The Dollop with Dave Anthony and Gareth Reynolds - 529 - The Taxi Cab War

Episode Date: April 19, 2022

Comedians Dave Anthony and Gareth Reynolds continue to examine John Hertz and the Taxi Cab Wars Sources Tour Dates Redbubble Merch

When you're staying at an Airbnb you might be like me wondering could my place be an Airbnb and if it could what could it earn? You could be sitting on an Airbnb and not even know it. That in-law sweet guest house where your parents stay only part-time Airbnb it and make some money the rest of the year whether you could use a little extra money to cover some bills or for something a little more fun. Your home might be worth more than you think. Find out how much at airbnb.ca slash host. You're listening to the dollop on the all-things comedy network. This is American

History podcast where each week I, David Anthony, read the story from American or Australian history to my friend. A gear of Threnold's who has no idea what the topic is gonna be about. Really don't. I don't. I don't. See the show notes for details. Inside Joe to start the show. We're in Australia. Oh my god. Yeah. Congratulations on your COVID airport. Man. Pack everybody in to get COVID. I mean it is amazing to like we knew COVID was airborne but did we know America was airborne and so highly contagious. And called it quote his jam pad. Jam pad. I'm the fucking hippo guy. My name's Gary. My name's Gary. Wait. Is it for fun? And this is not gonna come to Tiggly Cloud. Okay. Now hit him with the puppy. You both present sick arguments. Actually. My friend. We are brought to you in part by athletic greens, which we use every day at

this point. Gareth, why did you start taking athletic greens? I know you're I started to take. I mean, honestly, when they sponsored us like two years ago and they sent product and it was I loved it. Basically, it's just a great way to just get a ton of nutrients in your body right away and traveling on the road. It's such a great thing to bring on the road because you you know what I mean? Like you're just kind of thrown in the middle of nowhere and you can't like get your greens as often as you can. This is just a great way to supplement it. So I'm a huge fan. You get you're absorbing 75 high quality vitamins, minerals, whole food, sourced superfoods, probiotics, and adaptogens, which I didn't

even know are a thing. Look, a lot of people are taking some kind of multivitamin. So it's important to choose one with high quality ingredients that your body can actually absorb. And that's that's what this is. Yeah. And you can get like a big jar of it or you can get like little packets. So it is super, super easy. It's just pour and water, shake, done. So right now it's time to reclaim your health and arm your immune system with convenient daily nutrition. It's just one scoop and a cup of water every day. That's it. No need for a million different pills or supplements to look out for your health to make it easy. Athletic Greens is going to give you a free one year supply of immune supporting vitamin

D and five free travel packs with your first purchase. All you have to do is visit athleticgreens.com slash dollop. Again, that is athleticgreens.com slash dollop to take ownership over your health and pick up the ultimate daily nutritional insurance. We're also brought to you in part by Helix sleep. Of course, Helix is a mattress that you go online. You take a little quiz. It tells you what mattress to get you order it and then it comes to your house. It comes alone because when I went it was at the door and and then you invited in and you take it out of the box and then it it screams and it comes to life. It's like a birthing as it comes out of the box. It's not wet. It's a dry berth, but it's it's a berth nonetheless

a dry berth. And and then you've got a mattress. I actually the last Helix we got, which was recent. We got another one for the boy, but we put it on the box spring and then had it just come to life right there. So we didn't have to move it. Just that's cool. Yeah. Like I said, you go to you go to the website, you take a quiz. It takes like two minutes. It's going to match your body type and how you sleep. The preference is all that. They have soft, medium, firm mattresses, mattresses, really good for cooling you down. If you sleep hot mattresses that are good for spinal alignment, you sleep in aches and pains. I sleep on my face. They have one for that. I got a medium. I'm going to move around a lot. Do some

somersaults. Nightmare. I've also been known to have sexual intercourse. Oh my God. This show is not going to be. We're not doing this. I'm fired. So look, I love it. I've been the whole family's on Helix sleep matches. You have one now. Yeah, I love Helix. Yep. So look, so if you're looking for a mattress, go take the quiz. You order the mattress that you're matched to and the mattress comes right to your door shipped for free. Helix is the order the number one best overall mattress pick of 2020 by GQ and Wired magazine. It's been recommended by chiropractors and doctors. So look, helixsleep.com slash dollop. Take the two minute quiz and they're going to match you with the correct mattress. They have a

10 year warranty and you get to try it out for a hundred nights risk free. And if you don't like it, they're going to come pick it up, but they're going to let you're going to like it. So it doesn't matter. Helix is offering up to $200 off all mattress orders and two free pillows for our listeners at helixsleep.com slash dollop. That's up to $200 off all mattress orders and two free pillows at helixsleep.com slash dollop. We are also brought to you in part by Edmunds. Obviously, you know, the auto industry, there's just so much stuff going on, you know, and there's always been tons of changes and they're hard to keep up with, you know, the new technology, the new kind of everything. And then, you

know, that makes it hard when you're buying a new car to figure out what you want, what's needed, yeah, like all that stuff. So yeah, it might be new things you're thinking you need in the car now. Yeah. And so I've been using Edmunds for years. One of the things I really like about Edmunds is the Edmunds free vehicle appraisal. Like my last car, I got appraised. So what I did was I had it appraised and then I could know if I could trade it in or take it to like CarMax and sell it and what the right price would be. So you're not getting ripped off. And with that, you can, with the trade in, now you know what your cars were. So you can go in and factor that in and be like, well, I want

a car with better gas mileage. I want a hybrid now or something like that. Sure. Which you might, might be time. Yep. And the online appraisals doesn't ask for any personal information. And it's instant. There's no obligation after you do it. You just go to Edmunds, you get the appraisal, it's good for seven days. If you Google how much a car is worth, the results are going to lead you to Edmunds because it's how big of a sight it is. And look, Edmunds really makes researching a car super easy. They got all kinds of categories. They got reviews. They tell you what cars on what lot and what color it is and all the stuff it has on it. Like it's very detailed and it, if one dealer has like seven of the same car,

you can probably get a big deal. That's where I shine. You probably get a better deal. That's where I shine. That's where you shine. And then they got best car rankings and in-depth reviews and all that stuff. So I highly recommend it. Like I said, I've been using it for years. Every time I buy a car, I'm on Edmunds for a long time before I go buy a car. So if you're considering making a change on the road, Edmunds is here to help. Visit Edmunds.com slash appraisal to get your free online appraisal today. That's E-D-M-U-N-D-S dot com slash appraisal. Edmunds, they drive it like it is. We are also brought to you in part by Squarespace. Now, Squarespace is essentially part of our family at this point. We go when we go to reunions,

they're there. But why? We're with them all the time anyway. It's a lot of hugging, a lot of hugging that goes on. Yeah, we, Gareth has his website with Squarespace. I have my Squarespace, my website. Dallup site is Squarespace. Dallup and then the Dallup sources. So we're all in. We're 100% in. Why? Because it's easy to use, looks really nice. They're very crisp, nice looking websites. And you can, you can change and you can use a bunch of different templates and check out which one you like, which one works best for your business. I know that you're into, you have the whole cat, large cat business that people, nobody really needs that except for one guy. But fatcat.com, is that what it is? No, why don't you just keep doing, no, Huskers is not a, that's offensive. What an offensive term that is. Squarespace has

domains and websites and online stores and marketing tools and analytics, they have it all. You can sell products, you can sell digital stuff, you can sell subscriptions, sales analytics, extensions, they have it all. They have everything you would want. If you try to do a little business on there, you can just set up a sweet little engagement thing. I know you and Jose are going to do that. Well, so yeah, I can't recommend Squarespace enough. So here's what you're going to do. You're going to go over to squarespace.com slash dollop for a free trial. And when you're ready to launch, use offer code dollop to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain. We should say we have a special show coming up here in Australia, two special says that we've added on. So we're

