What's up?
It's me, Don Toliver. If I could describe the open hair, but I would describe it just very seamless. It's like you clip it onto your ear and then sometimes you can forget it's there, but it's not going anywhere because it's like clipped.
It's kind of crazy. If I could bring my music with me wherever I go, it would just make life easier and seamless without interruption. To be able to have the music on hand like that without any interruptions would be great.
Check out Bose.com for more. How do we go about supporting government leaders when we may not want to vote for or support any of them? Do babies who die in the womb go to heaven? Are there only certain reasons in the Bible that are valid for divorce?
Is IVF an option for Christian couples? I'm Pastor Mike Novotny and these are just some of the topics I tackle in my new podcast, Taboo Questions with Pastor Mike Novotny. I answer questions for people just like you on essential topics that are not often discussed in church.
To listen, just search, Taboo Questions with Pastor Mike. What does every grocery store aisle now have in common? Products that come in paper packaging. And we don't just mean the obvious ones like cereal boxes and juice cartons. From beauty products to boxed water, there are more opportunities to go paper terrion than ever before. So why should you?
Because paper comes from a renewable resource and can be recycled up to seven times. Simply put, it's the smart choice for the environment. And it turns out the easiest choice for you.
Learn more at HowLifeUnfolds.com slash paper terrion. Finding the right news podcast can feel like dating. It seems promising until you start listening. When you hit play on post reports, you'll get fascinating conversations and sometimes a little fun, too.
I'm Martine Powers and I'm Elahe Azadi. Martine and I are the hosts of Post Reports. The show comes out every weekday from The Washington Post.
You can follow and listen to Post Reports wherever you get your podcasts. It'll be a match. I promise. This is Lee Habib and this is Our American Stories, the show where America is the star and the American people. Richard Gatling hoped that the tremendous power of his new civil war weapon would discourage large scale battles and show the folly of war. What would happen here to tell the story of Gatling is Ashley Labinski.
Take it away, Ashley. There aren't sufficient words to describe the horrible tragedies that befell Americans during the Civil War from 1861 to 1865, with an estimated of over 600000 dead in just four short years. At the beginning of the war, a colonel and a dentist wondered if there could be a weapon so terrible that it would deter warfare from continuing. That dentist was Richard Jordan Gatling, and he decided to take on that task with his invention that bore his name, the Gatling gun. Born in 1818 in North Carolina, Gatling showed a lot of promise for inventing pretty early on.
He created improvements on steamboats and also different agricultural equipment. Although after about a smallpox, Gatling decided to shift to a career in medicine, and he earned his M.D. in 1850 from the Ohio Medical College.
But he actually never practiced as a doctor. In 1861, Gatling took out a patent for repeating rifle battery. Now, people often incorrectly cite the Gatling gun as a machine gun, although that definition is misleading. A machine gun itself fires continuously with one trigger press, but Gatling's gun operated with a hand crank at the back of the gun. So the gun was seated onto a carriage. It was a very, very large piece of artillery, and it had multiple barrels that were affixed around a central access, similar to that of a cylinder on a revolver. And the rate of fire was about 200 rounds per minute on the initial Gatling guns, although you could kind of say that the rate of fire was however fast you could turn the crank. But later models would fire up to 400 rounds per minute, which is pretty impressive when you think that the standard military firearm at the time of the American Civil War is a single shot rifle musket, that if you were good you could fire maybe three shots a minute.
So the difference is pretty impressive. Gatling though is a really interesting character because he's a bit of a hypocrite. He was living in Indiana at the time the war broke out. He was a Freemason, and he had no problem selling his Gatling gun to the Union, but simultaneously he was an active member in the Order of the American Knights, which was a secret group of Confederate sympathizers who often operated as silent saboteurs in the north. Ultimately, the Gatling gun was a bit ahead of its time, as the style of warfare at the beginning of the war didn't really call for a gun with that kind of size and that kind of firepower, because most of the fighting was happening shoulder to shoulder, meaning that soldiers would stand in lines together row after row after row, and they were equipped with rifle muskets. Interestingly though, during the Civil War, two Gatling guns were stationed at the New York Times in Manhattan in order to quell riots that consisted of draft dodgers in what a lot of people call one of the bloodiest outbreaks of civil disorder in American history. But on the battlefield, the Gatling gun really doesn't appear until around 1864 at the sieges of Petersburg in Virginia. And that military purpose started to appear for the Gatling gun because warfare changed by the end of the Civil War.
