Stuff You Should Know - Short Stuff: Liberty Bell

Episode Date: November 15, 2023

The story of the Liberty Bell is far more confusing than we imagined.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hello, I'm Chelsea Paredi. Do you feel chronic existential dread but love talking about delicious snacks? Call me! My podcast is relaunching! Do you fear wild, dangerous animals to the point where you're constantly watching attack videos and reading articles about wild animal tech survivors or those who succumb to attack? Call in! We can also discuss reality shows and emergency room footage.

Listen to Call Chelsea Paredi on Will Therill's big money players network on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. I've been singing Ween all day because of this one. Oh, yeah. Are we talking about Maulisks? No. From the song Freedom of 76. The only thing about the Liberty Bell.

I don't know that one. Liberty Bell cracked in half. Yeah. It's divine. So that's been on a loop in my head. Okay. I'll bet. A bacon steak, a perfect match.

You know it's been on a loop in my head. Okay, I'll bet. I'll bake a bacon steak, a perfect match. You know, it's been on a loop in my head. Either the final countdown or that one you were whistling the other day that drove me. Sure. Yeah. Do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do Yes. You know, I was thinking about Ween the other day, I was like, I need to find something new to like get into. And I was like, you know, Ween's got a pretty extensive collection. And you never really get into it. And I never really got into them, not because I don't like them.

I just never got into them. So I'm like, I'll go see if I can get into Ween a little bit. Well, I can see the book on how to do that, the order of operation. Oh, okay. Please do. Yeah. Please do. I'll need to send you a canister of nitrous too, though. That's fine. I'm not sure if you can do that through the mail. Please do. So we're talking Liberty Bell. That's right. And the reason why we're talking Liberty Bell is because, well, there's no good reason. But let's talk about the Liberty Bell anyway because it's actually pretty interesting. The Liberty Bell, we think of today's Liberty

Bell is a broad. Yeah, let's go back in time a little bit to 1751. Let's hop in the old way back machine. This is a boy. Dusty as can be. Don't get too close to that spiral. Yeah, this is very dusty But it still fires up look at that the flux capacitors fluxing Yes, and off we go to 1751 to the state house Of Philadelphia the Pennsylvania state house where they have just brought in the bell and

Even though it's not named the Liberty Bell at this point, that would come along, as we see much later, it's a bell. And it was used, although it had very, a lot of causes and purposes through the years. Sure. At first, it was just a bell. Like, we ring it when someone important dies or when we need to call the government together, like, the reasons you ring a town bell. Someone won at Bingo. Yeah, ring that bell. They called it initially the state house bell, which is on the nose, but appropriate because it was originally commissioned

by the Pennsylvania Provincial Assembly to be the bell in the Pennsylvania State House in Philadelphia. They didn't even call that Independence Hall. It was the Pennsylvania State House in Philadelphia. Everything was very business-like, bureaucraticallyically named and it told you what it did and what it was and that's how they liked it. That's right the bill itself was cast by Lester and PAK company out of London with the words

proclaim liberty throughout all the land and to all the inhabitants thereof, which is apparently referenced to Leviticus in the old Bible. It was about three feet high, a circumference of 12 feet, which is about 2100 pounds. And like I said, it was just a bell. And here's the thing about the liberty bell in that crack is no one really agrees on exactly how that happened. No, but some historians think that it cracked the first time it was used in 1752 after it was installed, like the first time. Yeah, and Lester and Pack were like, I don't know what you're talking about.

Right, actually, it's pretty cool. They made good on replacement. So the Pennsylvania Provincial Assembly said pack, lester, fellas, we needed a replacement bell and we're not going to pay for it, okay? And they said, that's fine. We'll send you another bell. And the Pennsylvania Provincial Assembly, there was like, what do you, I mean, you want the correct one back? Do you want us to send a picture of it or something? They're like, you just keep it, do whatever you want with it. Make belt buckles out of it, munitions, hat buckles,

if you're still into the pilgrim think, shoe buckles. Shoobuckles. All the any kind of buckle you want to make, you go ahead and use that belt. And they said, you know what, we're gonna actually use this belt to make a replacement belt while we wait for the real replacement belt.

And this is where it gets confusing unnecessarily. And I say we take a break, just let all that sink in. All right, let's do it. Letting stuff with Joshua Chalves, stuff you should go. Hello, I'm Chelsea Paredi. Do you feel chronic existential dread but love talking about delicious snacks? Call me! My podcast is relaunching!

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Those are words I hope I'd never have to say. or wherever you get your podcasts. All right, so if I am understanding this correctly, you now have two bells? Technically three, eventually, but one doesn't exist any longer, but it does, because it's now been melted into the second bell. Okay, but you also have the replacement bell, right? Yeah, right. And they were both apparently in the Pennsylvania State House. They were both used, but who knows what happened to the replacement bell that Paekin Lester sent?