starting a new podcast called the past times. And we're going to do a little sneak preview here at the Melbourne company festival on two days from now, right? The 21st. Yep. Or whatever, how many days it is. Thursday, the 21st. Is that right? I feel like it's not Thursday, the 21st. Let's get that right. It's Thursday, the 21st. Good work, Dave. Good talk. Thursday, the 21st, we're going to be doing it. So go to dollpodcast.com for tickets. Also Sentry has the tickets. And just buy them. Should we say what it is? No, let's keep it a surprise. Great stuff, Dave. We should also point out the night after that and the night after that, I will be doing shows at in Melbourne without my booby Davey. But if you want to see that, you can go to gareth

reynolds.com. That is Friday, the 22nd and Saturday, the 23rd. Oh, yeah. So it is at the European beer cafe, the rooftop. That's Friday, April 22 at 945. The following night, same place, European beer cafe, 945. That's at Melbourne. Go to gareth reynolds.com for ticket information. Also, we, when we're done with Australia, I guess, well, actually, we're in other places in Australia. If you want to come see us, we'll be in Adelaide. We'll be back at Melbourne this Sunday. We will be in Brisbane on the 27th. We will be in Sydney on the 29th. We'll be in Canberra on the 30th. We'll be back in Sydney May 1st, and then we'll be in Perth on May 3rd. Go to dollpodcast.com for all those. And then the United States, we will get to you somehow, some way.

You're going to be flying. It might be walking. Go to dollpodcast May 12th, Boston, May 13th, Town Hall, New York City, May 14th, Washington, D.C., 15th Philadelphia, thanks for indoor masking, June 2nd, Barrymore Theater, Madison, June 3rd, Milwaukee, June 4th, Chicago, June 5th, St. Paul, Minnesota, June 17th, Seattle, June 18th, Portland. So join us for those in Dave. I have an exciting announcement. I'll even say the date. I am making a return, June 23rd, to Flappers. So for those of you in the Los Angeles area who are always like, why don't you do shows in LA? It's because they don't want me, but Flappers will have me. So I will be there June 23rd. Flappers get desperate. I'll be there June 23rd. April 10th, 1879.

Year of Lord Jesus Christ. Wow, what a nightmare. What? It's just so not helpful. Well, it's, sometimes it gets a little fun. You know what I mean? Well, we, let me just say quickly, for some of these East Coast shows, we do have a beer that we have made with Twin Elephant Brewing, and it is called Beer of Our Lord. That's right, Beer of Our Lord. And I was sending a picture of the vat today. It is happening. So at some of those shows, definitely in New York, we will probably have Beer of Our Lord. Shandor Hertz was born into a Jewish family in a part of Austria, Hungary that is now Slovakia. Shandor is a name that we got to get back into the fall. 100%. Shandy. No, no, no. Shandor. Shandor is like, you want to go full, well in

Australia, it would be Shandy. Yeah, well, that's everything here. Or Shanno. Yeah, Shanno, he'd be like, I am Shandor. Yeah, you can't, you actually, you're right. I make thunder. I am Shandor. That's right. Yeah. How did you know what the story is about? He makes thunder. I am the thundermaker. Shandor is the name. He is the oldest of six alive children. Nice to put it that way. When he was three, the family emigrated to America and then lived in Chicago. Okay, best country. A ton of immigrants there at the time. It's just everyone's moving there. So it's a big mixing pot. The city exploding in population. Now his name was switched to John at some point. It's close to the original. It's very similar to Shandor. John ran away from home when he was 12.

He was like, I'm fucking out of here. He better take Shandor back on. He said it was after a quote sound beating from his dad, not just random. Those are the ones that that's that's a love beating. Those are nice ones. Yeah, you got to just sometimes knock a couple of teeth out. Yeah, especially in this era. This is how you expressed yourself. He would later say he richly deserved it. He deserved the beating. Well, that certainly shows that he was not brought up in a tough environment where, you know, he was meant like he actually equated abuse to something that he did. That's fine. I had it coming. Yeah. So when he when he left the house, he already had a read and write, he'd gotten a bit of an education there. So he got a job as a copy boy with the Chicago

Morning Herald, or the Harry, as they call it. Uh huh. He worked nights. God, it's just a good 12 year old life. It's crazy. It's also crazy that it's kind of starting to happen again. Come back. Yeah, 100%. And during the day, he'd get in tons of trouble because no parents, right? So he's just out fucking around. He said he was quote as wild and untamed as the grass on the prairie. He can read and write. He can really can. Also, I don't look at the prairie and go, look how wild. Look how wild and untamed this grass is. It's not tamed grass. Yeah, but it's not. It's still just unkempt grass. It's just grass. No, but it's no. Look at the grass going. This is fucking wild. Well, I'll tell you a lot of men with mustaches in the Midwest here,

they're like that crab grass. This is out of hand. I've let it gone wild enough. What? Because I describe myself. I mean, it's it got a little close because I'm a man from the Midwest of the mustache. Yep. Whatever. Straight out of Wisconsin shot of a cannon. And yeah, there it is. Green Bay tattoo. So he enjoyed boxing, got into boxing. His lifestyle, however, of being on the streets, not eating enough, getting into fights a lot, took a toll. And one day, the Harold's doctor said the Harold's doctor. This is back when a newspaper had a doctor. Okay. We're looking to hire a doctor to write. No, just a lot of fingers get broken on all the typing and breaking news, breaking hands, you know what they say.

Doctor, we've got a kidney problem in sports. Oh, boy, I'll get right over there. Well, the problem is you've buried the lead and now it's below the fold. It hurts. Of course. Cut it out, dog. We're going to need to break some news to get in there. I haven't done a kidneyectomy since I guess I was I guess in the wedding department. So the Harold's doctor says he's unfit to work. He's like, you can't work here anymore because of all the face bruising and not eating enough and all the other stuff. I feel like the doctor, I mean, okay. Should he have another concern? Like, should he be like, should he like try to help instead of just being like, well, unfortunately,

medically speaking, you're fired back then help was like, we're putting you on a train to Omaha. So you're fired. You're really, really sick. Get out of here. Get the fuck out of here. I'm done. My work is done. You're in a bad state. Leave the paper. Get out of the paper. You don't look well. You're sick. Leave the paper. So he moves on and he finds a job driving a horse drawn carriage delivering stuff. Sure. Right. Sure. That's a 12 hour work day. It's the gig economy. It's good. It's he's like probably 1314 at this point. Sure. In the little time he had, he paid $10 for boxing lessons and spent a ton of time at the gym. So he's fighting. He's learned how to fight. Right. Probably avenge that doctor paper. Yeah. Beat the shit out of that guy. He did box a little bit

professionally under the name Don Donnelly because it was better to have an Irish name than a Jewish name. Sure. Right. Listen, quit shirking Shandor. Shandor the boxer. I am Shandor. Stippin' ring. Shandor's here. I will make thunder in the ring. I don't disagree with anything. It will shake you to your foundation. I don't. Ladies and gentlemen, weighing it at everything, Shandor the thunder maker. Shandor. I don't want to box the thunder maker. That's right. I am Shandor. Yeah. No, he's scary. I don't want to box that guy. I just want to box that guy. Come on, Iron Mike. Fight Shandor. Did John hurt Jimmy or something like that? Is that Frank? And your heavyweight champion, Mike Tyson versus Thunder making Shandor. That's really thick. I am just

a rapist. That's quite a confession, Iron Mike. What a weird. I freaked out. Jesus. Not good shit talk. So he still knew people at the Herald and because he's around boxing a lot, he would give him tips for, you know, a little bit of extra scratch. Okay. Like who was good or what? Yeah, we're just like, well, like, is that guy injured or something like that? Okay, right, right. And then they had him start writing like little paragraph things. Look who comes crawling back. Yeah, right. And then and then he starts writing actual articles and he turns into a good, a good writer. So what with the Herald doctors? He like, well, well, this is awkward. Now that you've been getting punched a lot, I think you're ready

