WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:03.459 Imagine for a second, you are standing on the 00:00:03.459 --> 00:00:07.099 the meticulously controlled set of the 1955 Alfred 00:00:07.099 --> 00:00:10.500 Hitchcock thriller to catch a thief. Oh, classic. 00:00:10.640 --> 00:00:13.679 Right. And you need a human wall to basically 00:00:13.679 --> 00:00:16.879 block a doorway for a scene. So you hire this 00:00:16.879 --> 00:00:20.219 six foot five, two hundred ninety pound ex wrestler. 00:00:20.480 --> 00:00:23.239 a guy who literally used to fight under the terrifying 00:00:23.239 --> 00:00:25.679 moniker, the Black Menace. Yeah, you don't mess 00:00:25.679 --> 00:00:27.699 with the Black Menace. Exactly. And you treat 00:00:27.699 --> 00:00:29.420 him like a piece of furniture, right? Yeah. You 00:00:29.420 --> 00:00:31.640 point to where he stands, he grunts on cue, and 00:00:31.640 --> 00:00:33.880 well, that is that. Just a prop. Just a prop. 00:00:34.119 --> 00:00:36.439 But what you don't know, what literally nobody 00:00:36.439 --> 00:00:39.380 on that set realizes, is that between takes, 00:00:39.780 --> 00:00:42.460 this hulking brute you're treating like a meathead 00:00:42.460 --> 00:00:46.200 is sitting in a folding chair, quietly sketching 00:00:46.200 --> 00:00:49.060 out complex optical blueprints for futuristic 00:00:49.060 --> 00:00:51.679 automotive technology. It is, I mean, it's the 00:00:51.679 --> 00:00:53.640 ultimate example of hiding in plain sight. Yeah. 00:00:54.140 --> 00:00:56.420 We rely so heavily on visual heuristics to make 00:00:56.420 --> 00:00:58.640 sense of the world quickly, you know? We see 00:00:58.640 --> 00:01:01.359 a giant wall of muscle and our brains immediately 00:01:01.359 --> 00:01:04.719 file that person under a physical threat or brute. 00:01:04.920 --> 00:01:08.340 Oh, 100%. But in doing so, we completely miss 00:01:08.340 --> 00:01:10.900 the multi -dimensional, often brilliant reality 00:01:10.900 --> 00:01:12.920 of the person actually standing right in front 00:01:12.920 --> 00:01:16.019 of us. Okay, let's unpack this because our mission 00:01:16.019 --> 00:01:18.879 today for this deep dive is to explore the Wikipedia 00:01:18.879 --> 00:01:21.560 article detailing the life of William Grandy 00:01:21.560 --> 00:01:24.340 Davis. Better known to history as Wee Willie 00:01:24.340 --> 00:01:27.140 Davis. Right. Born December 7th, 1906 in New 00:01:27.140 --> 00:01:30.379 York City and died April 9th, 1981 in Louisville, 00:01:30.540 --> 00:01:34.319 Kentucky. and we are going to explore how this 00:01:34.319 --> 00:01:37.319 one single human being managed to live roughly 00:01:37.319 --> 00:01:40.799 four wildly contradictory lives. It really is 00:01:40.799 --> 00:01:42.980 wild. It proves that sometimes leaning completely 00:01:42.980 --> 00:01:45.920 into society's stereotype of you is, well... 00:01:45.920 --> 00:01:48.060 actually the most efficient way to fund your 00:01:48.060 --> 00:01:51.019 secret genius. It's so true. Davis' life is a 00:01:51.019 --> 00:01:53.260 master class in challenging societal assumptions, 00:01:53.620 --> 00:01:55.920 but also, and this is key, in manipulating them. 00:01:55.980 --> 00:01:59.579 He spent his entire career mastering how to manipulate 00:01:59.579 --> 00:02:02.079 an audience's visual perception. And it turns 00:02:02.079 --> 00:02:04.280 out, manipulating visual perception was exactly 00:02:04.280 --> 00:02:06.340 what he was doing off the clock, too. Just, you 00:02:06.340 --> 00:02:08.400 know, with lenses and light rather than masks 00:02:08.400 --> 00:02:11.860 and muscles. I love that. I want to start with 00:02:11.860 --> 00:02:14.319 the raw physical reality of this guy, though. 