Written By Will Grant
 

Charles Vance Millar was the greatest troll ever. Born in Aylmer, Ontario in 1854, Charles was a fan of practical jokes. Some might have described him as a cantankerous man, capricious and out to do whatever the hell he wanted to do. 


Extremely intelligent, and top of his class in law school, Charles built a silly amount of wealth by investing in companies and real estate. Then he bought some racehorses as wealthy men do. 


But he was also an ass. With no love, no living relatives and a fortune worth 5 million in today’s money, Millar collapsed dead on the evening of Halloween in 1926.  


So who got all his money?


Soon after his death, articles started appearing in newspapers about the curious nature of Millar’s will. Some interesting clauses were found that ended up shaking the entire city and pissing a bunch of people off. 


Millar’s money was to go to the mother who gave birth to the greatest number of children in the ten years after his death. 


And so the race began. 


Women went wild! The government tried to step in, issuing a bill to escheat the estate and nick all the cash but that couldn’t stop the women. They talked emphatically and persistently until the town seethed with indignation, eventually turning over the government’s rule.


Tune in to hear about some of the families who were contenders for the Millar’s loot. 


Perhaps not so coincidentally, contraception was legalised in Canada in 1969.

 
 

SOURCES:


Image credits

 

  • [00:00:00] Rod: There are many things will just told me in this episode, but the one that stuck in my head is how many babies is enough via one person. He told me a terrifying tale, and I don't know how much more I want to tell you other than it's a very strange kind of thing to call a horse race, and I'm gonna say that the person who had 26 children is having 25 too many, maybe 24.

    [00:00:23] I don't wanna tell you anymore because it might ruin the surprise. So just keep listening.

    [00:00:31] Will: There's really no other way of saying this. Charles Vance Miller was a troll. Someone who does fuck with people's emotions fucks with their mind maybe causes a little bit of disturbance. Disturber of the peace, definitely. And look a Ionizer .

    [00:00:45] Rod: Yes. Was it Charles Vance Putz. Charles Vance Miller.

    [00:00:48] Miller's not a hard name to remember. You think I'd do?

    [00:00:50] Will: You'd think, but I'm just gonna go out on limb here. Yeah. He might be the greatest troll ever. Born in Elmer, Ontario in 1854. And a quick yes. Shut up. A quick note here. Canadians, I'm fucking sorry for my pronunciation of all of your country

    [00:01:10] Rod: because they're the nicest people in the world allegedly. Maybe what happened was,

    [00:01:13] Will: except for this guy,

    [00:01:14] Rod: that's what I mean. They put it all into one member. Like every, each generation a Canadian is born and they get all the troll in shitty personality bits.

    [00:01:21] Will: ' It's possible. It's possible. There's a couple in here might be in there.

    [00:01:24] Anyway, Elmer Ontario, 1854. Charles Miller was the only child of the farmer, Simon and Sarah. He was a smart kid. He went to University of Toronto where he studied law and got an average grade of 98% in all of his subjects in law.

    [00:01:40] Rod: It's very high.

    [00:01:41] Will: 90th percentile. He passed the bar exam in 1884, so he's 30 there and opened up his own law office in Toronto where he practiced corporate and contract law, but he made all his real money turning his lawyer and skills to investing in companies and real estate.

    [00:01:56] Rod: This is gonna go really well. I've got a good feeling. What I [00:02:00] got a great feeling about this guy.

    [00:02:01] Will: Okay, so for in 1905, for example, this is just showing he made money he bought an interest in a silver mine in, in cobalt on Ontario, which soon after hit a long 14 inch wide strip of silver, like just this long chunk of silver.

    [00:02:15] The strip of silver became known as the silver sidewalk. Not the most creative, but, and it made him a wealthy man. Another he got really angry at the ferry that was gonna take him over to Detroit Canada to America. This ferry? Yeah. It was late. Well, angry. Angry with the boat. Driver guy.

    [00:02:28] Ah, okay. Okay. Or lady. He got angry and then invested $2 in the franchise that was talking about building a tunnel. There were some people around saying, Hey, we should build a tunnel to America.

    [00:02:37] Rod: I'll give you two bucks.

    [00:02:38] Will: And he gave 'em two bucks. eventually that two bucks turned into a hundred thousand dollars later. He bought some other companies. He bought like a shipping company. The British Columbia Express Company. Started with ponies, then they had trains. They went ponies to trains. Nice. He became president and part owner of O'Keefe's Brewery in 1913.

    [00:02:54] Yeah, I don't know. Yeah, it's a famous Toronto brewery. He had a bunch of racehorses too including

    [00:02:59] Rod: you know when some dude gets really rich, it's like, and he brought Racehorse and you're like, this story's gonna turn. Oh, know, he's the story's, even if I didn't know would, anyway, this story's gonna turn,

    [00:03:07] Will: but I think clearly set. And he's a guy that he's making money, but he's like, what do I like breweries and I like the races, and I'm gonna, I'm gonna do that.

    [00:03:13] Rod: He's, I like drunk horse rides.

    [00:03:14] Will: There's, there is a huge streak of doing what he wants in Charles Vance Miller.

    [00:03:19] Rod: He could have bought draft horses to pull the beer.

    [00:03:21] Will: Maybe he did in the British Columbia Express Company. Anyway, one of his race horses was a good race horse. It won the King's plate, which is the number one Canadian race. It's like the Melbourne Cup of Canada, anyway, throughout his life, as I said, troll, he loved doing practical jokes.

    [00:03:35] Now I've got only a few examples I like at the start, and then I'll get to some good ones. Yeah. But like one of his examples was he liked to drop money on the pavement. This sounds actually weirdly nice. Maybe he liked to drop money on the pavement. Yeah. And wait for people to. And he just got, and then just go, he got joy outta his face. Okay. It's not the best practical thing.

    [00:03:53] Rod: Look at those idiots. They picked up money, they found. I'd be prepared to be fooled by that every time.

    [00:03:56] Will: Yeah. I've heard, you know, there was I knew friends of mine that used to [00:04:00] glue money to the ground. Yeah. And it's like, all right, that's slightly more asshole, but kind of funny as well.

    [00:04:04] Rod: Depends if you like doing a $50 bill or a,

    [00:04:06] Will: I did try and read into this and I think there was there, there's also those people that put money on a fishing line sort of thing and yeah, I don't know if he was doing that.

    [00:04:13] Rod: I don't think that ever happened except in cartoons.

    [00:04:15] Will: Okay, this next thing is not him doing a practical joke. I just had to put it in here cuz it says a bit about his character. He used to sleep on the veranda outside his house in Toronto in all weather to keep himself hard. Yeah, tough. I think tough. Anyway. I dunno why you hear it your way. It's just one of the bits of stories I thought He's, I think Cantankerous does what he wants, has a bit of fun.

