WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:03.580 Picture this for a second a really simple twisted 00:00:03.580 --> 00:00:05.960 piece of metal just a regular wire right just 00:00:05.960 --> 00:00:08.519 wire. It's inexpensive It's totally unassuming 00:00:08.519 --> 00:00:11.800 and yet sitting right there on a basic wooden 00:00:11.800 --> 00:00:16.039 post it completely reshaped the physical and 00:00:16.039 --> 00:00:18.160 the political landscape of our entire world. 00:00:18.440 --> 00:00:20.100 Yeah, you see it driving down the highway, maybe 00:00:20.100 --> 00:00:21.960 stretching for miles along the roadside, and 00:00:21.960 --> 00:00:24.379 it just kind of blends right into the background. 00:00:24.640 --> 00:00:27.059 Exactly. It's one of those invisible forces of 00:00:27.059 --> 00:00:30.000 history. You really rarely stop to think about 00:00:30.000 --> 00:00:33.280 the sheer impact those little twisted points 00:00:33.280 --> 00:00:36.119 of steel have actually had on human civilization. 00:00:36.320 --> 00:00:38.579 Which is exactly why we're bringing this to the 00:00:38.579 --> 00:00:40.539 table for you today. Welcome to the deep dive. 00:00:41.100 --> 00:00:43.640 We have gathered a massive amount of historical 00:00:43.530 --> 00:00:46.890 documentation, design schematics, global impact 00:00:46.890 --> 00:00:49.850 studies, all of it centered entirely on barbed 00:00:49.850 --> 00:00:52.310 wire. The humble barbed wire. The humble barbed 00:00:52.310 --> 00:00:55.429 wire. And our mission today is to take you on 00:00:55.429 --> 00:01:00.049 a journey exploring how this really basic agricultural 00:01:00.049 --> 00:01:04.540 tool went from a random idea tinkered with in 00:01:04.540 --> 00:01:07.879 a farmhouse to a global symbol of both private 00:01:07.879 --> 00:01:10.000 property and severe oppression. We're basically 00:01:10.000 --> 00:01:11.939 doing all the heavy lifting to save you the time 00:01:11.939 --> 00:01:13.659 of digging through all that dense historical 00:01:13.659 --> 00:01:15.439 text yourself. Because there is a lot of it. 00:01:15.480 --> 00:01:17.099 There's so much. So we're really glad you're 00:01:17.099 --> 00:01:19.500 here. Let's just jump right in. To really understand 00:01:19.500 --> 00:01:22.500 why this invention hit the world like a lightning 00:01:22.500 --> 00:01:25.000 bolt, we really have to look at the landscape 00:01:25.000 --> 00:01:27.659 of the American westward expansion, specifically 00:01:27.659 --> 00:01:31.500 right before barbed wire existed. You have railroads 00:01:31.500 --> 00:01:34.629 expanding. at just a breakneck pace. And you 00:01:34.629 --> 00:01:36.569 have farmers pushing out into the plains who 00:01:36.569 --> 00:01:38.609 desperately need to keep free -ranging livestock 00:01:38.609 --> 00:01:40.629 out of their crops. And the scale of that problem, 00:01:40.890 --> 00:01:42.689 I mean, it's really hard to wrap your head around 00:01:42.689 --> 00:01:45.769 today. But imagine trying to protect thousands 00:01:45.769 --> 00:01:48.250 of acres of wheat from massive herds of wandering 00:01:48.250 --> 00:01:51.269 cattle. And your only traditional fencing materials 00:01:51.269 --> 00:01:54.689 are wood and stone. Out in the vast, treeless, 00:01:54.870 --> 00:01:57.879 rocky plains? Yeah. It's a total logistical nightmare. 00:01:58.260 --> 00:02:01.099 It was an entirely unsustainable business model. 00:02:01.540 --> 00:02:03.760 I mean, look at the very first farmers in the 00:02:03.760 --> 00:02:08.080 Fresno, California area around 1872. They spent 00:02:08.080 --> 00:02:11.000 nearly four thousand dollars on lumber just to 00:02:11.000 --> 00:02:13.659 protect twenty five hundred acres. Wait, four 00:02:13.659 --> 00:02:17.379 thousand dollars? In 1872. Yeah. In modern money, 00:02:17.460 --> 00:02:19.900 so for the year 2025, that's equivalent to about 00:02:19.900 --> 00:02:23.360 $108 ,000. Oh. Just to build a basic wooden perimeter. 00:02:23.520 --> 00:02:26.000 That is just staggering. A farmer can't absorb 00:02:26.000 --> 00:02:28.039 that kind of overhead just to keep cows away. 00:02:28.699 --> 00:02:30.680 But surely they tried other methods before resigning 00:02:30.680 --> 00:02:32.840 themselves to, you know, bankruptcy by lumber. 