengoku period into the more peaceful, culturally expressive, but isolationist, Edo period, which began around 1603. And in this chaos, it's hard to wrap my head around Japan in this time. But in this chaos between eras, the Kabuki Mono emerged. Kabuki Mono, the crazy ones, as it translates. And also,

as you'll hear, another translation is The Strange Ones. So this is a gang of Samurai's, roaming the streets of feudal japan oh boy this is quite that we talked about in a recent episode talked about gangs but this gang in particular boy oh boy so um possible ancestors the kabuki mono of the most 20th century of phenomena thanks in large part the portrayal in film the yakuza so this is like the japanese equivalent of gangsters and the mob the yakuza this is the precursor to some of that people believe feudal Japan. So they were really I, isn't it funny? We touched when we talked about

the gangs episode, how about so much of gangs and gangsters is about how they dress and there's something intimidating if they've got a bit of a uniform if they're wearing suits. The Kabuki Mono have a really interesting way of dressing. It is super flamboyant, especially when you consider the fact this is like 1603. So they would not wear traditional colours. They're wearing

really flamboyant colours and they're wearing like European clothing, Chinese hats, and some of them even wore women's clothes. The idea was to really stand out. And I go back to the kind of, the translation of Kabuki Mono,

which is like the crazy ones, the strange ones. It's almost like the way they dress is so unique. It's like it elicits fear in the people who see them. Also, I think if you're a samurai, nobody's going to take the piss anyway

if you were a funny time. I'd probably let that go. So basically, yeah. Then you notice a sword. You go, Love your funny hat, mate. What do you get it from? So their sartorial habits were surpassed by their taste for violence.

The Kabuki Mono do, I would say, traditional gangster-ish things. Like the really scary bits. It always scares me in, I think it's, is it Goodfellas, where they basically, the gangsters have a favourite hangout, and then they just stop paying the bills, and then they're using it as a front to kind of move on all the dodgy gear. they've stolen off truck and eventually

when the restaurant can't pay their bills anymore they just torture it and take the insurance yeah Gubei Mono were doing this in Feudal Japan so they're going to restaurants

running up huge bills and not paying Yeah It's your first day and you've got a Saturday job in a cafe and there's a group of men in there in suits

and at the end they refuse to pay and you're like really seriously I've only been I've only had this job for an hour You really need to pay, or I'm going to get sacked. And then the boss says, it's fine.

They're gangsters. Just leave it. And you're like, right, okay, okay. Not sure this job is for me, actually. I'm only doing it because I'm, I want to buy some clothes because I'm doing my eight levels. And I go out, you know, every Saturday. Just forget it. It's fine.

You're working behind the Toby Carverie. One of the samurai's got his sword out and is cutting out a larger bit of meat. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Using his samurai sword. Yeah, help me, sir. Yeah, it's fine. It's fine, yeah, have the whole... You can only have the chicken, the beef, or the gammon,

not a mixture, Mr Samurai. Mr Samurai! Kabuki Mono would do that. They're going up to the harvester, they're having multiple bowls of salads. Yeah, yeah. Actually, isn't that allowed? Oh, that's actually fine.

I think that is allowed. I was once told I had too many roast potatoes, so that... Is that true? Yeah. That wasn't a Tudikarvri. That was in a pub in Gorslas. How many had you had? I think she gave me three and I said,

could I have a fourth? And she said, no. And I said, all right, fine. And then there was a brief standoff. Can I have a four? I think that's the most depressing thing I've ever heard. Can I have a fourth roast potato, please? Oh dear.

It's made me feel depressed. Nothing in this podcast has made me feel depressed. We've discussed war. People stuck on Ireland unable to eat. Just being attacked by rats. And you said, you asking for a fourth potato in Midway. I love potatoes. Nope, okay, no.

All right, well, I'll just enjoy the three you've given me then. Thank you. Now I think about it, me and my brothers, if we went to a harvester, would have a competition to see who could go back to the salad bar the most times. And I'm pretty sure the record was three. Oh, wow. Good on you. Security.

What a healthy competition. Basically acting like the Kabuki Mono. I bet I can eat more be true than you. God, you're hard. My ex-girlfriend, her father, used to have special buffet trousers, elasticated buffet trousers he would wear to a buffet. There was an all-you-could-eat around-the-world buffet they would go to, and he would wear special elasticated trousers.

