Music Welcome to Snewscast, the podcast designed to help you fall asleep. Find us at snoozecast.com and if you enjoy our show, please share us with a friend. This episode is brought to you by Unebated Seal. Tonight we'll read the opening to the humorous short story, an experiment in gyro hats written by Ellis Parker Butler and published in 1910. Butler was a prolific American writer, although his writing was mostly a part-time endeavor for him as he was also a banker. Butler was also known as an always present force in the New York City, literary scene. A gyroscope is a device used for measuring or maintaining orientation.

It is a spinning disc in which the axis of rotation is free to assume any orientation by itself. While in this story, a gyroscope is used in a hat. Real life applications include the Hubble Telescope, submarines, and smartphones.

Let's get cozy. Close your eyes.

Relax your body into the softness of your bed. Now take a few deep breaths. the idea of a gyro hat did not come to me all at once, as some great ideas come to inventors. And in fact, I may say that but for a most unpleasant circumstance, I might never have thought of gyro hats at all. Although I had for many years been considering the possibility of utilizing the waste space in the top of silk hats in some way or other. As a practical hat dealer and lover of my kind, it had always seemed to me a great economical waste to have a large, vacant space inside the upper portion of top hats or high hats or stove pipe hats as they are variously called. When a shoe is on, it is full of foot.

And when a shoe is on, it is full of foot.

And when a glove is on, it is full of hand.

But a top hat is not, and never can be full of head

until such a day as heads assume a cylindrical shape,

perfectly flat on top. And no sensible man ever expects that day to come? I had, therefore, spent much of my leisure in devising methods by which the vacant space above the head in high hats might be turned to advantage, And my patterns ranged all the way from a small filing cabinet that just occupied the wasted space to an extensible hat rack on the accordion plan that could be pushed compactly into the top of the top hat when the hat was worn, but could be extended into a hat and coat rack when the hat was not in use. This device should have been very popular, but I may say that the public received the idea coldly.

My attention had been for some time drawn away from this philanthropic work by certain symptoms of uneasiness I noticed in my daughter Anne, and my wife and I decided after careful consideration that Anne must be in love and that her love must be unhappy. Otherwise we could not account for the strange excitability of our usually imperturbable daughter. a practical hat dealer, my time has been almost exclusively devoted to hats, and as a good wife, my companion's attention has been almost exclusively devoted to her husband. While Anne was usually so calm and self-contained that she did not take my attention for my hat business at all.