00:02:14.520 --> 00:02:17.680 Because in 1930, when he steps into the public 00:02:17.680 --> 00:02:20.719 eye, his physical baseline is just impossible 00:02:20.719 --> 00:02:23.300 to ignore. Oh, absolutely. He stands six feet 00:02:23.300 --> 00:02:26.039 five inches tall and weighs 290 pounds. Which, 00:02:26.180 --> 00:02:29.139 by the way, is massive today. But in 1930. Oh, 00:02:29.199 --> 00:02:31.080 right. People were smaller then. Yeah. The average 00:02:31.080 --> 00:02:34.879 American male was about five foot seven and maybe 00:02:34.879 --> 00:02:39.159 150 pounds. Wow. So a man approaching 300 pounds 00:02:39.159 --> 00:02:42.319 who stands six and a half feet tall is practically 00:02:42.319 --> 00:02:45.520 a walking natural disaster. He would have eclipsed 00:02:45.520 --> 00:02:47.900 almost everyone he interacted with. And naturally, 00:02:48.280 --> 00:02:50.259 the wrestling promoters look at this absolute 00:02:50.259 --> 00:02:53.680 leviathan and decide to call him we. Willie Davis. 00:02:53.960 --> 00:02:55.800 The irony is so thick you could cut it with a 00:02:55.800 --> 00:02:58.240 knife. It's hilarious. It's a classic carnival 00:02:58.240 --> 00:03:00.860 barker trope, right? You take the largest, most 00:03:00.860 --> 00:03:02.620 intimidating person in the room and you slap 00:03:02.620 --> 00:03:04.840 this diminutive nickname on them? Like calling 00:03:04.840 --> 00:03:07.629 a huge bouncer tiny? Exactly. It immediately 00:03:07.629 --> 00:03:09.530 establishes a character. It tells the audience, 00:03:09.750 --> 00:03:11.270 we know he's a monster. You know he's a monster. 00:03:11.389 --> 00:03:13.590 Let's just have fun with it. And he really needed 00:03:13.590 --> 00:03:16.430 that character, because we, Willie Davis, spent 00:03:16.430 --> 00:03:19.889 an astonishing 31 years as a professional wrestler. 00:03:20.210 --> 00:03:23.090 31 years. Let that sink in. From 1930 all the 00:03:23.090 --> 00:03:26.430 way to 1961. Yeah. But he didn't just wrestle 00:03:26.430 --> 00:03:29.389 as we, Willie. I mean, the aliases this man fought 00:03:29.389 --> 00:03:32.030 under are legendary. Oh, read the list. It's 00:03:32.030 --> 00:03:35.409 so good. OK, we have the Black Menace. The Black 00:03:35.409 --> 00:03:39.389 Panther, Diablo Hashtag One, Dr. X, The Hood, 00:03:39.710 --> 00:03:42.349 The Mask Manager, The Mask Marvel, Red Devil 00:03:42.349 --> 00:03:45.310 Hashtag One, and of course, just Willie Davis. 00:03:45.610 --> 00:03:47.870 I mean, it reads like a catalog of Pulpfish and 00:03:47.870 --> 00:03:51.189 villains from a 1930s radio serial. It totally 00:03:51.189 --> 00:03:53.449 does, like a roster of comic book supervillains. 00:03:53.990 --> 00:03:55.889 I am struggling to bridge the gap here, though. 00:03:56.110 --> 00:03:58.650 Taking body slams, getting thrown into turnbuckles. 00:03:59.210 --> 00:04:01.389 How does a human body sustain the physical toll 00:04:01.389 --> 00:04:03.750 of a wrestling career for over three decades? 00:04:03.849 --> 00:04:05.629 It's a great question. Especially starting back 00:04:05.629 --> 00:04:08.439 in 1930. decades before modern sports medicine 00:04:08.439 --> 00:04:11.180 or physical therapy or, you know, arthroscopic 00:04:11.180 --> 00:04:13.319 knee surgeries even existed. Well, to understand 00:04:13.319 --> 00:04:15.139 how he survived, we really have to look at the 00:04:15.139 --> 00:04:17.339 mechanics of the wrestling industry during that 00:04:17.339 --> 00:04:21.540 specific era. Prior to the 1920s and 30s, professional 00:04:21.540 --> 00:04:24.040 wrestling was largely based on catch as catch 00:04:24.040 --> 00:04:26.339 can grappling. OK, bring that down for me. What 00:04:26.339 --> 00:04:29.660 does catch as catch can actually mean in practice? 00:04:30.079 --> 00:04:33.629 It means it was legitimate. brutal submission 00:04:33.629 --> 00:04:36.410 wrestling. Oh, so not fake. Not at all. You could 00:04:36.410 --> 00:04:39.329 grab almost any hold you wanted. It was not choreographed. 