Isn't that amazing? Having a uniform to allow yourself to eat as much as too dark as possible. You know the scene in the Simpson where Homer, like, gets thrown out of the all you can eat because he eats too much. One of the things I worry about is that I, one day I have to own a buffet, and I'm watching out for customers coming in thinking, this guy's a professional.

I think if I saw your ex-girlfriend's dad with buffet trousers walking in, you think, we are not turning a profit today. They didn't say buffet trousers down the side. You wouldn't have known there were buffet trousers. They just have elasticated ways. Part of the M&S buffet trousers range. The Kabuki Mono are not paying restaurant bills.

They're robbing people in the street willy-nilly. Guess that, oh, this is just gross. There's evidence that they would test new swords by just cutting random people down in the street. That's like they're testing new swords. These guys sound awful. I thought the samurai was all about respect. But this is the Kabuki Mono. They're not from the fringes of the samurai class.

So they're usually the younger sons who are not in direct line of succession. or inheritance for the family. They're basically the loose ones. Again, the crazy ones. They're low-ranking samurai. They're out to make a name for themselves as independent samurai. They're without a master or a family

known as the Ronin. So the Kubuki Mono are fringes and they're dangerous and they're crazy. So they'd rover around the street in gangs. They would engage in gang warfare, take out other gangs, and also they would take on commissions for violence. So if you wanted someone murdered,

If you wanted a business smashed up, whatever it is, you can basically engage the Kabuki Mono. Like a bad 18. Yeah, a naughty 18. Yeah, naughty 18. Relatively few Kabukubuano are known by their name, but there was Atori Ichibai who lived in the early years of the 17th century. He was arrested in 1612 AD

and was the leader of a gang of Kabuki Mono who rampaged around the street and came into direct conflict with the Shogun. His sword was apparently mine. marked with the words, 25 is too long to live. Oh, wow. Oh, my God.

That's a sort of lame t-shirt someone would wear in sick for me. Yeah. With like a picture of someone on a surfboard, on a massive wave. Another Kabuki Mono that we know something about was Fua Kazumon, who was born in 1670, died in 703.

He became a Ronin in 1697. He was dismissed from his adoptive Asano clan, apparently for engaging in thrill-killing, killing for the sake of it, like just, oh, man. The Kabuki Mono were suppressed in the early Edo period after 1615 and the accuser emerged in their place, and it's worth saying that the accuser, the name most associated with Japanese gangster in the West, but in Japan they are known variously as Gokudu, which means the extreme path,

to the police as boyokudan, violent groups, and to themselves as Ninkio Dantai, which means chivalrous organes, interesting that they have a different name for themselves than everyone else has. Slightly different perception, yeah. Like the Lecusa, like the Italian-American counterparts, they have a strict code of allegiance, honour and loyalty. By the mid-1960s, there were more than 160,000 members of Yakuza syndicates. An international reach through the Japanese diaspora.

By now, there are around 10 to 20,000 Yakuza, they believe. And aspects of the Yakuza culture, which were not. based on the gang violence of the Kabuki Mono, derived from lower class society in the Edo period, most notably gangs of peddlers, the Tequia and roving gangs of gamblers known as the Bakutu. The Tequia had a boss at the top and gang members at the bottom and maintained a kind of protection racket

over the trade of illicit goods at market. So again, similar to American gangsters. The Bakuto, on the other hand, engaged in illegal practices, gambling, as well as offering illicit financial transactions and consumer credit, loan sharking. That's an element of gangsterism we haven't really touched on, but that's the thing that scares me.

Always think of that Alan Partridge coat. Like, when Alan Partridge's book gets outsold by a gangster's book, they'll lend you a tenor and then want £500 back a day later. Yeah, so you can see how the tequila, which is like protection records of Bakutu, illegal practices, they combine to create the, kind of Yakuza in the modern state. But the Yakuza was, in a bit like Robin Hood.

It once had a kind of quasi-folk hero status, including Shimizu Dirocho, the famous Kingpin, who rose to prominence in the second half of the 19th century. And by the early 20th century, silent cinema fueled this perception as gangsters shown as outlaws with a good heart more than anything more negative. And the violent side of their trade was kind of pushed to one side. And we definitely have a bit of history of that. in the UK, but a great train robbery.

