October 3, 2016 • 37 mins
Fishing plays vital role in the culture and economy of both the United Kingdom and Iceland. A dispute between the countries over fishing territory started off with cordial tone, and then escalated into a serious conflict.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
This episode is brought to you by square Space. Start
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square Space. Build it beautiful. I am Scott and I'm
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(00:21):
trains and automobils. That's right, and you can find all
of our episodes on Google Play, Spotify, iTunes, and really
anywhere else you get your podcast. Welcome to Stuff you
missed in History Class from how Stuff Works dot com. Hello,
(00:43):
and welcome to the podcast. I'm Tracy B. Wilson and
I'm Holly Frye. When I was in Iceland back in
the spring, I learned a very tiny bit about the
Cod Wars. Uh. Long time listeners to the show will
probably notice some similarities between the thing that going to
talk about today and the Chesapeake Bay Oyster Wars, which
(01:03):
we talked about back in But while the Chesapeake Bay
Conflict was mostly confined to the states of Virginia and Maryland,
the Cod Wars were an international dispute that wound up
having a lot more long lasting ramifications in both the
United Kingdom and in Iceland. So after I got home
from the strip where I learned that the cod Wars
(01:24):
had happened, I put them on the potential episode list,
and then all of a sudden, over the last week
or so, multiple other people, sort of apropos of nothing,
said hey, would you talk about the cod wars um
and that included most recently Gemma and Steve. So I thought, Okay,
I guess I'll put cod Wars at the top of
the list. It had been kind of languishing there, and
(01:46):
now we're gonna do it. I do want to be
clear that this is definitely not the only fishing dispute
that has ever happened in these particular waters, but it's
definitely one of the most famous. Uh And in some
ways it's the weirdest and the most comical, even though
it was not actually funny to the people it was
happening to like it sounds funny, but a lot of
(02:10):
people's livelihoods were deeply at stake in the middle of
this thing that sounds sort of comedic. So to give
you the setup, Iceland and the United Kingdom are two
relatively small island nations. The UK is a little more
than ninety four thousand square miles and Iceland is a
little less than forty thousand square miles. That's about two
(02:32):
hundred and forty three thousand square kilometers and one hundred
three thousand square kilometers respectively. The UK, however, has much
more habitable land than Iceland does. The middle of Iceland
is mountainous, and it's covered in glaciers and also in
many places volcanic, so nearly all of its population lives
relatively close to the coast. It is completely unsurprising that
(02:57):
two relatively small island nations, one of which is only
really habitable along the coastline, have historically relied on fishing,
both as an industry and for the nation's cuisine. As
we discussed in our podcast about the volcanic eruption on
the island of Hamming, fishing is critically important to Iceland's economy. Today,
(03:20):
the fishing industry and Iceland employees about eleven thousand people,
which is a little more than four percent of Iceland's
total workforce, and the fishing industry directly contributes to about
eleven percent of Iceland of the icelandic GDP and indirectly
a full quarter of Iceland's GDP. About forty of Iceland's
(03:42):
export earnings come from fish today, with cod being a
primary export, and before the nineteen seventies almost nine of
Iceland's exports were fish. Meanwhile, Britain's fishing industry employs a
little under twelve thousand fishers today, so about the same
sizes Iceland's industry, but because the UK's population and economy
(04:04):
are so much larger, it's really a much smaller proportion
of the UK economy as a whole. The UK has
a population of sixty four million compared to three hundred
and twenty three thousand in Iceland. Marine fishing is about
zero point oh five percent of the British GDP, and
all forms of fishing together make up about zero point
(04:26):
zero seven percent of the British GDP. Prior to the
nineteen fifties, though, fishing was a much bigger part of
the British economy, especially in fishing ports cities like Hull,
Gramsby and Fleetwood. In these ports, fishing trawlers were the
primary employer, and most of the fishing fleet that sailed
(04:48):
from these ports did what's known as distant water fishing,
so boats would leave these ports in Britain and they
would travel hundreds of miles to fish in the waters
around Iceland. In addition to catching a lot of cod,
Brittain eight and continues to eat, for that matter, a
lot of cod. In the nineteen fifties and nineteen sixties,
(05:09):
four and thirty thousand tons of cod were being eaten
in Britain annually, overwhelmingly in the form of fish and chips.
Britain continues to eat more cod than anywhere else in
the world, a third of the cod in the world,
and of the cod caught in European waters. So yeah,
the Iceland and Britain were united by the fact that
(05:32):
there's lots of cod around Iceland and Brittain was eating
almost all of it, almost all the cod because fish
and chips. I mean, it's it's delicious and also kind
of astounding just how much was being eaten. Another important
piece of background information in all of this story has
(05:53):
to do with the idea of international waters and how
nations get to decide which parts of the ocean are
There's the idea that a nation with the coastline has
rights to a certain amount of the ocean around it
has existed for centuries, and a nation's territorial waters extend
a certain distance past its coast and then beyond that
(06:13):
our international waters. Starting in the seventeen hundreds, in Europe
and the America's, a nation's territorial waters typically extended about
three miles past the coastline, although there were definitely exceptions,
with nations claiming more or less. Prior to its independence
(06:34):
in nineteen forty four, Iceland was a part of Denmark,
and according to the Anglo Danish Territorial Waters Agreement, it,
like so many other nations, followed that three mile limit.
That agreement was set to expire in nineteen fifty one.
But when Iceland became independent from Denmark, it got to
work setting its own terms for where other nations could
(06:54):
fish immediately. Iceland had two primary motivations for reevaluating its
fishing boundaries. One was that fishing was so enormously critical
to its own economy that it wanted to make sure
its own fishing fleet had the greatest advantage. Iceland sort
of viewed this situation as a zero sum game. Other
(07:16):
nations that were taking fish out of the waters around
Iceland were taking them from Iceland because Iceland had so
few other industries or national or natural resources to add
to its economy. The other was that Iceland was becoming
increasingly concerned about the health of the fish stocks around
it and the threat of overfishing, so banning other nations
(07:37):
from fishing closer to its shores was a way to
try to keep Icelandic fishers fishing while ideally lowering the
risk of depleting those fish populations. As a result, on
May fifteenth, ninety two, Iceland extended the line from three
miles to four And this wasn't the first push of
(07:58):
its territorial water or since becoming independent, but it was
the first extension that affected a part of the sea
that Britain had been using for its fishing. Yes, some
of the prior extension was more to the north, which
was not as much of a British fishing ground. Britain
was not happy about this change. There was more shelter
(08:19):
available in bad weather three miles out compared to four
miles out. Uh And then, of course there was just
the principle of the thing. Britain's who had been making
their livelihoods through fishing for generations and who lived in
port cities where fishing was the biggest industry. We're basically
being shut out of a strip of the sea that
they had historically had access to. When Iceland said its
(08:40):
new line at four miles, flags flew at half mast
in British distant water fishing ports. The Grimsby Evening Telegraph
called it black Thursday. In spite of this new law,
the four mile zone around Iceland did not make that
big of a difference to British distant distant water fishing boats.
