0:00

Ridiculous History is a production of iHeartRadio.

0:27

Welcome back to the show Ridiculous Historians.

0:29

Thank you, as always so much for tuning

0:31

in. That's our own cartoonist

0:34

super producer, mister Max Williams.

0:39

Do you know that I really love spinach,

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but.

0:42

I can't eat it?

0:43

No edition, he's got the

0:45

condition complex vegetables. I'm

0:48

so glad that you have approved

0:51

of us putting

0:53

that weird Victorian malady term

0:56

on the condition.

0:57

It's just we knew, we knew it was serious

0:59

when Max just started coughing kind of wheedily

1:02

into a hanky and then a little bit of blood

1:04

kind of came out, you know, and you.

1:06

Kept You bought the fainting couch,

1:08

and you keep fainting.

1:09

Yeah.

1:10

The vapors vapor, yeah

1:13

yeah. And then and then I got the tobacco smoke

1:15

animals. I started reading Jayjay's

1:17

book and I read that. I'm like, oh, that's on the fifth

1:19

page.

1:20

Oh, yes, of course, The Year of Living constitutionally

1:22

available anywhere. Fine books are so quick.

1:24

Question, Max, if you can't eat spinach, where do you

1:27

derive your super strength from? Oh?

1:29

He rubs a head, okay,

1:31

and the twenty inches of hair as well, and.

1:34

We are your host of ridiculous history. I'm

1:36

Ben Bollen, joined as always with the

1:38

man, the myth, the legend, mister Noel Brown,

1:40

Noel Barcelona Brown. Okay,

1:42

I'll think it's been called sometimes and

1:45

so as you can probably tell from our

1:47

uh, from our spinach references

1:49

and a little bit of some great uh, some

1:52

great catchphrasing here, today's

1:54

episode is about Popeye the Sailor.

1:57

Uh No, what's the first thing you think about when

1:59

you hear the Popeye?

2:01

I think of expanding biceps

2:03

with a giant steamship tattoo

2:06

that it was. It becomes larger and larger and

2:08

starts to pump like vapors out

2:10

into the air, you know, it starts to animate

2:13

and then punch and stuff, big,

2:15

big punching, serious violence

2:17

in that cartoon. Oh yeah,

2:19

for sure.

2:20

I mean Popeye the Sailor for almost a

2:23

century has been a mainstay of comics

2:25

and cartoons, and of course the

2:27

film helmed by Robin Williams.

2:29

We all saw that one, you know. I've been wanting

2:31

to for ages. It's sort of been on my list, but

2:33

I haven't seen it. I just know the

2:36

song from it, sung by Shelley Devall. That was

2:38

used delightfully non

2:40

sequitarily in Paul Thomas Anderson's

2:42

Punch Chunk Love. He needs me, he

2:45

needs me, he needs me, the

2:48

olive oil kind of love theme. I guess

2:50

I have not seen Robert Altman's

2:53

Popeye movie. It's apparently freakin'

2:55

Bonker's weird.

2:57

Yeah, it kind of whent over my head the first

2:59

time I saw so in the

3:01

course of this we you know I

3:03

rewatched this. Why are

3:05

we talking about Popeye today?

3:08

Well, the guy's ridiculous. You know,

3:10

he's got a strong sense of right and wrong.

3:12

You described his situational

3:15

super strength perfectly.

3:17

He's got this bizarre pantheon

3:20

and entourage of allies and villains.

3:22

And in full transparency.

3:25

We do a lot of stuff for a lot of different shows,

3:27

and one Saturday, we're working

3:29

on something about credit cards and

3:32

instead found ourselves in a cost

3:34

coat sized rabbit hole about

3:37

Popeye. What do you say, Noel, should we crack

3:39

open this podcast?

3:41

Spinach can does that work? Yeah?

3:43

Because that's how he does it right. He just sort of squeezes

3:46

it and then the lid pops off and

3:49

the spinach shoots up into the air and

3:52

immediately just goes right down his gully

3:54

hole, at which point he is imbued

3:56

with super strength and vanquishes

3:59

his foes with righteous

4:01

indignation. As you said, Ben, Popeye

4:04

is he doesn't like bullies, and

4:07

he's got a couple of nemeses

4:09

that we've seen over time, But I think the one

4:11

most people will probably remember is Bluto,

4:14

the quintessential kind of thick

4:17

necked bully. He was essentially

4:19

a bit of a sex pest. He's

4:22

always coming after olive oil like some

4:24

sort of weird, stalker

4:26

ish kind of you know, misogynistic

4:29

weirdo. Right a more, Yeah,

4:33

no shade on lumber checks. But man,

4:36

Bluto, what a bad guy. And I

4:38

didn't know how many words and terms

4:40

in the kind of popular vernacular

4:43

came from Popeye the

4:45

other way around. We're gonna get to all this stuff.