    [00:04:40] After he was jilted by a girlfriend while he was at uni, he never found love and he never married. And so when he walked the three flights of stairs in his office on Halloween, 1926 apparently he's deep in the middle of a legal argument. He had no living relatives but a fortune worth about 5 million in today's money, and he collapsed.

    [00:05:02] It seemed like it was a heart attack or a stroke. And he died before the doctors could come. In the days after there were several small and laudatory obituaries in the newspapers. Yeah, in trying, they're saying good things about him, but a few days later, still more articles started appearing, noting the curious nature of miller's will. I'll read a little bit from the start.

    [00:05:24] Rod: I'm happy now.

    [00:05:25] Will: So this is the start. The wording on this and the following initialized pages is the will of me, Charles Miller. That's just legal Turk. You gotta get that in. Made at Toronto, this seventh, June 20, 1921. This will is necessarily uncommon and capricious because I have no dependence or near relations and no duty rest upon me to leave any property at my death. And what I do leave is proof of my folly in gathering and retaining more money than I require

    [00:05:50] Rod: capricious is an interesting way to lead off . This is gonna be a shitty one. are you ready?

    [00:05:56] Will: So there's a few clauses and I'll just draw your highlights to a few [00:06:00] and then we'll get, so a small start. One of the ones he left a chunk of his money, not heaps, but enough to an old housekeeper who was already dead,

    [00:06:08] Rod: sweet.

    [00:06:09] Will: And she died long before 1921. He's just like,

    [00:06:11] Rod: let's see what you guys do with it. I'll wait. I won't be here. Okay.

    [00:06:14] Will: He left money for prayers to be said for the soul of a Protestant acquaintance of his by the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Tron, .

    [00:06:24] Rod: It's like I'm not a Catholic, but here's money.

    [00:06:26] Will: He Charles Miller quite enjoyed being Catholic and teasing Protestants. I think that was a big part of his feeling here. That's fun. Because in the next one he left a huge chunk of his Catholic brewery. That's O'Keefe's. Well, it's as in like, it was, I believe Irish people ran it politically.

    [00:06:40] All the people that Yeah, probably. And they probably associated it like a lot of the people associated with the Catholic church there. Right. But anyway, he left a huge chunk of his Catholic brewery, O'Keefes to a bunch of prominent Protestant ministers and temperance advocates

    [00:06:52] Rod: I'm really liking this guy, Joe Miller.

    [00:06:55] Will: He left $25,000 worth of Ontario Jockey Club stock, so race club to fervent anti racing advocates.

    [00:07:02] Rod: Perfect.

    [00:07:02] Will: And then, and this one is fun. He had a beach house down in Jamaica and he left that to three lawyers that he knew hated each. And it was very much, when you die, you can't pass it on to anyone. Let's go. It's going to the city. So you have to have this while you're alive and fight over.

    [00:07:17] Rod: You can't sell it.

    [00:07:18] Will: No. Couldn't sell it. It would just go, it reverts back to the city thinking,

    [00:07:21] Rod: excellent. I'm okay. I may regret this, but. This guy's, you know. He's all right.

    [00:07:26] Will: I thought he might inspire you.

    [00:07:27] Rod: I love the shit stiring when he's such a jerky. Your wid. You're like, I won't even see any of this.

    [00:07:31] Will: He must have been, you just imagine him writing this will and chuckling to himself just like, like a movie villain. But the real kicker, it was something that it went relatively unnoticed in the first reporting of the will.

    [00:07:45] I'll read it out and there's a bunch of lawyer terms, but you should be with you. Okay. All the rest and residue of my property where so situate I give where it is. Yeah. I think that's what it devise and bequest onto my executives and trustees named below entrust to convert into money. Yeah. As they deem [00:08:00] advisable.

    [00:08:00] Yeah. And invest all the money. Yeah. Until the expiration of nine years from my death, and then call in and convert it all into money and the expiration of 10 years from my death to give it and its accumulations to the mother who has since my death given birth in Toronto to the greatest number of children as shown by registrations under the Vital Statistics Act.

    [00:08:21] Rod: Get down.

    [00:08:22] Will: If one or more mothers have equal highest number of registrations under the Set Act to divide the monies and accumulations equally between them.

    [00:08:29] Rod: Oh, let the fucking begin. That's insane, .

    [00:08:32] Will: And this begins the Great Stalk Derby.

    [00:08:42] Welcome to the wholesome show.

    [00:08:43] Rod: A podcast that wants to make a baby with the whole of science.

    [00:08:48] Will: Yeah, we do.

    [00:08:49] Rod: We do. We wanna breed with you. Science.

    [00:08:51] Will: A wholesome show is Me Will Grant,

    [00:08:53] Rod: and me Rodika g Lamberts.

    [00:08:55] Will: How do you feel about writing your will now?

    [00:08:57] Rod: I've never been so interested. I mean, unfortunately, of course if I die first it could be a bit, yeah,

    [00:09:04] Will: sure, sure.

    [00:09:05] Rod: But holy fuck, put in some fucking troll clauses is an excellent idea

    [00:09:09] Will: I totally get the idea of this bachelor, lifelong committed bachelor. Yeah. Don't have any near relatives. Yeah. In just saying, you know what, I wanna muck some rake. I am gonna see what happens with this.

    [00:09:19] Rod: And he, but the only bummer is in a way, is he could write it himself so he didn't have other people like reading it and notarizing it.

    [00:09:24] Will: That's true. Surely he has to he has to be witnessed. I don't know, lawyers, I don't know. Look, I put it in the comments.

    [00:09:30] Rod: I nearly have a will so I can almost tell you,

    [00:09:32] Will: you nearly have a will? So close. You've got dogs. You need to say what happens to them.

    [00:09:37] Rod: They've fent to themselves. They sleep outside

    [00:09:38] Will: they would eat your body. Literally my dog is not tough enough to eat my body.

    [00:09:42] Rod: Ah, how hungry is she? Yeah. Maybe our, ours aren't tough, but they like food.

    [00:09:46] Will: Yeah. Okay. Just a quick note on sources. There's a bunch out there on this topic.

    [00:09:51] A lot of them are worth reading but there is one that is head and shoulders above all the others, and it's a shout out to a master's dissertation. This is Elizabeth Marjorie Wilton's masters [00:10:00] thesis bearing the burden, the Great Toronto Stalk Derby 1926 to 1938 . Nothing really happened with Miller's weird contest for a few years.

    [00:10:07] Right. There, there are a few disputes around the will. The first one there was I think the Roman Catholic archbishop who was, had to say the prayers. Either he protested or someone protested and they removed that clause. think he said. I dunno. Maybe I don't take money for prayer.