A lot of them had already been crossing the three
(09:03):
mile line when fish were scarce beyond it. A number
of captains and owners also thought that the fine that
came with crossing that four mile line was worth the
risk if it meant better fishing on the other side
of the line. All in all, even though there was
a bit of captain mouse darting around the line, British
captains and crews surrendered when they realized they were caught,
(09:26):
and Iceland a Coastguard personnel. We're always honest and faring
court cases over illegal fishing. Aside from some tomfoolery, people
on both sides of this dispute were generally respectful and
professional about it. Yeah, and in spite of all the
like the flying the flags that half mast and the
skittering back and forth across the line where people weren't
(09:47):
really supposed to be, like, you know, when the Coastguard
showed up and was like, you're not supposed to be here,
they would have been like, yeah, you're you gottus. The
UK also took the very reasonable of course of action
of taking their dispute with Iceland before the International Court
of Justice. When Iceland's four mile limit was upheld, Britain
(10:09):
responded by banning Icelandic fishing vessels from landing their fish
in Britain since Britain, as we said earlier, was buying
most of Iceland's cod and I mean British British cod
catches were not nearly enough to keep the nations supplied
in fish and chips. This basically was an economic santion
sanction against Iceland, but Iceland did not back down. And
(10:33):
this was only the first of several times that Iceland
would move its fishing boundary. And we're going to talk
about where things stopped being so sort of cordial and
respectful and started to really get ugly. After we have
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In nineteen fifty eight, the international community participated in the
first international Conference on the Law of the Sea. The
u n's International Law Commission had been discussing and evaluating
maritime international law for nearly a decade, but this was
the first conference that was specifically devoted to international maritime law.
(12:20):
Eighties six states participated in this conference. Fishing, we should
point out, was certainly not the only thing being discussed
at the conference. Resolutions were adopted regarding nuclear tests, radioactive
pollution of the oceans, and conservation, and various smaller nations
suggested a major expansion of the commonly used three mile
(12:41):
limit between international and territorial waters. The new proposed limit
a twelve mile economic exclusion zone around a nation's coast.
Most larger nations resisted this idea for reasons ranging from
economic unfairness to concerns that their navies could not effectively
maneuver or patrol with that much of the sea off limits. However,
(13:05):
when Iceland then expanded its exclusionary zone to twelve miles,
part of its argument was that that twelve miles was
eventually going to be international law anyway, and while that
previous move from three miles to four miles had been
met with flags at half masted in Britain's port towns,
the jump to twelve miles was genuinely alarming. The zone
(13:27):
between four and twelve miles from Iceland's coast was prime
fishing territory for Britain's distant water fishing fleet. Shutting Britain
out of twelve miles around Iceland had the potential to
completely disrupt the fishing industry. Aside from really genuine concerns
about the British economy, especially in these sports cities, Britain
(13:49):
was also really frustrated on principle. I understand this. I'm
a person who gets colossally frustrated on principle, as had
been the case with that four mile on the twelve
mile line was cutting Brittain out of waters that it
had historically had access to and felt entitled to. And
then there was an emotional way to all of it,
(14:10):
and the cities that were home to Britain's distant water
fishing fleets. Fishing was really at the heart of the
community and of people's identities, so pushing out distant water
fishing felt like it was stripping people of their way
of life and of something that they felt like was
a core part of who they were. Also, there's the
whole fish and chip thing again, which is also part
(14:34):
of like the identity issue. Yes, Like in the United States,
fish and chips and a lot of places they're just
like they're just sort of standard pub food, right, But
in the fifties and sixties and Britain, fish and chips
was really a working class staple and like chippies were
(14:55):
places that that sold fish and chips, and like there's
a whole cultural layer to the existence in the consumption
of of fish and chips that um does not have
the quite the same weight. And most of the United States,
yeah uh. And the UK was not the only nation
affected by this expansion in Iceland's territorial waters. Belgium, West
(15:20):
Germany and the Faroe Islands were among the other nations
fishing in that same area, But it was the British
fishing fleet that was making the most use of it
among the international community, and it was Britain that became
the most vocal in wanting continued access to that four
to twelve mile zone. Those cat and mouse shenanigans that
had happened at the four mile line kicked up several
(15:44):
notches in the four to twelve mile zone around Iceland.
As one might expect, Iceland deployed its Coast Guard to
try to enforce the policy, and it allowed officials to
board British ships and arrest their crews for fishing in
water where they were not supposed to be. In response,
Britain deployed ships from the Royal Navy to protect the trawlers,
(16:07):
essentially mandating that the trawlers fishing areas where the Royal
Navy was patrolling, and the trawlers used nets to try
to keep Icelandic inspectors from boarding, as well as spring
boarding parties with hoses and trying to use spears to
puncture the rubber digghis the coast Guard used for boarding.
When a trawler was boarded, they'd often call in the
(16:29):
Royal Navy to assist, and on at least one occasion,
the Royal Navy then refused to let the Icelandic Coast
Guard officials go back to their own vessel, instead kept
them on board as guests. In quotation marks of the Crown.
One boarding party was eventually put into a little boat
off the coast of Keflavik and allowed to row back
(16:50):
to shore there. And that's really irritated the people that were, uh,
we're working at the NATO base in Keflavik, because they
were like, what do you mean there is a British
warship right there that just dropped you off in the water.
Because Iceland had about six gunboats compared to the thirty
seven Royal Navy ships that Britain had deployed, Iceland didn't
(17:13):
really feel comfortable making a direct assault on the British force. Instead,
Iceland kept thorough records of the names and numbers of
all of the British ships that broke the twelve mile limit.
I kind of love fighting it with bureaucracy and I
don't even understand why. Yeah, it Yeah. This distribute wound
(17:33):
up being settled with a compromise in nineteen sixty one.
Britain ultimately agreed to respect the twelve mile limit and
exchanged for a three year period to phase out the
distant water fishing in the twelve mile zone. Once this
agreement was reached, Iceland destroyed all those records of who
all had been illegally fishing in the twelve mile zone,
(17:54):
which I also am kind of charmed by. Yes, it's
like this is going on your perman record. Okay, now
we're cool. We could get rid of that permanent record. Uh.