to come back. You've gone the other way. Now you've been hit so much, you're good at your job. Has somebody been eating beans? Look at you. So you've really grown into those welts. Yes, I'm swelling on the left thigh. Absolutely. So he starts pretty soon. He's making $3,000 a year as a sports writer and then an editor. Okay. But then the Herald and the Chicago reader merge and he gets laid off. Okay. They probably had another, the reader probably had another kid who was ill health boxing writer. I'm the guy who's wilting from bruises over here. No, I might bruise the bigger. Well, medically speaking, there can only be one. I suggest we cut both boys in half and put them each together as one. I didn't want to say it, but yes. All right. So at 24, he started

managing boxers. Interesting. God, he's a whole, I mean, everything just happens so much early. Yeah, I really do. Well, I'm retired. I'm 24. I was in my prime six years ago. So one was Benny, a yanger, also known as the Tipton slasher. Right. Yeah. For carrying the knife into the ring and stabbing people. It would just slice them right across. Well, he didn't see that coming. He's down. He's dead actually. Look at the slasher. He met and fell for Francis Kessner and soon they were engaged. Now he's making good money, but her family and Francis herself after her family talked to her said it's not happening until he gets a better job. Okay. This managing box or shit. Right. Not, not cool. Right. So

a friend told him to try car sales because cars are new and they're taken off. Everyone wants one. Right. So he did and the first year doesn't go well. He's bad at it. Okay. And the second year it starts to take off and he is making a lot of money. What didn't help at the first time he ever got into a car was when he was 26. So he'd never been in a car. Well, that's hard to sell him at the same time. How fast does it go? These things go. Hey, you guys should buy this thing. I have no idea what it is. Kind of mileage is an automobile like this. Five or 20. Five or 20 what? In yes. In yes. Yeah. It goes, it goes a bunch of yeses. There's no no's involved in this at all. That's why I mean, no, no, no. The question, how far, no, what, what is the,

how many miles per gallon of petrol does this automobile get? I only know by whoopsie doodles. So it can get like 40 whoopsie doodles. Like if you, what is a whoopsie doodle? Is that a chocolate bar? How many, it's no, how many, how many whoopsie doodles can you say to get from here to the library? It's like 42 whoopsie doodles. But is that, that's some sort of metric for you or? Yeah, your whoopsie doodle. And then you do 42 of those. And that's, that's it. How many horsepower? I just said, you're thinking of a carriage. This is a motor vehicle. No, no, no. No, compared to, well, compared, how many, when I drive it, how many horses will it feel like I have pulling it? You know, now that I actually hear that, that is a pretty crazy question to be

asking someone. That is a very strange question to still compare that to. It seems like you don't know what you're talking about. I feel like I've got, now how many whoopsie doodles was it again? 42 to get to the library. Pretty good, darling. What do you think? A thousand whoopsie doodles an hour. Well, hello. There's no engine in this. Yeah, what's the difference? You're fair. So, so second year selling cars, he totally takes off. He comes around and out sells everyone at the dealership. He makes the equivalent of $350,000. Wow. Okay. So other, now other dealerships, other dealerships want him, right? Sure. He's a free agent. Yeah, he gets wooed away by Weldon Shaw to sell these expensive French cars. I didn't look up the name

because who cares? A French car, who cares? Right? Right? Sure. I assume it's just Pujo. What else? I got nothing to, I can't push back, unfortunately. I would love to defend the honor of the French. I would love to defend the French. So John invests 2000 in the business. So he's investing now. Sure. It went from losing money to making money in 1907 when he gets there. So he turns it around. Since cars are new, they're not, there's not really used cars. Okay, right. There's no used car market. Wow. That's amazing. Isn't that weird? Yeah. The first time that happened, someone's like, but it was yours. Yeah, it's not mine anymore. I have to buy your waste? Well, it's, you know how sometimes, like if someone's wife will die, then she'll have a bunch of clothes and you go buy them

for your wife. Yes, of course. It's like that, but it's a car. Wow, it is like my dead wife's clothes. Yeah. Gosh, you really just broke that down so eloquently. Well, that's why I'm a car car. Car's, car's man. We don't have a name for how many whoopsie doodles. We don't have a name for what a guy named how many whoopsie doodles does an automobile like this get 1500 an hour in French. Mm hmm. The whoopsie doodles. Correct. The whoopsie whoopsies. So, uh, so they're making money. There's no used cars, but now people are starting to want trade ins. They're like, I want a new one. So the dealers start doing trade ins, but then they have these used cars and they're like, what the fuck, we should have thought about the second part

of this. This is a bad idea. We just got a bunch of shitmobiles. John quote, as my customers weren't buying, as my customers weren't buyers of secondhand cars, I had to put on my thinking cap to find some way of disposing of them or making them earn their keep. Truckasaurus. Truckasaurus was born. Now most people in cities are getting around on trains or horse-drawn carriages still, although the rich would rent a car for an hour a day, uh, or a day for an hour or a day. Sorry. So rich people would rent cars. Mm hmm. That seems strange. And then taxis start to pop up. Oh, here we go. They're owned by a hotel or a theater. Taxis are shuttles, basically. Yeah, it's basically a shuttle. Right. Um, so John convinces the Shaw's to take the traded used

in cars that they have and put them out on the streets as caps. Wow. Okay. So this is taxi origin. So what are you talking about? Independent of businesses. You should be laughed out of this town boy. Get into a stranger's car. This is crazy. So if they start by the first thing to do is they put 10 cars out and they're driving members of the Chicago Athletic Association. So it's just tied to that. Okay. Business, right? Right. And, and then in 1909, they start the Walden Shaw auto livery company. So now it's not tied to anything. Right. Other companies are also saying this and getting into the taxi business. There's a lot of taxi businesses starting up now. Right. And they all start making exclusive deals with businesses. So there'd be a cab stand

outside of a theater for one company. Only that cab company can pick up people from that theater. Was there still the guy like last night I took me forever to get a cab from the airport. And there's always the guy like the shady guy who's like not in his car, but he's like standing outside. He's like, you need a taxi? Yeah. Just like, but I'm not, listen, I've watched Taken. I've watched three of the Takens. I'm not. Come on. You want to get murdered here? Yeah. Come on. What do you want? He put even murdered in the back of a car before. I guess though, I mean, it's, it's, it's, it's crazier than like Lyft or Uber, but it's still, it's like, I mean, it is a little bit, but it's still like Lyft or Uber is like.

Do you remember when we went to Ireland and they have a whole system where you can check the driver and do a whole thing? Yeah. Other countries should have that, but why would you? Well, I mean, come on, what do you want to do? Like give people a feeling of safety and protection when they're in a stranger's vehicle? So taxis are taken off really quick, which means more cap companies. So, you know, more people are like, taxes are great. And then they're taken off, more businesses are coming out. So a lot of competition. The shot company merges with another and they become the biggest company. Okay. Now, John is one of the three owners. All right. And they start buying custom cars for taxing. So it's very specific cars

that are built to taxi. Right. They expand into St. Louis. It's not an easy business. Cabbies are mostly dicks to customers at this point. They're just fucking assholes. Carried through. Decades and decades. That never stopped. Right. Were they on their cell phones and you couldn't tell still? Like when you're like, get them one now and he's like, Oh, absolutely. Yeah, that's for sure. Yeah, we got a hole in this guy. I think I'm talking to him. Not you, sir. Okay. So John starts hiring women to combat the dick guy thing. Interesting. Wow. People are probably like, this guy's lost his marbles. Well, this guy's a dick. But how am I going to get in a car with someone who can't drive? I mean, good Lord. What the fuck are we doing here?

So whoops. Right. So he's hiring women and also the drivers. It's amazing that you can't like talk dudes out of being assholes. You need to like gender swap. Like you can't like reason with men. You know what I mean? He's like, rather than try to talk to all these assholes, I think it's better to just eliminate men from this project. Yeah, let's get rid of the men. This isn't really, I don't know what else to do. I've really, I've tried to talk to them. It just they really are just assholes. Yeah, they're not when I tell them when I say, Hey, can you guys be nicer? They go fuck yourself. Oh yeah, for sure. Fuck you. So the cap the cab drivers off also want to be treated better. Oh, here we go.