00:02:33.080 --> 00:02:36.370 They did try. The primary alternative was planting 00:02:36.370 --> 00:02:39.469 a biological fence. It was a plant called Osage 00:02:39.469 --> 00:02:43.009 Orange. OK. It's this intensely thorny bush. 00:02:43.370 --> 00:02:45.590 But the problem is, to make a functional fence 00:02:45.590 --> 00:02:47.889 out of it, you have to transplant thousands of 00:02:47.889 --> 00:02:49.949 these individual bushes. Then you have to wait 00:02:49.949 --> 00:02:51.689 years for them to grow thick enough to actually 00:02:51.689 --> 00:02:53.770 stop a thousand pound animal. Right. And you 00:02:53.770 --> 00:02:55.909 just have to cross your fingers that the rain 00:02:55.909 --> 00:02:58.150 -starved dusty soils out on the plains won't 00:02:58.150 --> 00:03:00.509 just kill the plants outright. OK, let's unpack 00:03:00.509 --> 00:03:03.750 this. Because when you have an entire agricultural 00:03:03.750 --> 00:03:06.629 industry facing what is essentially a billion 00:03:06.629 --> 00:03:09.990 dollar problem, it usually triggers a frantic 00:03:09.990 --> 00:03:13.750 race for a practical solution. And that race 00:03:13.750 --> 00:03:17.210 really hits a boiling point around 1873. Yeah, 00:03:17.349 --> 00:03:20.370 at a county fair in DeKalb, Illinois. Of all 00:03:20.370 --> 00:03:22.819 places. Right. That year, you have this meeting 00:03:22.819 --> 00:03:25.740 of minds. The major players who would eventually 00:03:25.740 --> 00:03:28.319 become known as the big four of the barbed wire 00:03:28.319 --> 00:03:31.479 industry were all just wandering this fair. Just 00:03:31.479 --> 00:03:33.860 attending the fair. Exactly. Joseph Glidden, 00:03:34.120 --> 00:03:36.919 Jacob Haish, Charles Francis Washburn, and Isaac 00:03:36.919 --> 00:03:39.379 L. Elwood. They all happened to see a display 00:03:39.379 --> 00:03:42.120 by a man named Henry B. Rose. He had recently 00:03:42.120 --> 00:03:44.199 patented something he called the wooden strip 00:03:44.199 --> 00:03:47.000 with metallic points. Which, just based on the 00:03:47.000 --> 00:03:49.039 name alone, sounds incredibly rudimentary. Oh, 00:03:49.039 --> 00:03:51.349 it was. It was literally just a - wooden block 00:03:51.349 --> 00:03:53.750 with wire protrusions attached to it, you were 00:03:53.750 --> 00:03:56.569 meant to hang it on a smooth wire fence to just 00:03:56.569 --> 00:03:58.870 prick any cow that leaned on it. But that really 00:03:58.870 --> 00:04:01.550 simple mechanism sparked an idea in Joseph Glidden. 00:04:01.930 --> 00:04:03.909 He went home from that fair and just started 00:04:03.909 --> 00:04:06.819 experimenting with wire. And the way he solved 00:04:06.819 --> 00:04:09.460 the manufacturing puzzle is frankly brilliant. 00:04:09.759 --> 00:04:11.939 Tell him how he did it. He realized he needed 00:04:11.939 --> 00:04:14.840 a way to hold the sharp metallic barbs perfectly 00:04:14.840 --> 00:04:17.160 in place without them sliding up and down the 00:04:17.160 --> 00:04:20.000 wire. To figure out the twisting mechanism, he 00:04:20.000 --> 00:04:22.920 actually used his own home coffee mill. Wait, 00:04:22.920 --> 00:04:24.720 you mean the little hand crank machine you used 00:04:24.720 --> 00:04:26.560 to grind roasted coffee beans in the kitchen? 00:04:26.920 --> 00:04:29.519 The exact same one. He used the internal grinding 00:04:29.519 --> 00:04:31.660 mechanism of the coffee mill to figure out how 00:04:31.660 --> 00:04:35.100 to uniformly twist two long strands of wire together, 00:04:35.519 --> 00:04:37.500 and that locked the shark barbs tightly into 00:04:37.500 --> 00:04:40.459 place right between the twists. That is unbelievable. 00:04:40.699 --> 00:04:43.139 That little kitchen experiment led directly to 00:04:43.139 --> 00:04:46.879 his 1874 patent, which he boldly named the winner. 00:04:47.439 --> 00:04:50.220 A kitchen appliance basically birthed the modern 00:04:50.220 --> 00:04:53.040 agricultural perimeter. Yeah. Lucian B. Smith 00:04:53.040 --> 00:04:55.540 had actually patented a very basic version of 00:04:55.540 --> 00:04:59.399 barbed wire earlier, in 1867, but Glidden's coffee 00:04:59.399 --> 00:05:01.779 mill modifications are what made it durable, 00:05:02.279 --> 00:05:04.860 mass -producible, and effective. It was the modern 00:05:04.860 --> 00:05:07.300 invention we recognize today. I have to imagine, 00:05:07.300 --> 00:05:09.579 though, that showing up with a spool of sharp, 00:05:10.040 --> 00:05:12.600 dangerous -looking metal didn't immediately win 00:05:12.600 --> 00:05:15.240 over everyone on the frontier. I mean, the farmers 00:05:15.240 --> 00:05:17.560 might have wanted it, but ranchers were entirely 00:05:17.560 --> 00:05:19.920 accustomed to the open range. What's fascinating 00:05:19.920 --> 00:05:23.560 here is how the product required a masterful 00:05:23.560 --> 