In the agreement, Iceland also acknowledged that it would continue
to consider extending the border even further, but would give
Britain advanced notice if this were to happen. Quote, the
(18:16):
Icelandic Government will continue to work for the implementation of
the al Thing Resolution of five May nineteen fifty nine
regarding the extension of fisheries jurisdiction around Iceland, but shall
give to the United Kingdom Government six months notice of
such extension, and in case of a dispute in relation
to such extension, the matter shall, at the request of
(18:38):
either party, be referred to the International Court of Justice. Yes,
that was basically referring to a resolution that had been
put out a couple of years before about possibly having
an even bigger exclusion zone. And then on July fourteenth
of nineteen seventy one, the government of Iceland released a
new policy statement which said, quote the fisheries agreement with
(19:00):
the United Kingdom and the Federal German Republic I'll be
terminated and a resolution be made about an extension of
fishery limit up to fifty nautical miles from the baselines,
effective not later than one September nineteen seventy two. So
at this point we've gone from three miles to four miles,
to twelve miles to fifty miles. Yeah, it's a big jump.
(19:22):
I can imagine if you are part of the fishing industry,
the knee jerk reaction could be irate at that point. Uh,
And that would explain why this is where things got
really really heated between the UK and Iceland. The United
Kingdom once again took its dispute to the International Court
of Justice in the Hague, which found in Britain's favor,
(19:42):
but Iceland argued that the court did not have jurisdiction.
Iceland was at this point incredibly frustrated and alarmed over
the condition of its fishing stocks. Stocks of the Icelandic
herring had dropped precipitously almost to nothing, and Iceland was
concerned learned that cod were headed for this same fate.
(20:03):
They had made repeated calls for international discussions on conservation
of fish stocks and sustainable fishing practices. And none of
that had gotten enough attention for Iceland to really feel
secure in the future of a nation that was basically
dependent on fishing like at this point and even still
today in a lot of ways, if the if the
(20:23):
fishing industry in Iceland is gone, Iceland as a nation
cannot survive. And so even though there were some nations
that were willing to talk about more conservation oriented fishing
practices at this point in the seventies, Iceland was like, no, really,
we will die as a nation if we don't look
after these fish. And to make matters worse from the
(20:45):
British point of view, also in nineteen seventy two, the
United Kingdom joined the Common Market, and this was basically
an approach by the European Economic Community that gave all
its members equal access to the territorial waters of all
the other members after a grace period. Iceland, not being
a member of the European Economic Community, was not affected,
(21:06):
but the UK was concerned about what it would mean
for its own fishing industry to give the rest of
the European Economic Community access to its fishing grounds. The
UK to the UK fishing fleet those waters off the
coast of Iceland became even more important, so the UK
once again deployed the Royal Navy to protect its distant
(21:27):
water trawlers. And during the previous dispute, the trawlers were
basically supposed to stick with the navy, and now they
were trying to do it the other way around. The
trawlers would go whether where they needed to fish, and
the Navy would follow them to protect them. In other words,
the UK had decided not to respect that fifty mile line.
And we're going to talk about the fallout from that
(21:50):
a little bit more after we once again paused for
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me Undy's dot com slash history. The first day that
British ships made their way across the newly established fifty
mile line around Iceland, they covered up their names and
numbers on their ships and hoisted pirate flags. Iceland's coast
(24:03):
Guard was mostly amused at this course of action because
at this point they had been patrolling these waters with
these British trawlers for years, and they were sort of like,
do you think we really can't recognize your ship without
the name on it? Like, we know what your ship
looks like, we know who you are. It's the clark
can't glasses disguise of the sea. It was absolutely the
(24:24):
clark can't glasses to sect the skies of the sea.
And this time around things really did start, though, as
much as we're laughing now, they became very serious and
physical between Iceland and the UK. Towards the end of
the previous dispute, Iceland had developed a trawling net cutter,
and this was essentially a minesweeper modified with a road
(24:46):
grading blade that was dragged through the water behind a boat,
so when it hit the high tension trawling wires, it
would cut right through them. This was the part I
learned at a museum in Iceland, where I was like,
who the ice Slandic Coast Guard was just cutting through
trawling nets. That's fascinating. However, the cruise of the British
(25:08):
trawlers were horrified and alarmed at this invention. The wires
of these trawling ups. I mean, these are enormous nets
that are under the water and they fill up with fish.
They are under a whole lot of tension, so it
was within the realm of possibility that a wire that
had been cut could rebound and literally cut someone in half.
(25:29):
Iceland insisted that this cutting was happening far enough below
the surface of the water that this was not a risk,
and there wasn't a risk to human life because all
of this energy that was being dissipated when the wire
was cut, basically was was dissipated in the traveling through
the water. Um Even so, even if if there wasn't
(25:51):
a risk, and I think you can argue that either way,
the loss of the trawling net itself and of the
time and energy that you had put into putting it,
to gathering, deploying it, and whatever time you had spent
fishing with it basically meant that people were losing a
lot of work and equipment in this process. The Icelandic
(26:12):
Coastguard was vastly outnumbered. It had six Coastguard vessels plus
two Polish built trawlers retrofitted for the purpose. Britain, on
the other hand, had a total of twenty nine ships
earmarked for the purpose, with six to nine of them
in Icelandic water at any given time. In addition to
those frigates were seven supply ships, nine tugboats and three
(26:34):
artillery ships to protect its forty trawlers. Soon, in spite
of being so heavily outnumbered, Icelandic vessels started intentionally ramming
British Royal Navy ships and trawlers. That's actually there was
one collision that did lead to the death of an
Icelandic officer. Britain responded by trying to update its trawler
(26:58):
fleet by radio about the position of Iceland's vessels, So
the Icelandic Coastguards started recording Britain's transmissions on the positions
of where the Icelandic vessels were and then replaying them
at a later date. That's so confusion. When Britain realized
that that was happening, their ships began to spread the
word by radio to disregard the prior message. So the
(27:20):
Icelandic Coastguard recorded that too to replay it later on.
It's a little ghost Army esque at that point where
they're doing like these false sounds escapes and Icelandic ship
shelled a British trawler. Also in May, Iceland banned British
planes from landing at Kevlavik air Base. That October, the
(27:44):
UK and Iceland finally agreed to limit the number of
British ships in Icelandic waters, limit the size of the catch,
and thankfully stop ramming each other. So this is kind
of an uneasy piece that lasted for a couple of years.
But in nineteen seventy five, Iceland extended its maritime border
(28:04):
again to two hundred miles, so now we've gone three
four twelve fifty two hundred. Once again Britain refused to
to respect yet another expansion in the exclusionary zone around Iceland.