They went out on strike because they wanted a 72 hour work week instead of the 83 hour work week. They just sometimes people are so greedy with their time, their lives. Three fucking hours. Well, I mean, you know, when you think about like Lyft or Uber now, I mean, you know, that in order to carve out a living, you've got to work around that or more. Yeah. Which is again, amazing, like how we have just gotten back to it's just all back. It's all right back where it was. So the entire cab system is like just a mess. Companies would charge different rates, some city governments set rates so the companies couldn't even make money. Companies started fighting over cab stands. Fist fights start breaking out between drivers.

Nice cab stands. Nice. Other fights would happen when one cab would jump the line. Sure. So in 1914, John goes to Paris with his wife on a little vacation, they go to Europe and the but in Paris is where he's like, he sees this crazy thing called regulation. What is this magical term? Why is everything working in harmony here? Unbelievable. Drivers are very nice. Cabs are all colored the same. So you know which car is a cab. It's amazing that that took a trip to Paris. Like it was you were just like, are you excuse me? Are you a cab? No, I'm a cab. Oh, good Lord. So he comes back and he paints all the cabs yellow. Nice. And the company is changed. The company name has changed to yellow cab.

Wow. God damn 1914. Yeah. He starts paying drivers more. So he didn't just have assholes. Right. So right when he went I'll hire women instead of his first thought being what if I pay more to have better guys. Yes. It was not his first thought. Well, to be fair, he was in America where that is just really a hard thing to process and think of. Why can't I pay these people like shit and have them be nice? Because you're American. Your instinct is right. Thank you. Change everything with it. Don't make your life much harder to figure out ways to not pay people more but better that than pay people more. Thank you. Plus they'll be miserable and so dependent on you. These aren't humans with souls. Right. These are work husks. Yes. So he now is paying more.

He's getting the best and most friendly drivers. I mean, you're paying for people to be like it's amazing just paying to be nice. Yeah. Yeah. It's a nice bump. The other cabs started training drivers. They'd never trained them before. And so that's the break. Oh, that's going to change everything. My grandfather was a cab driver in San Francisco. And to become a cab driver in San Francisco at that time, you had to take a test. You had to know where to get everywhere. Yeah. So you would study maps of the city. Sure. And then you would have this knowledge in your head. And that's the only way you could be a cab driver in San Francisco. Yeah. Or most cities at that time. And now it's just like, well, I mean, even and then that also like does, I mean, you know,

it is like empowering to have a skill like that was like, I mean, I remember that like in movies when it would be like, hey, go pay the cab driver, he'll tell you all the secret ways to go around the city. Yeah. You know, stuff like that. He also had them wear uniforms. They were shining their shoes. They would clean cars after every ride. He gave. So here's the thing, though. He gave them about 20% of profits and they're leasing their cars. So they're leasing the car from him, they're getting 20% of profits. Right. So it's a little kind of independent contractory. He gives them health care, which is very rare. He also gave them dental and legal assistance. I mean, it's it's still great how dental does not fall under health care in any way.

It's a different hole in your head. Come on now. Teeth ain't body a body. Drivers were forbidden from working on their own cars, which was the total rarity in the taxi business. What does that mean? Well, they don't want you. They want the car to be safe. And if you just want to go out and work, you might drive out there and save car. Gotcha. Gotcha. Gotcha. So they're like, why don't we have different guys do this? Right. Gotcha. Right. So he has now he has garages with really good mechanics in them. Right. So they promoted their bed of drivers with big ads in the paper, right, telling them that their car company, their cab company are the best drivers. Okay. Quote, the drivers are educated men who have been taught

by Shaw. These drivers are married men and have children. We have no drunkards or joy riders or grouches or tip hunters. I mean, there is something to that as a single man. It's like, you are more open to just being like, I'm gonna go get shit face on my buddies tonight. This was like, no, no, he's held accountable by a wife and family at home. I would actually say there's probably more married men getting shit face because they don't want to go home and they go to a bar and stuff. Well, to each their own, Dave, I guess, I guess the good news is a lot of men are getting shit face. But at this time, there's just a shitload of guys who after work go have beers and they go home to their wife. Like it's I don't think it makes a difference.

Right. Right. And also, they're saying married men are nicer. Like what the fuck are you talking about? Oh, absolutely. Like it's kind of not always found that. Yeah. So in 1917, the company is just kicking ass. They started making their own cars. Okay. So now they're into car production and they buy smaller companies and they increase in size. So the main competition came about in 1919 with checkered cabs started by a driver from from yellow cab. No, he wasn't. I don't think he was from yellow cab, but he was a driver. Okay. Not a business, but an association of drivers. Okay. You got insurance, a garage to work out of. But John says, well, look, checkered cab are all guys who I fired. Right. That's a good marketing. Rumors swirled that the checker garage

had a closet that was full of guns. They have a gun closet? Is that like, what? Is that a selling point at the time? It feels like it could be. That's right. Here at checkered, we have a gun closet. You're not going to find that at yellow cab. So being an association, it's harder for John to deal with them, right? Right. Shut down or fuck with them or whatever you do. Well, that's why he needs to just put the cape on and be Shandor. I agree. The thunder will shatter checkered cab. Shandor. Hey, boss, we got a weirdo outside who's in a cave by the power of Shandor. He's in front of the garage. I demand to see the gun closet and talk to your leader. It says his name is Shandor. I will make the hills thunderous.

Yeah, he's talking about noises. Shandor. And he keeps saying his name, which I'm by the power of Shandor. Please open this Shandor. Hello. Are there anyone in there? No, we're not here. Damn it. When will you be back? Shandor, I have. You have what? I have to be somewhere. So I've like got a limited. I don't know. We'll be open tomorrow. That's what you said yesterday, empty building. Well, the hours shift. Just a terrible business model. Sometimes we all go and drive. I see. I think I see a shadow. Nope, that's a cat. All right, Shandor shall return tomorrow. What's that Jewish name? Shandor? Shandor? Yes, it has a Jewish roots. But to be fair, it is not attached to any religion when it comes to making of thunder, which is my power.

Shandor will return. Can you make some taxi? Can I get a cab? Can you make some thunder before you take off? Yeah, hold on. Maybe in a couple of days, it looks like. Yeah, yeah. So after you make the thunder, you come back here and we'll talk. All right. Can I get a cab? No, everybody. I'll walk. I'll walk. It's fine. I'll walk. All right, good. Thank you for coming. Thank you. Good cat. So he he's John is used to buying out or starving companies of business and then taking them over. Sure. The amount of business. So this is the whole new animal. So he goes to the city government because he's buddy buddies with the mayor. Okay, here we go. Mayor Thompson and then the cab stand ordinance was changed. So there's a cab stand ordinance that a lot of the rules

come from. So now drivers have to get a city issued permit to operate minis admissible cab stand. I bet yellow cab gets a lot of those. And check it out has trouble. Well, that's weird. Is that each driver had to be investigated before they got a permit and somehow did they know about it or were you like that guy's following me? Are you in my trash? No, I'm just what? No, I'm walking around. What are you talking about? I just have all of my bills walking around in the trash. I'm a guy. I'm a trash guy. I'm a walking cabbage. I'm a cabbage guy. Also, like I just just do stuff. You work for yellow cabbage. I knew it. No, I'm pretty good. Is it because of my yellow hat, my yellow shoes, my yellow suit? The uniform is quite a giveaway.