4:47

It's so fun because you think about

4:49

a character named Wimpy, and you think,

4:51

oh, surely they named Wimpy after the word

4:53

wimpy. Well, it turns

4:55

out not quite the case. The

5:04

story of Popeye, or as

5:06

some people in more of the

5:08

like Midwest and maybe Boston

5:10

area might refer to him as Popeye.

5:12

I say this because Mitch

5:15

from The dough Boys. I was always talking

5:17

about Popeye's Fried Chicken, so

5:20

I think it's very charming. But his creator,

5:22

I was an American cartoonist named Elsie

5:25

Chrissler Seeger who was

5:27

born December eighth, eighteen ninety four

5:30

in Chester, Illinois. Yeah,

5:32

and just.

5:33

Like a lot of up and coming artists,

5:35

he has a ton of jobs. In his early years.

5:37

He paints houses. That is not an

5:40

assassination euphemism. He was

5:42

actually painting houses. He paints

5:44

signs, which is a cool thing

5:46

to do. As a job, he works

5:48

as a projectionist with

5:51

motion pictures, and the entire

5:53

time he's doing this, he is continually

5:56

cold calling, or I guess I would

5:58

say cold pitching cartoons

6:00

to papers magazines of the day.

6:03

And eventually, also

6:06

he gets bupkus. They're not listening

6:08

to him or taking his submissions until

6:11

he travels to Chicago and

6:13

gets a little gets by with a little help

6:16

from his friend.

6:17

That's right, a fellow

6:19

by the name of Richard m out Cult

6:22

was a little bit, you know, more kind

6:25

of up and coming in the field, and he

6:27

liked the cut of Seeger's jib,

6:30

and he used his influence in

6:32

the industry to get him a gig at

6:34

the Herald, the Chicago Herald, drawing

6:37

Charlie Chaplin's comic capers,

6:40

which we love the alliteration. Oh, it's a

6:42

very illiterative story today. But yeah,

6:45

it would have been, you know, I guess Chaplin

6:47

was such a brand. It never really occurred

6:50

to me that he would have had his own cartoon

6:52

in the newspapers, but of course he did. So

6:54

this would have been like the equivalent of getting

6:56

a job, you know, drawing for

6:58

the Simpsons or something. Thing. Right, You're not necessarily

7:02

gonna use your own style, You're

7:04

probably following a style guide. But

7:06

it's steady work, right.

7:08

Yeah, it's steady work, you know, And

7:11

it seems like a really promising

7:13

thing because even even back

7:15

then, of course, working in any creative

7:17

field can be intensely competitive,

7:19

right, and a to be a heck of a slog. So

7:22

he was able, through this personal

7:24

relationship to get a real

7:27

plum gig that a lot of other people

7:29

were doubtlessly vying for. Unfortunately,

7:33

this Herald, this paper he's working at,

7:35

it ceases publication in nineteen seventeen,

7:38

so he relocates again. He moves to New

7:40

York. Now he's got some bona fides, right,

7:42

he's got a resume, he's got a CV, he's

7:44

got proven published

7:46

cartoons. And he uses

7:49

this to talk to a group called

7:51

King Features Syndicate, and

7:54

he pitches his own strip.

7:56

That's the dream. We know a lot of artists. All

7:58

that's the dream is to have your own original

8:01

work.

8:01

Everyone wants to own strip in the funny papers.

8:04

That's how that's how you know you've made it as an

8:06

honest today. Okay,

8:08

maybe a measure of a different era, but certainly

8:11

the measure of this era. King's

8:13

Features Syndicate, which sounds like some sort

8:15

of weird movie cartel, doesn't

8:18

it.

8:18

It does syndicate.

8:20

No, there were syndicate. I just think of crime

8:22

syndicate. But no, this is a feature syndicate.

8:25

And yeah, he pitched this idea

8:28

and it was accepted. You saw

8:30

it for the first time in nineteen nineteen called

8:32

Thimble Theater. At

8:35

first, the strip

8:37

dealt with the fat, tabulous

8:39

adventures of Olive Oil spelled

8:42

oh oh y l olive Oil,

8:45

which, okay, just to just maybe hyperbolically

8:48

to describe maybe what we're all thinking a little bit

8:50

sort of a bit of a bean

8:52

polely kind of gawky

8:55

old maid. For some reason at the time,

8:58

you know, unmarried women were

9:00

a source of scorn and

9:05

yeah not cool. So Olive

9:07

oil was sort of fit into that role

9:09

and was maybe made a bit of

9:12

a point of mockery,

9:14

right, yeah, yeah,

9:17

my brother was also depicted as kind of an idiot,

9:20

right, who's had an equally hilarious

9:22

name, a little oakfish.