Negotiating negotiations really quickly broke down. Iceland threatened to close
(28:26):
the NATO Basic Kevlevik entirely and to end diplomatic relations
with Britain. The international community became really alarmed. All of
these conflicts were running parallel to the Cold War, and
there were some concerns that Iceland, which was strategically placed
between Russia and North America, might, under all of this
pressure and resistance from Britain just abandoned its other diplomatic
(28:48):
ties in favor of allying with Russia. Eventually, after numerous
rammings and even some shelling caused damage to ships on
both sides of the conflict, the Criteria General of NATO
Dr Joseph Lunz had to mediate an agreement between Iceland
and the UK, and that was signed in June of
nineteen seventy six. It upheld Iceland's two hundred mile exclusion
(29:13):
zone and it specified that Britain could have a maximum
of twenty four trawlers in that zone at any given time.
Conservation zones were established where no fishing would be allowed.
After six months, there would be no more fishing in
the two hundred mile zone. When those six months were up,
Britain's distant water fishing fleet was effectively put out of business.
(29:34):
Trawler owners were given some restitution for the loss of
their businesses, and the government had reassured the distant water
fishing industry to expect retraining for other work as well
as compensation for basically having been made redundant. However, that
support did not actually materialize. In three Britain's Fishermen's Association
(29:54):
was formed to start fighting for compensation, and this was
a battle that went on until July of two thousand,
when a settlement of twenty six billion pounds was was
earmarked for people who had been put out of work.
As a consequence of this international agreement, fish stocks began
to be depleted anyway, with Iceland needing to send boats
(30:15):
farther afield, which turned into conflict with other nations as well,
particularly Russia and Norway. Yeah, there's stocks have rebounded a
lot now, but if if you look at charts of
the fish populations around Iceland, there's like a decline over
the sixties and then a cliff and then they are
very alarmingly low and then they start to recover. Uh.
(30:39):
There's also a documentary it was actually an Icelandic documentary,
but it aired on the BBC and one of the
Icelandic officials that was interviewed for it talked about going
to Britain visiting some of these ports that had been
the distant water fishing ports, seeing all of these decommissioned
ships just sort of derelict there in the port, and
it reconfirming for him, Okay, seriously, we have got to
(31:02):
we have got to conserve our fishing stocks because as
a result of our trying to do that, all of
these people were put out of work and lost their
livelihoods um which I like, I thought was a an
interesting sentiment to come back to you because at that
point it was years after the decisions had all been made.
I like the part with the pirate flags, that's my
(31:24):
favorite part well, and there's also there were things about
like the British ships basically throwing potatoes at people, uh,
I mean at the at the Icelandic ships. So this
documentary documentary is really super interesting because you hear from
people who were who were on these ships and we're uh,
we're making living, making their living fishing, and it really
(31:47):
does seem like, especially through the first the first couple
of incidents where it moved from three miles to four
and from four to twelve that there was kind of
a weird spirit of camaraderie where where the British, the
British fishermen would be like, uh, yeah, we're gonna do
this anyway, and I also throw potatoes at you, and
(32:08):
Iceland was like, that's not cool, but we're gonna totally
be fair when we arrest you and take you to
court for your unsanctioned fishing activities. UM. It definitely though,
just just ruined the economy of some particular ports cities.
And then when you look at Britain's fishing industry today,
(32:28):
it is completely different than it was up through nineteen seventy.
And also a lot of the fish that used to
be uh used to be fished through distant water fishing
fleets are instead now uh raised through aquacultures that are
basically farmed, instead of um having this whole international agreement
to send trawlers to other international waters to try to fish. Yeah. Yeah,
(32:58):
do you have some listener ale that is less grown
up talk kind of? It's another thing about food. I
mean we kept saying fish and chips. Yeah, some some
fish and chips. I do love fish and chips. Um.
So uh, this is for Mindy. And every time I
think we've gotten the best email about Marjarine, we get
(33:20):
another email about Margarine and Mendy's email is titled the
real Jewish Aspect of OLEO Margarine. She sold it and
we're excommunicated for doing so. And it says, Dear Tracy
and Holly, I've been debating whether or not to write
you after your Butter Versus Marjarine podcast, but hearing you
read to listener emails about the Jewish aspect of this
story really clenched it. One of my friends genealogists, named
(33:43):
Tracy Hepps, has given a number of lectures on her
quote Jewish Margarine crime family. In her talk the Marjarine
Moonshiners from Minsk, she pointed out how this substance, which
was made from beef tallow mixed with milk, was being
sold as re butter to Kosher households. Needless to say,
the Jewish community was extremely upset with her ancestors, some
(34:07):
of whom ended up in Leavenworth. In fact, a brother
in law had even been excommunicated for selling Marjorine made
out of pig fat mixed with milk and claiming it
was butter. While Marjorine is now loved by practically every
Kosher household, it definitely wasn't at the time. If you
ever want to do a Marjorine follow up podcast, your
take on the Wassaki Jewish Marjorine crime Family would be
(34:28):
a lot of fun. And later lectures, she updates the
story to include more members than the original three she
had uncovered. By the time of her first lecture, her
Marjorine crime family spanned several states and included a large
number of her ancestors. And then she has links to
all of these lectures and UH and other information. It
is fascinating. Another thing I didn't think of, Like I
(34:53):
didn't think of the part about about Marjorine's place in
kosher cooking today. Also, when we talked about margarine fraud,
it did not occur to me that anyone was selling margarine,
which at the time was made out of beef, tallow
and dairy, which is like just by definition not koshert
(35:14):
correct to Jewish families right, And that this was specifically
uh like a Jewish crime family selling it to other
Jewish people, and then that of course people were outraged
when they learned about what was going on. It reminded
me a little bit of when Fast Food Nation came
out and it was revealed that McDonald's was flavoring their
(35:36):
French fries with beef. H And at that point the
state of available vegetarian options and restaurants was dramatically different
than it is today, and many vegetarian people were like,
I've been eating that and it's flavored with beef. I
was one of those people. I don't think my outrage
(35:58):
was nearly as the same as if I had had
a religious prohibition against eating uh meat. It was just
a personal prohibition. But still, that's fascinating, man, these emails fascinating.
I did not get to watch the longer of the lectures,
but I did watch the shorter one, and that was fascinating.
We will link to them in the show notes. Once again,
(36:18):
just because I was not raised in a kosher household,
it did not occur to me that anybody would be
selling margarine as butter to Jewish people. That's awful. Don't
do that. If your margarine is made out of non
kosher ingredients, that's wrong. If you would like to write
(36:38):
to us about this or any other podcast where a
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com and find lots of information about all kinds of stuff.