Yeah, I just thought I just thought you'd think I'd like curious George. Fair. That is one of our icons of the year. What a monkey. He's quite an incorrigible. Yeah, he's really without question and incorrigible. He's really something he almost sunk his ship once. Sorry. What's that? Yeah, he's also he also takes a bulldozer once in a while to the Children's Park. What? Yeah. Are these actual things are you fucking legitimate? Has it that does not sound curious? No, he's a problem. That is an aggressive George. No, if you if you put down what he does on paper, it's fucking terrifying. These are these are crimes. A fucking monkey in the city. What do you think's gonna happen? All right, that's it. We need to join force. First thing's curious. No, he does the

craziest shit. You're like, is anybody gonna call the fucking sunk a ship? I he almost sunk a ship. He does a lot of bad stuff. Stuck a bulldozer fucking monkey Lord. That's a podcast. So, so, yeah, somehow yellow cab drivers are getting instant approval for permits and checkered cab drivers are getting nothing. Right. So it's during a recession. They got to make money. They got to now they got to find other ways to make money. Drivers are, you know, having to quit. They're getting fucking pissed. So like I said, a lot of unemployment. And then there's a lot of race issues going on. There'd been there'd been massive race riots the year before led to 38 dead. Oh, fun. Prohibition has just started. Oh, boy, which means a huge quick rise in organized

crime. Oh, here we go. Are being used to transport illegal booze. Take people to speakeasy. Right. All kind of bring muscles, you know, muscle. You take a cab, if you're going to beat someone up and you jump in the cab and you go away, like it's all it's all I think like muscles, the food. No, the actual day they would they would cut someone's muscle out of like his leg and they put in the cap and they go, okay, take this over to Jimmy. No, okay. Sorry. All right. So they but it is muscles were like a big like, I mean, I don't know what you're talking about. There's a little bit too much Wisconsin happening right now. Which muscles are you talking about? The one on your arm where you punch a guy. They you're talking about a guy, a guy who's muscle, right.

Okay. Not if not a shellfish. Well, I mean, it's not crazy to picture like oysters and muscles being shipped to these speakeasies. That's what I'm thinking of first. I was like, you know, don't tell anyone we got a bunch of seafood for the speakeasy. I think muscles are illegal, my friend. Get out of here. Get out of here. Get those muscles over to Frankie's. You didn't see nothing. What are these? There's a bunch. There's a bit. There's a there's a cow tongue boys got shellfish. What do you take shellfish? What is shellfish? You mean stuff like fish off a shelf? No, it's a it's a it's a it's a shelled sea animal. These are cow tongues in the cow tongue called it. Muscles kid. Muscles. Muscles are someone your arm officer. What the fuck? These

are legal. What are you fucking doing? I don't care. I can ask if I can have like six or seven to bring home to the white. If did you think that you can't have muscles? You just seem so kind of where you stand with clams? Are you like, uh, I never even heard of them. Are they illegal? Clams? Yeah. No, you sure? No shellfish are illegal. It's all I've had a clam. Sure. I mean, never before I drive. Can you have them before you drive? Yeah, they don't do nothing to you. It's just it's a thing you eat. All right. These are all muscles and clams. We're taking them to a speakeasy where they're having a bunch of champagne. What the fuck did you just say? Oh, here we go. So, uh, so things between the two companies are heating up and on July 27 1920, two drivers get into

a fist fight and they start on the south side and then then I guess they it says the battle continued so then they must a loony tunes fight. Yeah, they got in their cars and they drove and then they keep fighting and then they get over the west side and now other drivers are getting involved in the fight and all these drivers are starting to fight. Uh, a car from the yellow cab company drove by a checkered cab company branch garage and shot into the offices. Oh gosh. So they got that gun closet. White men and men in the yeah, they shoot back men in the checkered garage a few minutes later. Shander over a dozen checkered cabs quote in close formation roared by the yellow branch garage pistols out the windows. The day by the way, just to be as an

outsider, the story is taking a bit of a turn. The checkered cab men shot at the yellow cab garage. The yellow cab men fired back and then hopped into their cabs and gave chase. Another checkered cab garage was shot at by three yellow cabs. Then all hell broke loose and shooting was happening all over the city. Wherever you saw yellow cab or taxi cab, cab, cab, cab, my hand, my hailing finger got shot off. It's from the AP quote. A battle between fleets of taxi cabs in which the vehicles were maneuvered according to the best strategy of tank warfare while their drivers fired hundreds of shots at each other, raged through the early morning hours on the streets of Chicago's west side today. What? So they had just an all night gun battle? It's an all night taxi

gunfight. All right. Okey dokey. Is that not normal? Um, no, it seems a bit. It's definitely strange. It's a strange direction. The paper described it as mobile warfare quote strings of yellow cabs in line rushed past the headquarters of the checkered cab company at breakneck speed emptying revolver broadsides into the latter's offices, rallying the black and white checkered cabs of the attacked, dashed out en masse and ripped into the yellow for counterattacks according to the best tactics of shock action. So it's just drive by shootings, but they're also working together. Like it's not just by shootings, like they're in formations. Sure. Sure. Right. Like do a V. You know, it's cab shit. Right. Um, cabs were also flying down streets and shooting

each other. It went on until the sun came up. Stop. Sun's up. Somehow there's no injuries. Wow. So yeah, I mean, they were like, it's really hard to shoot. It is really hard to shoot and drive really hard. I got to like keep my eyes on the road. I'm trying to shoot. Three cab drivers were arrested. It's really a little small amount. I would assume the cops didn't have a lot of cars. These guys got muscles. Get them. The fighting went on and would flare up over months. Well, everyone saw there'd be a gunfight between sure taxis. Sure. On August 7th, two drivers were shot on August 20th, 50 cabs were positioning for a theater emptying out and things became heated. And then they started ramming their cars into the opposing company's cars. Wow. One driver was shot.

By this time, 10 cab drivers have been killed. Jesus. That is good. I mean, that like certainly takes some of the luster off of getting like if you're coming out of the theater, you're like, maybe we should walk. I don't know about this. These cabs, it seems like you're more likely to die in a cab now. Yeah. So here's my my one qualm with taking a cab is I don't want to get shot and killed. You know, I just want to get home alive. So that's definitely a like a drawback. Yeah. I could get the horse carriage just around. I would like to get one of those. I just don't want to take a bullet. There's only one man who could really solve all this. If you think about it, Frank. No, no, Frank's good. Timmy. Timmy's good too, for sure. But just someone. You're

talking about the bird. No, the bird. No, no, it's Jean foie. Jean foie. La Burton. Jeff. No, no, Shandor. They got the muscles guy. No, no, the thunder guy, the guy who can make thunder. He's never made thunder. That's the thing. No, he has. I'm sure they did a whole investigation and they're like, Nope, no thunder from this guy. He's definitely made thunder. That's his whole thing. He just tells you. Yeah. Yeah, it's kind of it's kind of sad. So it turns out that he as a kid was Shandor is here. Here we go. He was like separated from Will some thunder help the situation family and he lost his name. So hey, what are you talking about? Are you talking about me? It's like a split personality thing where he's got some kind of Hey, I still keep a great touch

with my family. Like it's like a psychotic break. You have made me do what I didn't want to do, which is cast thunder down upon ye sir. Here's the thing though. Thunder will reckon this moment. Look, I'm looking up. There's no thunder. Also, you can't see thunder dumbass. Yeah, you can't feel it either. So it doesn't fucking do anything. You can hear it. So you're gonna make it loud around me. Well, a lot of thunder would really could rupture some stuff and shatter windows. Okay. Well, do you want that? I've never seen it because you've never done it. Well, you've never seen thunder, but you could see the buildings if I do not tempt me, sir. I'm tempting. You're tempted. Shandor couldn't do for tempt. You're lucky. I'm in a good mood. You're

always in a good mood. I'll make thunder in a few days, maybe depending on the clouds. I'll be back. See you all. Do you want to come home and call you a cab? No, no, I'll. I mean, is that cool? I don't know if it's cool, but yeah, I took a cab. You might get shot and killed. Taxi! I got that dark. At the end, it got weird. Well, no, it was weird. It's going on and on, the fighting. Ten guys are killed, like I said. In September, the bombing of cabs started. A lot of cabs are destroyed by fire bombs. Well, there's bombs, so that is gonna track with what I'm thinking bombs do. In June, 1921, some checkered drivers tried to take over a yellow

