Why Did These American Settlers Eat Each Other?
2024 ж. 18 Мам.
947 085 Рет қаралды
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Thoughty2 (Arran) is a British KZheadr and gatekeeper of useless facts. Thoughty2 creates mind-blowing factual videos about science, tech, history, opinion and just about everything else.
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Writing: Damien Knightley
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Script Development: Steven Rix
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much love!
weed
I was waiting for you to cover this story, your the best!
🌝🌞🌝
Also the famous 49s who had a hell of a story of there own, in a journy for the American dream, they found tragedy and there route to cali, went into the heart of the infamous area 51,, they left messages to be found on there path that still rxist today, but only a few scientists ever found them, leaving the message to never found!
Been hilarious if you'd gotten this sponsored by hello fresh or grub hub.
Omg yes that would be
Athletic greens
gurb hurb
Go grub your own hub weirdo
This video did get a Mc. Donalds ad. Lol
Many years ago, I worked with a woman who was a direct descendant of the Donners. Every couple years members would gather for a family reunion and the "be careful or I'll eat you" jokes were limitless. On a more serious note, this woman owned an old diary written by one of the Donner women and included many accounts of what actually happened during this (above) event, of how emotionally difficult it was for members of the Donner family to make the decisions to survive or die. This particular diary was never published, and no plans to do such by its current owner, as she told me herself. I was told by this woman, my co-worker, that many of the stories told today have been highly exaggerated and sensationalized outside the living family descendants. The author of the diary of which I speak, eventually made her way to San Francisco and lived to be a very old woman herself.
That amazing.
Stories like the Donner party always tear at me. My survival instincts tell me I'd do it, my Anishinaabe heritage screams "Wendigo!!!" But I've been through Donner pass, it's still terrifying.
Why wouldn't you want to release that though? If most of the stories are exaggerated? Wouldn't you want the truth of the to be known? So your family isn't being dragged in the dirt by exaggerated fairy tales?
while I respect their choice, it would be interesting to read a primary source from someone who actually went through that.
I’m a direct descendant of the Breen family in the Donner party. Other than a few phone calls when I was a kid, I’ve never really heard much about it. No diaries passed down. I don’t know. It’s not something you think about. It’s just as interesting for me to learn about my relative who got his overcoat sucked into a train and killed.
Virginia Reed, who was a child on this trip, wrote this advice in her diary for future travelers, "Hurry along as fast as you can and don't take no cutoffs."
Wonderful! Where'd you happen upon this lovely tidbit?
@@therealzilch at 21:10 :)
@@joshuakerger2897 Ah, thanks.
@@therealzilch I took my children to Truckee and read everything I could about the misadventures of the Donner party. Children in USA are not really taught much about what it took to 'settle this continent,' AKA 'save this continent from incursion by the French and Spaniards,' AKA steal this continent from the natives.'
@@lesleyewen-foster3629 It is interesting that they got help from the natives. Who btw had no problem to "settle" the continent. They took their time - and if they looked for new regions they just were not so arrogant as to venture into the unknown with so little information.
Its sad to know that the native americans were actually very friendly and helpful. They saved a lot of people no matter their race and no matter what they looked like. Sadly the payment they get is the destruction of their tribes.
Same thing happened to lots of people. Lots of tribes were friendly to the Roman's when they first evaded, same with genghis (before his conquest was known) and same with the Persians, Egyptians, phonecians, conquest is a terrible but in a way needed thing to progress the human race further.
That's not true at all. The reason the Donner party died is because over 100 cattle were killed or stolen by Indians. Some tribes were helpful, but the whole thing wouldn't have happened without the numerous attacks from the Indians. They'd ride by on horses and shoot arrows into the cattle just to kill them.
@@The_ScapeGoat if that was the case they wouldn’t of had to worry about food
@@The_ScapeGoat probably didn't appreciate people settling on their own land
@@The_ScapeGoat they are native americans. not indians. learn geography
This should be an interesting watch right before I eat lunch.
lol
kzhead.info/sun/hth8cceBaKlnmp8/bejne.html yeah its better to eat lunch, feeling the hungriest
Bone appetite! 💀🍽
"should"? Cast all doubt from your mind, this is the best thing to watch before lunch!