00:05:26.600 psychological approach to sales. Down in Texas, 00:05:26.920 --> 00:05:29.360 folks were highly skeptical. Oh, I bet. Open 00:05:29.360 --> 00:05:32.259 range ranchers absolutely hated the concept of 00:05:32.259 --> 00:05:34.920 enclosed land. Plus, they were terrified this 00:05:34.920 --> 00:05:36.839 new wire would just tear their valuable cattle 00:05:36.839 --> 00:05:39.500 to shreds. And there was also this deep lingering 00:05:39.500 --> 00:05:42.220 political suspicion that northern industrialists 00:05:42.220 --> 00:05:44.699 were just trying to exploit. the South. So how 00:05:44.699 --> 00:05:47.420 do you convince an angry, skeptical crowd of 00:05:47.420 --> 00:05:49.860 Texas ranchers to buy into this? You bring in 00:05:49.860 --> 00:05:53.860 a showman. In 1876, a salesman named John Warren 00:05:53.860 --> 00:05:56.240 Gates takes the wire down to the Military Plaza 00:05:56.240 --> 00:05:59.279 in San Antonio, Texas. He doesn't just pass out 00:05:59.279 --> 00:06:02.040 pamphlets, he sets up a massive public demonstration 00:06:02.040 --> 00:06:04.040 right in the middle of the plaza. Right in the 00:06:04.040 --> 00:06:06.139 open. He builds a corral out of the barbed wire, 00:06:06.300 --> 00:06:08.860 drives a herd of really aggressive Texas longhorn 00:06:08.860 --> 00:06:11.519 cattle inside, and just lets the crowd watch. 00:06:11.819 --> 00:06:15.300 Let me guess. The cattle charge the wire, get 00:06:15.300 --> 00:06:17.920 a prick from the barbs and back off. Precisely. 00:06:18.339 --> 00:06:21.040 It safely and effectively contained the animals 00:06:21.040 --> 00:06:23.660 without slaughtering them. The visual proof was 00:06:23.660 --> 00:06:26.220 completely undeniable. The demonstration was 00:06:26.220 --> 00:06:29.000 such a massive success that Gates actually had 00:06:29.000 --> 00:06:31.519 to retreat to the nearby Menger Hotel just to 00:06:31.519 --> 00:06:33.819 process the flood of orders. Wow. The industry 00:06:33.819 --> 00:06:38.319 just exploded. Between 1873 and 1899, there were 00:06:38.319 --> 00:06:41.680 up to 150 different companies manufacturing variations 00:06:41.680 --> 00:06:44.220 of this wire. And as with any massive industrial 00:06:44.220 --> 00:06:46.899 boom, the big fish eventually eat the small fish. 00:06:46.980 --> 00:06:49.339 Always. John Warren Gates realized the power 00:06:49.339 --> 00:06:52.000 he held parted ways with his initial partners 00:06:52.000 --> 00:06:55.379 and created a massive monopoly called American 00:06:55.379 --> 00:06:58.600 Steel and Wire. He utilized total vertical integration. 00:06:59.019 --> 00:07:00.300 That means his company controlled everything 00:07:00.300 --> 00:07:02.759 from mining the iron ore to drawing the steel 00:07:02.759 --> 00:07:05.240 rods all the way to twisting the final barbed 00:07:05.240 --> 00:07:07.779 wire. By total monopoly. Exactly. It became a 00:07:07.779 --> 00:07:10.139 colossal corporate empire that was later absorbed 00:07:10.139 --> 00:07:12.980 into U .S. steel. But the business history is 00:07:12.980 --> 00:07:16.509 really only half the story here. To really appreciate 00:07:16.509 --> 00:07:18.910 how this product changed the physical landscape, 00:07:19.290 --> 00:07:22.509 we have to look closely at the engineering. Because 00:07:22.509 --> 00:07:25.069 putting up a barbed wire fence is not just unrolling 00:07:25.069 --> 00:07:28.110 a spool and nailing it to a tree, it is an intricate 00:07:28.110 --> 00:07:30.310 exercise in physics. Because you're dealing with 00:07:30.310 --> 00:07:33.550 a staggering amount of force. A properly installed 00:07:33.550 --> 00:07:37.040 barbed wire fence is stretched under up to half 00:07:37.040 --> 00:07:39.579 a ton of tension. Half a ton. That's a thousand 00:07:39.579 --> 00:07:41.660 pounds of pull trying to snap that wire back. 00:07:41.759 --> 00:07:44.399 Which means the most critical component of the 00:07:44.399 --> 00:07:48.259 entire fence is the corner post. Its sole function 00:07:48.259 --> 00:07:51.660 is to resist that massive tension. If a corner 00:07:51.660 --> 00:07:54.579 post fails, the whole fence collapses. You can't 00:07:54.579 --> 00:07:57.019 just stick a log in the mud. No. You need a primary 00:07:57.019 --> 00:07:59.399 post. And then about eight feet away, you place 00:07:59.399 --> 00:08:02.100 a brace post. You connect those two with a horizontal 00:08:02.100 --> 00:08:04.139 compression brace and then run diagonal wires 00:08:04.139 --> 00:08:06.569 between them, twisting them tight to form a solid, 00:08:06.850 --> 00:08:08.990 immovable assembly. It's an entire structure. 