00:04:39.329 --> 00:04:42.930 It was this grueling test of joint breaking endurance. 00:04:43.629 --> 00:04:46.189 And matches could literally last for hours in 00:04:46.189 --> 00:04:49.829 a really boring, painful stalemate. Yikes. That 00:04:49.829 --> 00:04:52.230 sounds terrible to watch. It was. And then the 00:04:52.230 --> 00:04:54.449 Great Depression hits. People don't want to pay 00:04:54.449 --> 00:04:56.870 their hard earned pennies to watch two sweaty 00:04:56.870 --> 00:04:59.870 men lie on a mat in a headlock for three hours. 00:05:00.110 --> 00:05:01.449 Right. They want to be entertained. Exactly. 00:05:01.360 --> 00:05:04.420 They want escapism. They want heroes and villains. 00:05:04.600 --> 00:05:07.459 They want theater. So the industry pivots. What's 00:05:07.459 --> 00:05:09.579 fascinating here is that the industry transitions 00:05:09.579 --> 00:05:12.360 into worked matches, sports entertainment. Ah. 00:05:12.639 --> 00:05:15.279 Now, it was still incredibly physically demanding. 00:05:15.379 --> 00:05:17.699 I mean, you are still taking real falls on hardwood 00:05:17.699 --> 00:05:20.740 and thin canvas. But it became about storytelling. 00:05:21.019 --> 00:05:24.250 And Davis had that figured out. Totally. Davis, 00:05:24.310 --> 00:05:27.389 with his 290 pound frame and his whole parade 00:05:27.389 --> 00:05:30.649 of masked personas, figured this out early. He 00:05:30.649 --> 00:05:32.850 didn't need to legitimately break someone's arm. 00:05:33.230 --> 00:05:35.790 He just needed to use his massive body to tell 00:05:35.790 --> 00:05:38.790 a compelling story of menace and power. He was 00:05:38.790 --> 00:05:41.410 mastering the art of physical acting. Yes. He 00:05:41.410 --> 00:05:43.889 was learning the geometry of the ring, like how 00:05:43.889 --> 00:05:46.930 to be Diablo, hashtag one, how to project aggression 00:05:46.930 --> 00:05:49.290 all the way to the cheap seats, and how to make 00:05:49.290 --> 00:05:52.050 10 ,000 people boo him simultaneously. He was 00:05:52.050 --> 00:05:55.050 learning how to hit a mark and elicit an emotional 00:05:55.050 --> 00:05:57.990 response using nothing but his physical presence. 00:05:58.870 --> 00:06:00.750 And when you view his wrestling career as a three 00:06:00.750 --> 00:06:03.209 -decade master class in physical acting, his 00:06:03.209 --> 00:06:05.170 next career move isn't a surprise at all. No, 00:06:05.170 --> 00:06:07.370 it makes total sense. It is the only logical 00:06:07.370 --> 00:06:09.350 progression. Right. You pack your bags, you head 00:06:09.350 --> 00:06:11.930 west, and you go... Hollywood naturally so starting 00:06:11.930 --> 00:06:15.970 in 1941 we Willie Davis begins this sprawling 00:06:15.970 --> 00:06:17.910 filmography that spans from the golden age of 00:06:17.910 --> 00:06:21.329 the 1940s all the way into the late 1970s it's 00:06:21.329 --> 00:06:24.029 a huge catalog but Hollywood casting directors 00:06:24.029 --> 00:06:26.050 looked at him yeah and immediately put him in 00:06:26.050 --> 00:06:28.470 a very very specific box listen to these roles 00:06:28.470 --> 00:06:31.370 oh this is my favorite part he played a character 00:06:31.370 --> 00:06:35.319 literally named mug in Shadow of the Thin Man 00:06:35.319 --> 00:06:38.680 and Ghost Catchers. Just Mug. Yeah, he was Strong 00:06:38.680 --> 00:06:42.759 Man in Mighty Joe Young, Bouncer in Johnny Cum 00:06:42.759 --> 00:06:46.639 Lately, Henchman Moose Harris in Wildfire, Arab 00:06:46.639 --> 00:06:50.720 Giant in Alibaba and the Forty Thieves. Oh my 00:06:50.720 --> 00:06:52.800 goodness. And wait, the most incredibly specific 00:06:52.800 --> 00:06:56.160 tight cast of all time, he was Swedish Tug of 00:06:56.160 --> 00:06:59.490 War Man in Calendar Girl. I mean... They're purely 00:06:59.490 --> 00:07:02.149 functional roles. Completely. There is absolutely 00:07:02.149 --> 00:07:04.769 no ambiguity about what the Swedish tug of war 00:07:04.769 --> 00:07:07.509 man is doing in that scene. He is there to pull 00:07:07.509 --> 00:07:09.910 a rope and look massive. Think of Golden Age 00:07:09.910 --> 00:07:11.769 Hollywood like a finely tuned machine, right? 