9:23

You know, these are cartoon characters, right,

9:25

but there is there is definitely that

9:28

prejudice against women baked into

9:31

the strip. Olive has a.

9:35

Suitor, a paramole brother.

9:38

By the way, the castor oil still

9:42

O y L.

9:43

Yeah, so they never

9:46

got to avocado oil, but maybe that's

9:48

a note in the future,

9:51

Olive has Olive has again

9:53

this suitor, this uh, this

9:55

lover of man named originally

9:57

he's named Harold ham Gravy all one

10:00

word and then it gets shortened to ham.

10:02

Gravy, ham gravy. Maybe

10:05

her boyfriend, right, also

10:09

somewhat buffoonish is he,

10:11

I don't know, sort of a proto

10:13

Popeye in a way, right, because

10:16

I mean that's what Popeye became was,

10:18

you know, by the sailor man, he's

10:21

about protecting his lady love

10:23

Olive Oil. They're they're betrothed.

10:25

In the stars is written that Popeye

10:28

and Olive shall be one.

10:30

Yeah, and for a while they kind of had this sort

10:32

of what we could call a Dagwood blondie

10:35

vibe, like here or here's

10:37

the here are the

10:39

one shot adventures of

10:43

these two, this odd couple, and

10:45

they would have a rotating cast, you

10:48

know how, like in X Files

10:50

there's a Monster of the.

10:51

Week of course, right, so there's there's

10:54

my favorite episode.

10:55

Same dude. I think they're tight, just

10:58

structurally as well as relistically. But

11:01

they're except for Home, which we

11:03

don't have to get into.

11:04

That's a freaky one. That's

11:06

a weird one.

11:07

So in Thimble Theater, originally

11:10

they have a bunch of these one shot characters

11:12

who show up in these various

11:15

different styles. It's meant

11:17

to be somewhat like an anthology,

11:19

hence the name Thimble Theater.

11:22

But to your point, to your excellent earlier point,

11:24

man Segar keeps

11:26

refining his universe and

11:28

he'll try characters out and then he'll

11:31

cut them if I guess he doesn't

11:33

like drawing them or they don't get a

11:35

good audience response. There

11:38

was for instance, a villain named

11:40

Willie Wormwood, and he

11:42

cut Willy about a year like

11:45

over the first year, and then he

11:47

said, all right, I'm going to focus on the

11:49

the dynamic between

11:52

ham gravy and olive oil. And

11:54

it was still like the classic you

11:57

know, first first couple

11:59

panels, set up a joke, next

12:02

is the punchline, right, and they

12:04

would call this a gag a day kind of

12:06

thing. Eventually he starts,

12:09

I think it's around nineteen twenty two, our

12:12

cartoonists starts saying, well, let me

12:14

take some longer storylines

12:17

over the course of multiple strips, which

12:19

reminds me a little bit by the way of

12:21

our pal Dan's work on Rick

12:24

and Morty, because remember Rick and Morty used

12:26

to be just like one shot, twenty

12:28

something minute adventures, and they started building

12:30

out the Mythos Navin story.

12:32

Yeah, we love a good we love some good

12:35

lore and world building. I

12:37

mean it makes sense that the format

12:39

first was much more of like a

12:41

you know, one off kind of jokey handful

12:43

of frames beginning, middle, and end, move

12:46

on. And I still kind of enjoy comics

12:48

like that. There's a whole subgenre of manga

12:52

horror comics that are these

12:54

very tightly contained like

12:57

beginning, middle, and end, almost like

12:59

a punch line joke kind

13:01

of set up, but with a horror story

13:03

that usually only take about a page or

13:06

so to tell you this

13:08

usually pretty twisted little taiale.

13:11

So I'm a fan of that kind of brevity.

13:13

But then, of course it's as a creator

13:15

obviously really cool to be able

13:17

to expand that universe, and honestly,

13:20

Popeye, it was sort

13:22

of righte for that. Because you already mentioned the

13:25

rotating cast of characters. Now we're going

13:27

to start to see some recurring characters.

13:30

Yes, yes, sir, it might

13:32

surprise some of us ridiculous historians

13:34

playing along at home to learn that

13:36

Popeye did not appear

13:39

in Thimble Theater until a like

13:41

a decade after the thing

13:43

you've been running.

13:45

Olive Oil was the first of the

13:47

bunch, right.