cab stand at the Hotel Sherman, which led to a big fight. Yellow cab bosses said they told their drivers to not get involved and keep the peace, but then they got punched and so they responded and fought back. Don't keep the peace anymore. I want you to keep the peace until you take one in the face and then it's peace off. Abandoned peace. A checkered driver was arrested. A checkered cab drove at high speed and rammed the back of a yellow cab. Then the two drivers got into a fistfight in the road. Police came and arrested several checkered cab drivers. So whatever happens, they're just arresting the checkered cab drivers. Oh, right. Okay. Yeah, because of the, because of John's ties to the city, the mayor. Another checkered cab was surrounded by yellow cab drivers

and forced off the road and crashed. In another fight at the Hotel Sherman, so a second fight happens, driver Morris Steuben was severely hurt when someone hit him over the head with a brick. Oh my God. This is intense. Cabbing is serious business. It's, there is an energy. There is an energy. Yeah. A bit later, PA Scriven and other yellow cab drivers. Pa Scriven. Were standing around talking in front of the yellow stand at Roosevelt and Kedzie when a car sped by and three men shot over 25 times. Wow. One hit Scriven just above the heart and he died. Police said they thought it was the checkered cab company. And they would be right. Yeah, I'm sure they were totally right. Yeah. Well, we've done our work and we're pretty sure it was

probably that cab company that's been shooting your way a bunch. Well, there were checkers on the side of the cab. So we figured, you know, there are a lot of, not a lot of cars I've checkered. Yeah, that's what we're thinking too. That's the thing is all these, these companies, they all have picked a certain look like the checkers of the yellow. So when they commit a crime. It's a pattern for sure. When they commit a crime. It's absolutely a pattern in a couple of ways. It's a pattern that they keep doing it. And the checkered look is also a pattern. Yeah, it gives them away like it's stupid. Like it's a, well, yeah, well, we're still investigating, but we, we think we have a company that we've definitely, we have a company of interest.

Let's put it that way. I'm just saying no one else has checkered cars. So yeah, well, that's kind of our point to you a little bit that we're pretty sure that it could be the other cab company who keeps fighting with you guys. We're not willing to, you know, we're not shutting down the investigation just yet, but all signs point in that direction. All right, I'm just going to go shoot back, I guess is what. Hmm. It's interesting. That feels like a lead. Okay. So that night, there were at least four shootings between cab drivers, two cabs who were shot out were carrying passengers. So now that she's a group of yellow, I'll get out here. A group of yellow cab drivers flipped over a checkered cab. And then one of them was shot in the foot. One of the yellow cab drivers.

Is yellow cab out of the two companies is yellow cab being more aggressive? It feels like there's more damage being done by yellow cab from just kind of the I think that because they're not being prosecuted prosecuted that they feel they're free or right. Yeah. The next day, John Hertz responded with a statement, quote, we have gone just as far with the murderous methods of the checker taxi company as we intend to. It has only been comic opera warfare until tonight. Excuse me? Yeah. It's not like the 12 people have died. He's like, sure it was funny for a minute. We've all had a laugh. But from now on, it is going to be a fight to the finish. We feel that this is not where I

thought the statement was going. This statement sounds like one where he's like, we're done with them. This is over. This is crazy. Here's what we're doing as the CEO of the other cab company. I can say we are going to destroy every checkered cab driver on earth. There will be none left. I am Shandor. Oh my God, that's the next thing in this. From now on, it's going to be a fight to the finish. I am Shandor. We feel we might as well end the whole business right now. End checkered. Wow. Good Lord. John demanded the state's attorney hold a grand jury investigation into checkered cab. He said he knew the checkered drivers would try to take over the hotel stand on this exact day for weeks. And he had worn the cops quote. The whole thing is a climax to a fight

which has started six months ago. Many of the checkered drivers are former employees of the yellow cab company dismissed for inefficiency dishonesty or worse. Naturally, they hate the company. He said the yellow cab company had tried to stay above the fray conducting itself in a dignified manner the whole time except for when we flip that checkered cab and the shootings and the what up shootings. Obviously, his company was doing what was best for the city and it wasn't a game to them. And then quote, we do not propose to be interred with one minute longer. John offered a $5,000 reward for the man who had killed Script. The checkered cab company responded we did it with a $25,000 reward for proof that the shooters were checkered cab drivers. Seems like a weird

counter. All right. Well, we've got a $25,000 reward. If you can prove we did it. Hey, hey, hey, don't negotiate that. No, here's what I'm saying. If you catch one of us and we've done it, well, pay you money. A lot of it. John did not bring up the fact that two men in a yellow cab drove by and shot four times at checkered driver Joseph Zamowski, who lived at 5019 Melvina Avenue. Thank God. None of the shots hit him. Or the checkered driver Harry Rosenthal was sitting in his car when it was riddled with bullets by a passing car. That same car soon shot at two cops on 16th Street. We only hire bad marksmen here at Yellow Cab. The city's had it. Two alderman introduced a resolution calling on the police chief to keep both companies' cabs off the street

until they can guarantee they'll stop fighting. Oh, wow. They proposed revoking cab licenses. Okay. And then 50 checkered cab drivers were arrested in Chicago's Loop. Pretty much any checkered driver who drove into the first precinct was arrested for having no standing license. Okay. So they finally just were like, fuck it. We're just going to end checkered cab. Yeah. The checkered cab company said they were fighting the mayor's office, the union's, and Yellow Cab company. Which is true. Which is true. Philip Fox, who lived at 2342 Washburn Avenue. Hold on. Let me write that down. I want to get there. That's this guy. Every single guy in the story had an edge. Which is crazy. During like a warfare. A warfare. We've got to keep, try

to keep these guys safe. Here are all their addresses. So Philip Fox and five guys were arrested in David Brown's house at 2002 West Division Street. How'd they find him? He said he and the other guys were there to hide guns they used in the drive-by that killed Skirvin. The closet's full at work. So yeah, all we would do, we weren't doing anything wrong. We were just hiding the guns that we used to kill the guy. Yeah. That's all. Yeah. Nothing's strange there. We're not hurting anybody. I mean, we did hurt somebody, but now we're hiding. Now we're burying the evidence that would incriminate us. What? So that's all I'm here for? That's not a crime. So he later would say, well, okay, so he confesses, says he's not the shooter. He says quite a confession.

And he says those guys are the other. Okay, so he sells them. They're the guy in the car with me. He said they've been driving on Chicago all night doing as much damage as they could to yellow cabs. Right. Okay. Turns out he had been called by a checkered garage manager to drive that night and told to pick up the four guys. And then they were going to get revenge for the fight at Hotel Sherman. Okay. So he had no idea the four guys were actually mob members. Interesting. But Fox later said after, you know, the dust settles, he said, well, the cops beat me. I didn't actually confess to anything. Oh, weird. So police used to use violence to get confessions. Not that I know of. Okay. Interesting. That would be bad. David Brown was also arrested and said

that yes, they had come to his house to hide the guns. And he said he testified. And he said he didn't want to be released on a writ of habeas corpus. So he's like, I'm ready to squeal. Just don't pull me out of the streets. Yeah, he's real ready. Like they were like, boy, this guy's pretty fantastic. Lock me up. Yeah. The next the next night, the chief of police ordered all cabs picking up at Hotel Sherman to get in a line. And then he had just the checkered cab drivers arrested for not having a license. Sure. So okay, none of them are convicted, though. So the checkered cab company asked for a meeting with the police chief. And he told them he would not arrest any more cabbies until after the judicial election. Okay. But is he saying cabbie like that's legally