@@eaglekiller888dragon2 Why is everyone posting this video everywhere? (Also, I commend the way you posted the link. You posted it AND said something moderately funny, instead of just "." because a lot of people for some reason do that? Why just "." after the link, help me)
fun fact about me that nobody cares about!: My family was among one of those 50 wagons that went with the Reed and Donner families. Thankfully my ancestors decided to go to Oregon and not California where they diverged from the Donner's and never ended up taking that "shortcut" route. It's scary to think that if my ancestors had followed them they may have shared their fate and i would never be alive today. Thankfully my family made it to Oregon with only two deaths out of their 14 children. Also another fun fact one of those kids was named America.
How old are you!??! Lol....
@@jasonexploring why?
@@clairef2998 because most people can’t trace their ancestry that far back or in detail. I can trace mine only until early 1900’s
@@seaofroses8888 My mom is really into our ancestry so I know a lot about it from her. Specifically the Oregon trail. I don’t know how my mom knows everything she does but we live in Oregon City Oregon which is at the end of the Oregon trail so there’s a lot of cool museums and such. Not to mention the Oregon trail occurred around the 1860s so it’s really only a generation or two away from the 1900s
@@seaofroses8888 I have my family back to 1623 Please!
“Thank the good God we have all got through and the only family that did not eat human flesh,” wrote fourteen-year-old Virginia Reed, a surviving Donner Party member, in an 1847 letter. “Don’t let this letter dishearten anybody and never take no cutoffs and hurry along as fast as you can.” Reed reported being “pleased with California, particularly with the climate.”
The Reed family was the only one that survived intact!
The real tragedy is that the Donner Party missed getting to safety by just ONE DAY. I learned that from the two-hour PBS special “The Donner Party” and the two-hour Weather Channel special “Dead Of Winter: The Donner Party”.
Elaborate? Safety as in... what were they only a day away from?
@@KS-qj1fe Crossing the pass into California that got sealed up by the snow
@@shewolfsiren that's so unfortunate...omg
@@KS-qj1fe Yeah, of all the b*tch slaps they got, that one was the worst!
This video did say that the forlorn group met a native settlement shortly after they ate their party members. So it's really just a matter of giving up too fast.
A couple years ago I happened to be driving alone at 2am in Truckee CA, knew vaguely about the Donner party so I spent some time driving around and getting out of my car to have a smoke. Wish I could tell you I saw a ghost or some shit but nah, just spooky middle-of-nowhere vibes. Just thought I’d share 🤷🏽♂️
how was the view where you stopped??
What the HELL is Poseidon doing in the MOUNTAINS?
Truckee/Lake Tahoe is just beautiful...
@@whiteiverson3579 Well it was 2 in the morning so there wasn’t much of a view except the darkness and trees
That sounds really nice, serene, peaceful.
"Come out to the coast, we'll get together, have a few laughs!"
We can twiddle each others mustaches?
Yippee ki-yay mother______. 😄
@@patrickglaser1560 circus strong man style
Now i have a muzzle-loaded musket. Ho, ho, ho
😂😂😂
"Meet the Pioneers Who Ate Each Other" No, I don't think I will.
I mean, they've kinda all been dead for a while now, for one...
@@Amy_the_Lizard Meeting a pile of bones isn’t exactly a very fun prospect either.
There is an old saying from my days at the Pfadfinder(german boy scouts): "The longest distance between two points is a shortcut!"
"Shortcuts make long delays." Pippin Took
the shortest is displacement... sorry bad joke
Donner party: we're gonna get rich in California! Nature: *no*
I love the part in patch adams where he's pushing the teaching skeleton around going "donner, party of fifty"
Dont think I will have that kebab now
Nature: Hey done blame me, I didn't tell the dumba**es to take that dangerous "shortcut"
growing up in Nevada we took a field trip to the lake and walked along the trail. the donner museum has a lot of interesting stuff in there.