13:48

Right, Popeye

13:55

shows up on January seventeenth of nineteen

13:58

twenty nine. And here's the set up,

14:00

all right. He's hired by you

14:02

know, our kind of oafish

14:05

brother boy Castor Oil and

14:08

Olive Oil's boyfriend,

14:11

Ham Gravy. These two guys hire

14:13

this new dude, Popeye, to

14:15

crew a ship for a voyage to

14:18

Dice Island. Dice Island

14:20

is important in the show or in the strip

14:22

because it is

14:25

home to a casino owned by

14:27

a crooked gambler named

14:29

Fade Well all one.

14:31

Word, great name. And by the way,

14:34

ham gravy. First of all, I

14:36

don't maybe maybe gravy on a pork

14:38

chop, but gravy on a piece of ham. That's

14:40

a little weird for me. Maybe it was a different time, but

14:43

to look at this fella, he

14:45

is a little bit of a sad sack. He's

14:47

kind of almost like a Charlie Brown, sort

14:50

of always a little hangdog walking around.

14:52

But he weirdly is like the

14:54

dude version of olive oil. He has

14:56

the same pointy shaped

14:58

nose, the same kind of wiry

15:00

frame, uh, the same

15:03

more or less kind of seemingly bald

15:05

head minus the braids coming down the side.

15:08

But yeah, he very much seems to be like a

15:10

male olive oil. So they you know,

15:12

it makes sense that they pair it to them. But I guess what did

15:15

did Popeye literally steal her away

15:17

from ham gravy with his muscles

15:20

and nautical skills?

15:22

Well, this is where we get

15:24

into some mythos, right, So our buddy

15:26

Castor Oil says, I'm

15:28

gonna I've got a ringer. I'm gonna

15:31

break the bank at the casino because

15:33

Bernice the Whiffle hid, who is kind

15:36

of our first spinach.

15:37

We'll see what we mean, folks. If you if

15:39

you.

15:39

Pet Bernice correctly, then

15:42

for a limited amount of time, you get

15:44

incredible good luck. So they

15:47

do this spoiler it's

15:49

you know, it's a comic strip. Uh,

15:51

And Popeye returns because

15:54

he now he has like you were saying,

15:56

no, he has this mission to

15:59

romantically pursue Olive

16:01

Oil, and she breaks up

16:03

with Ham to date Popeye

16:05

in March of nineteen thirty, and

16:08

then he also gets

16:10

the Originally his

16:12

superpowers are given to him by petting

16:16

or rubbing Bernice the whiffle hen, but

16:18

then later, of course the

16:21

spinach.

16:21

And it's jumping real quick. I was

16:23

also very curious about ham gravy nol.

16:26

It turns out, at least for my very

16:28

brief research, that ham gravy is just

16:30

like gravy made from the drippings

16:32

of ham.

16:33

Mm hmm, okay, he can clear on anything. Gravy

16:36

is gravy exactly.

16:37

It's not like gravy specifically for

16:39

ham, but it's gravy.

16:41

That makes us like mushroom gravy

16:43

or any Okay, fair enough,

16:45

thank you. This has been Max's culinary corner

16:48

or Max with the Max

16:50

with the fact is

16:52

that seeking in the phone

16:56

and he's fallen. Lolgh, it's

16:58

just for you right now. Oh

17:04

yeah, that too. They're interchangeable. But yeah,

17:06

so, I mean, okay, so, but it is true

17:09

though, Ben, that they wrote into the

17:11

storyline that olive oil

17:13

dumps Sam gravy. Yeah,

17:16

in favor of of of the uh,

17:18

I guess slightly more fetching than

17:21

Edgy, somewhat dangerous but

17:23

weirdly misshapen jawlined

17:26

Popeye.

17:27

He's a bad boy. Yeah, he

17:29

is some bad things. There's a yeah,

17:32

which we'll get to. There's a bevy

17:34

of unique and eccentric characters

17:37

that are continually showing up before and

17:40

after Popeye, and we'll describe some of those in

17:42

a moment. This guy became so popular

17:44

he was a sky rocketing success

17:47

in the world of comics. He was also inherently

17:50

associated with Spinach. Just six

17:52

years after he first appears going

17:54

to Dice Island, the town of Crystal

17:56

City, Texas, built a statue

18:00

for Popeye for fictional character

18:02

because Crystal City, Texas, at

18:04

the time was a huge agricultural

18:08

center for spinach. Then they renamed

18:11

the copy strip. It's no

18:13

longer Thimble Theaters Thimble Theater

18:15

starring Popeye, and then later they shorten

18:17

it and they just say Popeye.