is basically he's saying there's a judicial election coming up. Oh, so he's right. You don't want trouble. You vote for our guys. And there won't be any arrest. I don't see checkered a yellow. I see cabbies. So a checkered, the checkered cab was not happy with this. And the checkered cab attorney told the reporter quote, if this was a hint for the checkered chauffeurs to line up with the Thompson Landon outfit in the judicial campaign, we ignored it. As a company and as individuals, we upheld the coalition candidates and gave them a dinner at which judge Hugo Friend was the principal speaker. So they're not rolling over for this right, you know, whatever, ploy, pressure, right, tactic, tactic. So checkered cab companies not backing on anyone. They they call

it a malicious abuse of power by the mayor, the police chief and the state's attorney. Now, the checkered attorney also said the yellow cab company was employing gunman and muscle. And one of them was actually bragging about the murders he had done for yellow cab company. Wow, okay. And he said cops are taking money from yellow cab. Okay. Quote, it's so easy for the yellow company to obtain indictments, but not for us. Last February, Billy Barton, a superintendent of the yellow cab company, was arrested as one of the men who riddled our garage on Broadway with bullets, damaging many cars. The case is still pending. So it's like when an email stuck in your outbox. It's exactly like that. Right. So and they're right. I mean,

obviously, like, yeah, they're just their thumb is on the scale just going against checkered cab. Yeah, john's john's got his hookup. He's got his hookup. He's got the judges. He's got the cops. He's got the so they're fucked. Right. In 1921, a grand jury investigation was held into look to look into cappy taxi cab violence. Okay. It noted that yellow cab had 1100 taxis. Checker had 674 taxis and planned to add 250 more before the end of the year. Okay. The investigation concluded that favoritism, cronyism and corruption were heavily contributing to violence. Hmm, interesting. Now the Fox murder trial happened and it became a huge media sensation. The first trial is a mistrial and then they have a second trial and Fox gets life for murder. Okay.

Well, all this is going on. So all the violence we've been talking about all this shit, Shandor, nobody's heard from Shandor. I agree. John is making bank. Right. He started a company to make taxis, buses and trucks. So he's selling those to all these transportation companies. It's a huge business is this. I mean, at this point, yellow cab is probably in a lot of other places like he's selling the brand. He's franchised it out. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. He set up owners in all these different cities. He put traffic lights in on Chicago Boulevard, paid for them himself. But the city liked him so much. Can I do that? There's a couple places where I'd love to just buy it.

It's such a rich guy thing. Yeah, I know. Should be like, I want some lights here. And the city liked him so much they reimbursed him and then started putting them in around the city. Okay. He came up with the windshield wipers. Wow. And a phone dispatch system. What did you do before the windshield? You're just like, well, we're going to live here for a while. And it went on for years, like years. It would just rain. You'd be like, no, that's it. Well, I guess we're sitting here. But honey, get the get the trunk blanket. We're sleeping in the car tonight. I'm sorry. It's wet. Yeah. What was your plan? All right. Well, I'm going to drive us to our death. It looks like

it's raining. I hope nobody gets in front of the car. Hopefully no thunder interrupts your drive tonight. Oh, Christ, don't say that word. Because you know what comes when it rains at time. Oh, don't the power of Shandor thunder to fall. No, I know. Thunder will come soon. Yeah, no, we'll sit around and wait for it. No, you have it. It's just a storm. It will be here. It's never here when you say it's going to rain. It's raining so much. There will be thunder. Shandor has decreed it. Christ. All right, Shandor. Just wait. I hear something. Do you hear that? No. You were talking over it. I think Gus let some gas go. Oh, well, that's nothing to do with Shandor. Nothing is nothing to do with Shandor. Shandor is just a guy with a cape who says,

capable of thunder manifestation. No, sir. Absolutely. So John is also buying up company after company that's involved in transportation in different cities, buses and all kinds of stuff. Right. He's a Titan. Him and his wife get super into horse racing. They're big in the horse racing circuits. Oh, cool. Honing their horses. Right, abusing them. So the violence is continuing, but it's mostly no longer on the front page. It's just like normalized. Strange. What a strange thing. And in 1923, organized crime is violently trying to take control of unions. The unions had some middling success in the Chicago cab industry. Drivers for both kind of companies are caught in the middle of all this shit. They just want to make a living, but it's

just, you know, in 1924, union officials are tossed out by checker cab management. Okay. And a group of police had been stationed at checker headquarters for protection after that happened, but they mysteriously were called back to the station house one day. And then four gunmen and masks came to headquarters and they made all the drivers and mechanics standing against a wall basically to freak them out. They're acting like they're going to assassinate them all. Jesus. None were shot, but they were scared. The next day, however, a driver was shot and killed in a drive by and another was wounded. Okay. So the Premier cab company was created. Premier was like, Hey, it's a pretty good business. We should get involved in this. What are you talking about?

It's a nightmare. It seems like what they need is a third. Yeah. Yeah. I see an opening for guys who aren't third party. Like not dead guys could do pretty good. We're Premier. We're pink. The Premier cab company was created right after the union officials were booted from checker cab. So they created that. Yeah. The checker company was placed on the unfair list of the Chicago Federation of Labor. Okay. It was believed mob leaders were invested in the Premier cab company. Now the cab stand at LaSalle hotel had been fought over for years. Originally the hotel at its own cab fleet. And then the drivers were getting in so many fights with yellow cab drivers that traffic was just stopped being stopped all the time in front of the hotel from the fights.

Right. Just street fighting. Well, it's fight traffic. So the hotel sells all their their taxi fleet. They sold them to the diamond cab company gave them the rights to the cab stand. But then quickly there was a lot of violence between the diamond cab drivers and the yellow cab drivers. So and and then yellow cab became yellow cab gets the rights. Well diamond did the diamond. Yeah. It died quickly. Right. But I mean that like is really in our society basically what just happens with everything which is just like the worst and violent will show they will win. So soon after that the deluxe cab company was formed which took over the LaSalle cab stand. Okay. But it also went on a business in the same way. Okay. Yeah. You're dealing with a monopoly

basically. Yellow cab is just terrorizing people. Yeah. A violent monopoly. Yeah. Violence then erupted at both LaSalle and Hotel Sherman cab stands as the premier cab company and the yellow cab company started battling over the stamp. Jesus. Right. So this so essentially was you have the checkered cab company which was semi bad and then all of the mob guys tried to take it over. They couldn't. They got kicked out. Then the mob guys just straight up started their own cab company. Right. They're just fighting. Right. In 1925 John Hertz merged the yellow cab manufacturing company with GM. Oh gosh. So now game over. He also he had bought a car rental business. GM also took that over. Okay. He got 40 million dollars which is 600 million today. Oh.

He gave 250,000 to longtime yellow cab employees. That's nice. What a nice. It's so not a lot of money. It's not a lot of money to give. I mean that's like 40 million. Yeah. But he's giving them that's nothing. That's nice. They made all the money. They're the labor and he's rewarding them. They made all the money and he's rewarding them by giving them a scrap. Who says the rich are generous. It's like when Bezos gives a hundred thousand dollars and people like see he's not a bad guy. You're like get the fuck off the Twitter. Do you understand me. Leave now. So he's involved in a ton of businesses now. He's still the president of the yellow cab companies chairman of Benzeline motor fuel company chairman of Chicago motor coach company chairman

of Fifth Avenue coach company chairman of New York transportation company chairman of omnibus corporation of America chairman of yellow coach manufacturing company chairman of yellow sleeve valve engine works chairman of yellow truck and coach manufacturing company. So it's just he's just complete. Yeah. Monopoly on the transportation industry essentially. So you need to spend years working behind the scenes to quietly lobby for the release of Philip Fox attorneys for the checker cab company finally got his sentence commuted in 1928 and the governor pardoned him at the end of that year. Wow. The yellow cab company is now the largest cab company in the world but there was also the mob. They're still around. They still have the

premier cab company. That's right. In early October 1928 some yellow cab garages were bombed. Hmm. We would hate to see that happen again. The next day Hertz's horse race stables were burned killing 31 very expensive race horses. It's nice when the horses are just going to make the horses and all this quote. The trouble was described as outgrowth of a taxi war after a checker driver was shot and killed. I love when it's like 31 horses die and people are just up in arms and it's like look I know it's really sad. It's not sad. They were worth a lot of money. Give a fuck about their feelings. Those were expensive horses. Okay. In October John told police his life had been threatened and he had been warned his grandchild would be kidnapped.