Did it have a buffet?
Was there a clown?
@@generaljj577 good one lol
@@seishonagon8468 terrible
@@Mrboomer135 .....COOKIE
Let's be real, Keseberg was no longer eating people out of desperation, there were 3 oxen legs for food, he was eating people because he enjoyed it, so I don't really feel bad for him being treated like a monster. I'll never judge someone who chooses cannibalism over death, but choosing it over regular food is entirely different.
such hard traumatizing conditions can enable pretty much anything by this point I'd assume.
Talk about a picky eater. o_o
Wendigo psychosis is real
I havent managed to find anything that actually mentions there being oxen legs there. Additionally there was still corpses laying around to feast on, so killing her would have just added more to the pile (when it really would have been better to keep her alive, eat the already dead corpses, and kill her later after for fresher meat), the most suspicious thing was that she was supposedly in decent health when the previous relief team arrived yet dead when the next did, and that Keseburg had her gold on his person, but he said she gave it to him to give to her family
It's easy to conclude or say things like he was a monster or that once he got a taste for human blood he just couldn't help himself... but I think that's a stretch. These were extreme, dyer circumstances of which I'm not sure anyone can confidently say what they would do... faced with the prospect of a gruesome death by way of starvation and/or disease can really twist a person's mind, I'm sure... suppose there were oxen legs available, isn't meat just meat apart from our own sentiments? Lol... that sounds terrible, I'm aware! Now, the argument that she was in seemingly good health when the rescue party last saw her is flawed because who can say that her health didn't rapidly deteriorate shortly after they saw her? It's perfectly plausible that he did kill her, which would, ya know, suck but there's no way to be sure of that... this was not how I expected to start my morning... lmak
"If ya brought more jerky ya wouldn't had to eat Grandma" Said: Some one
And she only died because someone got a D in grammar. "Let's eat grandma" should have contained punctuation.
"it was quite keen on killing anyone who entered it" the mormons: "its free real estate"
LOL as an ex-Mo and Salt Lake City resident, this comment is absolute gold.
Nobody lives out in the actual desert/salt flats ya freaking dingus... -_- ... They settled/lived in the temperate valleys to the east.
@@Cooe. no one said they lived on the flats. Why are you calling anyone a dingus? Utah is a desert, flats or not...
@@patrickglaser1560 me too. Just wish my family would
@@Cooe. dingus is what dingus does.... everybody is a food source... yum yum.. clean you're plate.
No clowns were permitted in the Donner party. They taste funny.
What about comedians? Which tastes funnier?
A bit of katsup doesn't hurt.
Forlorn Hope is a great name actually. ‘Forlorn’ sounds very much the same as ‘verloren’ in Dutch. That means ‘lost’, so ‘Forlorn Hope’ sounds pretty much like ‘lost hope’ to me and that’s a pretty adequate name if I say so myself.
That's where it comes from: it was originally a military term, "verloren hoop".
It also sounds like lost in German
"Donner" means thunder in German. I assume the Donner brothers or their parents were German emigrants. I've always thought their name fitted quite well to this story. Thunders can be quite scary, as was their experience. A thunder of fate, so to speak.
Donner kebab makes sense now.
@@terrypeart3875 That's actually spelt Döner in German
@@terrypeart3875 That's Turkish.
@@terrypeart3875 maybe thunder in your bowels
Oh I thought it was blitz
_"PIONEERS WHO EAT EACH OTHER..."_ *Also that one pioneer:* Krusty Krab Pizza! It's a pizza for you and me...
You got a like from me simply for the Clockwork Orange pic
@@aceundead4750 a bit of the old in out in out
the title changed lol
@@SpuddyWesker holy shit bro, that's my favorite line from that movie. I'm shocked anyone else would even remember
😂🤣😂🤣😂☠️
I’m 14 from the US and I love your channel. The way to edit and make your videos are amazing. This channel has kept me sane during the lockdown, Ive learned so much. Thank you
are you sure your not 32 year old professional nba player kevin durant
@@ytpeak4080 it's a possibility he is a 32 year old proffesional nba player known commonly as kevin durant but that's left up to debate.
