Shoot Your Shot

protect a second set of softer wings. They come in all kinds of shapes and sizes too. The biggest can be larger than a grown man's hand, while the tiniest can be as small as the tip of a ballpoint pen. And here's a fact that will really make your heads. If you counted up all the animal species on Earth, one fourth of them would be beetles, which seems impossible, I know, But the sheer amount of beetle biodiversity means there are well over three hundred and fifty thousand documented species.

Some fly, some don't. Some are shaped like ladybugs, others like violins. Some live on land, some in water, a few make their homes inside mushrooms. Beetles can be bright blue, jet black, neon green, and nearly every other color in between. Really, when you get down to it, there's nothing that beatles can't do. So it probably wouldn't surprise you to learn that there's an entire branch of science dedicated to studying these curious creatures. It's called Coleepterology, which comes from the

word colyeptera, the scientific name for beetles. There is even an international organization of beatle fanatics called the Coleopteris Society. It's made up of professionals and amateurs, brought together by their love of this hardshelled insect. Speaking of amateurs, one of them most important figures in the history of coleopterology wasn't a scientist at all. He was an investment banker, a philanthropist, and one of the wealthiest men who ever lived.

Enter David Rockefeller, the youngest son of John D. Rockefeller Junior. David grew up fabulously wealthy. His childhood spanned the Roaring twenties, and his New York home was certainly the setting for many parties and negotiations, but At the time, David wasn't yet old enough to have a head for business. In nineteen twenty five, ten year old David was just beginning

his education, taking lessons with a summer tutor. This teacher introduced him to a few different kinds of beatles, and I truly don't think that they could have imagined the kind of obsession that this lesson would spark. Young David began collecting beatles, and this was far more than a childhood hobby. He did lots of research to learn about the different species and kept his specimens carefully arranged in display cases. Over the next eight years, he amassed an

impressive catalog. By this point, David was eighteen years old and with a last name like Rockefeller, he had some seriously big shoes to fill. He moved from New York to Massachusetts, where he studied economics at Harvard University. He went on to earn a PhD from the University of Chicago in nineteen forty. After a stint in the military during World War II, he started working as a member of the executive staff at Chase National Bank. It probably

helped that his uncle was chairman of the board. David quickly rose through the ranks, becoming senior vice president in nineteen fifty two and taking over his uncle's position as chairman in nineteen sixty nine. He also served as CEO from sixty nine to nineteen eighty, making him one of the most influential bankers in the world. But outside of his day to day grind as a high powered executive, David had a secret passion his undying love for beatles.

You see, David had never stopped collecting the little bugs. When he was a student at Harvard, he spent his free time combing Massachusetts for specimens. When he came home from serving in World War II, his bags were full of beatles. Even as the CEO of Chase National Bank, he planned his vacations around these little critters, traveling to

locations where he knew he could find exotic species. When David passed away in twenty seventeen at the age of one hundred and one, he left behind thirty massive cabinets filled with over one hundred and fifty thousand beetle specimens. His relatives were understandably overwhelmed with this bounty, so they called up Harvard University, David's alma mater, and offered to make a donation. Today, David Rockefeller's beatle collection is on

display at Harvard's Museum of Comparative Zoology. Brian Farrell, the museum's director of Entomology, has expressed admiration for David's extensive catalog. In Farrell's words, collecting is a result of quote passionate curiosity, something David always had in high supply. Every autumn, our doctors remind us to get our flu shots, and according to data from the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, at least half of the US population chooses not to.

Nobody likes being stuck with a needle, but still, in an age when vaccines are readily available, it's easy to forget how much they change the world. Vaccines are one of the greatest marvels of modern medicine. Take the flu shot, for example. It first became available to the public in nineteen forty five. Every year since then it has prevented thousands of debts and kept millions of people from getting sick. Other diseases like polio, have been completely eradicated through the

use of vaccines. Throughout history, Countless doctors and researchers have worked to develop safe and effective shots. But there's one immunologist who stand out from the crowd, doctor Maurice Hilleman. Maurice was born in Montana in nineteen nineteen, but his early years were marked by tragedy. Just two days after he was born, his mother died, leaving his father alone to raise eight kids. With little money and less time to spare, Maurice's father sent him to live with one

of his uncles. Marie spent his days at school and his evenings working on his uncle's farm. He was a promising student too, especially when it came to science, but he didn't have many prospects when he graduated high school. It was nineteen thirty seven, the middle of the Great Depression, and he didn't have the money to go to college. He worked odd jobs here and there until he heard about one that his older brothers was doing. Maurice's brother

had enrolled in Divinity School on a scholarship. When he realized he might be able to go to college for free, Maurice applied to Montana State University. He ended up getting a full scholarship to study chemistry and microbiology. After he graduated, he received a fellowship to attend the UNI University of Chicago. As a PhD student. In Chicago, Maurice studied infectious diseases. He received his doctorates in microbiology in nineteen forty four,

when he was just twenty five years old. A long way from the farm boy he once was, Maurice had now officially become doctor Hilliman. He found a job at a vaccination manufacturing company, where he worked to create an immunization for a certain strain of encephalitis. A few years later, in nineteen forty eight, he joined the Army Medical Center

as a respiratory disease expert. He worked with a team researching the flu and in nineteen fifty seven, when a novel influenza strain emerged in Japan, doctor Hilliman and his team quickly developed a vaccine, quite possibly stopping the strain from becoming an epidemic. Then, at thirty eight years old, doctor Hilliman left the Army and began working at a pharmaceutical company called merk and this is where his research

really expanded. He led a team developing vaccines for all sorts of diseases, including measles, chicken pox, hepatitis A and B, and strap, but the most interesting vaccine doctor Hilliman developed was for the mumps. At the time, in the early nineteen sixties, nearly every child caught the mumps at some point. While the disease itself wasn't usually fatal, it was a

leading cause of meningitis and hearing loss. One night in nineteen sixty three, while he was sleeping next to his wife, doctor Hilliman awoke to the sound of his five year old daughter toddling into their room. Her name was Jerre Lynn. Usually an energetic and happy child, she pulled on her dad's arm and told him that she didn't feel good. Maurice took stock of her symptoms fever, swollen throats, headache,

and realized that his daughter had the mumps. Now, not every child grows up with a prolific microbiologist for a dad, but Jara Lynn did. Doctor Hilliman jumped out of bed, grabbed some cotton swabs, and took a saliva sample from his daughter. The next morning, he brought the swab to the Murk laboratory and got to work. It took some time, but four years later, in nineteen sixty seven, doctor Hilliman

revealed his latest medical marvel. He had developed an effective mumps vaccine using a viral sample from his own daughter. It was the fastest a vaccine had ever been created and approved until in twenty twenty, the COVID nineteen vaccine shattered debt record. Doctor Hilliman continued his research for another four decades. By the time he passed away in two thousand and five at the age of eighty five, he

had been instrumental in creating over forty different vaccines. It's estimated that even now his work saves approximately eight million lives every year. So while I know that nobody likes needles, I'm sure doctor Hilliman would say that you should shoot your shot, or you should get your shots, you know what I mean. 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 Manke in 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 Theworldoflore dot com. And until next time, stay curious.