00:08:09.189 --> 00:08:10.930 Yeah, and for really long stretches of fence, 00:08:11.069 --> 00:08:13.009 you actually need double braces built into the 00:08:13.009 --> 00:08:15.329 line just to keep the tension stable. And the 00:08:15.329 --> 00:08:17.990 wire itself has to be engineered to survive the 00:08:17.990 --> 00:08:21.480 elements for decades. For standard agriculture, 00:08:21.939 --> 00:08:24.360 you're generally looking at double -strand zinc 00:08:24.360 --> 00:08:27.360 -coated galvanized steel. And that galvanization 00:08:27.360 --> 00:08:30.579 process is key. It basically means giving the 00:08:30.579 --> 00:08:34.460 steel wire a bath in molten zinc. The zinc acts 00:08:34.460 --> 00:08:37.259 as a sacrificial armor, so the elements eat away 00:08:37.259 --> 00:08:39.919 at the zinc coating instead of rusting the steel 00:08:39.919 --> 00:08:41.840 underneath. But extends the life of the fence. 00:08:42.100 --> 00:08:45.750 Dramatically. If you buy a class I coating, which 00:08:45.750 --> 00:08:48.509 is a lighter dip, it'll start to rust in about 00:08:48.509 --> 00:08:51.149 8 to 10 years. But if you spring for the heavy 00:08:51.149 --> 00:08:53.870 duty class 3 coating, you get 15 to 20 years 00:08:53.870 --> 00:08:55.850 of rust protection. Then you have to actually 00:08:55.850 --> 00:08:58.629 attach it to that massive corner post. You wrap 00:08:58.629 --> 00:09:00.850 it around and tie it off using a specific knot 00:09:00.850 --> 00:09:03.269 called a timber hitch, which is fascinating because 00:09:03.269 --> 00:09:05.549 that specific knot actually holds under tension 00:09:05.549 --> 00:09:08.049 much better with stiff wire than it does with 00:09:08.049 --> 00:09:10.110 flexible rope. Then you just stretch it tight. 00:09:10.299 --> 00:09:12.820 The line posts you see every 10 or 15 feet in 00:09:12.820 --> 00:09:14.480 between the corners. They aren't there to take 00:09:14.480 --> 00:09:16.919 up slack or pull the wire. Their only job is 00:09:16.919 --> 00:09:19.340 simply to keep the evenly spaced strands suspended 00:09:19.340 --> 00:09:21.860 off the ground. Here's where it gets really interesting, 00:09:22.000 --> 00:09:24.519 though, because this brilliant feat of engineering 00:09:24.519 --> 00:09:27.500 designed to save farmers money brought about 00:09:27.500 --> 00:09:31.379 massive, sweeping, unintended consequences. Yeah. 00:09:31.679 --> 00:09:34.440 The most immediate being the dramatic sudden 00:09:34.440 --> 00:09:37.399 end of the American cowboy era. Herding thousands 00:09:37.399 --> 00:09:40.000 of cattle across the open plains required an 00:09:40.000 --> 00:09:42.960 army of men. You needed cowboys to track the 00:09:42.960 --> 00:09:46.600 herds, catch strays, drive them to market. But 00:09:46.600 --> 00:09:49.259 once barbed wire provided this incredibly cheap 00:09:49.259 --> 00:09:52.179 permanent method to enclose landing control movement, 00:09:52.820 --> 00:09:55.860 that vast manpower was obsolete. It just wasn't 00:09:55.860 --> 00:09:58.460 needed. Right. Historians frequently point to 00:09:58.460 --> 00:10:00.720 the widespread adoption of barbed wire as the 00:10:00.720 --> 00:10:03.139 literal endpoint of the Old West. But closing 00:10:03.139 --> 00:10:05.240 the open range wasn't just an economic shift 00:10:05.240 --> 00:10:08.120 for ranch hens. It triggered an absolute catastrophe 00:10:08.120 --> 00:10:10.919 in the 1880s known as the Big Die Up. It is a 00:10:10.919 --> 00:10:14.080 truly grim chapter of history. cattle rely heavily 00:10:14.080 --> 00:10:16.720 on instinctual migration patterns for survival. 00:10:17.220 --> 00:10:19.559 When brutal blizzard conditions hit the northern 00:10:19.559 --> 00:10:21.519 plains, the herds naturally turn their backs 00:10:21.519 --> 00:10:23.860 to the wind and migrate toward the warmer southern 00:10:23.860 --> 00:10:27.019 plains. That's just what they do. Exactly. But 00:10:27.019 --> 00:10:30.639 by the early 1880s, ranchers in the Texas Panhandle 00:10:30.639 --> 00:10:33.639 had aggressively fenced off their claims. They 00:10:33.639 --> 00:10:36.159 knew the sparse winter grass on their land couldn't 00:10:36.159 --> 00:10:38.779 support extra grazing from northern cattle. So 00:10:38.779 --> 00:10:41.240 they built miles of barbed wire to physically 00:10:41.240 --> 00:10:44.399 block the migration. You really have to imagine 00:10:44.399 --> 00:10:48.000 the sheer horror of that scenario. Massive herds 00:10:48.000 --> 00:10:51.230 of cattle. freezing and exhausted, blindly walking 00:10:51.230 --> 00:10:54.590 south through blinding snowstorms, only to suddenly 00:10:54.590 --> 00:10:57.629 hit an endless immovable wall of sharp wire. 00:10:57.690 --> 00:11:00.289 Yeah. During the particularly brutal winter of 00:11:00.289 --> 00:11:02.990 1885, up to three quarters of some of these herds 00:11:02.990 --> 00:11:05.149 either froze to death or starved right there 00:11:05.149 --> 00:11:07.070 piled up against the fence lines. And the fallout 00:11:07.070 --> 00:11:09.850 from that mass death was explosive. Smaller cattlemen, 00:11:10.129 --> 00:11:12.110 particularly down in central Texas, were desperate. 