Oh, okay. So that's the one that wasn't officially hung or hanged. I'm not sure what you would say there. I would say hung, but then you would correct me. Okay. So it was the one that they fixed, melted down and fixed the and redid the original, that is the official one then.

That's what we call the Liberty Bell yet. Okay, all right. But they didn't call it the Liberty Bell back then again. They called it the State House Bell. And then they were like, which one? They're like the original one. They're like, I thought that one was melted down. They're like, yes, this is the one that we melted down

from the original. Yeah, it went on a lot. Every time somebody asked about it. So they're belling this thing up. They're using it as you would use a bell. In 1777, when the British were encroaching, they removed the bell because it didn't want it captured and melted down into bullets basically. Or buckles.

Or buckles, they hit it again later on in a church. Oh, I'm sorry, they hit it in the church then in Allentown. And then in 1785, they raised it again. And it was really just a bell until 1824 when Marquis de Lafayette was the last general of the revolution that survived when on a tour of the United States and America that's when America was like hey like let's rename this place independence hall and let's let's call this thing Well actually it took another 11 years to call it the Liberty Bell even yeah, it was some abolitionists who were like Oh, you got a Liberty Bell, huh? You know who the Liberty Bell isn't ring floor enslaved people So let's do away with slavery and they actually use the the Liberty Bell isn't ring floor enslaved people. So let's do away with slavery. And they actually use the Liberty Bell

and the new national pride around it. We really kind of point out just how slavery is a terrible thing and we need to do away with it. Yeah, so here's where it gets really interesting. That first bell was damaged and cracked. So they melt it down, make this new one. The new bell cracks as well. And they're not exactly sure how this happened either, but they think it was in 1835 when it

was wrong to mark the death of John Marshall Chief Justice of the United States to mark his passing. And other people say, you know, no, it was really the 1840s during the 4th of July when things got really rowdy. Or other people said, no, it was on February 23rd when we were getting hammered celebrating George Washington's birthday, like people are just ringing the heck out of this thing. And no one's really sure. The National Park Service for their point of view just says, you know, it just cracked

after 90 years of use, like quit asking. Just be quiet. Just take the pamphlets and be quiet. Exactly. But apparently there are some researchers who in 1975 were like actually, it wasn't just like hard use. This bell was destined to crack. And the reason why is because they're high-tin content, it's like a quarter-tin almost. That you don't want to use that in a bell, that peels. Maybe a decorative bell, something you can find that like Kirkland's or something that it's not meant to ring. Sure, make that a tint. But you're using like a functional workhorse bell. Do not put 25% tin in that thing. functional workhorse bell do not put 25% 10 in that thing.

You've been telling me that for years. Sure. Uh, the bell they tried to fix, uh, in 1846, because Washington's birthday was rolling around again. And they're like, listen, you know, what we do here and Philly, we get drunk, we ring this bell. Uh, we act incredibly inhospitable for our professional sports teams and the teams that play them. Don't get us started on Santa Claus. And they use something called stop drilling, which in which they actually widen the crack. The crack now is 21 inches long and about an inch, a couple of centimeters wide. And they would widen it. So basically when it was wrong, the two sides would not touch each other at all and create

this awful buzz. The boy you're enjoying? Yeah, exactly. So they widened it so it wouldn't touch, but another crack developed and they were like, we got to find a better way to celebrate Washington's birthday. We can't ring this thing anymore. They said, forget it. Forget it. I'm done with the stupid bell.

That's what they said. Yeah. So it became a true symbol after that point. They just stopped ringing it. And apparently over the years, people have been like, we got to fix that thing. We got to ring that thing again. It's a big deal.

And other people are like, don't even bother. It's like better as a symbol. And in fact, it proved it's worth pretty quickly on as a symbol during World War 1. I guess it went on a whistle-stop tour of the United States on the back of a train, and drummed up enthusiasm and support for Liberty bonds. Like they were called Liberty Bonds because the Liberty Bell was basically the mascot of this bond drive to raise money for the U.S. to fight World War One. And they ended up raising in today's dollars billions of dollars from Liberty Bonds.

Thanks to that cute little bell with the crack in it. Yeah, pretty good. Earned its worth. Yeah, they think a quarter of the United States saw the Liberty Bell during that tour. That's how popular it was. People just threw on to see it. Yeah, that's right. Pretty neat. Pretty neat.

And if anyone is emailing me right now, well, the Philly's own the Braves the past two years, that's exactly what I'm talking about. Yeah, give out of sports radio. It's toxic. Are you got anything else? I got nothing else. Okay, well since checks of that, sure stuff's out.

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