He probably just named himself that
No I just named myself that 😆
@@kevindurant7803 YES! I was right!
I've been watching to this channel for 8 months now and i seem to tell my family weird factual information I've learned on this channel they always don't believe me end up trying to ask Google and i come on as a very interesting person thank you for making my world bigger
To think that each group independently thought of eating their friends and family is disturbing
Sickening! My neighbours also do that, whenever I pass their house on a Saturday evening, i always hear something about them eating each other!
I have lesbians in my neighborhood too
@@BDXRP11B 😂😂😂oh man
I-
Befriend them, they might be closet cannibals targeting other neighbors
@@missblink4611 had to
I love signing into classy restaurants as the Donner party
Donner party of 7, donner party of 5...
kzhead.info/sun/hth8cceBaKlnmp8/bejne.html okay
Bone appetite! 💀🍽
@@itwasagoodideaatthetime7980 Just be careful! You just might get boned! (And then later de-boned!) Happy Trails!
@@lukejohnson6415 this had me dying xD
I was very impressed with mrs. Reed since a kid I've always been impressed with the Reed Donner Party my ancestors came by wagon and still lived a quiet rural farming lifestyle well into the 60s because of where they lived electricity couldn't get there until the 70s. Mrs. Reed kept that family together Protected Their assets and refuse to eat human flesh. She knew that it would make her family vilified in society or considered pariahs or Oddities. It also went against her religious beliefs and she was concerned that it could also psychologically harm her children at the time she may not have known the word psychologically but she knew that this would not be the right thing to do. Her family made it through healthy. They were the ones who ate the bark and pine needles Etc. The reason they feel Mrs Donner was murdered is her gold was never found and they feel that the man stayed behind to kill her for the gold. The families had pooled their money and they were known to be carrying coinage real gold and silver on the Trail as they paid for items with it. They we're not a poor family they had not filed bankruptcy they had made a profit selling out everything they had to go west. They feel either she hid it so well and he killed her without ever learning where it was or he did get it but never had a chance to go back for it or may have spent some of it every once in awhile but it was not enough to support him throughout his lifetime. She and he were the last two people left in the Donner encampment her refusing to leave unless they could take her belongings with her which told them that she had done something with the gold and was afraid to leave because she knew he'd been spying on them. Mr. Donner was also still alive but barely breathing when they came and she wanted to stay with him till his last breath I'm sure she thought she could defend herself against the true cannibal in the group because he pretended to be weak but he'd been eating a lot more than people knew and he had become a deranged man.
Something to remember is that, because the dead bodies didn’t have any fat on them, it was incredibly difficult for those living to actually get any kind of nutrition from eating the bodies. So, even though they had like dozens of bodies to eat, no one had any fat, so no one actually gained anything. I mean, I’m sure the bodies helped, but they didn’t help as much as one might expect them to. (I learned this from Ask a Mortician’s video on the Donner Party.)
"Hey 42 here" never gets old. Edit: true fans know it's 42
Ok
@@eyevan7100 stfu
@@Milan_M95 Lol ok.
"Hey 42 here" never gets old,never gets old 😆 🤣
Ok
" as far as omens go...that was a crappy one." I snorted when he said that
snorted? lol that's another way to say
I'm reading "Stick A Flag In It" right now. Your chapter on the pre-Revolutionary War America, the war itself, and the long term consequences that ultimately resulted was the best one-chapter survey of the subject I have ever read. Your one-liners keep things entertaining, but even ignoring that, the facts presented are so on-point. I love your book.
Been watching you for 5 years man. It’s amazing how much you’ve improved. Well done bud.