00:11:12.210 --> 00:11:14.230 Their herds were dying. They had no access to 00:11:14.230 --> 00:11:16.629 water or grazing land. So they took matters into 00:11:16.629 --> 00:11:18.519 their own hands and started cutting. the fences, 00:11:18.759 --> 00:11:20.960 which erupted into what became known as the fence 00:11:20.960 --> 00:11:24.100 cutting wars. It was complete chaos on the frontier. 00:11:24.299 --> 00:11:27.419 You had midnight raids with wire cutters, vigilante 00:11:27.419 --> 00:11:30.200 justice, and outright range wars between the 00:11:30.200 --> 00:11:32.360 farmers defending their perimeters and the open 00:11:32.360 --> 00:11:34.320 range ranchers trying to keep their livelihoods 00:11:34.320 --> 00:11:36.789 alive. People were actually dying in shootouts 00:11:36.789 --> 00:11:38.889 over this wire. It escalated to the point where 00:11:38.889 --> 00:11:41.809 the state government had to step in. In 1884, 00:11:42.169 --> 00:11:44.730 Texas passed a law making fence cutting a felony 00:11:44.730 --> 00:11:47.269 offense, which effectively ended the violence 00:11:47.269 --> 00:11:49.690 and legally settled the American frontier in 00:11:49.690 --> 00:11:51.990 favor of private property. But the story doesn't 00:11:51.990 --> 00:11:54.529 stop at the frontier. No. If we connect this 00:11:54.529 --> 00:11:57.210 to the bigger picture. You start to see a very 00:11:57.210 --> 00:12:01.029 dark, chilling evolution. A tool that was explicitly 00:12:01.029 --> 00:12:03.629 designed, refined, and perfected to control the 00:12:03.629 --> 00:12:06.190 movement of animals was very rapidly adapted 00:12:06.190 --> 00:12:08.690 to control the movement of human beings. It didn't 00:12:08.690 --> 00:12:10.789 take long for global militaries to recognize 00:12:10.789 --> 00:12:13.870 the potential of an impassable razor -sharp barrier. 00:12:14.509 --> 00:12:16.970 The first recorded combat use of barbed wire 00:12:16.970 --> 00:12:20.029 was actually by Portuguese troops defending against 00:12:20.029 --> 00:12:22.970 African tribes during the combat of Maghul in 00:12:22.970 --> 00:12:27.399 1895. And by 1899, it was being deployed extensively 00:12:27.399 --> 00:12:29.919 in the Boer War. But it wasn't just being used 00:12:29.919 --> 00:12:32.279 to protect military outposts from charges. It 00:12:32.279 --> 00:12:34.539 was used strategically to control vast spaces 00:12:34.539 --> 00:12:37.919 of land and, significantly, to hold the captured 00:12:37.919 --> 00:12:40.820 Boer population inside concentration camps. As 00:12:40.820 --> 00:12:43.500 the timeline pushes into the 20th century, we 00:12:43.500 --> 00:12:46.100 see this wire increasingly defining international 00:12:46.100 --> 00:12:49.340 borders and urban unrest. Looking at the U .S.-Mexico 00:12:49.340 --> 00:12:51.879 border, the government built its first international 00:12:51.879 --> 00:12:55.210 fence along the California line. from 1909 to 00:12:55.210 --> 00:12:57.509 1911. But that was initially just to keep cattle 00:12:57.509 --> 00:12:59.269 from wandering between the countries. Right, 00:12:59.509 --> 00:13:02.389 cattle. But by 1924, the newly established Border 00:13:02.389 --> 00:13:04.769 Patrol began building more barbed wire fences, 00:13:05.370 --> 00:13:07.549 this time specifically to prevent people from 00:13:07.549 --> 00:13:11.379 crossing. Decades later, during the 1968 Chicago 00:13:11.379 --> 00:13:14.059 riots, authorities actually attacked barbed wire 00:13:14.059 --> 00:13:16.240 frames to the front of police and National Guard 00:13:16.240 --> 00:13:19.059 vehicles to drive directly into crowds of protesters. 