But when such a daughter suddenly developed signs of weeping and size and general nervousness, any father, no matter how devoted to the hat trade, must pay attention. One of the primary necessities of a dealer in good hats is calm. An ordinary hat dealer may not need calm. He may buy his hats as another dealer buys flour in the bulk and then trust to advertisements to sell them. But I am not that kind of hat dealerdealer. Hat-dealing is an art with me, and great art requires calm and peace in order that it may reach its highest development. When I buy hats, I do not think of dozens and dollars. No indeed, I think of noses and ears. To be able to buy of a manufacturer a hat that will make the pug nose and big ears of a man I have never seen seem normal and beautiful when that man enters my store and buys a hat requires calm. And no hatter can have calm in his soul while his daughter is lovesick and unhappy. I demand happiness about and around me, and I must have it. So I told my wife, and I told her so most emphatically, and I informed her that Anne must become happy at once. Perhaps you can imagine the shock I received when my wife, after making the necessary inquiries of Anne, informed me that Anne was in love, and in love with Walsingham Gribs. It was not because Walsingham Gribs had never bought a hat of me that I was shocked. Bad hats are a common failing of mankind, and a man will try a hundred hatters before he at last comes to me. The trouble was deeper than this. The thing that staggered me was that Walsingham was a staggerer. This is a joke, but I hold that a hadder has as good a right to make a joke as the next man. That my daughter had fallen in love with wholcing him grubs without having met him was altogether to her credit. She first saw him when she was crossing the ocean. For she travels where she pleases, my hat business affording her such pleasures. And that he reeled and staggered about the boat did not impress her, for it was a stormy trip, and everyone aboard reeled and staggered even the captain of the boat. But when she returned to New York and saw Walsingham Gribs on the firm pavement of Fifth Avenue, she had a harsh, cruel disillusionment. Walsing him grips reeled and staggered on terra firma. I am glad to say that my daughter saw it once the impossibility of the daughter of a high class hadter mating with a permanenteggerer. As she realized this, she became sad and nervous, thus creating an atmosphere in my home that was quite opposed to the best high-class hadding, irritating my faculties, and threatening to reduce me to the state of a mere commercial hatter. Further investigation only made the matter seem worse, for quiet inquiries brought out the information that Walsingham Griggs had been staggering since the year his father died. He had been constantly in a reeling staggering state since his 20th birthday. For such a man reform is indeed impossible. And what made the case more sad was that all proof seemed to point to the fact that Walsingham Gribbs was not a bounder, nor a rounder. Two classes of men who occasionally acquire a stagger and a real in company with hearty boon companions. In short, no one had ever seen Walsingham Gribs take a drink in public, and I was forced to conclude that he was of that horrid type that drinks alone. Alone but with unabated zeal, as that great poet, Sir Walter Scott has remarked in one of his charming poems. If all these investigations of mine were conducted without the knowledge of Walsingham Grips, you must admit I did only what was right in keeping them secret from him. For since he had never met my daughter, he might have considered the efforts of a perfect stranger to peer into his life as being uncalled for. My wife did what she could to comfort Anne, but Anne sadly replied that she could never marry a man that staggered in real day in and day out. Thus day by day she became more sad, and I became so upset that I actually sold a narrow brimmed derby hat to a man with wide, outstanding ears. Of course, this could not go on. No high-grade hat business could support it, and I was standing in my shop door looking gloomily out when I chanced to see Walsingham Grib's stagger-by. I had seen him many times, but now, for the first time I noticed what I should have noticed before, that he invariably wore a high hat or topper as our customers like to call them. I observed that the shape was awful and that the hat badly needed the iron, and then my mind recurred to the old problem of the vacant space in the top of top hats, but I found I could not concentrate. Whenever I tried to think of top hats, I thought of waltzing hem grips in one of them, staggering in reeling up the straight. And gradually the thought came, that it would be an excellent idea, should I be able so to use the space in the top of Walsingham's hat, that he would no longer stagger and reel, and then the thought of the gyroscope hat came to me. I admit that at first I put the idea aside as futile, but it came back again and again, and at length it seemed to force me into enthusiasm. I dropped everything and went to work on the gyro hat. The gyroscope is, as everyone knows, a top. And I might have called the hat I invented a top hat, except that any tall cylindrical silk or beaver hat is called a top hat, so I was forced to adopt the name of gyro hat. A gyroscope is not an ordinary top. It is like a heavy flywheel revolving on an axis, and if it's spun, the speed of the revolutions maintains the axis in the perpendicular. A huge gyroscope is used to steady the channel steamers, which would otherwise stagger and reel. A gyroscope has just been adopted to the monorail cars, and so long as the gyroscope gyrates, the monorail car cannot stagger or reel. If a proper gyroscope was placed on the end of a knitting needle and gyrated at full speed, that knitting needle could be stood on end and it would not fall over. Therefore, if a gyroscope was placed in the top of a top hat and the top hat firmly fastened to the head of a man, and the gyroscope set going that man would remain perpendicular in spite of anything. He could not stagger, he could not reel, he could walk a line as straight as a crack. When I had completed this gyro hat I showed it to my wife, and briefly explained what it was and what I meant to do with it. The small but wonderfully powerful motor and the gyroscope itself were all concealed inside the hat, and I explained to my wife that wallcing him grips need but fastened the hat firmly on his head, and he would never stagger again. At first my wife seemed doubtful, but as I went on she became enthusiastic. The only thing she disliked was the method of fastening the hat to the head. For, as it was quite necessary that the hat be very firmly fixed to the head, I had sewed ear tabs to the hat, and these I tied firmly under my chin. my wife said she feared it would require some time to persuade the public to take to silk hats with ear tabs, and that the sight of a man in a silk hat with ear tabs would be a sign that he was a staggerer. She wanted another method of holding the hat on the head. Facumed suction, I said, for I am quick to catch an idea. A man has to be in the hat business. But I added, where would you get the vacuum? A man cannot be expected to carry a can of vacuum, or whatever he would need to carry vacuum in around with him, especially the kind of man that would need the gyro hat. My dear, said my wife, after a minute of thought, during which we both studied the gyro hat. I have it. Let the hat make its own vacuum. If the hat is lined with air-tight aluminum and has a rubber sweat band and an expulsion valve, the gyroscope motor could pump the air out itself. It could create its own vacuum. Of course it could. I exclaimed. I could rig it up so that putting the hat on the head would start the gyroscope. And the gyroscope would pump a vacuum. Whole any stagger or would need to do would be to put on his hat. And the hat would do the rest. It would stay on his head, and it would keep him evenly on his keel. Of course I would not use a nautical term like keel in my hat shop, but at home I allow myself some liberties of that sort. I set to work at once to perfect the gyro hat on the plan suggested by my wife and in a few days I was able to say it was a success. By this I mean it was a success in so far as the eye could judge by looking at the hat and all that was needed was a practical trial. As the hat had been invented for a wall-singham grubs more than for any other man, I proposed to my wife that wall-singham, we had spoken of him so often that we now mentioned him as wall-singham, should be man to try it out. But my wife is better posted in social matters than I, and she said it would not do at all to attempt such a thing. In the first place, none of us knew Walsingham, and in all the other places, it would be insulting to suggest such a thing to him and might ruin Anne's chances. I then assured my wife that I did not mean to allow any ordinary intoxicated man to experiment with the only gyro hat I possessed and possibly wreck and ruin it. We had too much at stake for that. So, after considerable discussion, my wife and I decided upon what was, after all, the only rational course. I should try out the gyro hat myself.