Okay. Yeah. But I mean he's like I mean this again it's like he's like this is just coming out of nowhere. I'm just a simple rich victim. Right. These are these are the rules he put in place. Yeah. And he's like and now it's finally effective. Yeah. It's finally effective. He's like oh my gosh. Not my grandchild. I mean he's essentially had these had his laborers in a war. Yeah. Over fucking cars. Yes. For like 10 years. Right. And he's like he finally gets touched. My grandson might get kidnapped. Look at his blonde curls. So what to do. Well he's 49. He's got so much money just like build so much money to make him again Dave it's moat time. Well he sold his interest in the yellow cab company. Okay. But he's still a prick. He's

still lit the fuse in 1929. He sold it to the owner of the checker cab company. And by the way 1929. I mean this dude's timing. I know. Is just like. Yeah. It's almost like he's otherworldly in some ways. You know what I mean. Like he's not even people like this just get lucky. Yeah. But it's also seems like he just had like some sort of super power in a way. Fucking his. But David feels like it feels like he probably has like he's a little more than just a man. No I don't know. He's saying like a like he might be a like super hero in a way. I mean I don't know. I'm just I'm just spitball here. It's just the level of what it just drained you physically. That's hard. Just seems like he might. What are you thinking. I soft pitch. Okay. He's

like maybe from another planet to some extent and his has a super power of conjuring elements. No. That's not. No. No. I'm just saying it sounds like he might actually like you said earlier. You said in this story earlier it's rumored that he made thunder. I feel like maybe that's true. I don't think I said that. Yeah. You said that's one of the first things you said. Yeah. I never said that. That's why I did the whole thing about the thunder because you said that it was rumored that he had a cape and was capable of conjuring thunder. You know play the tape back after. So he sells it to the checker cab company. He merges the two companies. John you know he still has his other business. He's still making tons of money. He has enough money

for the rest of his life. I mean he does find during the depression because he has so much money and he's involved in so many businesses. Yeah. That nest is full of stuff. He runs bus systems in New York and Chicago and St. Louis. And in 1933 after the Great Depression Wall Street was in trouble and Lehman Brothers came to him. His that name. He bought 8 percent in Lehman Brothers. Oh man. And now he's involved in even more business. He becomes the financial chairman of Paramount to rescue it like he's. Geez. He's involved in everything. His horse Count Fleet won the triple crown in 1943. In 1953 he bought back Hertz rent a car from GM. And then he retired. Chicago. Sorry. Hertz would. Hertz would change hand but remain a top rental company for years.

He declared bankruptcy in 2020 of June 2020 but got financing and is still around just before declaring bankruptcy. They gave key executives at the director level sixteen point two million dollars in bonuses. It's funny how they there's like money for it's just strange how it works. Yeah. Recently Hertz has come under fire for having hundreds of people arrested for car theft even though they returned their cars. What. Three thousand five hundred people have been arrested in jail for theft by conversion which means a renter who lawfully rented from Hertz is charged for theft event through Hertz who has his payment information on file. They also charged the person's credit card for the full amount of the car. What. For the full amount of the car. Hey honey.

Did you rent a car for thirty two grand. Just on the bill it's sort of like we have no money it because of Hertz. Charles Doucette was an elite president circles member who spent over fifteen thousand dollars with Hertz in twenty twenty and in twenty twenty one. He was arrested. What. Yeah. He was arrested and put in jail and that's fucking crazy and they charged his car and they did the whole. You stole the car that we have. That's crazy. So you know as as is to be expected. John Hertz lived a wonderful life. He died on October eight nineteen sixty one. His life Francis died two years later. They are now buried in Woodland Woodlawn Cemetery in the Bronx. Yeah. So he got to he got to do everything he wanted. Yeah. Of course he caused nothing but

mayhem. Right. And none of it. No I mean well first of all it's so crazy how I mean again like the roots of how cabs start is that is always so that stuff's so interesting like it's like traffic laws when we did that episode like it is it's just so interesting that you know there's some guy who was just like I think people might like transportation on the fly you know people are pretty crazy. But then I mean we just it just never has ended where it's like you just money equals power. The system just allows you if you have money to do whatever the fuck you want you get away with basically anything and because you're rich you have access and I mean it's you know I mean like everything else it's the main crimes that take place in this country are

are committed by people who are the heads of corporations where they just ruin their workers and they don't pay the money the politicians who allow that to be how this is all this is all because there weren't rules. Yeah. And and but that's the same thing now and then it's just like if you're poor you get fucking arrested. Yeah. You know that you are the criminal if you're fucking poor if you don't have the money then you know so it is and and I keep thinking that with like the people in our government like you know they're so fucking old that they are going to get away with this shit. Yeah. Like there's no some of them will probably see some shit but you know I mean these are like 80 year olds 85 year olds like they've created this nightmare house

of cards and they're not going to be around to watch it tumble they're just going to still have two fridges full of all the ice cream they like or you know just have access to all the shit that they want and nobody's going to you know they're not going to realize that it fucking they're not going to feel the error of their way. They never do. No. Not America. It's almost not anymore. France had it happen once. France is like I mean France you know they get out in the streets like pretty quickly. Yeah. Like bars won't have free matches anymore and they're like get your tractors downtown. We're going to show them. Yeah. Yeah. But here it's just we're like god damn it really sucks. They really really are fucking ruining everything. Well I don't have enough wiggle

room to protest. I got to go to work. Like they've really created quite a little prison. They have. It's good. That's just crazy. And then and and now I mean this our country even though we're not there right now I mean it is when we came in yesterday we were just like this is so America. Yeah. We're just watching. We're exporting. You're watching like that. We are like the anus of capitalism is now just being spread like those cheeks are just getting pulled apart and just enjoy. Yeah. People in other countries can't really understand what it's like. But we came into Sydney and the fact that there's one person working and trying to handle a bunch of machines that don't work. You're like oh this is America. Yeah. Well it's because we're trying to replace

workers with robots as much as possible as quickly as possible to save money and robots don't work and the robots don't work. And so you know you take the brunt of it. The citizens I mean and not just like for travel but in every you know in every way you're taking we are taking the brunt of that if you're a worker who has to work or you're basically you know managing the robot. So we have robot managers. Yeah. Not managers of workers and we're not there yet. And also that is when it comes to like job phobia you know like these immigrants are taking our jobs and that whole angle on society. It's like that is that that you are that's a straw man. I mean these machines are actively being created to try to do what humans do so that people don't have to get paid.

And then what's the fucking plan. The plan is that companies just save a ton of money and fuck you find a different job. Go work in the gig economy. Go drive a lift. Go drive an Uber. You know there was one the other day I think it was a McDonald's making fries and they created a robot and they were like it and they gave it like a funny name and like it's going to be our fry robot maker. And like so people will see it back they're making fries. And I was just like this is this is so pathetic that they they can't just replace it and leave it out there. They have to get something that looks that people be like that's cute. Look at the fry robot. He's got a name it's Mr. Fry. The normalization of like the AI shit like even I forget what the Amazon robot in

your house is. I can't remember what it's called. Oh no no there's like an actual robot. There's a robot robot. Yeah so there's like a robot button like Rodney and it has facial recognition technology and it's like you're supposed to like allow it to like recognize your face and you know recognize your family members faces. It's like I just cannot imagine being like that's a good call. Has nobody seen movies? Has nobody seen what happens with like a ring or Alexa or like the stuff where Alexa's just like I'll kill you and someone's like Alexa I said put on the Beatles. I'll kill your wife Alexa. Good times. All right great oldies. You great oldies. You great oldies. Sources for this episode American business history dot org

Jim Hinckley's america dot com chicagoology dot com and the washington post