18:19

Yeah, And then anyone's thinking of Popeye the

18:21

salor man. That's largely from

18:24

the theme of the cartoon. That'll come later,

18:27

and quick cook point of on the spinach

18:29

thing, the marketing, I don't see it anymore,

18:32

but for years you could get bagged

18:34

spinach that was logoed

18:37

up with Popeye cartoons, and I

18:39

don't know what happened if the deal

18:41

run. I mean a lot of this stuff is public domain. Actually

18:44

we'll get to that too. There's some interesting gray area

18:46

questions around the public domain

18:48

mess of the Popeye character.

18:51

But I wonder what happened. I would love to figure

18:53

out, because for years you'd get bags spin

18:55

into the grocery store and it would be covered

18:57

in Popeye logo.

19:00

It might be a.

19:01

Thing where because they definitely still

19:03

have Popeye brand canned spinach,

19:05

it may be a thing where maybe

19:07

a particular grocery store does not have that

19:10

supplier anymore, but Popeye brand

19:12

Spinach is still very much in playee.

19:14

I'm sure, I'm sure it is, just it used to be everywhere

19:16

at the you know, in our neck of the woods, the

19:18

Kroger or the publics of the

19:20

world, which is typically what we get

19:23

around here. But yeah, Crystal City,

19:26

Boomtown for Spinach at the time already

19:29

hitching their wagon to Popeye's

19:32

pipe, I guess. And he

19:35

gets so popular right at a time

19:38

when animated cartoons

19:40

are really starting to be a thing like this is in the

19:42

early days of Disney from

19:45

the Ink, well really weird psychedelic

19:48

cartoons from the Fleischer brothers,

19:50

Max and Dave, who produced

19:52

all these cartoons shorts, they

19:54

decided to, you know, capitalize

19:57

on Popeye's popularity as a comic.

20:00

It creates an animated version voiced

20:02

by Jack Mercer, and that's where

20:05

you get here and

20:07

all of that stuff. That really is what absolutely

20:11

elevates Popeye into the

20:13

stratosphere pop culturally speaking,

20:16

is to have that voice and that theme

20:18

song, you know, And it's

20:21

honestly something I grew up with. It's

20:23

forever with me, you know, all

20:25

my I remember I had a friend who told

20:27

me during a sleepover once he was messing

20:30

with me, but he swore to me that

20:32

his mother would not let him watch Popeye

20:34

cartoons because they were too violent.

20:37

But it turns out he pretty with me, but

20:39

they were violent, you.

20:40

Know, the older ones, especially, I mean,

20:42

Popeye is part of the World War

20:45

two propaganda moves

20:47

that brought in Disney and had Donald Duck

20:50

do some questionable things, and then

20:52

in the it persists into the nineteen

20:55

sixties nineteen seventies. Popeye

20:57

cartoons are made for American TV,

21:00

and the old it triggers a wave

21:02

of nostalgia. Weirdly enough, because a

21:05

certain amount of decades have passed, so now

21:07

people are finding the old cartoons

21:09

as well. And Popeye comic books have been

21:11

around since the nineteen thirties. They were still

21:14

up until or publishing up until the nineteen

21:16

seventies. There were toys,

21:18

clothing, merchandise. It's very

21:21

spaceballs.

21:22

We know that.

21:23

We already talked about how Robin Williams

21:25

was in the star of the live action

21:28

Popeye film in nineteen eighty, but maybe

21:31

we describe Popeye a

21:33

little bit more. He's thirty

21:35

four years old when you first meet him.

21:38

Even though the stablished this yeah,

21:40

even though it looks like he's maybe mid fifties,

21:42

hard lived, put away wet, but he's

21:45

got one eye in the beginning is

21:48

he is weirdly enough, specifically

21:50

from Santa Monica, California, So

21:52

I don't know who seeger met.

21:54

You know, I never really thought of him of just having one eye.

21:56

I thought it was more of a really hard squint

21:59

yeah in the rock yeah,

22:01

you know, kind of yeah. And the things

22:03

that I always found interesting about the character

22:06

design of Popeye is that, aside

22:08

from his weirdly bulging

22:10

muscles, he's like rail

22:13

thin everywhere else. He's got

22:15

these noodley arms. He looks like a freakin'

22:18

what is it like a muffler on

22:20

a car, you know, where it's like a

22:22

tiny tube. Can I do a big old honking

22:24

thing and then another tiny tube coming out on the other

22:27

side.

22:27

And he always has a pipe, yeah,

22:29

in his weird, weird little mouth.

22:32

And he's yeah, he's always aggressively.

22:34

Right, He's always ready to fight in

22:37

place of reasonable discussion. He's got

22:39

a grabbling voice. There's a

22:41

subreddit called thirteen or thirty

22:44

which is entirely photographs. I don't

22:46

know if you guys have seen it, but it's entirely photographs

22:49

of people who look bizarrely not their

22:51

age in one direction or another.

