3: Poultry Slam 1995

Ira Glass

In Danielle's house, ever since she was a girl, when dinner comes, sometimes they serve a meal that might look familiar to you. Here's the main course. On a big platter, picture drumsticks, white breast meat, golden brown skin.

Somebody carves this. Perhaps on a holiday, there's stuffing and cranberry relish on the side. And in Danielle's family, they have a name for this meal. As she told me on the phone recently, the name for this meal is--

Ira Glass

Got that?

Ira Glass

Well, from WBEZ Chicago, it is Your Radio Playhouse, a special program tonight on the wonders of "fish." Actually, we can say the word here. And the word would be "poultry."

We are in the interregnum of poultry. We stand at this moment between the poultry of Thanksgiving and the poultry of Christmas. This is the peak poultry moment in our American year. Something like a fourth, a little less than a fourth of all the turkey consumed in this country consumed during these few weeks.

And to honor that, we bring you this evening an odd variety of stories and things you would not hear elsewhere, as we always do of course. Things you not would hear elsewhere-- just transpose the words of that sentence yourselves at home. I'm not going to do that for you-- about turkeys, chickens, ducks, fowl of all kind and their mysterious hold over us.

Well, I am Ira Glass. A Chicago poet actually named Jim Banks suggested a special name for this special poultry edition of this Your Radio Playhouse. His suggestion, "A Poultry Slam," after, of course, the poetry slams the we hold here in Chicago, in the venerable paneled darkness of the Green Mill Cocktail Lounge each Sunday. Coming up this hour, David Sedaris, Luis Rodriguez, and other writers and radio heroes. And of course, of course, of course, what poultry-positive radio program could be complete without--

Ira Glass

Yes, indeed. In the late 1960s, the winged warrior Chickenman struck terror in the hearts of evildoers everywhere, on Chicago radio first and then across the nation. Tonight, we're going to bring you a historic first, the first new episode since 1969, later. That will be later, later.

See, because we're savvy broadcasters here. Even though it's public broadcasting, we're going to make you wait 'til later in the show for that. We know many of you are tuning in for that, and we're going to make you wait.

OK, to return to our story. Danielle's family. The power of poultry is so great in their lives that when they serve chicken or turkey, they call it--

Ira Glass

That's right. And they call it this for a reason. And the reason has to do with this stuffed hand puppet called Duki.

A little background, Danielle is 28 years old, editor at Details magazine in New York City, a very fashionable magazine. Her sister, Ashley, two years younger, now a graduate student at the University of Michigan. And Duki has been in the family since they were children.

Ira Glass

Now it is not unusual for older siblings to dominate younger ones. And as children, Danielle pretty much would dominate Ashley. Danielle always got her way, except, except when Duki was around.

And basically what would happen is Ashley would channel-- that's kind of an anachronism to use that word in this context-- but Ashley would channel Duki's voice. She would speak as Duki. She would produce the Duki-like voice. And Duki was sarcastic and selfish and bossy. Duki would insult and tease Danielle and give her painful nose squeaks.

Ira Glass

18 years after Duki arrived in the Mattoon household, I can say, I think fairly accurately, that the fluffy whiteness is long gone. "Fluffy" is not a word-- you would never use that word with Duki anymore. Nor is two-eyed, actually, if I remember correctly.

Ira Glass

OK, I have been at Danielle's house sometimes and witnessed the following scene. Picture this. Danielle has not spoken with her sister in weeks, picks up the phone, calls her sister Ashley in Michigan. Ashley answers. Danielle asks immediately, "Can you put Duki on the line?" And then Ashley essentially becomes Duki, puts Duki on the line. Danielle talks to Duki for 15, 20 minutes. And then they both hang up. That's the whole conversation. And they both feel satisfied.

Ira Glass

So I hope that it's becoming clear why, when you eat dinner in the home of Danielle's family, if they are serving some kind of poultry, chicken or turkey, if you ask anyone in the family what's for dinner, they'll tell you--

Ira Glass

Now I thought I would try to book Duki to come on the radio for this show. So a few weeks ago, I contacted Danielle's sister, Ashley. And I asked her if Duki could come on the air.

And I didn't get a call back. I got an answer back by electronic mail that for Duki to appear, I would have to call someone named Yona Lu, who I could reach through Danielle and Ashley's mom. And when I talked with Danielle, I asked her about this.