Comments like make me want to subscribe ❤
“At least the snow meant they didn’t have to worry about those depleted water supplies” Me a Boy Scout: no
Well you need a fair amount of snow (snow is mostly air) and something to melt it in for it to be workable. I'm guessing they had pots and pans and fuel for fire. To those who don't know: In a survival situation, do NOT eat snow to quench thirst. You will use up calories you need to stay alive raising its temperature. Do not melt it with body heat, use an external heat source if possible.
@@shawnhartmann4581 Yeah, eating snow is the quick way to die of hypothermia.
@ LEAST THEY HAD SOME SLURPEES 👍🏾👍🏾👍🏾👍🏾
Donner party to me as a German sounds more like Thor having a party during a thunderstorm or well… causing it
Let's do "get help", it will help, I promise
or a fart party
"Just 200 Miles from their Destination" That sounds like was actually quiet close, when it really wasn't.
This is one of those is 200 miles a long way? dealios. In an airplane, no it's just a hop. In a car, kinda, it's a four hour drive. On foot? Hell yes! That's gonna take a few days maybe even weeks if you got wagons and children and old people to move as well.
That was a really long ad at the beginning. now I remember why I haven't stopped by this otherwise great channel in awhile
Just skip it then hell there’s even extensions which skip them for u
PBS did a fine documentary on the Donner Party several years ago. It is one of the most tragic tales of the Western Expansion, or (and I hate this phrase) 'Manifest Destiny'. The two Native men that came to assist the party, were sent by George Sutter (who had a fort near what is today Sacramento), after the two men who rode ahead brought news of the party's predicament. Reed also worked tirelessly to lead rescue parties. Lansford Hastings went on to write 'The Emigrants Guide to Brazil', following the Civil War.
The original title of this video "Meet the Pioneers Who Ate Each Other" sounds like it could also be the title of the next Terrence & Philip Holiday Special.
Actually, there is already such a movie. It is called "Cannibal the musical" and was Matt Stone and Trey Parkers early masterpiece. It is not about the Donner party but Packer who basically did the same thing in smaller scale and itt is pretty funny (others think of Frozen if someone say "Let's build a snowman" but this movie have a better song on the same theme.
I'm pretty sure this person is aware of Cannibal The Musical.
@@jralanmorgan Thank you. XD
Just adding a comment and a like to help this reach top comment. If we keep this trend up, maybe he will react
6:40 "What could possibly go wrong".... I had a friend who often said this,... God rest his soul.
I have a little extra info if you want it, Lewis keysburg the demonized cannibal was infact a wife beater and was in support of hanging red because he caught him beating his wife and threatening him not to do it again. Also read killed the man because he hit his wife and was beating Reed with a whip so take this info as you will.
Here's to the Ancestors who without their survival we wouldnt be here talking about the weird creepy stuff they did... They survived and for that I say thanks ♡ remember this when the food shortages they are saying we are in for start and go get food while ya can.. You dont wanna be the star of a video 100 years from now!!! Just saying.. stay safe all the world is getting weirder by the day ♡
y'know what, i wanna do something so Aaron's grandkids can make a video about me
@@rmdhn1 lol that's the spirit..
You are who you eat
Jeah great! Props to them being dumb af and eating their saviours. Top notch white settler moves there. 12/10
@@herrschmidt5477 yeah well, hopefully we don't ever know hunger that great! There's a few important lessons to be learned here... stay safe and have a blessed day!
I would love if you did a video covering Overlander falls in British Columbia Canada, because the story is that they got to the mountains thought the mountains were going to be easy to get past and we’re horribly mistaken so they build rafts to hold their cattle and everything, and Overland Falls is this place where they didn’t know waterfall was coming and they only knew when they heard it and saw the front group go over, yes some made it off the river but lots of people died going over
Fun fact, people can go up to 5 weeks before needing to resort to canniblism. The settlers resorted to cannablism about 2-3 weeks before nessecary, implying there was someone instigating the idea. I believe this individual was probably Lewis, or another one who died early. _Natives didnt view cannablism as abhorrent as we do, albeit it still wasnt something to brag about unless for a ritual, so in my opinion, what spooked them was how fast the settlers resorted to cannablism._
“Went quite well” … gets assassinated 🥺😭
In a disturbing fit of irony, there is a restaurant in Donner California that is owned by the descendants of the Donner brothers. The food is actually very good....