00:07:11.829 --> 00:07:14.209 OK. You have the glamorous gears, the Cary Grant's, 00:07:14.269 --> 00:07:16.250 the Clark Gables, the delicate inner workings 00:07:16.250 --> 00:07:19.269 of the plot. But Davis was the heavy iron casing. 00:07:19.470 --> 00:07:21.850 Oh, I like that. You don't necessarily notice 00:07:21.850 --> 00:07:23.949 the iron casing when you look at a fancy watch, 00:07:24.310 --> 00:07:26.329 but the whole mechanism collapses if you don't 00:07:26.329 --> 00:07:29.470 have a convincing henchman or bouncer for the 00:07:29.470 --> 00:07:32.050 hero to punch his way past. That is a perfect 00:07:32.050 --> 00:07:34.790 analogy. Without the physical threat of Davis, 00:07:35.050 --> 00:07:38.060 the hero doesn't look heroic. He was foundational 00:07:38.060 --> 00:07:41.879 to the visual language of those films. And, you 00:07:41.879 --> 00:07:43.720 know, he wasn't just in B -movies. No, he was 00:07:43.720 --> 00:07:46.819 in huge stuff. Ubiquitous. He was in Alfred Hitchcock's 00:07:46.819 --> 00:07:48.819 To Catch a Thief, playing Big Man in Kitchen. 00:07:49.139 --> 00:07:51.379 Literally the name of the role. Yeah. He was 00:07:51.379 --> 00:07:54.259 in the legendary John Huston film Noir, The Asphalt 00:07:54.259 --> 00:07:57.339 Jungle. He was in Cecil B. DeMille's biblical 00:07:57.339 --> 00:08:00.699 epic Samson and Delilah. Need a physical obstacle 00:08:00.699 --> 00:08:03.399 to block a door? Call Davis. But I have to push 00:08:03.399 --> 00:08:05.819 back on this. I really do. Okay, go for it. You're 00:08:05.819 --> 00:08:09.360 painting this as a brilliant career move. But 00:08:09.360 --> 00:08:12.100 if you have any actual intellect standing around 00:08:12.100 --> 00:08:15.879 for 12 hours a day on a movie set Just to grunt 00:08:15.879 --> 00:08:18.699 look mean and get punched by the handsome lead 00:08:18.699 --> 00:08:21.560 I mean that has to be soul -crushing sounds rough 00:08:21.560 --> 00:08:24.040 Yeah, you're relegated to uncredited roles like 00:08:24.040 --> 00:08:27.579 mug or big man in kitchen for 40 years Was he 00:08:27.579 --> 00:08:29.819 really just a pragmatist or was he trapped by 00:08:29.819 --> 00:08:32.399 his own physique? I completely understand the 00:08:32.399 --> 00:08:34.460 skepticism, but we really have to look at the 00:08:34.460 --> 00:08:37.019 economics of typecasting. Okay, economics. Most 00:08:37.019 --> 00:08:39.120 actors struggle their entire lives just to get 00:08:39.120 --> 00:08:41.559 a single line in a film, right? And they wait 00:08:41.559 --> 00:08:43.779 tables to survive. Yeah, the starving artist 00:08:43.779 --> 00:08:48.379 thing. Right. Davis hacked the system. By fully 00:08:48.379 --> 00:08:51.519 embracing the stereotype, by being the very best 00:08:51.519 --> 00:08:55.220 mug or strongman available, he guaranteed himself 00:08:55.220 --> 00:08:58.080 steady, highly paid work in an industry famous 00:08:58.080 --> 00:09:00.179 for chewing people up and spitting them out. 00:09:00.789 --> 00:09:03.590 Oh, so he was in on the joke. Completely in on 00:09:03.590 --> 00:09:05.909 the joke. He let Hollywood rent his body. He 00:09:05.909 --> 00:09:08.149 let the wrestling promoters rent his imposing 00:09:08.149 --> 00:09:10.769 frame. And by doing so, he achieved something 00:09:10.769 --> 00:09:13.909 very rare. Financial stability. Okay, so you're 00:09:13.909 --> 00:09:17.169 going, he was securing the bag. Exactly. But 00:09:17.169 --> 00:09:19.009 what was he doing with that financial stability? 00:09:19.330 --> 00:09:21.909 Why did he need to fund his life so aggressively? 