Yeah, yeah. And I think that, bizarrely, the craze and the Richardson's have this in East and South London. Oh, they only ever slashed their own. Yeah, absolutely. They only robbed and murdered their own. They only robbed and murdered their own. You knew where you stood with a craze, right?

Scary. That now Yakuza is seen as a much more dangerous thing to be associated with, and a more dangerous sight of gangs was shown it in their Akira Kawasawa. film in 1948, The Drunken Angel, with Toshira Mufoon as the ultimately tragic leader, Yakuza trying to do the right thing. But these days, Yakuza films tend more towards the violent and betray their ruthlessness rather than a Robin Hood-style heroism. Modern Japan's largest Yakuza gang, the Yamaguchi Gumi, based in Yokobe, has its traditions in a scab unions formed among strike-breaking dock workers in the early part of the 20th century, under the

leadership of Kazua Taoka, from 1946 until his death in 1981, it's grown into the world's largest crime syndicate. Wow. And actually did provide disaster relief after the Kobe earthquake in 1995 and the 2011 tsunami, which engulfed eastern Japan. And Kazua Taoka said he got into gangs because he used to work at the Kawasaki chipyard, got into a fight with his boss and quit the company so he couldn't go home. and then turned to a violent life of crime.

But yeah, the Yakuza, obviously, still around today, but its origins are in the Kabuki Mono, gangs of samurai roaming the streets. So today, I'm going to talk to you boys about the most unlikely millerick. military promotion of all time, okay, featuring a character called Voitech the Bear. And Voitek the Bear wasn't called Voitech the Bear, just to say, because he was sort of fearsome and hard. He was called that because he was literally a bear, okay? He was a Syrian brown bear, to be more exact, and he was adopted by Polish soldiers during World War II. Okay, so for a little bit of context,

for thousands of years, animals have helped humans in contact. We've had red, cross dogs. We've had horses on the Western Front in World War I, carrier pigeons relaying information between lines, camels carrying the injured in Egypt and India, and so on and so on. But never, understandably, a bear until Voitek came along. So the question is, before we sort of get into this, is how had he ended up in the army? Well, in the spring of 1942... How the hell do you adopt a bear? Well, you will find out. It's remarkable. In the spring of 1942, Polish armed forces based in the USSR left the Soviet Union for Iran. And on the journey to Tehran, they encountered a young Iranian boy who had found a bear cub whose mother had

been shot by hunters. And one of the civilian refugees in this group was an 18-year-old called Irina Bogovic, who was the great niece of a really powerful Polish general. And she took to this little tiny cub and then convinced the lieutenant to buy it. So first question. Do you want to guess what the army swapped for a bear? What do you think feels fair when you're trying to bear? What year is this again? So this is 1942. There's an object.

Four grenades. Yeah, it's got to be a good. I mean, what else they got knocking about? Guns, isn't it? Just to remind you, this is a small Iranian boy they're trading with. All right, then a Tommy gun. A pistol. A cannon.

A cannon ball. A cannon. They've gone. I think this is a pretty good deal for a bear A Swiss Army knife They've got a bear for a Swiss army knife Not a bad deal is it I think if you've got the bear

You're coming out Probably better in the trade there The bear then spent the next three months In Polish refugee camps Being looked after by Irina Now as parents I'm just intrigued How much hard did you think it would be

Raising a small bear than a child There's no nappies There's no potty training Occasionally though You see Because Twitter now is such a mess I get shown things from people I don't follow

You'll see these videos We'll be like Some bloke Discovered this bear When he was a cub In similar circumstances And raised it as his own And there'll be loads of footage