Bet they don't have a lot of homeless around there. 🤪
Don't take a short cut there
Are long pork sandwiches on the menu? :D
The original title was "Meet the Pioneers who ate each other"
Still is
@@snowtiger7260 probably won't will be for lonh
@@snowtiger7260 check the capitals
Haha
Lmao at this point we all know he’s gonna change it
"Even when an experienced mountaineer named James Clyman warned him [...]" Few people know this, but the act of scaling a mountain was actually named after him. When he was seen on a steep mountain wall and asked what he was doing, he simply yelled "CLYYYMAAAAANNNNN!!!". The person asking misheard and thus "climbing" had been invented.
I used to occasionally give my group's name as Donner at restaurants so when they shouted out "Donner... party of five!" I would call back "Party of four! Party of three!" I like to think my life has been fulfilling...
"That's GOTTA hurt!" - Costanza
lol !!!!
My mom's side of the family are the descendants of the only surviving members of the Donner family. The stigma followed them back home to Illinois sadly and so did the financial loss of the whole thing. I could've been a rich kid living in California but instead I grew up poor in Pennsylvania lol ...if they would've just went the right way 😒
Oh shit. F*** you James Reid😒
What a bunch of.....Misfits?
Was your mother the one on the documentary where it was proved that when the party split in two and ended up stranded forty miles apart and it was proved by examining the cooked bones round the fire pit that one of the parties didn't resort to canabalism and actually managed to find plenty of gsme
@@starrchild254 I'm not aware of her being involved with anything like that. Do you recall the name of the documentary?
@@ifeafa7310 indeed a big f*** you Mr. Reid lol
Another good one. Also finished your book. It was Grand learned a lot! Thank you
Dinner Lake is where we had all my birthday parties as a kid….one of the shelters still mostly stands and I remember playing near it as a kid. Very strange to hear the full story. I love this channel.
The presentation in these videos is absolutely fantastic! Held my captivation for the whole 22 minutes! cheers
Somehow you managed to make the gruesome tale of the donner party, well, much like a party. Was very entertaining, witty and enjoyable.
I've heard the Donner Party so many times but I was excited to hear how Thoughty2 was going to present this! You didn't disappoint! 👍😁♥️
Enjoyed every video you put out... Thanks!😊🙏🏻
Sorry for back to back comments. However, I just wanted to post this (quote) as to shed a little clarity on the actual snow amounts that fell during this voyage… “Ten major storm periods generated exceptionally deep snowpacks at Alder Creek (10-12 feet), Donner Lake (15 to 20 feet) and on Donner Pass (25 feet & more). Rain and snow pounded the mountains from Nov. 1 to Nov. 11, which buried the pass to California with 10 feet of snow.” Some reports say 66’ total
I actually lived about half a mile from where the two trails cross into NV for 15 years. Also side note the guy who wrote the 'shortcut' wasnt wrong contrary to what most ppl think. There really is a shortcut that cuts through there and had they arrived a week or two earlier to that spot it would have been great, even today there are prominent roads around that area that lead east. It would have been great except for one issue, elevation. There's mountains there and in Utah winter comes about a month early to the mountains. We will see snow on the Mountains long before we see snow in the valley. So the early mountain snow slowed them down and caused them to be delayed then boom the forests and death. Also its not 'web er' its 'We ber'.
The humor added into these stories keeps me coming back for more.
I remember playing the Oregon Trail computer game and coming across a reference to the Donner Party, and as we listened to Louis L'Amour growing up, we caught a few oblique references to the story there as well. What is amazing, is that two years or so before, the Sager children, possessed of even worse luck, made it to the Whitman mission without ever once resorting to cannibalism. In fact, I would be interested if you would do a video on the Sager children.