So initially, soldiers are essentially a human wall, but by the end of the war, you start seeing the earliest styles of trench warfare begin. And so at Petersburg, trenches were dug and the Gatling guns were set up around the perimeter in order to be utilized in kind of your earliest form of trench warfare, which will be modernized and used mostly during World War One. And the Gatling gun also appeared in some forms by use in the Navy. The US Army though did adopt the Gatling gun in 1866, but the Gatling gun is probably more prolific in the movies than it actually was in any practical application in American military history.
It saw a lot more widespread adoption overseas in places like Africa and Asia. Even George Armstrong Custer wasn't a fan during the Plains Indian Wars because the Gatling gun was so cumbersome with its carriage that it really wasn't useful on mountainous terrain out West. And the Gatling gun quickly kind of became a technology that was too far advanced when it was first developed, but was quickly outpaced by new inventions such as the automatic machine gun. Gatlings were present at the Battle of San Juan Hill during the Spanish American War in 1898, but so were Colt Model 1895 machine guns, which proved far more effective, especially when you consider the fact that they were literally fighting up a hill. And the Gatling gun is a very, very large gun. Gatling would try to maintain some level of relevance and would improve upon the gun during his lifetime, but it wouldn't truly show its potential until a century later, believe it or not, when designers affixed belts to the surviving Gatling guns and turned them into the earliest prototypes for today's minigun, capable of firing over 6,000 rounds a minute.
But back to Gatling himself. After his limited success with the gun, he went back to inventions outside the gun world, including improvements on toilets, bicycles, cleaning wool, pneumatics, and many other fields. His work was recognized.
He was elected the first president of the American Association of Inventors and Manufacturers in 1891, but unfortunately, Gatling died after losing his fortunes through bad investments in 1903. A sad ending for a man who, according to legend, had the naive and futile dream to make a gun to end all wars, rather than serve as a catalyst for designs that inspired more deadly ones still used in war today. And a terrific job on the production, editing, and storytelling by our own Greg Hengler, and a special thanks to Ashley Lebinski. She's the co-host of Discovery Channel's Master of Arms, former curator in charge of the Cody Firearms Museum, and she's the co-founder of the University of Wyoming College of Law's Firearms Research Center. And what a story she told about a gun that was much more useful for movie lore and mythology than an actual war, good for trench warfare for a spot, too big to move along with troops, and in the end, some of the technology adopted by other firearms to be used down the road in warfare.
The story of Richard Gatling and his gun, here on Our American Stories. Here at Our American Stories, we bring you inspiring stories of history, sports, business, faith, and love. Stories from a great and beautiful country that need to be told.
But we can't do it without you. Our stories are free to listen to, but they're not free to make. If you love our stories and America like we do, please go to OurAmericanStories.com and click the donate button. Give a little. Give a lot. Help us keep the great American stories coming.
That's OurAmericanStories.com. How do we go about supporting government leaders when we may not want to vote for or support any of them? Do babies who die in the womb go to heaven? Are there only certain reasons in the Bible that are valid for divorce? Is IVF an option for Christian couples? I'm Pastor Mike Novotny, and these are just some of the topics I tackle in my new podcast, Taboo Questions with Pastor Mike Novotny. I answer questions for people just like you on essential topics that are not often discussed in church. To listen, just search Taboo Questions with Pastor Mike. I don't know if you know this, but when you don't have time to read The Washington Post, you can listen to it. Almost every article has a listening option. And right now, you can become a Washington Post subscriber for just 50 cents a week.
It's an incredible deal. Stay on top of what's happening by signing up at WashingtonPost.com slash pod. That's WashingtonPost.com slash P O D. Hey, I'm here to tell you about Upfaith and Family, the leading streaming service for uplifting entertainment. This Christmas, cozy up with the ones you love and experience movies that inspire and bring people together. Watch Festival of Trees, where holiday competition leads to unexpected friendships, or the heartwarming family movie, A Bluegrass Christmas. And don't miss our special virtual Christmas Fest event on Monday, November 25th.
Meet stars from these movies like Aaron Bethea, Franco Lopresti, Emily Alitalo, and Shawn Johnson as they answer fan questions live and share holiday memories. It's all commercial free and you can stream anywhere. Plus, it's just a fraction of the cost of other services. Start your free trial today and experience the magic of Christmas.
Visit UpfaithandFamily.com. Hate has been winning for too long. It's at an all time high, and too many people are facing too much hate all over this country. To turn the tide, we have to stand together. As a united team, we can change the momentum. It's time to take a time out against hate. Visit StandUpToAllHate.org to help. Join us in calling for a hashtag timeout against hate by following at what's up with hate or posting the blue square emoji. We'll be right back.