Ira Glass

OK. In Danielle's family-- I guess you're figuring this out. There's Duki. There's Yona Lu. And then there are four or five other characters, Therese-- I can never keep all their names straight-- who live in this world that's fleshed out with a lot of vivid detail and drama. They have a club called The Smart Set, and people are forever falling in and out of favor with The Smart Set.

Anyway, there are jealousies. There are rivalries. People fight for favors and treats and invitations to ice cream socials. And each of the characters corresponds to some stuffed doll that Danielle and Ashley received as children.

Though a few months ago, Danielle and Ashley were talking. And they realized that one of the characters, Guy Frank, didn't seem to correspond to any particular doll that they could remember. Where did he come from?

They attempted to recall this. And then one of them did. Guy Frank is Duki's imaginary friend. Duki is such a fully realized imaginary friend that he has his own imaginary friend.

As you might imagine, not everyone in the family takes all this so lightly. Danielle's father, for example, was never too keen on it.

Ira Glass

Well, I did finally snag an interview with Duki by calling Ashley.

Ira Glass

Long time no see, back at you. And welcome to our little radio program.

Ira Glass

Well, the story of a 26-year-old graduate student who talks like a duck brings us naturally to the subject of Chickenman. Chickenman first soared the radio airwaves from 1966 to 1969. And nearly every day, there would be a new episode for three years. These are short, little two-minute things, starting on WCFL here in our beloved Chicago.

And after that, Chickenman appeared on over 1,500 radio stations across the country, around the world. According to the people who syndicate it these are the numbers. They say it's been translated into German, Dutch, and Swedish. It is still on the air, they say, in several dozen markets, making it one of the longest-running radio features anywhere.

Chickenman began years before National Public Radio existed. It will probably continue years after we are gone. Like the mighty cockroach, like, I don't know, the bagel, like Hamlet, Chickenman endures, will endure.

Coming up later in the show, we'll have the first new Chickenman episode since 1969. Have we mentioned this enough in the show? Should we just mention it every time? Every time we open the mike, I should just mention that? It was written especially for our broadcast by Dick Orkin, the voice of Chickenman. But before we hear that, let's just hear what all the fuss was about.

Chickenman Announcer

Now, another exciting episode in the life of the most fantastic crimefighter the world has ever known.

Chickenman Announcer

Benton Harbor, employed as a shoe salesman for a large downtown department store, spends his weekends, his only two days off, striking terror into the hearts of criminals everywhere as the white-winged warrior called Chickenman. How did it come about that Benton Harbor, weekend winged warrior, selected the visage of the chicken in his crusade against the forces of evil? Now it can be told.

Chickenman Announcer

Be listening tomorrow for another exciting episode in the life of the most fantastic crimefighter the world has ever known.

Ira Glass

The all-new Chickenman, coming up at the end of our show. But next, a real-life story of real poultry and a real poultry farm. Stay with us, won't you?

Julie Showalter

I'm Julie Showalter. I grew up on a turkey farm in southwest Missouri. "The night 3,000 turkeys died." The day before the night that 3,000 turkeys died, we moved 13,000 turkeys to the range.

This requires some explanation. Turkeys spend their first 16 weeks in a heated brooder house. When they are 16 weeks old, they are put outside to range in fenced enclosures.

Daddy decided we would herd them to the range. It looked simple enough. We made a temporary chute of wire fencing that ran from the double-end doors of the brooder house 50 yards to the pen. We would get behind the turkeys in the brooder house, shout, wave old shirts and gunny sacks at them, and they would run out the doors, through the chute, into the pen.

And that's the way it worked in the first brooder house. The first turkeys hesitated at the door, walked out cautiously, then moved through the chute and dispersed. The rest followed. It took about an hour. Daddy was pleased. "Let's work straight through," he said. "We'll be done by 10:00."

By the time the turkeys have been in a brooder house for 16 weeks, the air is filled with ammonia, feather particles, and dust. The stench is overwhelming. After an hour in the brooder house, your lungs hurt for a day.

You can contract disabling lung diseases from working only a week in a poultry house. Tiny barbed pieces of feather dig into the tissue of your lung and never let go. But we didn't know that then.

We moved the temporary fence to the doors of the second brooder house. When we threw open the doors at the end of the second house, it was 9:00 in the morning. The sun streamed in the open doors on turkeys that had never seen direct sunlight.