(37:03):
And then you can come to our website, which is
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(37:23):
thousands of other topics. Does it how stuff works dot
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This episode is brought to you by square Space. Start
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square Space. Build it beautiful. I am Scott and I'm
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(00:21):
trains and automobils. That's right, and you can find all
of our episodes on Google Play, Spotify, iTunes, and really
anywhere else you get your podcast. Welcome to Stuff you
missed in History Class from how Stuff Works dot com. Hello,
(00:43):
and welcome to the podcast. I'm Tracy B. Wilson and
I'm Holly Frye. When I was in Iceland back in
the spring, I learned a very tiny bit about the
Cod Wars. Uh. Long time listeners to the show will
probably notice some similarities between the thing that going to
talk about today and the Chesapeake Bay Oyster Wars, which
(01:03):
we talked about back in But while the Chesapeake Bay
Conflict was mostly confined to the states of Virginia and Maryland,
the Cod Wars were an international dispute that wound up
having a lot more long lasting ramifications in both the
United Kingdom and in Iceland. So after I got home
from the strip where I learned that the cod Wars
(01:24):
had happened, I put them on the potential episode list,
and then all of a sudden, over the last week
or so, multiple other people, sort of apropos of nothing,
said hey, would you talk about the cod wars um
and that included most recently Gemma and Steve. So I thought, Okay,
I guess I'll put cod Wars at the top of
the list. It had been kind of languishing there, and
(01:46):
now we're gonna do it. I do want to be
clear that this is definitely not the only fishing dispute
that has ever happened in these particular waters, but it's
definitely one of the most famous. Uh And in some
ways it's the weirdest and the most comical, even though
it was not actually funny to the people it was
happening to like it sounds funny, but a lot of
(02:10):
people's livelihoods were deeply at stake in the middle of
this thing that sounds sort of comedic. So to give
you the setup, Iceland and the United Kingdom are two
relatively small island nations. The UK is a little more
than ninety four thousand square miles and Iceland is a
little less than forty thousand square miles. That's about two
(02:32):
hundred and forty three thousand square kilometers and one hundred
three thousand square kilometers respectively. The UK, however, has much
more habitable land than Iceland does. The middle of Iceland
is mountainous, and it's covered in glaciers and also in
many places volcanic, so nearly all of its population lives
relatively close to the coast. It is completely unsurprising that
(02:57):
two relatively small island nations, one of which is only
really habitable along the coastline, have historically relied on fishing,
both as an industry and for the nation's cuisine. As
we discussed in our podcast about the volcanic eruption on
the island of Hamming, fishing is critically important to Iceland's economy. Today,
(03:20):
the fishing industry and Iceland employees about eleven thousand people,
which is a little more than four percent of Iceland's
total workforce, and the fishing industry directly contributes to about
eleven percent of Iceland of the icelandic GDP and indirectly
a full quarter of Iceland's GDP. About forty of Iceland's
(03:42):
export earnings come from fish today, with cod being a
primary export, and before the nineteen seventies almost nine of
Iceland's exports were fish. Meanwhile, Britain's fishing industry employs a
little under twelve thousand fishers today, so about the same
sizes Iceland's industry, but because the UK's population and economy
(04:04):
are so much larger, it's really a much smaller proportion
of the UK economy as a whole. The UK has
a population of sixty four million compared to three hundred
and twenty three thousand in Iceland. Marine fishing is about
zero point oh five percent of the British GDP, and
all forms of fishing together make up about zero point
(04:26):
zero seven percent of the British GDP. Prior to the
nineteen fifties, though, fishing was a much bigger part of
the British economy, especially in fishing ports cities like Hull,
Gramsby and Fleetwood. In these ports, fishing trawlers were the
primary employer, and most of the fishing fleet that sailed
(04:48):
from these ports did what's known as distant water fishing,
so boats would leave these ports in Britain and they
would travel hundreds of miles to fish in the waters
around Iceland. In addition to catching a lot of cod,
Brittain eight and continues to eat, for that matter, a
lot of cod. In the nineteen fifties and nineteen sixties,
(05:09):
four and thirty thousand tons of cod were being eaten
in Britain annually, overwhelmingly in the form of fish and chips.
Britain continues to eat more cod than anywhere else in
the world, a third of the cod in the world,
and of the cod caught in European waters. So yeah,
the Iceland and Britain were united by the fact that
(05:32):
there's lots of cod around Iceland and Brittain was eating
almost all of it, almost all the cod because fish
and chips. I mean, it's it's delicious and also kind
of astounding just how much was being eaten. Another important
piece of background information in all of this story has
(05:53):
to do with the idea of international waters and how
nations get to decide which parts of the ocean are
There's the idea that a nation with the coastline has
rights to a certain amount of the ocean around it
has existed for centuries, and a nation's territorial waters extend
a certain distance past its coast and then beyond that
(06:13):
our international waters. Starting in the seventeen hundreds, in Europe
and the America's, a nation's territorial waters typically extended about
three miles past the coastline, although there were definitely exceptions,
with nations claiming more or less. Prior to its independence
(06:34):
in nineteen forty four, Iceland was a part of Denmark,
and according to the Anglo Danish Territorial Waters Agreement, it,
like so many other nations, followed that three mile limit.
That agreement was set to expire in nineteen fifty one.
But when Iceland became independent from Denmark, it got to
work setting its own terms for where other nations could
(06:54):
fish immediately. Iceland had two primary motivations for reevaluating its
fishing boundaries. One was that fishing was so enormously critical
to its own economy that it wanted to make sure
its own fishing fleet had the greatest advantage. Iceland sort
of viewed this situation as a zero sum game. Other
(07:16):
nations that were taking fish out of the waters around
Iceland were taking them from Iceland because Iceland had so
few other industries or national or natural resources to add
to its economy. The other was that Iceland was becoming
increasingly concerned about the health of the fish stocks around
it and the threat of overfishing, so banning other nations
(07:37):
from fishing closer to its shores was a way to
try to keep Icelandic fishers fishing while ideally lowering the
risk of depleting those fish populations. As a result, on
May fifteenth, ninety two, Iceland extended the line from three
miles to four And this wasn't the first push of
(07:58):
its territorial water or since becoming independent, but it was
the first extension that affected a part of the sea
that Britain had been using for its fishing. Yes, some
of the prior extension was more to the north, which
was not as much of a British fishing ground. Britain
was not happy about this change. There was more shelter
(08:19):
available in bad weather three miles out compared to four
miles out. Uh And then, of course there was just
the principle of the thing. Britain's who had been making
their livelihoods through fishing for generations and who lived in
port cities where fishing was the biggest industry. We're basically
being shut out of a strip of the sea that
they had historically had access to. When Iceland said its
(08:40):
new line at four miles, flags flew at half mast
in British distant water fishing ports. The Grimsby Evening Telegraph
called it black Thursday. In spite of this new law,
the four mile zone around Iceland did not make that
big of a difference to British distant distant water fishing boats.