00:09:22.139 --> 00:09:24.379 Yeah. Well, here's where it gets really interesting. 00:09:24.440 --> 00:09:26.879 Oh, yes. Because the source material throws us 00:09:26.879 --> 00:09:30.200 a massive curveball that shatters this entire 00:09:30.200 --> 00:09:33.039 meathead narrative. William Weeway, Willie Davis, 00:09:33.179 --> 00:09:35.159 the man who spent his days as henchman Moose 00:09:35.159 --> 00:09:38.240 Harris, was an engineer. And not just a hobbyist 00:09:38.240 --> 00:09:40.679 tinkering with radios in his garage either. No, 00:09:40.919 --> 00:09:43.659 an actual published, documented inventor. In 00:09:43.659 --> 00:09:46.279 the July 1950 issue of Mechanics Illustrated, 00:09:46.559 --> 00:09:50.980 on page 60, there is a feature on Davis. He contributed 00:09:50.980 --> 00:09:53.419 to the invention of a device called the galometer. 00:09:54.019 --> 00:09:56.139 We really need to spend some time on the galometer 00:09:56.139 --> 00:09:58.879 because to understand what he accomplished in 00:09:58.879 --> 00:10:01.860 1950 requires us to look at the actual mechanics 00:10:01.860 --> 00:10:04.379 of what he built. It's wild. It is practically 00:10:04.379 --> 00:10:06.720 science fiction for the era. Yeah, the galometer 00:10:06.720 --> 00:10:09.580 was an early HUD, a heads up display. It took 00:10:09.580 --> 00:10:11.929 the car's speed and projected it directly onto 00:10:11.929 --> 00:10:14.070 the windshield, hovering right in the driver's 00:10:14.070 --> 00:10:17.169 line of sight. Which is crazy for 1950. We're 00:10:17.169 --> 00:10:19.490 talking about technology that didn't become standard 00:10:19.490 --> 00:10:22.129 in fighter jets until years later. And it only 00:10:22.129 --> 00:10:23.950 started showing up in high -end luxury cars, 00:10:23.990 --> 00:10:26.129 what, a few decades ago? Yeah, maybe the late 00:10:26.129 --> 00:10:28.929 90s or early 2000s. And think about the engineering 00:10:28.929 --> 00:10:31.409 problem he was actually solving here. Today, 00:10:31.750 --> 00:10:33.669 a heads -up display is just a digital screen 00:10:33.669 --> 00:10:37.000 and a microchip. Super easy. Right, but in 1950 00:10:37.000 --> 00:10:39.659 everything is analog. So how do you project speed 00:10:39.659 --> 00:10:43.019 onto a piece of curved glass using 1950s technology? 00:10:43.559 --> 00:10:45.080 Okay, break the mechanics down for me because 00:10:45.080 --> 00:10:47.879 my brain goes straight to digital and obviously 00:10:47.879 --> 00:10:50.519 he didn't have a little LED screen. No, not at 00:10:50.519 --> 00:10:52.759 all. It was an optical and mechanical marvel. 00:10:53.059 --> 00:10:56.159 They had to take the physical spinning speedometer 00:10:56.159 --> 00:10:58.940 cable from the car's transmission. Wait, like 00:10:58.940 --> 00:11:01.059 the actual physical cable under the hood? The 00:11:01.059 --> 00:11:03.919 physical cable, yeah. And hook it up to a mechanical 00:11:03.919 --> 00:11:08.080 gear system. That gear turned a transparent circular 00:11:08.080 --> 00:11:10.419 disc that had the speed numbers printed on it. 00:11:10.440 --> 00:11:14.340 Wow. Then they placed a small, intensely bright 00:11:14.340 --> 00:11:17.440 incandescent light bulb behind that disc. So 00:11:17.440 --> 00:11:20.700 as you sped up, the disc rotated and the bulb 00:11:20.700 --> 00:11:23.340 shone through the corresponding number. So it's 00:11:23.340 --> 00:11:25.600 literally like a mini slide projector hidden 00:11:25.600 --> 00:11:28.059 inside the dashboard. Exactly like a slide projector. 