The one thing you can count on with turkeys is that you never know how they are going to react. I've seen turkeys clamber against a fence trying to get into a range fire. I've seen them rush toward a screaming child, trying to kill it. And I've seen them run from a screaming child, spooked and terrified.

These turkeys didn't want to go into the sun. As we pushed from behind, they compacted. It was like an old adventure movie where the walls are closing in. But there was no wall at the end, only a patch of sunlight which turkeys would not touch.

We yelled louder, waved our cloths, kicked at the ones in the rear. Finally, Daddy walked through the solid carpet of turkeys to break the logjam at the front. He stood at the edge of the sunlight, lifting the turkeys three or four at a time with his feet, stirring them with this legs, forcing them into the sun.

Suddenly, they broke free. As stubbornly as they had refused to go into the light, they now rushed toward it. They ran in a panic, piling on top of each other, knocking down the temporary fence. By the time Daddy could get the doors closed, at least 1,000 turkeys had escaped and were running free on the farm, onto our neighbor's farm, into the road.

We didn't own the turkeys. We raised them for a company that owned the hatchery, the feed mill, the fleet of trucks that delivered and loaded the turkeys, the processing plant. We got a portion of the profits, if there were profits.

With 1,000 turkeys gone, there would be no profits on this flock. 16 weeks of Daddy working 14-hour days, of my sisters and me working alongside him any time we weren't in school, all for no pay. And if we weren't paid for this flock, we would have no cash coming in until the next flock was raised.

It took us eight hours to round up the escaped turkeys, four of us trying to track down 1,000 birds that had the whole world in which to hide and run from us. The sun beat down, and the air was thick and humid. We stopped once for water, and my sister, Billie, the youngest of us, just 11, vomited from the cold water hitting her stomach after hours of sun, heat, and dehydration.

As she lay on the ground, shaking and holding her stomach, I hated her for being the one too sick to continue. But even she was not too sick. We all went on. She got an extra five minutes to rest, but we all went on.

You may be asking right now how my father could be so cruel, how he could work young girls like that? Or you may think that I'm exaggerating, that self-pity has magnified our distress. I tell you, this is no exaggeration. And I tell you, my father had no choice. Or that any choice he had was so far in the past that there was no unraveling it. Years later, when we were grown, we caught a glimpse of his guilt, his bitterness over what he had done to us. "I couldn't afford n------," he told my sister Billie. "So I had daughters."

At 6 o'clock, we rebuilt the chute. We opened the doors, and the 6,000 remaining turkeys, the sun now low in the sky behind them, walked through to the pen. We cleaned up. We ate supper. And we went to bed. That's the day we had before the night 3,000 turkeys died.

At midnight, Mother woke us up. "We have to get to the pen. Daddy needs us." We had been too exhausted to hear the storm. We ran out in the driving rain. Flashes of lightning showed Daddy picking up turkeys and throwing them, one after the other.

When people learn I grew up on a turkey farm, they invariably ask, "Is it true? Are they really so stupid that they open their mouths in the rain, look up at the sky, and drown?" The answer is yes, some of them do that. They are that stupid. But that's not how 3,000 die in one night.

They die because they are scared, and they huddle together in their fear. They climb on top of each other, trying to get close, to find protection in the mass of bodies. And they suffocate.

We called it piling. It wasn't unusual for a loud noise to cause a pile in the brooder house. If there wasn't someone to pull them off each other, 50 could die because someone slammed a door.

But this was worse than any pile we'd seen, turkeys who'd never spent a night outdoors panicked by thunder, lightning, and rain in sheets. All we could do is pull them out of the pile and throw them away from it. They would run back, still seeking the comfort of the group.

After a while standing in mud, grabbing soaked turkeys, throwing them, grabbing more, you don't know if the ones you are throwing are dead or alive. You don't care. Maybe we saved some.

The next day, the sky was cloudless, and the sun bore down on us again. We picked up dead turkeys, throwing them onto the back of a flatbed truck. Daddy drove the truck into a field far from the house. He poured gasoline on them and struck a match. They burned for days.

Ira Glass

Well, Julie Showalter lives in Burr Ridge, Illinois, and says that she still does eat turkey. Well, twice a year, she eats it. And this is the special Poultry Slam edition of Your Radio Playhouse, coming to you from WBEZ in Chicago. Stay with us, won't you?