22:53

I haven't seen this, but I know the vibe.

22:56

Yeah, Popeye's one of these. And one

22:58

of his most popular catchphrases is also,

23:01

I would argue his fundamental like philosophical

23:04

and moral axiom, I

23:06

am what I am, and that's all what

23:09

I am.

23:09

Yeah, And you know, you know you hit on something just now, Ben.

23:12

He does almost have

23:14

like a lilting kind

23:17

of Irish accent almost.

23:21

It's more like, you know, the voice

23:23

of Willem Dafoe in the

23:25

in the Lighthouse.

23:27

You know, he's kind of got this grizzled.

23:29

Like Seeman's kind of

23:32

brogue, I guess you could call it. And

23:34

he does have a spouse

23:37

sort of a personal philosophy. Uh.

23:39

And he does so often very

23:42

weirdly monologuing

23:44

to himself under his breath,

23:47

kind of like demons.

23:51

He the guy's a bit of a of

23:53

a of a crazy person. Let's not

23:55

let's not men's words here.

24:03

And to the point made earlier

24:07

the comic strip, the original strip was

24:09

pretty violent by today's measures.

24:11

In his first appearance, you

24:13

know, rubbing Bernice. The Whifflehn

24:16

gives him the ability to survive fifteen

24:19

gunshot wounds and he's

24:21

fine. But that's a lot for kids.

24:24

We would imagine today, and it's

24:26

the end of nineteen twenty nine when

24:29

his strength is no longer derived

24:32

from Bernice. Instead it's derived

24:34

by spinach, by the consumption

24:37

of spinach, often in the most cartoonish

24:39

method possible. He squeezes the can.

24:42

Sometimes it goes into his mouth, sometimes

24:44

through his pipe.

24:45

It's weird he does go through I forgot about

24:47

that is he's smoking it? What's going

24:49

on?

24:49

Smoking the spinach?

24:50

He's smoking that sweet sweet green

24:53

leaf by the way, really quickly. Just

24:55

which as we're talking about his weird personal philosophy

24:57

and mumblings, he had a couple other

24:59

can phrases besides I am what I

25:02

am, and that's all I am. Uh,

25:04

that's all I can stand because I can't

25:06

stands no more. That's a good

25:08

one. And uh, let's see

25:11

you. You got a face I like

25:14

to touch, Yeah, talking

25:16

to all of talking to all of yeah, and

25:18

I am disgustiated. And

25:21

a personal classic which sort of shows his

25:24

you know, if you're not with me, you're against me.

25:27

Mentality. If we can't be friends,

25:29

we'll be enemies. Yeah.

25:32

That was always chilling to me reading

25:35

this, And we also know that there

25:37

are a lot of other catchphrases,

25:39

cultural tropes. We set this up so well

25:41

in the beginning that come not just

25:43

from Popeye himself Popeye the Man,

25:46

but come from his pantheon

25:48

of side characters, villains, ed allies,

25:51

Jay Wellington. Wimpy of course

25:53

be one of one of the crowd

25:56

favorites. He's kind of lazy,

25:58

he's not in the shape he

26:02

beat me here, Max. He loves

26:04

hamburger.

26:05

Oh yeah, he came up organically on a recent

26:07

episode where you said something to the effect of I'll

26:09

gladly pay you Tuesday for a hamburger

26:11

today, which was his catch phrase.

26:14

But he he did sometimes in the way

26:16

that a lay about comic relief kind of

26:18

character will sometimes be the hero of

26:20

the day. Sometimes Wimpy accidentally

26:23

inspector gadgets his way into

26:25

sort of like you know, being the

26:27

lynchpin of what leads to the successful

26:29

outcome and the caper.

26:31

M one hundred percent. And you

26:34

made this point so well earlier, the

26:37

way that Popeye has informed American

26:40

culture, and indeed American English.

26:43

A lot of etymologists will argue

26:46

that Wimpy is actually the

26:48

source of the word wimp

26:51

meaning timid or cowardly or not strong.

26:54

Or you know, wimpy. That's a

26:56

wimpy guy right there.

26:58

You know, it's also a huge Hamberg chain,

27:00

right or it was? Are they still around?

27:03

I guess it was in England,

27:05

right because I'm not familiar with it, but perfect

27:08

branding. Also, Popeyes

27:10

the restaurant unaffiliated

27:12

with Popeye is the cartoon the chicken restaurant.

27:15

I think at some point there was some litigation

27:18

around that. I'd have to I think you're right,

27:21

but I think they sorted it out because Popeyes is still

27:23

Popeyes, Popeye the cartoon, and the intellectual

27:25

property is still that. So

27:28

yeah, Wimpy became

27:30

a bit of a fan favorite. Mm hmmmm,

27:33

he sure did.

