An Exploration Hoax. I'm Jason Horton. I'm Rebecca Lieb. And this is Ghost Town.

Jonathan Swift's Am modest proposal is arguably one of the most famous social and political satires

in the English language. And one of the most famous lines within it is when Swift claims,

quote, a native of the land of Formosa, Formosa, now present-day Taiwan,

idiotically suggests the solution for poverty is feeding Irish babies to the upper classes.

Remember that from school, maybe? Well, 10 years after Swift penned a modest proposal,

another celebrated author, Dr. Samuel Johnson, would befriend that same promotion mentioned in

a modest proposal, a blonde haired, blue-eyed man with a vague French accent and bizarre rituals.

A man who captured English audiences, claiming to be the first Asian man to visit Europe.

His name was George Salmanezer, and in the early 1700s, he was a superstar. And a gigantic con man.

In late 1702, Alexander Innis, an Anglican chaplain of a Scottish army unit stationed in the Netherlands,

met a man he called a heathen, a handsome, blonde hair, blue-eyed individual who spoke at a

strange language and claimed to be from Formosa, again modern-day Taiwan. Innis promptly converted

the man to Christianity, christening him George Salmanezer, after the Assyrian King Salmanezer,

the fifth, a nice, meaty, old testament reference. In 1703, Innis, so fascinated by Salmanezer's

strange customs, which included a completely indecisurable calendar, eating raw meat,

spiced with cardamom, sleeping while sitting upright in a chair, and hours-long moon and

sun rituals, left for London, taking his intriguing new convert with him. Innis plan to show Salmanezer

off to his fellow Anglican clergyman, maybe gain some clout in the most powerful church in Europe,

or, hey, maybe both. When Innis and Salmanezer touched down in London,

news of the exotic foreigner with bizarre habits spread quickly, and Salmanezer was pretty

instantly famous. People loved him not only because he seemed palatably and inoffensively,

...