    [00:10:20] I'll say prayer. Well, for the prayer I'll say prayer, but you know,

    [00:10:22] Rod: so yeah. It's above my morals. As a member of the Catholic church, we don't like to accumulate wealth

    [00:10:26] Will: there were certainly as we'll come back to this, a few family members distant relatives who are like, I'd be thinking I'd be having some of that money.

    [00:10:32] Rod: What do you know? They pop up suddenly.

    [00:10:33] Will: I mean, it's weird. Hard to believe. It's weird. And you know, the term half aunt came up and I had never seen the term half aunt before. There, there is no half aunt 1926 rolled around then 1928, then 1929, but in 1930. Things started to change.

    [00:10:46] Rod: So how many years out are we from?

    [00:10:48] Will: So 1926. Halloween is the Death and Halloween 1936 is the finish line.

    [00:10:54] Rod: So interesting to try and time your run.

    [00:10:57] Will: Time your run. The point about a marathon is you just gotta keep going. You can't go I'm gonna save my run and get 19 babies in the last year.

    [00:11:06] Rod: Dodecatuplets run in my family. I'm gonna bargain on a litter

    [00:11:10] Will: First I've gotta prep my body enough that I can have to Dodecatuplets in last year.

    [00:11:14] Rod: So you really literally, if the moment you hear about it, you're like, we're having a kid, we're having a kid, we're having a kid. Could you adopt them?

    [00:11:20] Will: The mother who has since my given birth in Toronto. So, so you gotta give birth,

    [00:11:24] Rod: look at me, looking for loopholes, failing

    [00:11:26] Will: look. So of course it's a large sum of cash and as you approach a finish line, of course people start paying more attention. But I think something else changed here and that it's the depression, the Great depression. So 1929, stock market crashed.

    [00:11:39] Everyone loses their job or nearly everyone. And so everyone starts getting a lot more interested in money . And so perhaps, and this is what Elizabeth Wilton suggests, maybe this had a bit of a catalyst in turning people more towards this competition.

    [00:11:53] Rod: So it was well publicized or you gonna get to that

    [00:11:56] Will: Not for four years. So the first four years, nothing like it was basically, [00:12:00] no one talked about this and the first. Real article about the Great Stalk Derby. It wasn't quite called that yet. But anyway four years into the competition. So October, 1930, Gordon Sinclair, one of Toronto's Toronto Daily Stars, most popular reporters.

    [00:12:14] Oh, everyone knows that took the innovative step of going to find mothers of large families who might be interested in winning a giant pile of cash. I don't know how Gordon Sinclair got the idea of the story there. There was reporting around the will because it was weird. Yeah. And then I was like, this is a funny will.

    [00:12:27] Yeah. And maybe at some point he thought, Look at large families. So in the quest, he discovered Mrs. Bagnato the mother of 20 children and Mrs. Brown, the mother of 26 children with 13 living,

    [00:12:40] Rod: ah, well there's one fight, okay. 26. So she started when she was three and had quadruples.

    [00:12:48] Will: I don't have all of the ages for all of the mothers here, but there are definitely some people in this story who have bag load of kids at they're basically the equivalent of first years at university. And I'm like, what?

    [00:13:00] Rod: What left in your body when you, give birth to 26 people?

    [00:13:03] Will: Look, this is one of the, this is one of the other components of this story. People became really, Conflicted and horrified about what this was doing to the women involved. And we all, look I didn't actually look up the science on this because we know, like, it's You just, I think you just asked mothers and you go, what's the toll of a pregnant?

    [00:13:23] Rod: And it, you know, you've heard two, have you thought of 24 more ?

    [00:13:27] Will: Indeed. And so, yeah.

    [00:13:29] Rod: Well, the first two have been in delight. Why wouldn't the next 24 be? You'd be ravaged. You'd just be a sack of goo with teets. I mean, you would, anyways, come on. Even the fittest, young lady, 26 babies.

    [00:13:43] Will: I admit that it would be a challenge. So the article focused on a discussion with Mr. And Mrs. Brown, Uhhuh , as they were seen as the challenges to Mrs. Bagnato. Who had just given birth to her 20th child, five of whom were eligible for the Milani. So they were very clear, had to be born within the certain period. She was up to 20, but five [00:14:00] were eligible children within the window.

    [00:14:01] Rod: So you needed the highest number and then there was a subcategory.

    [00:14:04] Will: No, it's just the highest number in that 10 years. So there's 10 years between Halloween and Halloween. And it's got a, you can have a, so you had 40 kids before stitch count.

    [00:14:11] Rod: Cross your legs, sweetheart. This one's gotta count. And it's the 31st.

    [00:14:15] Will: There's a little bit of that. I'm surprised. Oh, just a this article uncovers a bunch of the themes that come through. And just a quick note that, that was a delicious beer.

    [00:14:22] Mrs Brown claimed six of her children had been born since Miller's death. Mrs. Brown. Mrs. This is only four years later.

    [00:14:27] Rod: Someone would say six full stop is a lot.

    [00:14:30] Will: Indeed, Mrs. Brown in asserting her right to the money proclaimed. I can't let any Italian. Get away with that leadership stuff. I dunno if that's the Canadian, so is it spelled Italian? I dunno if that's the Canadian version, but the Australian racist would've done it that

    [00:14:42] I'm a Canadian and so is my husband. Where honest to gosh, died in the wood native born Canadians of the fifth generation and think six babies in five years ought to lead. Mr. Brown added to his wife's comments saying if a few more Canadians would be themselves and produce a decent size family, the country would not be overrun by foreigners. I dunno why he turned Australian There.

    [00:15:00] Rod: Because many have spoken that way in our Fair Nation. That is so classic. It sounds like a bad satire.

    [00:15:06] Will: Yes. Look, you, you may be surprised, but the 1930s were not low on racism really? And so everything in this is just, oh, can we interpret this through a racist prism then? Let's do it.

    [00:15:16] Rod: Yes we can. Hold my beer.

    [00:15:18] Will: Okay. So articles in this sort of light continued for the next few years, but interviewing mothers as if it was a race, but people weren't really paying much attention. It needed something else to turn up the heat. In 1932 the Ontario Government Attorney General William Price stepped in to crack down on the silliness and introduced a bill to a sheet, the estate sheet.