27:33

He actually became the

27:36

next or the third full time

27:39

major character alongside Popeye

27:41

and all of Maybe one of the

27:43

weirdest comparisons to draw is

27:46

the in the world of DC comics,

27:48

the three main members of the Justice

27:50

League are Superman that's our Popeye,

27:53

Olive Oil that's our Wonder Woman, and

27:55

Wimpy, who I guess now is

27:58

our batman. I have painted by self

28:00

into a comparison quarter there.

28:02

Also to jump in real quick, I did some

28:04

quick diving into wimpy Burrs. They

28:07

are basically out of the United

28:09

States.

28:10

There's one in Memphis, Okay.

28:13

Where they really found success was

28:15

South Africa. They're headquarters

28:18

in Johannesburg, and they have four

28:20

hundred and fifty three outlets. Obviously, this

28:22

is according to the modern day

28:25

Great Library of Alexandria Wikipedia.

28:28

So yeah. And they're also in the United Kingdom

28:30

with sixty two outlets. So yes,

28:32

very much around. Not easy

28:35

to find one unless you go to Memphis. According to

28:37

Ben.

28:58

South Africa, the country

29:01

that is perhaps best known for its love of

29:03

whippy hamburgers. A couple other things

29:05

happened there too. You guys ever heard of jolliby,

29:08

Yes, in the Philippines. It's so popular

29:11

in the Philippines.

29:11

There are some elsewhere, Like I think there's there's something

29:14

like Boss California, California.

29:16

That's right, I'm slute, You're absolutely right, California. But it is

29:18

a Filipino fried

29:21

chicken and spaghetti joints that also

29:23

makes like crushed Hawaiian

29:25

ices and various odd

29:28

kind of boba

29:30

type sweets, but

29:33

I really want to go. I saw an Anthony board an

29:35

episode where I think it was David Chang took

29:37

him there. But it seems very interesting. It's good.

29:39

Unrelated to Popeye, but one thing

29:41

that is related to Popeye is the

29:44

Fleischer cartoon. Obviously, is when you started

29:46

to see all of these characters joining the Fray.

29:49

You had Eugene the Jeep, which

29:52

was a dog who's

29:55

dog like, he's the Jeep. He's

29:57

a jeep, that's what he is.

30:00

He only has the one word such is

30:02

jeep.

30:03

And apparently.

30:06

He is not named after the vehicle

30:08

or the type of vehicle, the jeep,

30:11

the automotive Jeep is named after

30:13

this cartoon.

30:14

Once again, first to market man, this is the

30:16

thirties, they're gonna be. They're

30:18

creating a lot of powerful pop

30:20

cultural kind of like phenomenon,

30:22

you know, and they didn't even realize it. I always, for

30:24

some reason, assumed jeep was an acronym,

30:27

though I couldn't tell you what that would possibly be.

30:30

I don't know, it just seems like one of those words that would

30:32

be. But Eugene the Jeep, he's

30:34

a dog sort of, but he's really

30:36

just a jeep. Who says jeep. He's magical

30:39

though, isn't he. I think he has some like shape

30:41

shifting kind of Sasquatch

30:45

esque powers of teleportation

30:47

sort of right.

30:49

Yeah, he is very difficult

30:51

to kill because of his magical

30:53

powers. And he does not look like a jeep

30:56

by the way, like the vehicle. He

30:58

is sort of a yellow, green

31:00

spotted like we said,

31:02

vague dog like yeah,

31:05

with a big h with

31:08

a big balloon shaped

31:10

nose.

31:10

Trebasis, yes, just so.

31:13

Yeah, and he's got a schnaz for

31:15

sure, and he uh, his

31:17

powers are explained by the fact

31:19

that he is in the three dimensional

31:21

world, but he's from a

31:24

fourth dimensional world. They got

31:26

deep into the lore pretty quickly.

31:28

Pretty cool. Popeye

31:31

and his nautical explanation explorations,

31:34

one would imagine found

31:36

a rift in space time where

31:38

he took his his sloop into

31:40

another dimension and came back with the jeep.

31:43

It's a really weird kind

31:46

of thing, right, and the uh, the

31:48

army vehicle was

31:50

called the general Purpose Vehicle

31:53

and then shortened to jeep. But we're pretty

31:55

sure that happened because of

31:58

the propaganda cartoons that

32:00

were shown to soldiers to kind of boost

32:02

morale. So we went from GP to

32:04

JEEP.

32:07

Look, this is our segue to

32:10

learning together with you ridiculous historians,

32:13

that this is a two part episode.

32:15

We already know much fun. You already

32:17

know what it is. This is one of those not posthumous.