Luis Rodriguez

This is Luis Rodriguez. And I'm going to read my poem, "The Rooster Who Thought it Was a Dog." Echo Park mornings came on the wings of a rooster's gnawing squawk. This noise, unfortunately, also brought in the afternoon, evenings, and most hours of the day. The rooster had no sense of time, nor any desire to commit to one. He'd cock-a-doodle whenever he had the notion.

For late sleepers, day sleepers, or your plain, ordinary, run of the mill night sleepers, annoyance had this rooster's beak. It was enough to drive one crazy. Often, I open my back window that faced the alley just across from the backyard where the rooster made his home. "Shut up, or I'll blow your stinking brains out," I'd yell. Great communication technique.

It worked on the brats next door, but the rooster never flinched. With calm aplomb, it continued to squawk. For one thing, the rooster never gave out a bona fide cock-a-doodle. It sort of shouted it out.

It happened that the rooster lived with three dogs, a German Shepherd and two mutts. The dogs barked through their existence. They barked at everything in sight. I finally concluded that rooster thought it was a dog. Somehow, I didn't mind the dogs barking. But when a rooster barks, that's murder.

In fact, I often saw it running alongside the dogs as they raced across the dirt yard, barking at passing cars or people. If the dogs went left, the rooster went left. They'd go right, and dang if that rooster didn't go right as well. Now I don't know if this is a regular condition for roosters.

I thought I had a story for the Weekly World News. I could see it now. "The Rooster Who Thinks it's a Dog." Who knows what rooster dementia we had here? And whether the rooster chased cats up trees or pissed on fire hydrants, this wasn't clear.

But once I grasped the heart of the matter, I began to see the rooster in another light. I felt sorry for this fowl with an identity problem. And I wondered how it must react when its owners threw chicken bones to the dogs. Would it nibble on the remains of its favorite hen? I shuddered at the thought.

Yet despite the revelation of the rooster's bark, the problem of sleep didn't end. Then one day, a new neighbor, a young lady, who often drank herself to bliss, got a gun and blew the rooster away. She became somewhat of a local hero.

I must say, though, it was an unfitting end for the bird. But I suppose one can tolerate barking dogs. But barking roosters? That's another matter altogether.

[MUSIC PLAYING - "A CHICKEN AIN'T NOTHIN' BUT A BIRD" BY CAB CALLOWAY]

Chickenman Announcer

Now, another exciting episode in the life of the most fantastic crimefighter the world has ever known.

Chickenman Announcer

The office of the Police Commissioner of Midland City.

[TELEPHONE RINGING]

Chickenman Announcer

Wow. Say, that chicken missile really works nifty. Will the Midland City Fire Department recommend that a chicken missile receiver be installed in what's left of Midland City Hall? Be listening tomorrow for another exciting episode in the life of the most fantastic crimefighter the world has ever known.

Ira Glass

More Chickenman. That all-new episode, coming up.

Ira Glass

In the meantime, my friend Verta tells this story. Verta, Vertamae Grosvenor, is a National Public Radio commentator, host of an NPR show called Seasonings. Anyway, back in 1970, she published a cookbook. And she was interviewed about it on television by Barbara Walters.

And as Verta tells this story, OK, she's on TV, making fried chicken for Barbara Walters. And at some point, Barbara Walters asks her, "How do you tell the chicken's done?"

And Verta tells her, "You can tell by the sound." Ms. Walters gives her this look which says, basically, "Give me a break," and quickly cuts to a commercial. And Verta says that's always people's reaction.

Ira Glass

Well, the fabulous Vertamae Grosvenor from a studio in Washington, DC. More fun a-comin', writer David Sedaris in New York City. And of course, have we mentioned-- I can't remember. Did we mention the new Chickenman episode, the first one since 1969? Did we mention it? All right. Stay with us.

[MUSIC PLAYING - "EAT THAT CHICKEN" BY CHARLES MINGUS]

David Sedaris

July 19, 1992. This afternoon, at the 26th Street Flea Market, I had one of those experiences that remind me why I shop in the first place. Not shop like grocery shop, but step out into the world searching for that one thing I cannot name.

I pass the usual objects, the grinning mammies offering themselves up as salt and pepper shakers, the coffee table made from dice, another head carved from a coconut. "That's collectible," the dealers say, referring to an ashtray in the shape of a doll-sized toilet bowl. Collectible to who?