00:11:28.460 --> 00:11:30.919 But the genius of the Glamder wasn't just shining 00:11:30.919 --> 00:11:33.340 a light. No. If you just shine a light onto a 00:11:33.340 --> 00:11:35.379 windshield, the driver has to constantly change 00:11:35.379 --> 00:11:37.279 the focal length of their eyes. Oh, because the 00:11:37.279 --> 00:11:39.679 glass is close to your face. Yeah, right. They 00:11:39.679 --> 00:11:42.419 look at the road, which is at infinity, and then 00:11:42.419 --> 00:11:44.120 they have to cross their eyes to look at the 00:11:44.120 --> 00:11:46.860 glass two feet in front of their face. It causes 00:11:46.860 --> 00:11:49.460 terrible eye strain and completely defeats the 00:11:49.460 --> 00:11:51.139 purpose of safety. Right. It'd be incredibly 00:11:51.139 --> 00:11:52.759 distracting. You'd get a headache in five minutes. 00:11:52.940 --> 00:11:55.759 Exactly. So how did Davis solve the focal length 00:11:55.759 --> 00:11:58.740 problem? I'm genuinely asking, did this guy go 00:11:58.740 --> 00:12:01.620 to school for optical physics? Well, there is 00:12:01.620 --> 00:12:04.179 no record of him having formal advanced degrees 00:12:04.179 --> 00:12:07.340 in optics. Really? Yeah. It appears to be a mix 00:12:07.340 --> 00:12:11.419 of intense self -study, and a deep, innate understanding 00:12:11.419 --> 00:12:14.740 of spatial reasoning. Wow. Perhaps honed by years 00:12:14.740 --> 00:12:17.259 of understanding the physical geometry of wrestling 00:12:17.259 --> 00:12:20.179 rings and camera lenses. But to solve the focal 00:12:20.179 --> 00:12:22.720 length issue, the galometer used a series of 00:12:22.720 --> 00:12:25.799 specialized lenses to collimate the light. Collimated 00:12:25.799 --> 00:12:27.740 light, what does that mean? It basically means 00:12:27.740 --> 00:12:30.059 making the light rays parallel. Okay. They took 00:12:30.059 --> 00:12:32.039 the image of the number, passed it through these 00:12:32.039 --> 00:12:34.940 lenses, and bounced it off a hidden mirror up 00:12:34.940 --> 00:12:38.409 onto a semi -transparent metallic patch, to the 00:12:38.409 --> 00:12:40.850 inside of the windshield. That is so complex. 00:12:41.289 --> 00:12:43.590 It is. And because the light was collimated, 00:12:43.909 --> 00:12:45.669 when the driver looked at the glowing number, 00:12:45.950 --> 00:12:48.450 their eyes focused as if the number was floating 00:12:48.450 --> 00:12:50.809 20 feet out in front of the car. Just hovering 00:12:50.809 --> 00:12:53.110 right over the road. Exactly. Hovering over the 00:12:53.110 --> 00:12:56.629 road. No eye strain, no refocusing. It was a 00:12:56.629 --> 00:13:00.809 brilliantly elegant analog solution to a super 00:13:00.809 --> 00:13:03.929 complex ergonomic problem. That is staggering. 00:13:04.169 --> 00:13:06.769 He is building collimated optical projectors 00:13:06.769 --> 00:13:09.169 in his spare time. Yeah. And if that isn't crazy 00:13:09.169 --> 00:13:11.610 enough, wait until you hear who the primary inventor 00:13:11.610 --> 00:13:14.210 and his partner on the galometer was. Oh, this 00:13:14.210 --> 00:13:16.950 is the best part. A guy named Egiselaki Mahalakis. 00:13:17.210 --> 00:13:19.649 Also known by his professional wrestling aliases. 00:13:19.809 --> 00:13:22.710 Yes. He fought under the ring names Prince Ilaki 00:13:22.710 --> 00:13:26.980 Imnale Hassan and the Mad Greek. It's unbelievable. 00:13:27.039 --> 00:13:29.539 Two massive, imposing professional wrestlers, 00:13:29.639 --> 00:13:32.659 The Mad Greek and Wee Willie Davis. It creates 00:13:32.659 --> 00:13:35.080 this unbelievable cognitive dissonance. Really 00:13:35.080 --> 00:13:37.299 does. Imagine walking into a wrestling locker 00:13:37.299 --> 00:13:40.659 room in 1949. You've got these two 290 pound 00:13:40.659 --> 00:13:43.659 giants covered in sweat, nursing bruised ribs 00:13:43.659 --> 00:13:45.759 after throwing each other through tables in front 00:13:45.759 --> 00:13:48.639 of a screaming, bloodthirsty crowd. Yeah, spitting 00:13:48.639 --> 00:13:51.580 blood into a bucket. Exactly. And while they 00:13:51.580 --> 00:13:53.820 ice their knees, they're casually sketching out 00:13:53.820 --> 00:13:56.519 optical projection schematics and discussing 00:13:56.519 --> 00:13:59.240 the refractive index of glass for automotive 00:13:59.240 --> 00:14:02.039 windshields. This raises an important question, 00:14:02.059 --> 00:14:04.779 though, about the boxes we put people in. What 00:14:04.779 --> 00:14:06.919 do you mean? Well, we tend to firmly believe 00:14:06.919 --> 00:14:10.159 you are either physical or you are intellectual. 