Of the bear cuddling him And then he'd be like And then he was mauled to death When the bear was three So I'm sure that with a very young cub If you fed it And clothed it And loved it

early doors it would show you some affection or certainly not be aggressive towards you but once it's a fully grown adult bear it's going to rip your face off isn't it so ellis as you point out when you adopt a bear it's only going in one trajectory and indeed this little bear did begin to grow at which point irena immediately donated it to the army

more specifically the second transport company who gave it the name voightec or happy warrior now that does make me laugh because clearly she's thinking this is great it's a sweet bear i'm enjoying this oh no it's getting quite big i don't want this anymore that's what happened unwieldy exactly so to begin with the army sort of struggle to look after it on the way it had a problem swallowing so the soldiers fed him condensed milk from an old vodka bottle which is the sort of thing i imagine you'll see me drinking when i'm having a break yeah what are you drinking that's on

is that condensed milk from an old vodka no it's custard so after the condensed milk from a vodka bottle they then moved him onto fruit honey and syrup but he was often rewarded with beer and beer quickly became his favourite drink because that's what you want a pissed bear I think that's

ideal he also enjoyed smoking or eating cigarettes as well as drinking coffee in the mornings now I'm imagining him in like a silk dressing gown for some reason with like a copy of the financial times open having a coffee cigarette in the morning on the vera

He's eating his face. Yeah, he really got into eating cigarettes. And his interactions with soldiers were remarkable too. So I want your take on each of these. Let's get your take on these. He would sleep with a soldier if they were cold at night. Are you ever letting a bear into your bed? Thoughts on that?

But also, then if, like, I don't know, in the 1940s at war, you know, could be like a little bodyguard for you. It could work the other way. No one's going to mess with you When there's a bear in your tent Have you seen the revenant? Yeah About the cuddly bear

The man who befriends a cuddly bear Exactly, yeah I'm not risking a bear in my bed He would also For exercise He would sometimes wrestle with the soldiers Are you doing that, Elle? Up for a bit of bear wrestling

Elle, you must have heard the story about the famous MMA fighter Kabib Nirmugamedov Who famously wrestled a bear When he was 12 His dad made him wrestle a bear and he went on to become like a grappling world champion. The dad was like, well, at 12 years old,

I think you can take on a bear now, and apparently he beat the bear. Really? But I would say, you put the best human up against the best bear. I'm not back in the human. The bear's winning every time. So, you know, weight classes exist for a reason. Yeah.

So you'd be like, okay, well, he's 12. Anyways, I don't know, eight stone. I'm going to put him in against another eight stone human who's preferably about his age once you're mixing species what a mad thing to do what if it had gone wrong what would he have told his wife

and the other thing they told him to do he was taught how to salute when greeted so he kind of came O'Fay with the things you're supposed to do in the army sort of the traditions of the army I suppose in fact he quickly became so popular that he soon became the official mascot to all units stationed in that area

And then with the 22nd company, he moved to Iraq and then through Syria, Palestine and Egypt. And now, this is when things start to get really crazy. Okay. From Egypt, his regiment was reassigned to fight along the British 8th Army in the liberation of Italy from German occupation. Okay. So he's sent to Italy to assist with getting rid of the Nazis, liberating Italy from the Nazis. However, I love this. The British transport ship that was due to carry them had extremely.

strict rules on mascots and pet animals. So, any guesses as to what the Polish army did to get around this? They dressed him up. They put him in soldiers' uniform. Close. How do they get around this? Do they all put lords of hair on their face and say, this is just what Polish people look like, hoping that the British wouldn't know or understand? They've got to disguise him or, I don't know. They officially drafted him into the Polish army as a private and listed him among the

soldiers of the 22nd Artillery Supply Company. So they went with a paperwork approach. As an enlisted soldier with his own paybook, rank, and serial number, he then lived amongst the other men in tents or in a special wooden crate, which was then transported by truck. The idea of bare with his own paybook, I just find so funny. It's getting wages. We'd have a picture? Would it be like...

I guess so. Yeah, he was treated exactly like a soldier. Had all the documentation that a soldier would have had, got money. Money, as a soldier would have. I'm not sure what he's spending it on. Honey. I'm not quite sure. Honey.

That is absolutely incredible. To be fair to him, though, we laugh, but he definitely earned his money. During the Battle of Monte Cassino, it's also known. No, well, I will, Ellis. Listen to this. This will blow your mind. During the Battle of Monte Cassino, it's also known as a battle for Rome, Votech the Bear, helped his unit to move heavy ammunition

by carrying £100-pound crates of artillery shells and never dropping any of them. Now, these boxes normally took four men to carry them, but he did it alone, stacking them onto a truck or onto other ammunition boxes. How does he know what to do? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, I suppose he's shown the particular crates to pick up, and then he transports them to the right place. It's just repetitive, and then it'll be reward.