I admit here that I am not much of a drinker, although not so by principle, I am by action a tea toteller. I consider that the highest good of a hat shop demands it. As a matter of fact, I had never up to this time tasted intoxicating liquor, but it was evident to my wife and me that the time had arrived when the hat business demanded this sacrifice on my part. Evidently, if a gyro hat is meant to keep a staggerer and realer steady on his keel, the only test of the gyro hat must be on the head of a man who, without the hat, could not help staggering and reeling, a thoroughly intoxicated man. We did not, of course, admit Anne into our little conspiracy, and we chose a restaurant where we were sure intoxicants would be sold. We proceeded to the restaurant about the dinner hour, and after studying the waiters carefully, I selected one that seemed likely to know something about intoxicants, and we seated ourselves at his table. I placed the gyro hat carefully across my knees, first setting the starter, and back end the waiter to us. I good fellow, I said, when he had approached with his pencil and order card in hand, I desired to become intoxicated this evening, and I presume you know something about intoxicating liquors. Yes sir, said the waiter.

Tell him Henry. You know something about intoxicating liquors. Yes, sir," said the waiter. "'Tell him, Henry,' said my wife, that we also wish something to eat, but that our principal object in coming here is to secure intoxicants. We wish him to be particular about them." You have heard what the lady said. I told the waiter, and you will be guided accordingly. Yes, sir. Said the waiter politely. Does the lady desire to become intoxicated also? No, heavens, no. Exclaimed my wife. Certainly not. Said the waiter. Now, I said to the waiter, you delus have different kinds of intoxicating liquors here, some strong and some not so strong, and I do not desire to drink a great quantity to obtain the result I desire. What would you recommend to give the required reeling and staggering condition as quickly as possible? Well, sir, he said, if you will let me advise, I will advise a certain brandy we have. Of that brandy, sir, a little goes a long way. I have seen it work, sir, and I can assure you that a small quantity of that will make you stagger and reel to your heart's content. Very well, I said. You may bring me some. I suppose a court would be enough. I beg your pardon, sir," he said, but have you ever tried the brandy of which I speak? I have not," I said. Then, sir, said the waiter apologetically. Unless you are a very heavy drinker, I would not advise a quart of that brandy. A quart of that brandy, sir, would, if I may so speak, lay you out flat. You would not real and stagger, sir. You would be paralyzed stiff, sir." I thanked the waiter warmly. "'You observe,' I said, "'that I am not used to this sort of thing, and I appreciate the interest you are taking. I am inclined to leave the matter entirely in your hands. I may not know when I have had exactly the right quantity, but

you, with your larger experience, will know, sir." Yes, sir, and I think the lady will know, sir," said the waiter. I found the brandy, most unpleasant to the taste, but certain symptoms assured me that the waiter had not belied its effectiveness.