00:14:10.559 --> 00:14:12.740 You know, you are the brawn or you are the brains. 00:14:12.820 --> 00:14:15.419 Yeah, the classic jock versus nerd trope. Right. 00:14:15.629 --> 00:14:18.850 People looked at the mad Greek and Wee Willie 00:14:18.850 --> 00:14:21.570 in the ring roaring like animals and they saw 00:14:21.570 --> 00:14:24.730 mindless brutes. The audience bought the performance 00:14:24.730 --> 00:14:27.049 completely. They were blinding people with their 00:14:27.049 --> 00:14:29.710 size. The audience couldn't see past the muscle 00:14:29.710 --> 00:14:32.090 to the minds underneath. Precisely. And because 00:14:32.090 --> 00:14:34.549 they bought the performance, society completely 00:14:34.549 --> 00:14:37.309 missed the reality that these same men were pioneering 00:14:37.309 --> 00:14:39.889 futuristic automotive safety technology. It's 00:14:39.889 --> 00:14:41.940 a shame, honestly. It is. And it makes you wonder 00:14:41.940 --> 00:14:43.740 how often that happened to Davis in Hollywood, 00:14:43.960 --> 00:14:45.919 too. I mean, do you think the legendary director, 00:14:46.080 --> 00:14:48.700 John Huston, while filming the Asphalt Jungle, 00:14:48.980 --> 00:14:51.600 had any idea that the guy he just hired to play 00:14:51.600 --> 00:14:54.399 a nameless thug could probably explain the optics, 00:14:54.639 --> 00:14:57.100 the focal lengths, and the light refraction of 00:14:57.100 --> 00:14:59.340 the very camera lenses Huston was using to film 00:14:59.340 --> 00:15:01.759 him? Almost certainly not. Huston just saw a 00:15:01.759 --> 00:15:04.340 mug. Exactly. He saw a tool to be used for a 00:15:04.340 --> 00:15:06.700 shot. Davis lived in a world where his physical 00:15:06.700 --> 00:15:09.539 shell completely overshattered his intellectual 00:15:09.539 --> 00:15:12.820 reality. But rather than fight it, he monetized 00:15:12.820 --> 00:15:16.000 the shell to feed the intellect. So smart. So 00:15:16.000 --> 00:15:18.440 after a lifetime of wrestling under masks, says 00:15:18.440 --> 00:15:21.279 Diablo Hashtag One, sharing the silver screen 00:15:21.279 --> 00:15:24.279 with Hollywood royalty and, oh yeah, inventing 00:15:24.279 --> 00:15:26.679 analog heads -up displays, how does a man with 00:15:26.679 --> 00:15:29.200 this much variance in his life wind down? Well, 00:15:29.240 --> 00:15:31.419 the final chapters of his life offer a stark, 00:15:31.740 --> 00:15:34.440 very grounded contrast to the roaring arenas 00:15:34.440 --> 00:15:36.740 and the meticulously lit Hollywood sets. Yeah, 00:15:36.779 --> 00:15:38.500 according to the sources, Davis eventually left 00:15:38.500 --> 00:15:40.440 California and moved to Louisville, Kentucky. 00:15:40.700 --> 00:15:44.720 And from 1972 to 1975, when he would have been 00:15:44.720 --> 00:15:48.200 in his late 60s, he took a very specific job. 00:15:48.620 --> 00:15:50.860 He worked as the gym guard at the Jefferson County 00:15:50.860 --> 00:15:54.639 jail in Louisville. A quiet, intensely practical 00:15:54.639 --> 00:15:57.600 job. Very. Far removed from the glamour, the 00:15:57.600 --> 00:16:00.080 flash bulbs, and the theatricality of his earlier 00:16:00.080 --> 00:16:02.860 decades. He did return to the screen for one 00:16:02.860 --> 00:16:06.440 final film role in 1978, a movie called American 00:16:06.440 --> 00:16:09.419 Hot Wax, where he played a character listed simply 00:16:09.419 --> 00:16:12.419 as Freed's friend. Back to the functional titles. 