Unfortunately, I know that they pronounce 'Weber' as ''Wee-ber''. Just FYI. LOL. Great video.
Gods forbid there be a consistent phonetic structure in this failed language
I prefer "Weh-ber", it sounds more bad ass.
@@mordekaishekelbergiv.4211 I know, but German is a phonetically written language, unlike English, it's also codified, unlike English
Doesn't really matter the way you pronounce it
One of my favorite youtube channles, ill be buying merchandise next payday , all the support & good will towards you thoughty 2 (Arran) ✌
I say mate, this is the third time viewing this video! I find the facts so interesting that I had to soak in the details. Keep up the good work! I love the good and humorous way you narrate these. They are so fun to watch and I like hearing your accent and great voice.⚠️
Been camping, rock climbing, and hiking at Donner and Donner Pass. Snow in June wasn't great, but beautiful area
"Hey thoughty2 here" never gets old.
Ok
Ok
Ok
Ok
Ok
For anyone in the future the original title was"Meet the Pioneers Who Ate Each Other"
It was? Now it’s “Why Were These American Pioneers Forced to Eat Each Other”
Not for me either
@@KingMikey17 it's called a joke
11 hours later and it's the same title
These work so well as audio stories as well, cheers.
Reed: Riding off into the sunset Laughing; "Take my wife! " He said shoving his hat in the air in a hehaww.
The convincing guy that got them into trouble went on to become a realtor in California .....
And the fraudster that made money by posing on experts for trails went on to write a how to book about settling in Brazil. He had just made up the shortcut to California - maybe to sell his book easier.
"Long live the Pioneers." Ahh, it all makes sense now.
Your podcasts sick bro, love it
Love your videos especially the ones on history. Keep up the good work lad.
This whole story is absolutely insane, I love it
“Feet? I’m not eating a foot!” Sounds like the plot to Cannibal the Musical by Trey Parker and Matt Stone. Their first movie. It’s a must watch.
🎶the sky is blue, and all there leaves are green.... my heart's as warm as a baked potato🎶
Yeah buddy!!
"You eat one lousy foot and they call you a cannibal forever" - from "Airplane".
🎶I've got a chest of wonder and balls of thunder they can bust right through a wall🎶
@@KS-qj1fe 🎶 I think you know precisely what I mean.. When I say its a shpidoinkle day!! 🎶
I grew up in the Donner Lake area. Learned all about this stuff in elementary school. Great to see other people talking about it.
You did a great job!! Loved the creepy but interesting story!!
You know its a good day when Thoughty2 post a video. Especially when it lands on a Friday.
Another epic video as always
I'm loving your podcast. It's awesome
The salty slush would have made the oxen's hooves sting and burn, no wonder they bolted. I am amazed when I think about how harsh regular traveling was back then, I doubt I would have followed a newby on an unknown route. Those families that followed Reed were very brave, too bad it turned into a nightmare.
I fell asleep right before this played on my queue, and ended up having a dream about 2 exploring groups who wanted to get from 1 part of the us to another. 1 followed the path of the map and another tried following a theoretically faster way, but many ended up dying and I think a person or two had to get eaten to suvive during the winter. I also remember the exhibition met a group of aboriginals who helped like 5 of 20 survivors. Afterwards they left and during the winter storms, the leader of the exhibition, when he got too tired, gave his supplies to the last two men, sat down and pulled out his pipe freezing to death. I think those 2 survived and the captains body was discovered by the same aboriginals who helped him and they made a fire pit dedicated to him. The reason they got lost was due to poor navigation abilities copied with that the guy who put the theoretical path did it by stitching together half baked maps without knowing what went where. It was meant to be a race to see who had the better path, but the guys that took the normal path arrived about a year or two earlier than the other. Now let's just hope I'm not underwhelmed by this video compared to my dream
Holy shit I remember waking up, but I wonder if I actually fell asleep. I also remember being on my couch for a few seconds I'm my dream.