Long before the waiter was satisfied that I would stagger and reel, my long-lost vocal prowess returned, and I caroled galey some songs that had been favorites in my youth. Many of these were affectionate songs, and when I sang them I had a great longing to hold my wife's hand, and did so. But as she would not let me kiss her, I felt the need of kissing the waiter. Here again, I was repulsed, but it did not make me angry. I merely slid down into my chair and waved my hand at him coquettishly. If you please, sir, said the waiter, when I had finished another burst of song, I think you are pretty ripe now. If you would just get up and walk a few steps I can tell more definitely. My wife smiled at me reassuringly and nodded to me that what the waiter proposed had her full sanction. even so, I was filled with a fear that we were about to be parted forever, and for a few minutes I clung to her neck, weeping bitter tears. I then tore myself away, and I did indeed stagger and reel. I believe I knocked over two small tables, and ended by seating myself in the lap of a young man who was dining alone. He accepted my apology before I had spoken more than 15 minutes of it, and then he aided the waiter in steering me back to my table. Whatever may have been my past opinion of wallcing him grips, for it was he, I loved him most dearly at that moment, and in my incoherent manner I tried to tell him so. I think he understood. At any rate, he spoke to my wife like a true gentleman. Madam, he said, I can sincerely sympathize with your husband, and if you will allow me, I will gladly help you assist him to a cab. I beg you not to be frightened by his condition. I myself am subject to the same trouble, and although he may seem drunk, seem drunk, exclaimed my wife. Seem drunk. I beg you to know that My husband is as drunk as a man can become without being senseless.

I... my wife. Seemed drunk. I beg you to know that my husband is as drunk as a man can become without being senseless. Either that, or we have been defrauded by this waiter." While Singham Gribs looked at my wife and then smiled. Very well. He said, if what you wanted was to have him drunk, I'll admit that he is about the drunkest man I have ever seen. I only spoke as I did in order that I might spare your feelings, for most wives object to seeing their husband's stagger and reel. I myself stagger and reel continually, and I have never tasted intoxicating liquor in my life, but I can share the feelings of one who staggers and reels, or who has a relative that staggers and rails. At this my wife said, Are you not, whalcing him grips? If you are, I am delighted to have met you, even in this unconventional manner, for what brought us here will interest you." She then told him of the gyro hat I had invented, and explained just why I had come to this place and had swallowed the strong brandy. I took no part in this conversation, but Walsingham gladly agreed to accompany us, and he put my gyro hat on my head. The result was indeed marvelous. Instantly, the vacuum pump began to work and the gyroscope to revolve. My head, which had been lying on one side, straightened up. The rubber-sweat band gripped my head tightly with a slight pulling sensation. Without assistance, I arose from my chair and stood erect. My brain was still confused, but I walked as straight as a string direct to the door of the restaurant, and stood holding it open while my wife and

Walsingham passed out. The gyroscope was revolving at the rate of 3,000 revolutions a minute, and the slight humming was hardly noticeable. I did not stagger and I did not reel.

When I reached Grammercy Park, I was full of glee. I had been walking on the edge of the curb, but I now desired to climb a top of the iron fence that surrounds the park and walk on the points of the pickets.

My wife and Walsingham tried to dissuade me, but I climbed to the top of the fence. I not only walked on the points of the pickets easily, but I was able to place the end of one toe on the point of one picket, and thus balanced wave the other leg in the air. My wife and Walsingham Gribs coaxed me to come down to the level of the walk, but as I saw no reason to do so, I flatly refused, and at last, Walsingham reached up and took me by the hand and pulled me. Ordinarily, a man that had imbibed a quantity of brandy would have fallen to the street if pulled by one hand while standing on the top of a row of pickets, but I did not. When wallsing ham pulled my hand, I inclined gently toward him until I was at right angles to the picket fence with my feet still on top of the pickets. And when he released my hand, I slowly swung upright again, without any effort, whatever on my part. I got down off that fence when I was ready, and not before. There could be no doubt, whatever, that I was far more intoxicated than wholesome hampps. And all the way home I gave vent to tremendous bursts of laughter, over the idea that while wall-sing ham-thought he was seeing me safely home. I walked straight and true as a general, and he staggered and railed except when he clung closely to my arm. you