    [00:15:39] I had never heard the term legal term for nicking the cash. So the government is just saying, all right that's ours. We'll give it to the University. Earlier on, Miller had said, give my money to the University of Toronto. But that was so preceded by the will

    [00:15:50] Rod: and after a small handling fee for those concerned,

    [00:15:52] Will: Generally he was saying, I mean there were three arguments that he was raising were being raised in defense of Nick in the cash. Yeah. The first was, and this is [00:16:00] probably legit, the will conveyed the estate on hazardous principle and because it was not along the lines of public policy, so, you know. Oh, okay. Yeah. You can't say you get my money. If you ride a motorbike into like one of those crushing jaws of death. Like you can't do that. Can't do that. So perhaps Fair enough. Yeah. Okay. Other people said that it would be too difficult to determine the winner of the baby marathon.

    [00:16:18] Rod: So you take the people who want to compete and you keep 'em in the same building.

    [00:16:21] Will: I like the idea that it would be too, for difficult to count the babies. Like, like there would be no possible way we,

    [00:16:26] Rod: one, two, fucking lost count again. How could we know? Put 'em out to the other side of the room again? Well, don't you cut 'em in half and count the rings.

    [00:16:34] Will: Toronto Daley Star wrote that the government felt that as the will applied, not merely to married women, but to any mother, it held out the door to fraud and all sorts of collusion agreements was left wide open. And that costly litigation may inevitably ensu.

    [00:16:46] Rod: When did ums parental testing to prove. Was that blood test based back then? Did they do it?

    [00:16:53] Will: Well, this is mothers, we're not testing, we're not testing that the fathers necessarily are,

    [00:16:56] Rod: but if they didn't see the baby coming out of said mother,

    [00:17:00] Will: I think usually someone does. Often.

    [00:17:01] Rod: So you always, you have to bring your obstetrician to the final interview.

    [00:17:06] Will: Yes. When babies are certified, there is a little bit of a trust process where we say, can you prove this came out of you?

    [00:17:13] And finally, there, there were other people saying they, they wanted to stop the money from going to an American. And that was the ah, good call. Yeah. That was the long lost relatives who were just the half hearts.

    [00:17:22] Yeah. When the government introduced the bill, it kicked off a whole bunch of hornets nests. Yep. On one side, they pissed off rich people and they're like, rich people don't like the idea of the government interfering with wills.

    [00:17:33] Rod: Ah, not the paw getting money.

    [00:17:34] Will: Yeah. Did they didn't like that. They didn't like that. But the idea that, oh, suddenly the government could say, no, your money goes to the University of Toronto. No matter what, that, that was not your wishes, whether you left it to your children or to someone's Mr. Segwin, matter of fact, there, there's all of the members of Parliament nearly said the same thing.

    [00:17:49] Conservative members suggested that cheating the estate could institute a dangerous precedent in which we are destroying the principle of wills and similar documents. All men have the right to make wills no matter how funny or curious they that will may [00:18:00] seem

    [00:18:00] Rod: within the parameters of, what is it? Due decimal harm?

    [00:18:03] Will: I think it was very much, this is striking at the striking, at the very basis of having property. So, so people didn't like that. But it also, it's also pissed off a bunch of women in Toronto. Well, while we will come to women's opinions on the call, on the competition later and if we have time, you enormously people changed opinion on this. They're all like, if people are competing then they should have the right to win.

    [00:18:25] Rod: And anyway, it's a strange way to compete anything. Oh my God.

    [00:18:29] Will: So the globe, Report at the time, womanhood, indignant, outspoken womanhood asserted itself in the political arena yesterday, dear, and they were happening speedy up, upset.

    [00:18:38] He had upsetting happenings. There was no dramatic invasion of the legislature halls by femininity, but the women made themselves heard in the homes over the telephones, on the streets, in the stores, and elsewhere did they? Now, they talked emphatically and persistently in the town sees with their sidling comment.

    [00:18:53] It was indubitably, the accumulation of indignation among women. This is the most overwritten article right? Among women, which forced this ulfa chair on the part of the attorney general.

    [00:19:02] Rod: I always wish I didn't speak English after hearing that. Like I, I don't even wanna understand .

    [00:19:06] Will: They were the quickest and most ahu in the, to resent the implications of the bill so, no the womanhood were womanhood, rich. Some overlap. Not often, but n yeah, not, I think the rich men were like, I wanna write my will and if I wanna write dumb stuff in my will, I should be able to do it. Yeah. And women were like, if I want to compete to have the most babies, then I should be able to do that.

    [00:19:25] Rod: You gotta love, I mean, I don't know how to end of it. The idea that you've got like a 12 way tie and everyone sitting there gasping and wheezing, they've just had 10 to 15 children in 10 years. I'm like, yay, I won $400. Oh my God. It was all worth it.

    [00:19:38] Will: So the government dropped the bill pretty quick. Yeah. But amidst, amidst this whole fight over the legislation, a bunch of the newspapers were like, oh there's a bit more interest in this story than we thought. And they started to pick up a lot more of the race dynamic. They started interviewing mothers a lot. They found all the contending families.

    [00:19:55] Rod: Oh, as in horse race, I'm thinking like, and now it's getting racist. Like holy

    [00:19:58] Will: No, it started racist. It [00:20:00] continues racist throughout but horse racing, yes. Right. Yeah. And so it's going around finding all the different contenders and every baby, every death, everything. They're gonna, they're gonna find out what's going on and suddenly everyone in Toronto is like watching the great stalk derby.

    [00:20:12] Rod: Well, you would, I mean, if it happened here, you totally would. Except there'd be a Netflix miniseries, et cetera. You wouldn't have to go.

    [00:20:17] Will: There is a bad Canadian show on this over the next few years. As it's approaching that Halloween 1936 deadline. Yeah. The newspapers turned the whole thing into just circus.

    [00:20:25] Yeah. Each newspaper's desperate to get scoops from contending families. There's a whole bunch of reporters hiding in bushes. There's rep report, there's just, because it's got nothing to do with the story. Yes. There's some family signing exclusive deals. With particular reporters.

    [00:20:38] There's one story where one family signed an exclusive deal with one newspaper and then another newspaper tried to get it, and then the husband beat up the guy from the other newspaper because, and it's just,

    [00:20:48] Rod: that's how you get out of those contracts.

    [00:20:49] Will: Yeah. It got pretty big attention,

    [00:20:51] Rod: the smart way to go, because that way, you know, you'd. Hedging your bets there and you go like, we might not win, but watch us try. . And then you know what you do. You don't really try, but you make it look like you're trying and then you get the exclusive money.

    [00:21:01] Will: Look, this is the interesting thing that throughout and this is what you'd have to do, is like absolutely. There were people that were having a lot of kids beforehand, before they really knew it was a competition. Clearly, you know, some of these women, what did you say before? There's 26 women, of which four of them counted and 26 babies, something like that. There are families having big families.