00:16:12.639 --> 00:16:15.259 Yep. And then he passed away in Louisville on 00:16:15.259 --> 00:16:20.100 April 9, 1981, at the age of 74. Wow. So what 00:16:20.100 --> 00:16:22.320 does this all mean? I look at this trajectory 00:16:22.320 --> 00:16:24.919 and I honestly struggle to reconcile it. You 00:16:24.919 --> 00:16:27.200 go from the roar of 10 ,000 wrestling fans in 00:16:27.200 --> 00:16:29.539 Madison Square Garden, to the high stakes sets 00:16:29.539 --> 00:16:31.759 of Alfred Hitchcock, to a workbench figuring 00:16:31.759 --> 00:16:34.360 out optical projections, down to the quiet echo 00:16:34.360 --> 00:16:36.419 of handing out basketballs to inmates in a county 00:16:36.419 --> 00:16:38.860 jail gym. It's a journey. It is a staggering 00:16:38.860 --> 00:16:40.919 series of contrasts. If we connect this to the 00:16:40.919 --> 00:16:42.840 bigger picture, it beautifully illustrates that 00:16:42.840 --> 00:16:45.259 a human life is rarely a straight line. Definitely 00:16:45.259 --> 00:16:47.799 not hit. And it is never defined by a single 00:16:47.799 --> 00:16:51.740 title. Davis's life was a sprawling, multi -faceted 00:16:51.740 --> 00:16:55.039 portfolio of experiences. The very same man was 00:16:55.039 --> 00:16:58.399 a working actor, an innovative engineer, a jail 00:16:58.399 --> 00:17:01.279 guard, and a masked villain. It sounds like four 00:17:01.279 --> 00:17:03.659 different Wikipedia pages. It really does. And 00:17:03.659 --> 00:17:05.960 maybe the jail guard job was just a desire for 00:17:05.960 --> 00:17:08.200 quiet after a lifetime of noise. We don't know. 00:17:08.339 --> 00:17:11.160 Right. But his story forces us to confront our 00:17:11.160 --> 00:17:14.079 own biases, reminds us to look at the seemingly 00:17:14.079 --> 00:17:17.160 ordinary or seemingly stereotyped people around 00:17:17.160 --> 00:17:21.079 us with a profound newfound curiosity. That is 00:17:21.079 --> 00:17:22.799 the ultimate takeaway here for you listening 00:17:22.799 --> 00:17:25.759 right now. Davis's life proves that sometimes 00:17:25.759 --> 00:17:28.039 leaning completely into society's stereotype 00:17:28.039 --> 00:17:31.440 of you is just a strategy. A very lucrative strategy. 00:17:31.759 --> 00:17:34.039 Exactly. He let the world rent his body so his 00:17:34.039 --> 00:17:36.500 mind could be free to invent the future. Never 00:17:36.500 --> 00:17:38.680 assume you know someone's full story just because 00:17:38.680 --> 00:17:40.759 of the role they currently play in your life. 00:17:40.779 --> 00:17:42.940 Yeah. That person scanning your groceries, the 00:17:42.940 --> 00:17:45.359 woman driving your bus, the massive intimidating 00:17:45.359 --> 00:17:48.160 guy at the gym. They might just have a past or 00:17:48.160 --> 00:17:49.960 an inner life that would completely blow your 00:17:49.960 --> 00:17:52.920 mind. It leaves us with a lingering provocative 00:17:52.920 --> 00:17:57.480 thought. Well, if two massive professional wrestlers 00:17:57.480 --> 00:18:00.380 in the 1950s were secretly spending their free 00:18:00.380 --> 00:18:02.619 time developing collimated heads -up displays 00:18:02.619 --> 00:18:06.670 for automobiles, What hidden geniuses, inventors, 00:18:06.829 --> 00:18:09.210 and world -changing ideas are currently sitting 00:18:09.210 --> 00:18:11.589 quietly in the locker rooms, gymnasiums, and 00:18:11.589 --> 00:18:13.549 background movie sets of today. Oh, that's a 00:18:13.549 --> 00:18:15.529 great point. Who is being completely ignored 00:18:15.529 --> 00:18:17.789 right now simply because they don't look the 00:18:17.789 --> 00:18:20.890 part of a tech visionary. Wow. The next time 00:18:20.890 --> 00:18:23.769 you see a mug on screen or someone playing the 00:18:23.769 --> 00:18:26.430 Swedish tug -of -war man, just remember, you 00:18:26.430 --> 00:18:28.269 might be looking at the next great inventor of 00:18:28.269 --> 00:18:30.329 our time. You just can't see past the role.