Short Stuff: Smoke Signals

I know it's a good one, you think, sure, al right, it's a I mean, it's a fairly short topic. Like even when you go research elsewhere outside of your brilliant article, there's not that much more to it. You know, it's like pretty straightforward stuff. But I think the thing the first thing to kind of cover with smoke signals is

that they actually were real. It's not something that like Hollywood invented from like Cowboy and Indian movies or something like yeah, which that seems like it could have been the case. The one thing that got me in reviewing this again and then originally when I was doing it years ago as an article, was just like, how brilliant

this is? It really is. It is also, Chuck. The one thing that struck me when researching, it's just how stressful it would be because if you screw it up, it's not like there's a signal for wait, let me start over. Well, maybe there was. I hope there was for for people like me, for neurotic Native Americans. Yeah, I guess so. All right, so we're talking about smoke signals, which, um, like you said, they were real, and they are still real. It's not like, you know, they're still smoke and they're

still wet blankets, right exactly. But Native Americans and not just Native Americans, as we learn we'll learn here in a second, but Chinese soldiers along the Great Wall of China. You know, they couldn't communicate long distances. But if you have a big fire with white smoke, you can see that for you know, a thousand miles maybe let's just say a million miles Chuck, Yeah, a million miles. And and they were so smart they figured out, hey, this is a great way to send a kind of rudimentary

message right over a long distance. Yeah. And that's a really important point too, is you're not sending like, hey, how's it going, what's up with Alexander, how's his foot doing right now? I'll wait for your reply Alexander the Apache yeah exactly, or the Chinese soldier what are the two? Yeah? Um, this is just strictly like like everything's okay, um, or I am here, or please please God send help. Something really horrible is going down, like really broad stroke communications

that you would need to send over long distances. Yeah, but it could be, I mean, depending on the tribe and what they are arranged. Because kind of the beauty of smoke signals is it's just puffs of smoke, so you can have it mean whatever you want to mean as long as you I'll talk about it beforehand. Get everyone on the same page. Although they didn't have pages, they had smoke so that that you couldn't use that. Turn back. Then get on the same puff. Get everyone

in the same puff. I'm gonna start using that. Um. As long as you had everyone together, you could send more complex messages. It's not just like hey, someone's invading. It could be like, hey, we're really uh sick over

here and could use some help, right or hungry or whatever. Yeah, And because everyone could see it, you had to kind of have like an previously agreed upon um message or meaning to each of the messages between you and who you're sending it to, so that you it was encoded in a way, I guess you could say, yeah, and as far as China on the Great Wall of China, and that's kind of a perfect scenario, best case scenario for sending a smoke signal, because it's sort of wide

open um, and you know, you can see it for many, many miles, and they had watch towers so you could convey from you know, you could string along from one watch tower to the next, and all of a sudden you're sending messages over a few hours, you know. Three. Yeah, I saw that the earliest accounts of smoke signals being

used is with the Chinese along the Great Wall of China. Well, I think interesting about the whole idea of smoke signals is that it's just such a such a great idea that it evolved independently in different parts of the world, like with Native Americans. As far as we know, they never had any contact with the Chinese the book fourteen

twenty one notwithstanding. But the Native Americans in the Southwest and in the plains, we're using smoke signals at the same time that the Chinese were, you know, half a world away, just because it's just such a basically good idea, but they were using virtually the same the same yeah and and technique, you know, yeah, the depending on you know, we're going to talk about the best stuff to burn. But in China they burned apparently saltpeter, sulfur, and wolf

dung to create really dense smoke. And I can't imagine what that must have smelled like. I'll bet it smell a lot like poop and saltpeter and salt would Yeah, sulfur, dude, that's that's the that's the icing on the case that the kicker, Yeah, just throwing a little eggy smell on top exactly. It's like, did you now it's the fire? That guy's always saying it's the fire, not the fire.

He's always blaming it on his dog or the fire. Oh, Alexander, Uh, well, should we take a break and then talk about how to do this? I guess so all right, let's do it. K Okay, Chuck, we're back. And before we we really get to the nuts and bolt of ale as, I want to say I also saw a lot of mention of how tribes in North America used mirrors too to sick and I was like, did they have mirrors? And though it's like polished mica, but they they used those

over long distances as well. And body positions too, like you could see how somebody was like standing or sitting or crouching, and that, um indicated something to other other people in their tribe who were say like also going through the woods with them, that they had seen something or who they had seen, or that there was a bear or whatever, um, which is pretty ingenious. Yeah. I wonder if they got respect from And by the way, I'm going to stop using the word settlers. Did you

see that email? Did I don't recall us using the word settlers, did we Well, I mean I've said the word settlers a lot of the years, I'm sure, um yeah, But I mean have we said it recently, I don't know. But it was just a very nice email, one of those. It was like, oh, you know, I never really thought about it. It was already settled. They weren't settlers. They were you know, conquerors, invaders, invaders, interlopers. Yeah, So I

just wondered if the invaders from Europe. Uh, if they saw these things, I know they were always like, you know, these rudimentary savages. I wonder if they ever saw the genius and some of these things, hopefully, you know, I mean surely, yeah, I'm sure that there were people who adopted smoke signals after they learned how to do it, like white Europeans who figured it out from from watching them, maybe even from being taught. They're like smoke signals, we