    [00:21:17] Yeah. But there was, you know, as it becomes this sort of race dynamic, a lot of people start talking more about, I know we just love having children and really stressing that point. And so cuz you don't wanna be caught saying, I'm having this baby to win a competition. And it's like, oh

    [00:21:32] Rod: yeah. Or, you know, own it.

    [00:21:34] Will: Yeah. Maybe. Got reported all over the place. Like there's definitely articles you can find in Australia on this. really? Yeah. All over the world. Okay. So the mothers were the center of this, you know, finding all about delving into private lives. They're also, the mothers are interviewed and told the stories about their child rearing and housekeeping abilities, hopes and aspirations.

    [00:21:51] And you can imagine families were subject to a fair bit of judgment. Really this now, yeah. Now we can talk about the underlying dynamics of the coverage in a lit, but [00:22:00] let's look at some of the families. And you can sort of guess at some of the patterns going on here.

    [00:22:03] Rod: I don't want to make me sound like a bad person.

    [00:22:05] Will: Now these are, of course, weren't all the families, but it were, I think it's most of the families. Because towards the end, I think it was around August, 1930. Maybe even before they started having events for all of the families. . Yeah. Where they're like picnics and so they'd have they'd have whatever it is eight, nine families there.

    [00:22:20] And there's literally hundreds of kids. Like it's shocking numbers of kids . So there's the Bang Yato family, and that's the one that we spoke on before. Mrs. Bang Yato was one of the first identified competitors. So at the time of the 1930 article, that was the first article she already had 20 children, 10 of whom were born in Canada of Italian immigrants. Really grace's Yes, indeed. That Grace's husband immigrated to Canada to marry her by arrangement. Grace was 12 years old at the time.

    [00:22:45] Rod: Her cousin came to marry his 12 year old cousin. Yes. Sweet.

    [00:22:49] Will: The Betos were Roman Catholics. She worked as a court interpreter in Toronto, and the papers most often referred to her as the still Comely mother of 24 children.

    [00:22:57] Rod: It's okay. She's still kind of pretty

    [00:23:00] Will: there was a portrait of the family done in the Toronto Star in 1936. The reporter described the activity level in the home as amazing. With 13 of the 18 children, and I think amazing is a nice positive term.

    [00:23:10] Like I would be amazed at any house that has 13 children. Oh yeah. Oh, Mrs. Bang Yato not only prepared all the meals, but worked full-time as a court interpreter. She drove a car and in her spare time acted as a legal advisor within the Italian community. The Beto family was the only home of all the St stalk derby contenders to possess a phone.

    [00:23:25] Rod: Oh. We're not even 1930, aren't we?

    [00:23:29] Will: By August, 1936. So this is the end of the competition. Yeah. Mrs. Bango had given birth to 23 children and was expecting her 24th. Nine of the children had been born within the magic period. Wow. Next, the Graziano family,

    [00:23:41] Rod: oh, fuck me.

    [00:23:42] Will: Hilda and Gus Graziano had 10 children by 1936, 7 of whom were considered eligible for the competition. Ah, an eighth child had been still born in 1929, so in the period and was unregistered. And a ninth eligible child died shortly after birth.

    [00:23:56] Rod: Well, can we get a judge's ruling here? I don't want to [00:24:00] like, Ooh.

    [00:24:01] Will: Mr. Graziano had immigrated to Canada from Italy, and Mrs. Graziano was a French Canadian extraction. They lived in a slum alley in Toronto. They were Roman Catholics mis in 1936. Mr. Graziano had been unemployed for four years. He'd previously worked as a market. One of their children was named Benito Mussolini.

    [00:24:16] Rod: Coincidence, right? I think so. You ready to look in the poem and going, you're not gonna believe this , there's this other guy. Wow. I'm as shocked as you.

    [00:24:30] Will: The Tim Lick family. They had 17 children, 13 of whom were living in 1936 and 10 of whom were considered eligible for the competition. Wow. He, she was born in Ireland, came to Ontario as an orphan.

    [00:24:40] Rod: If she had, was it 13, 10 eligible? Yeah. But someone who had 40 children and seven eligible would beat her because they had a bigger family first.

    [00:24:50] Will: No. Gotta be, you gotta have the most babies in that window, no matter how many you had before,

    [00:24:53] Rod: Oh, okay. Okay. They count for nothing. They come for nothing.

    [00:24:56] Will: Mr. Tim Lack was born in Sask. They were living in a house on River Street. Poor part of town. Mr. Tim Lick had worked as a mechanic with the city Parks Department for the past 10.

    [00:25:04] Rod: Okay. Yeah. So super wealthy, they can afford heaps of kids, all of them.

    [00:25:07] Will: The Nagle family the Nael were both from Ontario devout Roman Catholics of Irish extraction. They had 12 living children and two others that had died, nine of their children were eligible for the competition. In 1936, Mr. Nagle had not had steady work for three years. Just the other thing is so many of these stories of, I mean, it's the depress. So it doesn't make unemployment better, but it's just horrifying lengths of long-term unemployment and looking around and just going there. There is no work.

    [00:25:32] Rod: So even better, the Roman Catholics. So contraception is completely evil. They got nothing better to do all day.

    [00:25:37] Will: I'll come back to that one. So, Mrs. Nagle had studied diet in the hospital where she worked before she was married and was 31 years old in 1936. So that's with the 12 plus two others. So, They lived in a small house in Leonard Street.

    [00:25:50] Rod: Of course they did, rich people don't have a hundred children.

    [00:25:52] Will: Mrs. Nagle also said if she were to win the money, she would see the other contenders got some money.

    [00:25:57] Rod: Oh, that's what you're supposed to say. Win the crowd.

    [00:25:59] Will: Well, there [00:26:00] is a nice story where as it started out was there was a lot of trash talking.

    [00:26:05] You know, whatever. We deserve this. Yeah. But it claim seems pretty clear that towards the later stages of the competition, most of the families were like, okay, this is rough. The only way we can cope with this weird situation is that we all actually become friends. And I think most of them did. Not all of them, but a lot of them were like whatever, whoever wins. It's not like the real winner is childhood babies. I, but it was very much, let's just, let's. You know, like lot of sports people will get a good comradery with the people they're competing.

    [00:26:33] Rod: Sure. Yeah. Different sports.

    [00:26:35] Will: Mrs. Kenny perhaps described by Wilson as perhaps the most colorful of all the stock derby contestants. She appeared in the newspapers in the autumn of 1934, and after that time was a constant focus for media attention. Cool. Both of the Kenny parents were born in Toronto. She of French Canadian extraction here of Irish descent, staunchly Catholic. Yep. Mrs. Kenny was the mother of 16, children of whom 11 were living by 1936.

    [00:26:56] Rod: Damn.