00:13:19.519 --> 00:13:21.740 They earned the nickname Daily Dozers after the 00:13:21.740 --> 00:13:24.000 city's mayor. But the most devastating, world 00:13:24.000 --> 00:13:26.360 -altering application of barbed wire in human 00:13:26.360 --> 00:13:29.299 warfare was undoubtedly World War I. The trench 00:13:29.299 --> 00:13:32.240 warfare of the Western Front. The endless entanglements 00:13:32.240 --> 00:13:34.759 placed in front of the trenches completely paralyzed 00:13:34.759 --> 00:13:38.039 troop movement. It trapped men in no man's land, 00:13:38.460 --> 00:13:40.720 slowing their advance to a crawl and making them 00:13:40.720 --> 00:13:43.419 incredibly vulnerable to the relentless machine 00:13:43.419 --> 00:13:46.419 guns and artillery. The environment was a muddy, 00:13:46.600 --> 00:13:49.299 chaotic hellscape, and the wire technology had 00:13:49.299 --> 00:13:52.500 to adapt to it. Think about the logistics. You 00:13:52.500 --> 00:13:54.840 can't exactly stand up in the middle of no man's 00:13:54.840 --> 00:13:57.019 land under the light of a flare with a heavy 00:13:57.019 --> 00:13:59.460 hammer pounding wooden posts into the ground 00:13:59.460 --> 00:14:02.299 to build a fence. You'd be shot instantly. Instantly. 00:14:02.860 --> 00:14:05.340 So military engineers invented the screw picket. 00:14:05.659 --> 00:14:08.279 It was a heavy metal rod with eyelets for stringing 00:14:08.279 --> 00:14:10.840 the wire, but the bottom was shaped like a corkscrew. 00:14:11.120 --> 00:14:13.000 That's really clever. It allowed soldiers to 00:14:13.000 --> 00:14:15.179 sneak out into the mud under the cover of darkness 00:14:15.179 --> 00:14:17.620 and silently twist the pickets directly into 00:14:17.620 --> 00:14:20.570 the ground without making a sound. The psychological 00:14:20.570 --> 00:14:22.750 terror of encountering that wire in the dark 00:14:22.750 --> 00:14:25.909 is hard to overstate. There is a visceral account 00:14:25.909 --> 00:14:28.269 from a British writer describing the specific 00:14:28.269 --> 00:14:31.350 horror of the German defossus. He noted that 00:14:31.350 --> 00:14:33.669 while the British wire was galvanized, giving 00:14:33.669 --> 00:14:36.429 it that zinc armor we talked about earlier, which 00:14:36.429 --> 00:14:40.230 faded to a dull, low visibility gray, the German 00:14:40.230 --> 00:14:43.009 wider was not galvanized. So it rusted. It rusted 00:14:43.009 --> 00:14:45.889 to this menacing, highly visible black color. 00:14:46.169 --> 00:14:48.690 And the construction was brutal. He described 00:14:48.690 --> 00:14:51.070 the German wire is being thick as a sailor's 00:14:51.070 --> 00:14:53.990 heavy rigging rope with 16 barbs packed into 00:14:53.990 --> 00:14:56.690 every single foot. 16 bars per foot. You can't 00:14:56.690 --> 00:14:59.289 even grab that. It's essentially a continuous 00:14:59.289 --> 00:15:02.409 rusted blade of metal. And this grim legacy of 00:15:02.409 --> 00:15:04.649 human containment carried right into World War 00:15:04.649 --> 00:15:07.250 II. During the internment of Japanese Americans, 00:15:07.370 --> 00:15:09.669 the United States utilized barbed wire perimeters 00:15:09.669 --> 00:15:13.009 to enclose massive camps like Manzanar. Across 00:15:13.009 --> 00:15:15.450 the Atlantic, the Nazis integrated barbed wire 00:15:15.450 --> 00:15:17.649 directly into the sinister architecture of their 00:15:17.649 --> 00:15:19.610 concentration camps. and extermination camps 00:15:19.610 --> 00:15:22.029 such as Auschwitz. The perimeter fences weren't 00:15:22.029 --> 00:15:24.730 just physical barriers there. No, they were heavily 00:15:24.730 --> 00:15:27.009 electrified to prevent any chance of escape. 00:15:27.769 --> 00:15:30.169 In the specific extermination areas of these 00:15:30.169 --> 00:15:33.350 camps, guards would sometimes meticulously braid 00:15:33.350 --> 00:15:36.009 the barbed wire with tree branches to camouflage 00:15:36.009 --> 00:15:38.509 the fences and hide the atrocities from outsiders. 00:15:39.190 --> 00:15:41.629 Through these systematic horrific applications, 00:15:42.149 --> 00:15:44.490 barbed wire permanently transitioned from a simple 00:15:44.490 --> 00:15:47.669 agricultural convenience into a universal symbol 00:15:47.669 --> 00:15:50.370 of oppression and the outright denial of human 00:15:50.370 --> 00:15:52.570 freedom. It's deeply ingrained now. It's the 00:15:52.570 --> 00:15:55.090 reason Amnesty International prominently features 00:15:55.090 --> 00:15:57.570 a barbed wire wrapped around a candle in logo 00:15:57.570 --> 00:16:00.549 and why the oppressive East German border regime 00:16:00.549 --> 00:16:03.470 was commonly referred to simply as wall and barbed 00:16:03.470 --> 00:16:05.769 wire. It is a really heavy history to process. 