A lot of them had already been crossing the three
(09:03):
mile line when fish were scarce beyond it. A number
of captains and owners also thought that the fine that
came with crossing that four mile line was worth the
risk if it meant better fishing on the other side
of the line. All in all, even though there was
a bit of captain mouse darting around the line, British
captains and crews surrendered when they realized they were caught,
(09:26):
and Iceland a Coastguard personnel. We're always honest and faring
court cases over illegal fishing. Aside from some tomfoolery, people
on both sides of this dispute were generally respectful and
professional about it. Yeah, and in spite of all the
like the flying the flags that half mast and the
skittering back and forth across the line where people weren't
(09:47):
really supposed to be, like, you know, when the Coastguard
showed up and was like, you're not supposed to be here,
they would have been like, yeah, you're you gottus. The
UK also took the very reasonable of course of action
of taking their dispute with Iceland before the International Court
of Justice. When Iceland's four mile limit was upheld, Britain
(10:09):
responded by banning Icelandic fishing vessels from landing their fish
in Britain since Britain, as we said earlier, was buying
most of Iceland's cod and I mean British British cod
catches were not nearly enough to keep the nations supplied
in fish and chips. This basically was an economic santion
sanction against Iceland, but Iceland did not back down. And
(10:33):
this was only the first of several times that Iceland
would move its fishing boundary. And we're going to talk
about where things stopped being so sort of cordial and
respectful and started to really get ugly. After we have
a brief sponsor break. You know that great feeling when
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(11:59):
In nineteen fifty eight, the international community participated in the
first international Conference on the Law of the Sea. The
u n's International Law Commission had been discussing and evaluating
maritime international law for nearly a decade, but this was
the first conference that was specifically devoted to international maritime law.
(12:20):
Eighties six states participated in this conference. Fishing, we should
point out, was certainly not the only thing being discussed
at the conference. Resolutions were adopted regarding nuclear tests, radioactive
pollution of the oceans, and conservation, and various smaller nations
suggested a major expansion of the commonly used three mile
(12:41):
limit between international and territorial waters. The new proposed limit
a twelve mile economic exclusion zone around a nation's coast.
Most larger nations resisted this idea for reasons ranging from
economic unfairness to concerns that their navies could not effectively
maneuver or patrol with that much of the sea off limits. However,
(13:05):
when Iceland then expanded its exclusionary zone to twelve miles,
part of its argument was that that twelve miles was
eventually going to be international law anyway, and while that
previous move from three miles to four miles had been
met with flags at half masted in Britain's port towns,
the jump to twelve miles was genuinely alarming. The zone
(13:27):
between four and twelve miles from Iceland's coast was prime
fishing territory for Britain's distant water fishing fleet. Shutting Britain
out of twelve miles around Iceland had the potential to
completely disrupt the fishing industry. Aside from really genuine concerns
about the British economy, especially in these sports cities, Britain
(13:49):
was also really frustrated on principle. I understand this. I'm
a person who gets colossally frustrated on principle, as had
been the case with that four mile on the twelve
mile line was cutting Brittain out of waters that it
had historically had access to and felt entitled to. And
then there was an emotional way to all of it,
(14:10):
and the cities that were home to Britain's distant water
fishing fleets. Fishing was really at the heart of the
community and of people's identities, so pushing out distant water
fishing felt like it was stripping people of their way
of life and of something that they felt like was
a core part of who they were. Also, there's the
whole fish and chip thing again, which is also part
(14:34):
of like the identity issue. Yes, Like in the United States,
fish and chips and a lot of places they're just
like they're just sort of standard pub food, right, But
in the fifties and sixties and Britain, fish and chips
was really a working class staple and like chippies were
(14:55):
places that that sold fish and chips, and like there's
a whole cultural layer to the existence in the consumption
of of fish and chips that um does not have
the quite the same weight. And most of the United States,
yeah uh. And the UK was not the only nation
affected by this expansion in Iceland's territorial waters. Belgium, West
(15:20):
Germany and the Faroe Islands were among the other nations
fishing in that same area, But it was the British
fishing fleet that was making the most use of it
among the international community, and it was Britain that became
the most vocal in wanting continued access to that four
to twelve mile zone. Those cat and mouse shenanigans that
had happened at the four mile line kicked up several
(15:44):
notches in the four to twelve mile zone around Iceland.
As one might expect, Iceland deployed its Coast Guard to
try to enforce the policy, and it allowed officials to
board British ships and arrest their crews for fishing in
water where they were not supposed to be. In response,
Britain deployed ships from the Royal Navy to protect the trawlers,
(16:07):
essentially mandating that the trawlers fishing areas where the Royal
Navy was patrolling, and the trawlers used nets to try
to keep Icelandic inspectors from boarding, as well as spring
boarding parties with hoses and trying to use spears to
puncture the rubber digghis the coast Guard used for boarding.
When a trawler was boarded, they'd often call in the
(16:29):
Royal Navy to assist, and on at least one occasion,
the Royal Navy then refused to let the Icelandic Coast
Guard officials go back to their own vessel, instead kept
them on board as guests. In quotation marks of the Crown.
One boarding party was eventually put into a little boat
off the coast of Keflavik and allowed to row back
(16:50):
to shore there. And that's really irritated the people that were, uh,
we're working at the NATO base in Keflavik, because they
were like, what do you mean there is a British
warship right there that just dropped you off in the water.
Because Iceland had about six gunboats compared to the thirty
seven Royal Navy ships that Britain had deployed, Iceland didn't
(17:13):
really feel comfortable making a direct assault on the British force. Instead,
Iceland kept thorough records of the names and numbers of
all of the British ships that broke the twelve mile limit.
I kind of love fighting it with bureaucracy and I
don't even understand why. Yeah, it Yeah. This distribute wound
(17:33):
up being settled with a compromise in nineteen sixty one.
Britain ultimately agreed to respect the twelve mile limit and
exchanged for a three year period to phase out the
distant water fishing in the twelve mile zone. Once this
agreement was reached, Iceland destroyed all those records of who
all had been illegally fishing in the twelve mile zone,
(17:54):
which I also am kind of charmed by. Yes, it's
like this is going on your perman record. Okay, now
we're cool. We could get rid of that permanent record. Uh.
In the agreement, Iceland also acknowledged that it would continue
to consider extending the border even further, but would give
Britain advanced notice if this were to happen. Quote, the
(18:16):
Icelandic Government will continue to work for the implementation of
the al Thing Resolution of five May nineteen fifty nine
regarding the extension of fisheries jurisdiction around Iceland, but shall
give to the United Kingdom Government six months notice of
such extension, and in case of a dispute in relation
to such extension, the matter shall, at the request of
(18:38):
either party, be referred to the International Court of Justice. Yes,
that was basically referring to a resolution that had been
put out a couple of years before about possibly having
an even bigger exclusion zone. And then on July fourteenth
of nineteen seventy one, the government of Iceland released a
new policy statement which said, quote the fisheries agreement with
(19:00):
the United Kingdom and the Federal German Republic I'll be
terminated and a resolution be made about an extension of
fishery limit up to fifty nautical miles from the baselines,
effective not later than one September nineteen seventy two. So
at this point we've gone from three miles to four miles,
to twelve miles to fifty miles. Yeah, it's a big jump.
