Alcohol: History's Favorite Mind-Bending Substance

Science Diction

Science Friday and WNYC Studios

Friday, Society & Culture, Science, Origin, Culture, Words, History, Word, Language

4.8 • 610 Ratings

🗓️ 2 March 2021

⏱️ 18 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Vervet monkeys steal it out of people's hands. Chimpanzees in Guinea are known to climb up palm trees and drink it. There’s even a theory that loving it was an important adaptation for our pre-human ancestors, that the smell of fermentation helped them track down very ripe, calorie-rich fruit. Alcohol has been deeply ingrained in our lives from the beginning, possibly since before we were human. And while the drive to drink is older than civilization, many have worked hard to reign it in. In 1920s America, these desires clashed like never before. It’s a story of a battle between chemists, and the unthinkable lengths the U.S. government went to to try to pry away our favorite mind-altering substance. Guest: Deborah Blum is a science writer and journalist. Footnotes & Further Reading: For more on the government poisoning program, check out The Poisoner’s Handbook by Deborah Blum. For more on the “chemist’s war,” read this article by Deborah Blum. Credits: Science Diction is produced by Johanna Mayer and Elah Feder. Elah is our editor and senior producer. Our composer is Daniel Peterschmidt, who also mastered this episode. Special thanks to the Arabic scholar Stephen Guth, and to Kat Eschner. This episode was fact checked by Robin Palmer. Chris Wood contributed sound design. Nadja Oertelt is our chief content officer. This season of Science Diction was sponsored by Audible.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	On Christmas Eve, 1926, a man stumbles into Bellevue Hospital in New York City,
0:07.1	and he tells him he's being chased by Santa Claus with a baseball bat.
0:13.2	Here's Deborah Blum, a science writer, and the author of The Poisoner's Handbook.
0:17.6	He comes screaming into the hospital emergency room, obviously intoxicated, looking for help
0:24.2	from evil Santa Claus, which was this alcohol-induced hallucination. This guy is a mess. He's totally
0:31.6	fleshed, completely convinced that Santa is hot on his tail. Seems straightforward.
0:38.3	He was drunk.
0:44.6	Even though this was nearly seven years into prohibition, people were still very much drinking.
0:49.7	Over the next day, more and more drunk patients show up.
0:54.4	By the end of Christmas, more than 60, and eight of them died.
1:01.1	This was happening across New York, an outbreak of alcohol deaths, 27 dead just over the holidays.
1:05.3	And yes, drinking too much can make you really sick and kill you.
1:08.3	But this rash of cases was different.
1:13.4	In almost every autopsy, they found traces of a telltale chemical,
1:20.3	Puridine. It was evidence that this alcohol had been poisoned, courtesy of the U.S. government.
1:28.9	From Science Friday, this is science diction. I'm Johanna Mayer. Today, we're talking about alcohol.
1:46.1	On January 17, 1920, America went dry.
1:49.0	Well, on paper at least.
1:54.6	No more selling, manufacturing, or distributing alcohol, thanks to the 18th Amendment and the National Prohibition Act.
1:56.7	A few months earlier, President Woodrow Wilson had tried to block it.
2:05.5	Perhaps not surprising, given that it kept a vast wine collection at the White House.
2:12.9	But no luck. Congress overrode him, and the country soon got to business getting rid of its stash.
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Science Friday and WNYC Studios, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Science Friday and WNYC Studios and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.