Last weekend at the flea market, I saw this thing, a taxidermied turkey's head attached to its own foot. This turkey was equipped with that length of flesh that spills from the top of its beak and fell to its neck. Stiff red hair stood out from the head and shoulders, and the claws were really sharp. You'd think that something armed like that might be able to protect itself.

I pictured its maker standing by a chopping block saying, "I know. I'll take the turkey's head and attach it to the foot." Why would you do that? Or more importantly, what sort of life would you lead that might enable you to make this connection?

I was hypnotized by this object and asked the price as if I were under a spell. "$45," the dealer said. My tongue was dry from hanging in the open air, and I tried to fit it back into my mouth. "All right," she said, "$35. $30." But she could have gone up. "All right. $85. $120. $370."

I had no choice but to follow wherever she led me. I handed over my wallet in a trance, just gave it to her, thinking she could take the whole thing, the cash, blank checks, library card, whatever. Take it all.

I stared into the face of this taxidermied turkey's head, and nothing else mattered. Tomorrow, what's that? Yesterday doesn't count. My life began the moment I could call this thing my own.

On the way home I felt giddy and confident that I could approach anyone at all and say, "I'll give you one hundred-- no, $500,000 if you can guess what I've got in this paper sack." And I swear that not one of them could have come up with the right answer. I walked home 30 blocks, looking everyone square in the eye and thinking, "Sucker."

Ira Glass

Well, David Sedaris is the author of Barrel Fever, often heard on NPR's Morning Edition.

Ira Glass

All right. Well, forget about those two new Beatles songs, so-called Beatles songs, put out two and a half decades after the group broke up, because here, here, right here on Your Radio Playhouse, we have chicken mania. Chickenman-ia All right, forget that.

Dick Orkin, the voice of Chickenman and the brains behind Chickenman. This is the style that launched 1,000 imitators. When I was a kid listening to the radio in Baltimore, I heard this stuff, and really, Chickenman, until the time I was 13 years old, and The Tooth Fairy, another series that Dick Orkin did. And then occasionally, you would hear these commercials for Time magazine or other stuff.

You could always tell. You could always tell. That's the guy. That's the guy. Those are [UNINTELLIGIBLE].

Because they all had this very deadpan feeling. There was just something offbeat. You couldn't even quite put your finger on what it was. And I, like many people who got into radio in the years that followed, spent the early part of my career in radio trying to imitate that sound and then giving up because of the utter futility of that.

And so we are very, very pleased. All of that is a way of saying we are very, very pleased. We, the corporate we, I and the little production staff here at Your Radio Playhouse, we are very pleased to be able to bring the first new Chickenman episode written since 1969, the first full episode written since 1969. You know, Chickenman is getting up in years. And no one appears to be more aware of that than his creator.

Chickenman Announcer

And now, another exciting episode in the life of the most fantastic crimefighter the world has ever known.

Chickenman Announcer

Well, what has the winged warrior gotten himself into here? Can he actually stop time by challenging the fates? And is it Frank Fate he's talking to or Georgie Jessel? And another thing, doesn't that nouveau Italian-Chinese restaurant sound super-trendy? Be listening tomorrow for another exciting episode in the life of the most fantastic crimefighter the world has ever known.

Ira Glass

Well, "Chickenman Challenges a Fate Named Frank" was recorded at Dick Orkin's radio ranch in Hollywood, California. Along with Dick Orkin, the cast included Charlie Brill, Allison Anne Martin, Miriam Flynn, and Jim Gallant. Engineers Elizabeth Lane and James Burns. Written by Dick Orkin and Christine Coyle. Ms. Flynn's hairstyle by Mr. Bunny.

[FUNDING CREDITS]

The show is produced by Dolores Wilber, Nancy Updike, Peter Clowney, Alix Spiegel and myself. Contributing editors Margi Rochlin, Paul Tough, and Jack Hitt. Many songs in tonight's program were provided by Mr. Steve Cushing and the Blues Before Sunrise Radio Network. Our program comes to you from WBEZ Chicago. Our address, 848 East Grand Avenue, Navy Pier, Chicago, 60611. Our email address, oh why don't you write us, [email protected]. That's [email protected].

[ACKNOWLEDGMENTS]

And finally, thanks to the Mattoon family, Ashley, Lynn, Duki, Yona Lu, and of course, Danielle.

Ira Glass

I'm Ira Glass. See you next week, same chicken time, same chicken channel. Same brave little radio station.