(19:22):
I can imagine if you are part of the fishing industry,
the knee jerk reaction could be irate at that point. Uh,
And that would explain why this is where things got
really really heated between the UK and Iceland. The United
Kingdom once again took its dispute to the International Court
of Justice in the Hague, which found in Britain's favor,
(19:42):
but Iceland argued that the court did not have jurisdiction.
Iceland was at this point incredibly frustrated and alarmed over
the condition of its fishing stocks. Stocks of the Icelandic
herring had dropped precipitously almost to nothing, and Iceland was
concerned learned that cod were headed for this same fate.
(20:03):
They had made repeated calls for international discussions on conservation
of fish stocks and sustainable fishing practices. And none of
that had gotten enough attention for Iceland to really feel
secure in the future of a nation that was basically
dependent on fishing like at this point and even still
today in a lot of ways, if the if the
(20:23):
fishing industry in Iceland is gone, Iceland as a nation
cannot survive. And so even though there were some nations
that were willing to talk about more conservation oriented fishing
practices at this point in the seventies, Iceland was like, no, really,
we will die as a nation if we don't look
after these fish. And to make matters worse from the
(20:45):
British point of view, also in nineteen seventy two, the
United Kingdom joined the Common Market, and this was basically
an approach by the European Economic Community that gave all
its members equal access to the territorial waters of all
the other members after a grace period. Iceland, not being
a member of the European Economic Community, was not affected,
(21:06):
but the UK was concerned about what it would mean
for its own fishing industry to give the rest of
the European Economic Community access to its fishing grounds. The
UK to the UK fishing fleet those waters off the
coast of Iceland became even more important, so the UK
once again deployed the Royal Navy to protect its distant
(21:27):
water trawlers. And during the previous dispute, the trawlers were
basically supposed to stick with the navy, and now they
were trying to do it the other way around. The
trawlers would go whether where they needed to fish, and
the Navy would follow them to protect them. In other words,
the UK had decided not to respect that fifty mile line.
And we're going to talk about the fallout from that
(21:50):
a little bit more after we once again paused for
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me Undy's dot com slash history. The first day that
British ships made their way across the newly established fifty
mile line around Iceland, they covered up their names and
numbers on their ships and hoisted pirate flags. Iceland's coast
(24:03):
Guard was mostly amused at this course of action because
at this point they had been patrolling these waters with
these British trawlers for years, and they were sort of like,
do you think we really can't recognize your ship without
the name on it? Like, we know what your ship
looks like, we know who you are. It's the clark
can't glasses disguise of the sea. It was absolutely the
(24:24):
clark can't glasses to sect the skies of the sea.
And this time around things really did start, though, as
much as we're laughing now, they became very serious and
physical between Iceland and the UK. Towards the end of
the previous dispute, Iceland had developed a trawling net cutter,
and this was essentially a minesweeper modified with a road
(24:46):
grading blade that was dragged through the water behind a boat,
so when it hit the high tension trawling wires, it
would cut right through them. This was the part I
learned at a museum in Iceland, where I was like,
who the ice Slandic Coast Guard was just cutting through
trawling nets. That's fascinating. However, the cruise of the British
(25:08):
trawlers were horrified and alarmed at this invention. The wires
of these trawling ups. I mean, these are enormous nets
that are under the water and they fill up with fish.
They are under a whole lot of tension, so it
was within the realm of possibility that a wire that
had been cut could rebound and literally cut someone in half.
(25:29):
Iceland insisted that this cutting was happening far enough below
the surface of the water that this was not a risk,
and there wasn't a risk to human life because all
of this energy that was being dissipated when the wire
was cut, basically was was dissipated in the traveling through
the water. Um Even so, even if if there wasn't
(25:51):
a risk, and I think you can argue that either way,
the loss of the trawling net itself and of the
time and energy that you had put into putting it,
to gathering, deploying it, and whatever time you had spent
fishing with it basically meant that people were losing a
lot of work and equipment in this process. The Icelandic
(26:12):
Coastguard was vastly outnumbered. It had six Coastguard vessels plus
two Polish built trawlers retrofitted for the purpose. Britain, on
the other hand, had a total of twenty nine ships
earmarked for the purpose, with six to nine of them
in Icelandic water at any given time. In addition to
those frigates were seven supply ships, nine tugboats and three
(26:34):
artillery ships to protect its forty trawlers. Soon, in spite
of being so heavily outnumbered, Icelandic vessels started intentionally ramming
British Royal Navy ships and trawlers. That's actually there was
one collision that did lead to the death of an
Icelandic officer. Britain responded by trying to update its trawler
(26:58):
fleet by radio about the position of Iceland's vessels, So
the Icelandic Coastguards started recording Britain's transmissions on the positions
of where the Icelandic vessels were and then replaying them
at a later date. That's so confusion. When Britain realized
that that was happening, their ships began to spread the
word by radio to disregard the prior message. So the
(27:20):
Icelandic Coastguard recorded that too to replay it later on.
It's a little ghost Army esque at that point where
they're doing like these false sounds escapes and Icelandic ship
shelled a British trawler. Also in May, Iceland banned British
planes from landing at Kevlavik air Base. That October, the
(27:44):
UK and Iceland finally agreed to limit the number of
British ships in Icelandic waters, limit the size of the catch,
and thankfully stop ramming each other. So this is kind
of an uneasy piece that lasted for a couple of years.
But in nineteen seventy five, Iceland extended its maritime border
(28:04):
again to two hundred miles, so now we've gone three
four twelve fifty two hundred. Once again Britain refused to
to respect yet another expansion in the exclusionary zone around Iceland.
Negotiating negotiations really quickly broke down. Iceland threatened to close
(28:26):
the NATO Basic Kevlevik entirely and to end diplomatic relations
with Britain. The international community became really alarmed. All of
these conflicts were running parallel to the Cold War, and
there were some concerns that Iceland, which was strategically placed
between Russia and North America, might, under all of this
pressure and resistance from Britain just abandoned its other diplomatic
(28:48):
ties in favor of allying with Russia. Eventually, after numerous
rammings and even some shelling caused damage to ships on
both sides of the conflict, the Criteria General of NATO
Dr Joseph Lunz had to mediate an agreement between Iceland
and the UK, and that was signed in June of
nineteen seventy six. It upheld Iceland's two hundred mile exclusion
(29:13):
zone and it specified that Britain could have a maximum
of twenty four trawlers in that zone at any given time.