00:16:05.909 --> 00:16:08.649 It truly is. The human cost associated with this 00:16:08.649 --> 00:16:11.250 invention is immense. So what does this all mean? 00:16:11.870 --> 00:16:14.049 When we step back from that heavy historical 00:16:14.049 --> 00:16:16.750 context, how do we interact with this invention 00:16:16.750 --> 00:16:20.090 now in the modern era, knowing all of this? From 00:16:20.090 --> 00:16:22.850 a pure safety and navigation perspective, humans 00:16:22.850 --> 00:16:25.419 have largely figured out how to bypass it. If 00:16:25.419 --> 00:16:27.299 you're careful, you can stretch the gaps, wear 00:16:27.299 --> 00:16:29.419 thick protective clothing, or if you're dealing 00:16:29.419 --> 00:16:31.820 with the modern high -security variant like razor 00:16:31.820 --> 00:16:34.519 wire, you can throw a thick carpet over it or 00:16:34.519 --> 00:16:37.759 use heavy -duty wire cutters. But wildlife doesn't 00:16:37.759 --> 00:16:40.659 have the luxury of wider cutters or thick carpets. 00:16:41.220 --> 00:16:43.860 Today, the sheer volume of injuries caused by 00:16:43.860 --> 00:16:46.419 barbed wire is primarily seen in the animal kingdom, 00:16:46.860 --> 00:16:49.220 and the reactions vary drastically by species. 00:16:49.480 --> 00:16:52.639 How so? Well, grazing animals like cows and sheep 00:16:52.639 --> 00:16:55.240 are generally slow -moving. When they press against 00:16:55.240 --> 00:16:58.019 a wire and feel the sharp pain of the barb, their 00:16:58.019 --> 00:17:01.100 instinct is to back away. But horses are entirely 00:17:01.100 --> 00:17:03.259 different. Because they're flight animals. Exactly. 00:17:03.820 --> 00:17:06.079 When a horse gets spooked or entangled and feels 00:17:06.079 --> 00:17:08.880 that sharp prick, it doesn't back up. It panics 00:17:08.880 --> 00:17:11.059 and tries to violently pull away or run through 00:17:11.059 --> 00:17:13.960 it. When a thousand -pound horse thrashes against 00:17:13.960 --> 00:17:16.359 tightly stretched barbed wire, the barbs act 00:17:16.359 --> 00:17:19.319 like hooks. Uh -oh. They tear off massive patches 00:17:19.319 --> 00:17:22.740 of skin. which often leads to severe career -ending 00:17:22.740 --> 00:17:25.640 disabilities or fatal infections. It's also a 00:17:25.640 --> 00:17:28.319 silent, invisible killer for nocturnal animals. 00:17:28.960 --> 00:17:33.000 Birds, owls, bats, they simply cannot perceive 00:17:33.000 --> 00:17:36.140 those thin metallic strands while they're flying 00:17:36.140 --> 00:17:39.460 at speed in the dark. The impact on local ecosystems 00:17:39.460 --> 00:17:42.119 is actually such a significant issue that it 00:17:42.119 --> 00:17:44.240 prompted major international legislation. Yeah, 00:17:44.519 --> 00:17:48.059 in Norway. Right. In 2010, the country of Norway 00:17:48.059 --> 00:17:50.539 took a definitive stand and completely banned 00:17:50.539 --> 00:17:52.940 the use of any new barbed wire fences aimed at 00:17:52.940 --> 00:17:55.799 limiting animal migration. They now require farmers 00:17:55.799 --> 00:17:58.500 to utilize electric fences instead, which provide 00:17:58.500 --> 00:18:00.759 a warning shock without the physical laceration. 00:18:00.960 --> 00:18:04.000 Which leads to an incredibly surprising, highly 00:18:04.000 --> 00:18:06.460 lucrative modern consequence that reaches far 00:18:06.460 --> 00:18:09.079 beyond the borders of Norwegian farms. Because 00:18:09.079 --> 00:18:11.160 those northern cattle are no longer grazing in 00:18:11.160 --> 00:18:13.680 fields surrounded by sharp barbs, their hides 00:18:13.680 --> 00:18:15.920 are virtually pristine. Right. They don't have 00:18:15.920 --> 00:18:17.880 the deep scratches, scuffs, and healed stars 00:18:17.880 --> 00:18:20.019 that you find on cattle raised in the American 00:18:20.019 --> 00:18:21.819 West. And this is something I had absolutely 00:18:21.819 --> 00:18:24.940 no idea about. How does a pristine cow hide from 00:18:24.940 --> 00:18:27.730 Norway impact the global market? It dictates 00:18:27.730 --> 00:18:30.809 the supply chain for ultra luxury automobiles. 