use pigeons far more advanced. Get with the times, all right, So this is still relevant today. The Boy Scouts of America still teaches smoke signaling, and it sounds still to think about. But if you are ever in the woods and you were hurt or injured or lost and alone or you know, can't get help, this is just lonely need a friend. This is still away that you can

send a message. Uh. And wilderness people understand if they see three, like clear wilderness people, if they see three distinct puffs of smoke, then that's a signal that says, hey, somebody needs help, get me out of here. Pretty much. Yeah, that's that's the that's a universal one. You can also do that with your gun if you're lost to the woods, you can shoot three times in the air. It's the

same in car horn, car horn YEP. The one thing you don't want to use like that old joke is, um, you don't want to shoot your bow and arrow three times in the year. It doesn't really do anything. When I'm sitting at a traffic light behind someone on their cell phone and it turns green, I go huh huh huh, and they always go, what do you need? What do you need? All right? Are you lost in the woods?

That's how that is down. Yeah, So, um to to do this for first, you have to start with the fire, obviously, but you have to start with a pretty good fire. You have to let your fire get going to start sending smoke signals because you're going to do your best to smother that fire from time to time repeatedly. Um. So you want to get a really good raging fire going that won't easily go out right, that's step one. Yeah, and part of the being able to see if you

want that good thick, dense white smoke. If you've ever been camping, you know, if you throw greenery on a fire or something that's even a little bit wet it's gonna turn really really white and thick, and that is sort of theft. After you get your fire going really good, that's when you put on um, the more green timber and leaves and stuff like that, or if you're glamping

you have someone do that for you exactly. So that's another reason you want a really good fire going, because you don't want it to be so weak that the grass or the green um sticks or whatever, don't you know, put the fire out. So you're creating this nice, white, dense smoke and you get the thing going pretty well, maybe you've got somebody's attention. They're like, you don't see that kind of smoke every day? What's going on over there? You want to you want to have a blanket with you.

It's actually it's vital that you do have some sort of blanket or some sleeping roll or something like that. Um that you can wet. That's another thing too, because I was thinking, like in the American Southwest, like that was, you know, kind of an investment of your water to wet a whole blanket enough to send a smoke signal. But you want to take a wet blanket and you throw it over your fire and hold it there until there's no smoke coming out. Right, And we don't mean

Alexander who was a total wet blanket. We mean a real wet blanket, right, like the the literal wet blanket, as the hipsters would say. Yeah, So, I mean, I imagine you could do it with it's something dry, as long as it's you're sending like one quick signal. Um, but obviously something dry you run the escope catching it on fire. So if if you have no access to any water, you could probably still get by, but you definitely want a wet something. It's gonna make it a

stressful form of communication even more stressful. So um, you hold it on there long enough to for smoke to cease, uh, and then you pull the blanket off, or I guess you kind of flap it off is probably the better way to do it. And while you have that wet blanket over the fire, smoke was still building up. So when you pull the blanket off, a big puff of smoke comes up, and there's your first signal. And if you if you just stop right there, what you've just

told the world is, Hey, how's it going, I'm here. Well, it could these that our research were specifically Apache UM, and a single plume basically is yeah, sort of an attention getter. Um, maybe something's going on, but like you don't need to send in reinforcements or anything, but maybe just keep an eye on the sky as things play out.

It could also mean something like I've arrived. Like somebody's watching for your signal and you're saying like I made it across the valley or over the mountain or across the desert. Whatever. It's just basically a generic signal, just saying, so this person is still alive. Um. If you are really good, you can do too in a row. And that's saying what chuck. If you're an Apache, well, uh,

if you wren Apache, that meant everything's fine. Um. You may have seen my one puff signal that meant to you know, we're not so sure about things, but now my two puff signal means everything's good. We've established our camp. We're all safe. Um. You just stay where you are unless you hear something else or see something else rather uh.

And this was important because they would, you know, they would travel around that you know, they had some more permanent encampments, but they also went where the food was depending on the season and where you could hunt better and get you know, more resources, right exactly, And yeah, you're right. I'm sorry I confused the boy Scout technique with the Apache technique. There the boy Scouts, one puff is just here, I am, whereas with the Apache it

was like something weird was going on. Yeah exactly. And then, like you said, already, three puffs in any language, a boy Scout or Apache means there's something bad going on. Yeah, like come and help us. We need you know, whether or not we have all been befallen with an illness, or there's an invader, or we have no food. We definitely need some help. And I saw also, I mean almost across the board it was just puffs. Basically was

was the way that um smoke signals are communicated. But I did see reference to one tribe from Texas called the Carrakawa, I believe, and they could get super fancy. They could do spirals and zigzags and stuff like that, which is pretty pretty impressive. I'd be stressed out with just the puff system, let alone having to make a spiral or a z zag. It would be kind of cool to know how to do that, though, and then of course the Snoop Dog tribe used the puff Puff

pass exactly. That meant come on over exactly, the doors open. Well that's it for this episode of short Stuff on Smoke Signals. Hope you enjoyed it. Until next time, So long Stuff You Should Know is a production of iHeart Radios How Stuff Works. For more podcasts for my Heart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.