Daily Double

about comedy and drama as separate genres. It's about trying to make it as truthful as you can. And to paraphrase the late Edmund Gwen who played Santa Claus in Miracle on thirty four Street, dying is easy, comedy is hard. Stand up can help us deal with difficult real world issues by showing them in a more humorous light. Sitcom's often depicted exaggerated but honest scenarios regarding parenting and marriage to show us that we're all going through the same

things and just trying to get by. Parody is perfect for lampooning those at the top and knocking them down a peg or two, and when it comes to parody, one man stands above all of them weird. Al Yankovic born in Downey, California, in nineteen fifty nine. Alfred Matthew Yankovic was raised by parents who unwaveringly supported him in whatever he did. His father often said the key to success is doing for a living whatever makes you happy,

and the young Yankovic took that to heart. He took his first accordion lesson on the eve of turning seven, after a door to door salesman stop by offering lessons at a nearby music school. As he got older and was stuck at home with little to do, Yankovic taught himself how to play popular hits of the nineteen seventies. But music was only half the equation. Al also had a passion for comedy, specifically parody. He'd been quoted as citing the likes of Alan Sherman and Tom Lahr as

inspirations for him growing up. Their influences as clear as day on all of his albums. And where did he hear these artists? His parents certainly didn't introduce him to them. Instead, he listened to the comedic stylings of Dr Demento, who would play all sorts of comedy albums and songs on his syndicated radio show. In fact, in nineteen seventy six, Dr Demento came to Yankovic school to talk to the students, after which Al handed him a cassette tape of himself

playing various parodies and original songs on the accordion. Dr Demento played it on his program almost immediately From there, Yankovic started performing at coffee shops and open mic nights, hauling his accordion up to the stage and blowing everyone's minds. I mean, who else would perform the theme from two thousand one of Space Odyssey on the accordion for a

bunch of college students, Al Yankovic, That's who. His big break, however, came when Dr Demento played Al's homemade recording of My Bologna, a parody of the Knacks hit song My Sharona. The Knacks lead singer Doug Figer was so impressed with it he reached out to Capitol Records and suggested that they

put it out as a single. From there came Another One Rides the Bus, set to Queen's Another One bites the dust, Eat It, a parody of Michael Jackson's hit beat It, and dozens of other clever takes on popular songs of their day. But one song did more than make people laugh and smile. It changed the face of television in the nineteen eighties and beyond. It was a send up of the song Jeopardy by the Greg Kin Band titled I Lost on Jeopardy, released in nineteen eighty four.

The song told the story of how the singer was a contestant on the original iteration of Jeopardy, which ran from nineteen sixty four to nineteen seventy five, and lost to a plumber and an architect, both with a PhD. Before Alex Trebek, Jeopardy was hosted by Art Fleming with Don Pardo in announcer's chair. Pardau would go on to be the announcer for Saturday Night Live from nineteen seventy

five until his death in two thousand fourteen. Both Fleming and Pardeaux made appearances in the music video for Yankovic song, as did Al's parents Dr Demento and Greg Kin, who wrote and sang the original song. I Lost on Jeopardy became a hit, reaching number eighty one on the US Hot one hundred charts. But what weird Al didn't know was that MERV Griffin, the creator of the original Jeopardy

game show, was working on something new. His other program, Wheel of Fortune had become a smash, and he wanted another half hour quiz show to round out the one hour block each evening. He had filmed a test pilot with Alex Trebec as the host in nineteen eighty three, but reactions fell flat. Griffin, however, decided to move forward despite what the test audiences said. One year later, on June four night, Griffin and the rest of the Jeopardy

crew got together to plan out the show. It was the same day that yankovic song was released, and Jeopardies had writer made sure that everyone in the room heard it. They initially thought that it was funny and cute, but when they started hearing it more and more on the radio, they got excited. Maybe there really was an audience out there for a new kind of Jeopardy. Griffin even invited weird Al onto his talk show to perform it later

that summer. After the performance, Griffin told Yankovic that the success of I Lost on Jeopardy was partially responsible for the show making a comeback, and hinted that there might even be a hosting gig in it for him, with

tongue firmly planted a cheek, of course. In September of Jeopardy made its triumphant return to the airwaves with Alex Trebek, not Weird al Yankovic as host, and although Mr Trebek sadly passed away from pancreatic cancer in the show he helped define for almost forty years, is still going strong today. As for Weird al Well, comedy came easy. Winning on Jeopardy, however, was hard. Sheriff Uriah S. Gregory knew he was headed for dangerous territory where he was unwelcome and likely to