He's probably given, you know, as you say, a pot of marmalade at the end or whatever or a nice blue duffel coat or something. He's kind of, he's rewarded for that. And he did the work that four men would do per trip. I really like, I absolutely love this point. While some people have questioned whether this happened, there are accounts from British soldiers who, and I quote, recall seeing a bear carrying crates of ammo.

The idea of, oh yeah, I do recall that. I do recall that. Yeah, I think I recall that. I'm pretty sure I saw a bear carrying ammo around. My cats obviously have been domesticated for thousands of years. My two cats are domesticated, living in a domesticated setting, having been born to parents who are domesticated. If I asked him to help me, they would be in a wartime situation, they would be worse than useless. Yeah, that's not the animal to be.

But maybe comfort for the troops. This is incredible. Maybe that can be their role. Just to comfort the coup. I mean, tried telling a cat to herd two boxes of ammunition up a hill. Yeah, it was literally like herding cats, isn't that, I suppose? His efforts in battle were considered so important. And this is brilliant.

He earned promotion to the rank of corporal. So we've talked before about great movie ideas. I think Corporal Bear is a really good idea for a movie. I'm looking at pictures of me now. This is absolutely mind-pocket. And now for the perfect enumont, the perfect conclusion of all this, In recognition of his popularity, an image of a bear carrying an artillery shell was adopted as the official emblem for the 22nd company

and is still the official emblem of that company in the Polish army to this day. When they were demobbed on the 15th of November, 1947, this is just the end of his life. Voitech was then given to Edinburgh Zoo, where he spent the rest of his life. And very sweetly, he was regularly visited by former Polish soldiers and he would often recognise anyone who had been in his former units. So he still had that attachment to people he'd fought alongside. If you came in and you fought with him, he would recognise you. He also gained media attention and was a frequent guest on Blue Peter.

And he eventually died on the 2nd of December, 1963, age 21, weighing nearly 78 stone. 78 stone. That is a big bear. So there you are. That's Voytec LeBeer, who progressed. the way up to corporal in the Polish army. That's incredible. Anyway, that's the end of the Orat-Time Milk Tray episode.

Thank you very much for downloading. If you're downloading this, you are a subscriber, and so you are our favourite kind of person. A legend. Thank you very much, absolute legend. We enormously appreciate it because without people like you, we would be unable to make this podcast. so it's very, very much appreciated.

Listen, you will remember clap for the NHS during the pandemic. We're on a Thursday night people will go outside and clap on their doorsteps. Chris Ellis and I, every Thursday night, we clap of subscribers, don't we? We do. At 8pm on a Thursday, we go out on our doorsteps and we clap for about 10 minutes. Feels long, actually. Yeah. But I think it's the least one.

I hit pans with wooden spoons. Did you, did a little treat for the subscribers? scribeers here. Did you both go out and clap? Big time. I did, yes. I genuinely did. As we discovered in an earlier episode, you were a great audience member. Good at applause.

At the Quigley Kevin Live show, it was honestly like I was on ecstasy. The amount I applauded when you walked on. I remember the night of the clapping for the NHS, I was saying to my wife, say, Sophie, like, we're not actually going to do it, are we?

People aren't going to do it. And then I remember looking out of the window and seeing the street emerge as the minutes closed into the top of the hour and go, bloody, I'm going to have to do it. I can't be the only one's not to do it. But I think it was a really lovely thing. I enjoyed the sort of community,

the coming together at a point where people were quite separated. It was really lovely and, you know, kind of... And also, we were clapping the energy. We weren't like clapping Amazon. Or I undie. That was the Amazon. clap was at 5 a.m. that very morning. I don't know if you. I did think a bit in the clap. I love the clap, but I did think, have we all lost our minds? As I banged my pan

on my doorstep. As I stood there naked on my doorstep, whacking a pan against my ass, I thought have we lost our minds? I thought, have we lost our minds? Covered in jam. Crying. I thought, have we lost our minds. Thank you so much for listening. You're all lovely. Thank you. Have a great week. Bye. I don't know. Follow oh what a time on the Wondry app, Amazon music or wherever you get your podcast, and you can listen early and ad-free,

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