@@crimsonwolf8174, aside from events being out of order a bit, your dream was very close to the video. I once had a similar experience while reading a book as a kid. I read an entire 200+ page book in about 2-3 hours sitting by my bed, but when a raised my head, it felt like I had fallen asleep and dream read my way through the book. Adding to my confusion was that I was entirely alone in the house after I closed the book, but I never knew the family Gad gone out for a while. Adding to my suspicion that I might have read my way through the book while asleep, Mom told me when they got home that I looked like I had fallen asleep with my open book in my lap. It was a strange experience.
Have you ever thought of looking into an infamous Canadian family called the Donnelly's or as they were known the Black Donnellys
10:37, Yeah, most people who haven't experienced it don't realize that as hot as deserts can get during the day, they can get cold at night. And, the severity of the swing in temperatures is absolutely brutal.
It’s very hard for those who haven’t been in those areas to understand how vast they are and how hard it was to travel back then. As you pointed out, when they got off of the main trail they were forced to cut a path through trees. A very difficult and time consuming thing to do with an ax. Even though the trees were mostly soft wood, they are incredibly thick in the foothills of the mountains. When I travel through that area I tell my daughter to look off to the side of our car and imagine what it was like to take a wagon through that country. No nice highways back then. Lots of rivers and creeks. Boulders and trees can become impossible to get through. That’s why a good trail was vitally important. Back then the settlers who had never seen that land didn’t understand either and the trails are still dotted with graves. Some marked and some forgotten. Independence Rock has the names of those who traveled through the trail and memorials of those who died trying. The Donner party went by it.
I had a similar experience at Gettysburg. I had read that Little Tound Top was the key to the battlefield, but with Big Round Top being the larger, I could never understand why nobody bothered to fortify it. When my family vacationed in the East for two weeks, one of our stops was Gettysburg, and I discovered that Big Round Top was impossible to fortify with cannons as the sides are nearly vertical and are heavily forested. I had always wondered what was so special about Chattanooga and Chickamauga that there were critical battles fought there during the Civil War, but standing on the top of the mountain staring over the river valley, it was suddenly very clear. Geography is an important influence on history.
its funny that you mention the donner party sounding "like a kabab shop" cuz i, as some one born in the US, and familiar with the donner party story, while traveling in Japan, found a "donner kabab" shop for the very first time. never hearing of them before then, in my mind, this was hilarious, because they had a big thing of roasting meat, and a sign saying "donner kabab", my first thought being that they were selling human meat, and that they had no idea, of the double entendre of its name.
Travelling through Hastings cutoff almost makes you wish for a nuclear winter.
you made a gruesom story funny. you have a real gift.
I apologize Thoughty2. You voice is so soothing, I snoozed off! Back for a second go...
I'm saving this for later, sounds delicious
4:44 and James Reed insisted his family would still go to Wally World.
😂😂😂
😂😂😂😂😂😂😂
Im in love with these series
Fun fact: Donnor Pass has a family picnic area. Good thing most of us avoid the mountain whenever it even looks like snow is coming 😂
Me: I should probably give watching true crime a rest for a while for my own sanity. Thoughty2: Meet the Pioneers Who Ate Each Other.
I said the same thing yesterday to myself and yet here I am watching this video 😂
I knew that was the Donners just from the thumbnail. Been to "Donner pass". There's a statue with a pedestal that is the height of the snow at the time. Edit: Whoops... It was the Reeds. 😟😆
I was hoping Morning Brew is a coffee subscription service. You know, like that wine box subscription thing.
I live in the Northern California foothills town of Rocklin, California, in Placer County or Gold Country. That's about an hour or so from Donner Pass, Donner Lake and Donner Summit. About two and a half hours away is Marysville a city built in the site if a settlement where Mary Donner stumbled out of the Sierras after the spring thaw.
Turning 15 soon, been watching since I was 9
It’s amazing how much faith people put into a book. 🤷🏽♂️
I'm actually from Reno Nevada where the Donner pass is, the place where the Donner party became trapped. So it's kind of cool to hear you talk about it.
They should make his voice that of the virtual assistants