Rat Poison, Stolen Cars, and Green Apples: Inside the 1904 Olympic Marathon Disaster
Rat Poison, Stolen Cars, and Green Apples: Inside the 1904 Olympic Marathon Disaster · Avonetics
The year is 1904, the sun is beating down on St. Louis at nearly 90 degrees, and 32 men are lined up to run 24.8 miles through choking clouds of red dust. What should have been a glorious display of human capability rapidly descends into something resembling a circus fever dream.
Organizers decide to test a bizarre theory that hydration during physical effort is bad for human health. As a result, 32 runners are given exactly one water stop along a seven-foot-wide dirt course packed with horses, spectator buggies, and automobiles kicking up dense plumes of dust.
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Within an hour, chaos reigns supreme. One runner collapses, vomiting blood after inhaling pounds of road dust into his lungs. Another, a Cuban mailman who hitchhiked to the event after gambling away all his money, spots an orchard along the road, eats several sour apples, gets severe stomach cramps, and decides to take a quick nap on the grass.
Meanwhile, two South African runners—making history as the first Black African Olympians—are forced miles off course because a pack of wild dogs decides to chase them across a dirt field.
Then comes the frontrunner drama. An American athlete suffers intense leg cramps at mile nine, gives up, gets into his trainer's car, and comfortably rides eleven miles down the track while waving to confused spectators. When the car breaks down, he nonchalantly trots into the stadium and crosses the finish line to thunderous applause before being caught posing with the President's daughter.
Your brand, right here.Reach story-obsessed listeners in 45+ languages → advertise on AvoneticsWhen the actual winner finally stumbles into the arena, he isn't running—he is hallucinating wildly while his trainers physically drag his feet across the finish line. His secret weapon? A mid-race dose of raw egg whites mixed with french brandy and literal rat poison used as an early performance booster.
One commenter modernizing the story noted that it reads less like an official Olympic event and more like an apocalyptic survival test designed by mad scientists. Another argued that the runner who took a mid-race nap and still finished fourth remains the true hero of early twentieth-century sports.
Our hosts jump straight into this incredible tale of bad science, absolute fraud, and incredible endurance on the latest episode of the podcast.