    [00:26:57] Will: There was a great deal of confusion of how many of her children were actually eligible for the competition. Oh, she was convinced throughout that she'd be the sole winner. She said that she had a divine connection with Charles Miller. Okay. And and that he assured her she would win. This is from Beyond the Grave, of course.

    [00:27:09] She carved a whole bunch of large wooden statues of Charlie Miller and of public dignitaries, and a replica of the hospital where she gave birth. There's a couple of other horrible stories here that Mrs. Kenny is one of them, but there's another house like living in terrible conditions. Yeah. And there's one house that's children suffering rat bites and just overrun with rats. One of Mrs. Kenny's children died. Of rats. Yes.

    [00:27:33] Rod: Look, if they were living on farms and stuff then breeding your workforce for a long time. Made sense. Yeah. Millennia made sense. This is living in slums, in city. Like, does not make sense.

    [00:27:45] Will: The McLeans entered the competition at the last minute, on the last day, October the surprise entrance. Suddenly people are like, whoa. There's another family. They had appeared in the star of the same year, but shielded their identity, calling themselves Mr. And Mrs. A.

    [00:27:55] Both parents were Scottish descent, which was received favorably by the newspapers, was it? Now a star [00:28:00] reporter actually called their home to ask them if they were going to register for the competition. Mrs. A had said that she'd been following the competition, but could not get her husband interested. She had nine children, all of whom were alive and properly registered.

    [00:28:10] Rod: Interested in what sense?

    [00:28:13] Will: Dunno. He seems to be interested, sweetheart. Yeah. The article gave a glowing assessment emphasis was placed on their Scottish thrift and believe belief in the importance of education. Infamous they were both Protestant. The reporter was equally impressed by their home.

    [00:28:24] Their home had polished furniture and lovely, colorful rugs, and all materials were tightened well. In the living room is a ve lured colored Chesterfield. Several comfortable, easy chairs tables with floor lamps near them, a piano and interesting pictures around the walls.

    [00:28:37] Rod: Fancy bastards.

    [00:28:38] Will: The room breathes a pleasant air of moderate prosperity in the thrift. Oh, McLean's expressed that they were anxious to avoid publicity, and they certainly gave no thought to the Miller will when having their children. They only entered it because others with fewer children thought they deserved it. They just wanted to correct the record is basically what they're doing.

    [00:28:53] Rod: Good citizens unmotivated by money. Well, they thrifty. They're not greedy.

    [00:28:56] Will: Yeah. The Smith or another last minute entry. They entered on October 21st, 1936. They had nine, all of whom were living and properly registered in Toronto. Okay. Mrs. Smith claimed that she had not followed the story at all and didn't know the names of any of the other contestants.

    [00:29:10] He was a fireman born in England. He'd fought for canner in World War I. The family was Protestant.

    [00:29:15] Rod: I know we're small, but whenever people talk about Canadian military operations and their participation stuff. I'm like, that's right. They have an army . I just don't think of Canada as having a military. Just mounties.

    [00:29:28] Will: I kind of feel like if you had like a million mounties, that would be, there's this terrible YouTube channel. Really it's, yeah, I know, like, and it does like all computer generated fights between, you know, pick two, you know, you'll get 400 gladiators versus Woody Allen.

    [00:29:43] They would win versus, you know, 7,000 werewolves. Or some sort of version of that. And they put them and it's just like computer generated and they just fight until there's one person left. And it's kind of dumbly compelling.

    [00:29:54] Rod: I wanna watch it now let's push pause.

    [00:29:56] Will: I want mounties versus whatever.

    [00:29:57] Rod: So he fought in a war, even though Canada doesn't [00:30:00] have an army, they only have mounties.

    [00:30:01] Will: And the newspapers again said, it's a pleasure to visit the Smith home. Auburn hair. Mrs. Smith, only 31 years old, despite her record of 10 Offspring nine, born within the Charmed period is a pleasant young woman to talk to with her good looking stocky built husband.

    [00:30:14] They make an affable and courteous pair. They are thrifty, kindly sensible folk. They are successful parents.

    [00:30:19] Rod: Damn thrifty's a feature here, isn't it?

    [00:30:21] Will: Oh yeah they're, well, it's the Depression.

    [00:30:23] Rod: Oh, no. It's just interesting, like nowadays, I don't re, the only way I've ever heard anyone's described, you know, their relationship as cheap fucker. But I've never heard thrifty as alike. And they're thrifty. Thrifty's just not a thing.

    [00:30:35] Will: Yeah. No, not a, yeah. Mrs. Pauline May Clark, she first appeared in the press as Mrs. X. She attempted to shield her identity in this matter because of the less than respectable circumstances surrounding the birth of her children.

    [00:30:45] Ah, she, by 1936, Mrs. Clark, at the age of only 24, was the mother of 10 children. She was discovered by the Telegram in August. She was discovered by the Telegram in uh, in August, 1936 and pleaded with them to keep her identity secret because five of her 10 children had been b born after she had separated from her husband. Ah she said that she would've married the second man, but didn't have enough money to secure a proper divorce.

    [00:31:07] And look it may also be in a time when there isn't a a no fault divorce type thing. Like you gotta demonstrate fucked, paid, and not be someone Exactly. Just get fucked. You know? If two people want a divorce, that's a divorce, they divorce.

    [00:31:20] Rod: Like, I, you didn't just cause we, we don't wanna be together anymore.

    [00:31:23] Will: She was not aware of the competition until the birth of her twins in July, 1936, right near the end. Yep. When the doctor asked her jokingly if she was trying to beat Mrs. Kenny . So how did it end halloween, 1936

    [00:31:37] Rod: badly.

    [00:31:38] Will: 17 mothers. Yeah. And 32 lawyers stepped forward to claim the price

    [00:31:44] Rod: 32 lawyers. What we need is at least two lawyers per mother , just to be safe. Ah. Oh, that's excellent.

    [00:31:52] Will: And the fortune had grown in this time. Uhhuh . I mean, it was meant to be invested, but Yeah. Only for nine years though. So the $2 in tunnel money. Yeah. That turned out to be a hundred grand [00:32:00] in Canadian money at the time. So a lot of money. So basically two and a half million.

    [00:32:03] Rod: So this tunnel exists?

    [00:32:04] Will: Yeah, we it's the only international tunnel that you can drive through. Roughly 5 million. It does. The numbers don't matter that much in originally, in today's money, now it's about 10 million in today's money. See, it's it's a packet of cash that you can look after your lots of kids with

    [00:32:19] and of course, with 32 lawyers, it ends up in court really, and it's Canada's biggest legal case of the 1930s. It dragged on for two years. Between 1936 to 1938, got to the Supreme Court, it went all the way through every level.