00:18:31.109 --> 00:18:33.390 Automakers, specifically top tier brands like 00:18:33.390 --> 00:18:36.029 Bentley and Rolls Royce, demand absolute perfection 00:18:36.029 --> 00:18:38.730 for the interiors of their vehicles. They source 00:18:38.730 --> 00:18:40.869 their leather specifically from Norwegian and 00:18:40.869 --> 00:18:43.410 Northern European cattle, precisely because the 00:18:43.410 --> 00:18:45.710 absence of barbed wire in those regions guarantees 00:18:45.710 --> 00:18:48.630 a flawless hide. That is the most mind blowing 00:18:48.630 --> 00:18:51.769 butterfly effect. A local environmental policy 00:18:51.769 --> 00:18:54.650 change designed to protect flying bats and panicked 00:18:54.650 --> 00:18:57.569 horses ends up defying the meticulous supply 00:18:57.569 --> 00:19:00.910 chain for a half million dollar luxury car. It 00:19:00.910 --> 00:19:03.529 really highlights how deeply intertwined this 00:19:03.529 --> 00:19:05.829 simple invention is with modern commerce. And 00:19:05.829 --> 00:19:07.829 I can't let us wrap up without bringing up one 00:19:07.829 --> 00:19:11.289 quick highly unexpected cultural note. Beyond 00:19:11.289 --> 00:19:14.549 farming, Beyond borders and beyond luxury cars, 00:19:14.829 --> 00:19:17.250 barbed wire also found a bizarre home in the 00:19:17.250 --> 00:19:20.069 theatrical world of hardcore professional wrestling. 00:19:20.109 --> 00:19:22.430 Oh, right. Legendary wrestlers like Mick Foley 00:19:22.430 --> 00:19:24.950 famously utilized baseball bats heavily wrapped 00:19:24.950 --> 00:19:26.990 in barbed wire during their matches. It just 00:19:26.990 --> 00:19:29.329 perfectly encapsulates how deeply embedded that 00:19:29.329 --> 00:19:31.710 specific imagery of extreme danger and toughness 00:19:31.710 --> 00:19:34.210 is in our collective culture. It's an instantly 00:19:34.210 --> 00:19:37.400 recognizable shorthand for danger. Whether you're 00:19:37.400 --> 00:19:39.779 looking at the plains of the American West, the 00:19:39.779 --> 00:19:41.920 muddy trenches of Europe, the supply chains of 00:19:41.920 --> 00:19:44.380 luxury cars, or the center of a wrestling ring. 00:19:44.579 --> 00:19:46.900 It's been quite a journey today. We have traced 00:19:46.900 --> 00:19:50.059 how a simple link of twisted wire, an idea that 00:19:50.059 --> 00:19:52.299 quite literally took physical shape inside a 00:19:52.299 --> 00:19:55.400 farmer's kitchen coffee mill, managed to completely 00:19:55.400 --> 00:19:58.690 transform global agriculture. It corralled the 00:19:58.690 --> 00:20:01.769 livestock. It ended the romanticized era of the 00:20:01.769 --> 00:20:04.950 American cowboy. And it drew the hard, unforgiving 00:20:04.950 --> 00:20:07.670 lines of private property across the frontier. 00:20:08.289 --> 00:20:10.690 And simultaneously, it defined modern military 00:20:10.690 --> 00:20:14.009 history. It became a devastating tool for unimaginable 00:20:14.009 --> 00:20:16.690 oppression, paralyzing armies in the mud of no 00:20:16.690 --> 00:20:19.569 man's land, while continuing to serve as a physical, 00:20:19.569 --> 00:20:21.910 psychological barrier that has shaped international 00:20:21.910 --> 00:20:24.680 borders and security for over a century. But 00:20:24.680 --> 00:20:26.900 before we let you go, there's one final detail 00:20:26.900 --> 00:20:29.359 from our deep dive that really stuck out. We 00:20:29.359 --> 00:20:31.099 want to leave you with this thought to chew on. 00:20:31.210 --> 00:20:33.529 Earlier, we talked about all the ways barbed 00:20:33.529 --> 00:20:35.730 wire has been used to divide us, to keep cattle 00:20:35.730 --> 00:20:38.650 in, to keep enemies out, to build walls between 00:20:38.650 --> 00:20:41.490 nations. But around the turn of the 20th century, 00:20:41.730 --> 00:20:44.829 in some rural areas, farmers actually use the 00:20:44.829 --> 00:20:47.190 metal strands of their barbed wire fences as 00:20:47.190 --> 00:20:50.190 local telephone networks. That's wild. Imagine 00:20:50.190 --> 00:20:54.230 that. The very same sharp, dangerous tool designed 00:20:54.230 --> 00:20:57.609 to isolate people and divide the land was simultaneously 00:20:57.609 --> 00:21:00.009 acting as the physical wiring that connected 00:21:00.009 --> 00:21:03.140 isolated voices together in conversation. It 00:21:03.140 --> 00:21:05.180 makes you wonder what other tools in our world 00:21:05.180 --> 00:21:07.559 designed for division might have a hidden potential 00:21:07.559 --> 00:21:10.559 for connection. That is a fascinating question 00:21:10.559 --> 00:21:12.619 to mull over. Thank you so much for joining us 00:21:12.619 --> 00:21:14.940 at the table for this deep dive. We hope it gave 00:21:14.940 --> 00:21:16.859 you a completely new perspective on something 00:21:16.859 --> 00:21:18.859 you probably drive past every single day without 00:21:18.859 --> 00:21:21.240 a second thought. Keep questioning the world 00:21:21.240 --> 00:21:23.220 around you and we warmly invite you back for 00:21:23.220 --> 00:21:25.099 our next exploration. See you then.