32:20

That's not the right word. What's the right word.

32:22

We can say post script.

32:24

Or Look, guys,

32:26

it's summer. We're all trying to take a little

32:28

time off. We thought this one was a beefy one

32:31

part or a nice nuggety,

32:34

spinach bite sized two parter

32:36

for you to enjoy this week. And I don't

32:39

know, man, I think Popeye deserves his own

32:41

week. It's Popeye Week here on Ridiculous

32:43

History.

32:44

Yeah, and maybe we can also

32:47

answer some other questions

32:49

that surely are burning in

32:51

our collective minds, folks, in Part

32:53

two of the Ridiculous History

32:55

of Popeye. But for now,

32:58

we've got a a lot of

33:00

thank yous. We're always grateful when we do our

33:02

credits. It's it's a fun it's a fun

33:04

thing for us. So, of course, shout

33:07

out to the man the myths legend, mister

33:10

Max Williams. Also, you know what,

33:13

shout out to Casey Pegram I think we should

33:15

have him back on the show.

33:16

It's oh, we must he's got his hands

33:18

full with fatherhood and other podcast

33:20

duties. But boy do we love that guy. I want

33:22

to say now, I want to take this opportunity to

33:24

add something that I think we didn't get into in

33:26

either of these episodes, where we might have just glossed

33:29

over. I didn't really

33:31

think about this. And again, we've we've promised

33:33

this, and we're going to fully deliver and report

33:35

back. Gonna go down some YouTube rabbit holes

33:37

rewatching some of these classic Popeye cartoons.

33:40

But I had forgotten, or

33:42

maybe it had never acknowledged or noticed in the first

33:44

place, that not only does spinach give

33:47

Popeye super strength, it

33:49

often gives him other kind

33:52

of like side.

33:54

Like playing the piano yeah,

33:56

or.

33:56

Whatever is required in the moment

33:58

to be the most ass right,

34:02

yeah exactly, dance like it make him dance like

34:04

Barishnakoff all of a sudden, right

34:06

right.

34:07

We also may at some point

34:10

another thing we forgot is we mentioned

34:12

this, but we may at some point need to explain

34:15

why Popeye's Chicken is

34:18

not related to popeye'es this Popeye

34:20

the Sailor.

34:22

Right, Yes, maybe you know

34:24

what, maybe will do that in our Out show for episode

34:26

two. I think that's a smashing

34:28

idea, and I just want to play on a couple

34:30

other things. Originally,

34:33

I think you had mentioned this, the chicken, the whiffle Hen.

34:35

It was a luck factor, right, so

34:38

essentially what up? It's like it's like maxing

34:41

out your luck parameter in a

34:44

Fallout game, right, And all of a sudden, everywhere

34:46

you go, people are just throwing themselves at you to

34:49

give give you their stuff, and you know, whatever

34:51

crate you open full of like magical

34:53

items that you'd never find, and.

34:55

A psychopath shows up starts shooting people

34:57

for you. Have you found his document

35:00

in Nick Valentine's office and fall It four?

35:03

No, I haven't gotten there yet. I also I have a Skyrim

35:05

related question that I want to post to you, but not

35:07

quite this second. So luck was what

35:09

the Whifflehen was about. But the spinach

35:13

he could at times he'd turn into like a

35:15

human bullet, you know, or like

35:17

a like a rocket, a cruise missile,

35:20

you know.

35:20

Yeah, absolutely, And

35:23

we're going to answer all these questions

35:25

and more in part two of our

35:28

series this week. Thank you so much for joining

35:30

us.

35:30

Folks.

35:30

Thanks to our superducer mister Max

35:32

Williams, Our Blue Toe, Jonathan Strickland

35:35

aka the Twister of course,

35:37

AJ Jacobs, Bahamas and

35:40

who else.

35:41

And just jumping here real quick. Special shout

35:43

out to our research associate for this episode,

35:46

no other than mister Ben Bolin.

35:48

Oh Chriss rossiotis here in spirit. He's

35:51

Jeff Coats wherever they may roam, check

35:53

out Eve's podcast on

35:55

Theme. They just did

35:57

a really cool live lit event

36:00

here in Atlanta in conjunction

36:02

with our buddy Michael Alder.

36:04

June is part of the Right Club series,

36:06

so do check out their podcast

36:09

on Theme with Eaves, Jeffcoats and

36:11

Katie Mitchell out now wherever

36:13

you get your podcasts, man

36:16

About covers the thank you, Thank you Ben

36:19

for your human abilities of

36:21

podcasting.

36:22

Oh yeah, yeah, it's all the spinach.

36:24

We'll see you next time, folks. For

36:33

more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio

36:35

app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen

36:38

to your favorite shows.