    [00:32:33] Rod: And let me guess, at the very end, the lawyer's got 9.73 million of it, and the pocket changes left to be split among the winners.

    [00:32:40] Will: You are so cynical. Yes. So there are three issues to discuss. Yep. First, justice Middleton, he's the presiding judge on this. He wa he said, okay, first. Too many lawyers. You do. You have 30 is my max. No, he went down to six. Six. So he kicks, he kicked 26 lawyers off the case and said, we're gonna do this with six lawyers.

    [00:33:00] Rod: How many people were the lawyers representing in theory? How many parties?

    [00:33:02] Will: Well, 17 mothers Plus also the distant relatives. At least. In the lead up to this when I said the families became sort of friendly. Yeah. A bunch of the families said, Hey, let's just a agree and split the cash.

    [00:33:12] Like let's just go, we are all up the front. Yeah. Yeah. And the lawyers arguing against that arguing that an arrangement of this sort could invalidate the whole will. A source close to the executors of the will, according to the newspapers compared the derby to a horse race saying what would happen if the horse race owners got together before a race and decided to split the purse not quite the same. No, not quite the same at all.

    [00:33:30] Rod: Yeah. You won, but we're all getting the money.

    [00:33:32] Will: Yeah. All right. Anyway, the lawyers said no, we we want some of our cash. Yeah. Okay, so that's issue one. Too many lawyers. Next issue was the validity of the will. This took a few months to put that up top. Yeah. Okay. I . The first one wasn't, I just liked the idea that he kicked off all the laws in no significant Oh

    [00:33:46] Yeah. In fact, Wilton just said there were two issues I just liked kick you off. That is an issue. The distant Miller relatives, so these are the half aren't Yeah. Popped up again saying the will should be declared invalid because it was against the public good. And also we want the money.

    [00:33:59] They [00:34:00] said it was contrary the public good because it promoted immoral behavior. . Anyway, that case actually like that component of the case, Supreme Court of Ontario, Supreme Court of Appeal, and eventually Supreme Court of Canada, where it was declared valid, like.

    [00:34:13] You're done. The will stands. The will is good. Oh, it was not the argument. Okay. Yeah. The argument's no good. The will is valid. So that's, . the second. So now we're down to the end point of the race. We know we get an end of the race. Yeah. They said that even it wa, even though it wasn't in pub, in, in the public good. Upholding a will. It's probably more important than that. So, okay. Final question. Who won? Who had the most babies? Which babies were. As Wilton writes, in November, 1936, when the claimant stepped forward, it was clear the division of money wouldn't be easy. There were three conditions, three were,

    [00:34:41] Rod: so that, that's a keen legal mind though, right there, that's not gonna be easy. First three conditions.

    [00:34:45] Will: First the children to be eligible, had to be registered under the Vital Statistics Act, and not all of them were. Therefore had to be decided if late registration would be allowed. Okay. A further question, fuck me, was where the stillborn children were to be included in the count.

    [00:34:57] Rod: Look, it's gross, but I'm not surprised. Yeah, I know. Because if the original provision was, gave birth to,

    [00:35:02] Will: and then there was the issue of legitimacy, as Wilton says, judge Middleton stuck closely to rigid rules of middle class. And traditional legal precedent rendering his decisions. So I didn't mesh it, mention Mrs. Meldrum before, but she had a whole, a lot of rats in her house. Oh yeah. Yeah. Had given birth to nine children in the allowed time. But two had born, been born in York County although the parents Oh, lived in Toronto. Yeah. Middleton kicked them out. No. Oh good. Two of two of your babies were born in a different.

    [00:35:29] Rod: So when he's sitting in a position where he is gotta go, oh, fuck, I've gotta make, I've gotta make a call. Somehow

    [00:35:33] Will: in, in slight defense to him, what's defensible? He's gotta, he's gotta start kicking out something. I don't know.

    [00:35:38] Rod: Or he could've just said, yeah, you can all have it. Then there would've been, the brawls would not end until I found a judge who actually made a call.

    [00:35:43] Will: Sure. Oh my God. I dunno if I would like to preside on this because it's pretty horrendous.

    [00:35:47] Rod: I don't wanna preside on anything. I think it would be horrifying.

    [00:35:49] Will: I'm not a presiding kind of guy. No. Unless he can podcast about it. Like, no he didn't. Another mother, Mrs. Carter. Had given birth to nine children, but one child had been born just prior to the opening date of the competition, so she too was ruled out.[00:36:00]

    [00:36:00] Okay. Well, well, fair enough. That's fair. That's simple rules in the window. Yep. Several other mothers who had been given, who had given birth to eight, six to eight children, hopefully put forth a claim for the money, but were met with complete dismissal. Mrs. Thomas Mays, a thin, clear spoken woman who had a backseat, said, I'm the mother of 12 children, and six of them were born on the, in the last 10 years.

    [00:36:16] I'm also thin and clear spoken well. I'm afraid six isn't enough to qualify. The justice commented. Well, I just thought I'd try, said, Mrs. Mays, you never can tell about these things, which it's fair. I mean, if you haven't been following the reporting and you're like, I feel like I've got a lot, I'd like to, I'd like to know.

    [00:36:34] Rod: I just had a baby. Does that work? No.

    [00:36:36] Will: So let's go with some of the others we introduced before. Yeah. Pauline May Clarke, she had 11 children. One had been born outside city limits, so that one didn't count. And only half of them, so she was down to 10 down two. Well, yeah, , only half of them had been born legitimate children with her legitimate husband. So now she's down to five. Sorry,

    [00:36:54] Rod: was that specified in the will loan though, they must. within the bound of propriety?

    [00:36:58] Will: No, that wasn't . That was not specified in the will. It did say born in Toronto in that period and registered with the Vital Statistics Act. Okay. But it didn't say anything about legitimate or not.

    [00:37:08] Rod: Okay. So irrelevant, but not, I'm not the judge.

    [00:37:11] Will: Sorry, Pauline. The Bagnatos. Well, they had nine children in the magic period. And another 14 before that. But sadly, two of their children weren't registered. So it feels more like seven rather than nine so no money for.

    [00:37:24] Rod: Not registered. The bureaucrats always get their win in the end, don't they? Oh my God. We don't have a file fax card in the bottom of a drawer.

    [00:37:32] Will: You know that baby came out of her, she suffered through all of that, and they're like, n not in the file.

    [00:37:37] Rod: Do you agree that happened? Yes, we do. Can we count it? No,

    [00:37:40] Will: I would be a little bit furious. Can we retrospectively fill in the card? No. Why not? Cuz that's not the rules.

    [00:37:45] And I think in some, Possibly most furious for Pauline May Clark. I guess she's got 11 children in the period. One born outside the city limits and I'm like, okay but she's got 10.