be met with resistance. Tensions between the northern and Southern States had been escalating for some time, and Gregory worried that it would soon boil over into violence. After all, a Missourian had recently crossed the Iowa border and cut down three b trees rich with honey, and that was practically a declaration of war. The Honey War between Iowa and Missouri officially started in eighteen thirty nine, but it had roots in a simple survey and assignment from twenty

three years earlier. You see when the United States bought the territory from France during the Louisiana Purchase in eighteen oh three. It was the first major addition to the country. The territory was quickly joined by land wrestled from indigenous tribes through threats and unfair treaties. In the aftermath of the War of eighteen twelve, the new country finally had

the time to define its boundaries. Something about their army getting badly beaten by the British for trying to steal British territory in Canada didn't sit well with the U. S. Government. In eighteen sixteen, they hired John C. Sullivan to survey the area. Now. Sullivan's task was to find the north south boundary of the United States. This would help distinguish what was and wasn't indigenous land. Eventually, it would separate

southern states from northern states as well. The line was meant to start at the east bank of the Missouri River and end at the rapids of the Des Moines River. Later, Missourians wanted to extend their northern border just to touch north. This would give state residents access to rich, fertile land full of wild honey bees that had taken up residents in hollow tree trunks called b trees. Honey was a hot commodity on the frontier as a sweetener, and these

be trees made that land incredibly valuable. But something unusual happened when J. C. Brown was or to redo the original line. As it turns out, Sullivan hadn't done a very good job of it the first time. The markers Sullivan was supposed to place along the way were nowhere to be found. He said that he had ended at the Des Moines River Rapids, when in reality he had stopped at the Mississippi River Rapids. Brown worked hard, but given the original materials, it's no surprise that his line

was off. It stretched nine to thirteen miles further north than the Sullivan line. When Iowa split from Wisconsin in eighteen thirty eight and began campaigning for statehood, the border came into question. Although the federal government intervened, Missouri refused

to give up the Brown line. Many of the residents in the new territory wanted nothing to do with slaveholding Missouri, as they were free staters through and through Missouri, however, didn't care and began sending state officials to collect taxes. To make matters worse, In the spring of eighteen thirty nine, a farmer from Missouri cut down three of the valuable be trees, infuriating the islands. He then sold the honey and wax without pain taxes, and then legged it to Missouri,

which refused to turn him over to Iowan officials. Between this and the taxes, it was just too much. Iowan's in the disputed territory contacted their governor, Robert Lucas in July of eighteen thirty nine, who issued a proclamation stating that if any Missouri officials crossed the Sullivan line, they would be arrested. Having drawn the line in the sand,

uh literally. Lucas was quite confident that he wouldn't be ignored, but it seems that he underestimated the indignation of the Missourians, who felt that their dignity and the honor of Missouri still needed to be protected. A month later, Missouri Governor Lilburn Boggs issued a proclamation of his own. He said that Missouri should continue to assert control over the land tension finally came to a head in October of that year when Sheriff Gregory entered the territory for the second

time to collect taxes on behalf of Missouri. He was quickly surrounded by twelve hundred angry residents as well as iow was Sheriff Henry Heffliman, who promptly arrested him. Things quickly spiraled out of control from there. By December, both Missouri and Iowa had assembled their militia's about a thousand men armed with old flint locks and farming equipment. Fueled by whiskey and rage, they marched to the disputed territory, proudly flying a flag that read death to Pukes, Pukes

being the nickname for anyone from Missouri. Now it could have ended very badly, but fortunately no one was adequately prepared for winter, and although plenty of the men had massed at the border, calmer heads would prevail. Delegations from both sides mets and traded messages, and most people didn't want an actual fight, except the governors, who weren't even there. In the end, the militia from Missouri was sent home,

annoyed at the whole ridiculous ordeal. To show their displeasure, they strung up two chunks of venison that they had shot earlier and dubbed one Governor Boggs and the other Governor Lucas. According to the words of one de lighted militia man, we fired a few rounds at them until we considered them dead dead. The effigies were then buried with full military honors before the Missouri men returned to

their camp. Sheriff Gregory was finally released, but the charges against him wouldn't be dropped for a few more years. The Governor's backed down and the U. S. Supreme Court decided that the boundary would be set along the original eighteen sixteen line, which would be resurveyed and corrected. It ran about halfway through the disputed territory. It was the perfect compromise and that nobody got exactly what they wanted

and everyone was left unhappy. And to top it all off, the loss of all those be trees probably stun I hope you've enjoyed today's guided tour of the Cabinet of Curiosities. Subscribe for free on Apple Podcasts, or learn more about the show by visiting Curiosities podcast dot com. The show was created by me, Aaron Manky and partnership with how

Stuff Works. I make another award winning show called Lore which is a podcast, book series, and television show and you can learn all about it over at the World of Lore dot com. And until next time, stay curious, Yeah,