Conservation zones were established where no fishing would be allowed.
After six months, there would be no more fishing in
the two hundred mile zone. When those six months were up,
Britain's distant water fishing fleet was effectively put out of business.
(29:34):
Trawler owners were given some restitution for the loss of
their businesses, and the government had reassured the distant water
fishing industry to expect retraining for other work as well
as compensation for basically having been made redundant. However, that
support did not actually materialize. In three Britain's Fishermen's Association
(29:54):
was formed to start fighting for compensation, and this was
a battle that went on until July of two thousand,
when a settlement of twenty six billion pounds was was
earmarked for people who had been put out of work.
As a consequence of this international agreement, fish stocks began
to be depleted anyway, with Iceland needing to send boats
(30:15):
farther afield, which turned into conflict with other nations as well,
particularly Russia and Norway. Yeah, there's stocks have rebounded a
lot now, but if if you look at charts of
the fish populations around Iceland, there's like a decline over
the sixties and then a cliff and then they are
very alarmingly low and then they start to recover. Uh.
(30:39):
There's also a documentary it was actually an Icelandic documentary,
but it aired on the BBC and one of the
Icelandic officials that was interviewed for it talked about going
to Britain visiting some of these ports that had been
the distant water fishing ports, seeing all of these decommissioned
ships just sort of derelict there in the port, and
it reconfirming for him, Okay, seriously, we have got to
(31:02):
we have got to conserve our fishing stocks because as
a result of our trying to do that, all of
these people were put out of work and lost their
livelihoods um which I like, I thought was a an
interesting sentiment to come back to you because at that
point it was years after the decisions had all been made.
I like the part with the pirate flags, that's my
(31:24):
favorite part well, and there's also there were things about
like the British ships basically throwing potatoes at people, uh,
I mean at the at the Icelandic ships. So this
documentary documentary is really super interesting because you hear from
people who were who were on these ships and we're uh,
we're making living, making their living fishing, and it really
(31:47):
does seem like, especially through the first the first couple
of incidents where it moved from three miles to four
and from four to twelve that there was kind of
a weird spirit of camaraderie where where the British, the
British fishermen would be like, uh, yeah, we're gonna do
this anyway, and I also throw potatoes at you, and
(32:08):
Iceland was like, that's not cool, but we're gonna totally
be fair when we arrest you and take you to
court for your unsanctioned fishing activities. UM. It definitely though,
just just ruined the economy of some particular ports cities.
And then when you look at Britain's fishing industry today,
(32:28):
it is completely different than it was up through nineteen seventy.
And also a lot of the fish that used to
be uh used to be fished through distant water fishing
fleets are instead now uh raised through aquacultures that are
basically farmed, instead of um having this whole international agreement
to send trawlers to other international waters to try to fish. Yeah. Yeah,
(32:58):
do you have some listener ale that is less grown
up talk kind of? It's another thing about food. I
mean we kept saying fish and chips. Yeah, some some
fish and chips. I do love fish and chips. Um.
So uh, this is for Mindy. And every time I
think we've gotten the best email about Marjarine, we get
(33:20):
another email about Margarine and Mendy's email is titled the
real Jewish Aspect of OLEO Margarine. She sold it and
we're excommunicated for doing so. And it says, Dear Tracy
and Holly, I've been debating whether or not to write
you after your Butter Versus Marjarine podcast, but hearing you
read to listener emails about the Jewish aspect of this
story really clenched it. One of my friends genealogists, named
(33:43):
Tracy Hepps, has given a number of lectures on her
quote Jewish Margarine crime family. In her talk the Marjarine
Moonshiners from Minsk, she pointed out how this substance, which
was made from beef tallow mixed with milk, was being
sold as re butter to Kosher households. Needless to say,
the Jewish community was extremely upset with her ancestors, some
(34:07):
of whom ended up in Leavenworth. In fact, a brother
in law had even been excommunicated for selling Marjorine made
out of pig fat mixed with milk and claiming it
was butter. While Marjorine is now loved by practically every
Kosher household, it definitely wasn't at the time. If you
ever want to do a Marjorine follow up podcast, your
take on the Wassaki Jewish Marjorine crime Family would be
(34:28):
a lot of fun. And later lectures, she updates the
story to include more members than the original three she
had uncovered. By the time of her first lecture, her
Marjorine crime family spanned several states and included a large
number of her ancestors. And then she has links to
all of these lectures and UH and other information. It
is fascinating. Another thing I didn't think of, Like I
(34:53):
didn't think of the part about about Marjorine's place in
kosher cooking today. Also, when we talked about margarine fraud,
it did not occur to me that anyone was selling margarine,
which at the time was made out of beef, tallow
and dairy, which is like just by definition not koshert
(35:14):
correct to Jewish families right, And that this was specifically
uh like a Jewish crime family selling it to other
Jewish people, and then that of course people were outraged
when they learned about what was going on. It reminded
me a little bit of when Fast Food Nation came
out and it was revealed that McDonald's was flavoring their
(35:36):
French fries with beef. H And at that point the
state of available vegetarian options and restaurants was dramatically different
than it is today, and many vegetarian people were like,
I've been eating that and it's flavored with beef. I
was one of those people. I don't think my outrage
(35:58):
was nearly as the same as if I had had
a religious prohibition against eating uh meat. It was just
a personal prohibition. But still, that's fascinating, man, these emails fascinating.
I did not get to watch the longer of the lectures,
but I did watch the shorter one, and that was fascinating.
We will link to them in the show notes. Once again,
(36:18):
just because I was not raised in a kosher household,
it did not occur to me that anybody would be
selling margarine as butter to Jewish people. That's awful. Don't
do that. If your margarine is made out of non
kosher ingredients, that's wrong. If you would like to write
(36:38):
to us about this or any other podcast where a
history podcast at how stuff works dot com. We're also
on Facebook at facebook dot com slash miss in history
and on Twitter at miss in History. Are tumbler is
missing history dot tumbler dot com or also on panterest
at pantherest dot com slash miss in History and our
instagram as at miss in History. You can come to
our parent company's website, which is how stuff works dot
com and find lots of information about all kinds of stuff.
(37:03):
And then you can come to our website, which is
missed in History dot com. You will find show notes
for all the episodes Holly and I have done. You
will find an archive of every episode ever, so all
kinds of cool stuff at how stuff works dot com
or missed in History dot com for more onness and
(37:23):
thousands of other topics. Does it how stuff works dot
com
Stuff You Missed in History Class News
Hosts And Creators
Holly Frey
Tracy Wilson
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