    [00:37:54] Yeah. 10. Come back to that number in a bit. Anyway, the Bagnatos had nine , two didn't count cuz. The Graciano [00:38:00] in 1936, they had nine children in the magic period, but two had died shortly before or after birth. So maybe more like seven if you're an asshole.

    [00:38:07] Rod: Died after. Okay, so was how long after one was a stillbirth?

    [00:38:12] Will: And I don't have the numbers. I think it was in the hours.

    [00:38:15] Rod: But again, but I'm thinking about that question. Okay. No. Stillborn doesn't count. What if they died an hour after? No. What if they died a year after?

    [00:38:20] Will: It's fucked. They didn't get any money messed up. So the Tim Lax, they had 10 pill children in the eligible period. they shared the prize money, the nags nine children in the eligible period. They shared the prize. McClains, nine children in the eligible period. All nice, neat and registered. They shared the prize money. The Smiths nice nine nice, neat children. They get the prize. Do you know there's a pattern here that three Protestant families and one Catholic family shared in the prize money in the end, four, four families.

    [00:38:48] The nags, the Tim lx, the McClains, and the Smiths shared in the money.

    [00:38:51] Rod: But one had 10.

    [00:38:52] Will: I know I, that's the bit that baffles me. So it smells me like nine if you're Protestant, 10, if you're Catholic and you get the prize,

    [00:39:02] Rod: saying it out loud, they've been the judge going, oh yeah, 10, but you've gotta share it with these others. Oh, they got 10 too. No, nine. What? How do you even do it with a straight face? You're like, yeah, no, that's, you gotta share why? Let's, that's the rules. It's obvious what are talking about.

    [00:39:18] Will: So each of those families received a hundred thousand dollars in that money each. So it's roughly two and a half million or something in Australian dollars now for their nine or nine plus children.

    [00:39:26] Rod: So I keep thinking like, that sounds like a great amount of money. I'd love to have that, but I don't want the nine kids with it. Kids are beautiful. I just don't want nine of them.

    [00:39:33] Will: No. Okay. Mrs. Pauline Clark and the Kennys did contest the findings and they were awarded an out of set. And remember, Pauline Clark was the one that had 11 children in the time. But you know, half were illegitimate.

    [00:39:44] And they were awarded out of court settlement for $12,500 each. Woo. The government received 137 grand in succession duties, Uhhuh, , and the lawyers worked away, walked away with 25,000. Total. No, total. Total. So yeah, they did all, it could [00:40:00] have been worse. Yeah, it could. It could have been worse,

    [00:40:01] Rod: as in they didn't deserve more.

    [00:40:04] Will: I said at the beginning of this, that Charles Vance Miller was a troll. It's pretty obvious now that the whole great stalk derby is pretty epic, horrible, freaky, I don't know. Move, but here's the thing.

    [00:40:16] Rod: Very successful though. Oh, for a troll.

    [00:40:18] Will: Well, wow. Here's the thing. On the 2nd of March, 1873, the US Congress passed what were called the Comstock Law. An anti obscenity law prohibited the dissemination of obscene material. Yep. And it specifically listed information about contraceptives, you know, uhhuh, , Yep. Stuff to stop you getting pregnant as obscene material. So feminists were arrested for sending material about birth control through the mail.

    [00:40:40] Yep. In Canada, people like John Charlton followed the American example. Here's a quote from of his, from Parliament in like, 1892, something like that. Vile literature is secretly and widely circulated in Canada, literature of a character calculators to undermine the morals of the people and entail the most disastrous consequences on society.

    [00:40:58] Improper and obscene or semi obscene literature is imported into this country and openly sold. And so in Canada's first criminal code in 1892, It also criminalized both the distribution and sale of contraceptive products and the dissemination of information about. You can't even talk about advertise.

    [00:41:16] This is not the more controversial end of reproductive health. This is contraceptives. This is condoms. This is diaphragms. It's not the pill yet. They're obviously not.

    [00:41:24] Rod: No, but this is saying, did you know you don't have to get pregnant? Here's some ways you might not get pregnant if you have the intercourse. Obscene.

    [00:41:30] Will: If the accused could not prove they were acting for the public good, and they typically couldn't, yeah, they could be sent to prison for two years. Sweet. Why wouldn't you? In 1926 and 1936, it remained illegal to disseminate information about birth control. So we don't have direct evidence that Miller was doing it for that purposes.

    [00:41:46] Well known that he thought the prohibition of not just birth control, but even the discussion of it was just, And the theory is that Miller wanted to bring about a spectacular discussion of what can happen when society denies the right to birth control. In fact, one of the winning [00:42:00] ladies Lucy, Tim, like, did take a moment afterwards to tell the press, I think birth control is a wonderful thing.

    [00:42:04] I'm sorry. In one way that birth control information wasn't available years ago. I know mothers would've welcomed such knowledge, a variety of campaigners and doctors including ar Kauffman and the absolutely heroic Elizabeth Beshore. Dr. Elizabeth bag. I just gonna she opened up a hidden clinic doing a lot of services for women. Yeah. I think in Toronto. Yeah. And providing contraceptions and stuff like that. And then worked as a doctor until she was 95.

    [00:42:28] Rod: Look, that's great, but can we get back to a doctor called Cough Man?

    [00:42:34] Will: Ah, it took until 1969 that contraception was legalized in.

    [00:42:40] Rod: That's fair to say our country ain't perfect. No. I, and actually, no, I'm not gonna say anymore. Cause I don't know where we fell on that either.

    [00:42:45] Will: I looked it up and I don't think we had these sorts of laws. I, it just blows my mind that I get abortion is a much more complicated ethical issue, and I bet that there's a much more active thing going on. But the idea of contraception being illegal, it just,

    [00:42:58] Rod: I'm not talking about it. I know. Talking about it. Oh my God. Also though, I can't help, but I mean, I. Old Miller was actually doing that but it also sounds like a convenient way to say it's actually, he's not a bad guy. No. He's all about this instead,

    [00:43:13] Will: think he's a troll, an asshole, but I do think there was a part of him that was like, you know, we should probably like have spectacle to talk about these kinds of things a little bit. Yeah. No, I don't I'm not painting him as a goodie here. I just

    [00:43:25] Rod: think, well, you can be a troll for good as well. So it could be an accident or not as a byproduct. You could still have, you know, dual purpose, dual use arguments.

    [00:43:35] Will: Go and have whatever number of baby you want, whatever number of baby. Have as many a baby as that. Do what you like, but you know, don't be tricked into it by a weird competition.

    [00:43:45] Rod: No, make it a really good competition. It's gotta be straightforward.

Will Grant
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