# Paper Trail

An episode of [Aaron Mahnke's Cabinet of Curiosities](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/1396546917), 14 Jul 2026, 11 min.

Audio: https://podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/arttrk.com/p/D5CA5/pscrb.fm/rss/p/traffic.omny.fm/d/clips/e73c998e-6e60-432f-8610-ae210140c5b1/e062c374-9a39-42fa-888f-ae2c007b3c85/eef567a8-ade8-4bd0-b16f-b48601386de4/audio.mp3?utm_source=Podcast&in_playlist=f0f95fe5-d5de-4abe-ada4-ae2c007b3c8e

Putting things down on paper can have curious consequences, as these two stories make clear. Order the official Cabinet of Curiosities book by clicking here today, and get ready to enjoy some curious reading! Join our Patreon for ad-free episodes!: https://www.patreon.com/grimandmild See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

## Transcript

[0:04] Speaker 1: Welcome to Aaron Nke's Cabinet of Curiosities, a production of
[0:07] Speaker 1: iHeartRadio and Grimm and Mild. Our world is full of
[0:14] Speaker 1: the unexplainable, and if history is an open book, all
[0:18] Speaker 1: of these amazing tales are right there on display, just
[0:22] Speaker 1: waiting for us to explore. Welcome to the Cabinet of Curiosities.
[0:36] Speaker 1: The stream of time, irresistible, ever moving, carries off and
[0:41] Speaker 1: bears away all things that come to birth, and plunges
[0:44] Speaker 1: them into uttered darkness, both deeds of no account and
[0:48] Speaker 1: deeds which are mighty and worthy of commemoration. The science
[0:52] Speaker 1: of history is a great bulwark against the stream of time.
[0:56] Speaker 1: In a way, it checks this irresistible flood. It holds
[0:59] Speaker 1: in its height grasp whatever it can sease floating on
[1:02] Speaker 1: the surface, and will not allow it to slip away
[1:05] Speaker 1: into the depths of oblivion. This is an excerpt from
[1:09] Speaker 1: the opening of the Alexiad, one of the most important
[1:13] Speaker 1: pieces of literature to come out of the Byzantine Empire.
[1:16] Speaker 1: It tells the story of the emperor Alexios Komnemnos, the
[1:19] Speaker 1: man who took Byzantium out of a desperate situation and
[1:23] Speaker 1: into its final successful era as an empire. Five hundred
[1:28] Speaker 1: years after the fall of Rome, the Byzantine Empire, or
[1:30] Speaker 1: the Eastern Roman Empire as it was known at the time,
[1:34] Speaker 1: was facing a fall of its own. In the early
[1:36] Speaker 1: eleventh century, the empire lost around half of its territory
[1:40] Speaker 1: to the Seljuke Turks. Normans pressed the empire from the west,
[1:44] Speaker 1: and the current emperor didn't know how to handle either threat.
[1:47] Speaker 1: In ten eighty one, Alexios Kommnos stepped into the chaos
[1:52] Speaker 1: and helped re establish the empire. He fought the Turks
[1:56] Speaker 1: and made efforts to re establish a friendly relationship with
[1:59] Speaker 1: the papals. In just a few short years, he went
[2:02] Speaker 1: from an upstart general to something of a savior for
[2:05] Speaker 1: the flagging empire. His most lasting contribution to this period
[2:10] Speaker 1: of history, however, came from when he requested European mercenaries
[2:14] Speaker 1: to help deal with the Turkish threat and inadvertently inspired
[2:18] Speaker 1: Pope Urban the Second to declare the First Crusade. And
[2:22] Speaker 1: because the Eastern Roman Empire was a Christian nation, this
[2:25] Speaker 1: was not a problem. In fact, it's the sort of
[2:27] Speaker 1: world altering decision that makes a king into a folk hero,
[2:31] Speaker 1: although of course it also takes a specific sort of
[2:33] Speaker 1: historian to make that transformation a reality. The Alexiad, with
[2:38] Speaker 1: a title that evokes Homer's Iliad, retells the rule of
[2:42] Speaker 1: Alexios like a cross between history and epic poetry. It's
[2:47] Speaker 1: a strange, singular work in the midst of an empire
[2:50] Speaker 1: that mostly produced historical accounts that were dry and factual.
[2:54] Speaker 1: And that's no accident. It's a history that's so personal
[2:58] Speaker 1: because it was written by someone who knew Komnmnos personally.
[3:01] Speaker 1: As a matter of fact, the author was the eldest
[3:04] Speaker 1: daughter of Emperor Alexios Anna Komnemni. She was present when
[3:09] Speaker 1: the first wave of crusaders arrived in Constantinople in ten
[3:12] Speaker 1: ninety six, and even though she was just a teenager,
[3:15] Speaker 1: her memory of the European rabble was fresh in her
[3:18] Speaker 1: mind when she wrote the account down many decades later.
[3:22] Speaker 1: An exceedingly smart and well read woman, she wasn't simply
[3:25] Speaker 1: content to live a life of luxury in the palace.
[3:28] Speaker 1: She wanted to learn and alter the world.
[3:31] Speaker 2: As her father grew older and infirm, it was assumed
[3:35] Speaker 2: that upon his death, the crown would pass to her
[3:37] Speaker 2: younger brother John. Both Anna and her mother attempted to
[3:41] Speaker 2: persuade the die in Alexios to let Anna's husband inherit
[3:44] Speaker 2: so that she could rule, but they were unsuccessful. When
[3:47] Speaker 2: Alexios died, John the Second was crowned almost immediately. Some
[3:52] Speaker 2: historians say that Anna schemed to depose John, but the
[3:55] Speaker 2: plot was discovered and she was sent from court in disgrace.
[3:58] Speaker 2: Her royal ambition permanently thwarted. Anna Kommemni spent the last
[4:03] Speaker 2: thirty five years of her life reading and writing. She
[4:06] Speaker 2: became Europe's first female historian, although there is still rigorous
[4:10] Speaker 2: debates over whether her work should count as literature or history.
[4:15] Speaker 2: After all, The Alexiad is far from an objective accounting
[4:18] Speaker 2: of history, and she knew that she would face this
[4:21] Speaker 2: criticism too. In the preface of the book, she addressed
[4:24] Speaker 2: the idea that one has to sometimes pay compliments to
[4:27] Speaker 2: your enemies and criticize your relatives. In spite of this awareness,
[4:31] Speaker 2: it's impossible to argue that she wrote an unbiased work.
[4:35] Speaker 2: In fact, her very opinionated prose is what makes the
[4:38] Speaker 2: Alexiad a vital read. It is not an objectively accurate
[4:41] Speaker 2: piece of historiography, but it provides a valuable insight into
[4:45] Speaker 2: the reign of Alexios from someone who is close to him.
[4:49] Speaker 2: It shows us her contempt for the Crusaders, her assessment
[4:53] Speaker 2: of her father's military achievements, her resentment toward her brother.
[4:57] Speaker 2: Like all good primary documents, it makes history feel a
[5:01] Speaker 2: little more human. More modern scholars have attempted to dismiss
[5:05] Speaker 2: or downplay her contributions to our understanding of the era,
[5:09] Speaker 2: but in spite of that, the Alexiad is among the
[5:11] Speaker 2: most important epics of its era. Without exaggeration, there is
[5:16] Speaker 2: no piece of literature quite like it. John may have
[5:19] Speaker 2: gotten the crown, but in the end Anna got the
[5:23] Speaker 2: last word. Otto g. Lindbergh and Ernest Alpers stood on
[5:40] Speaker 2: the dusty shoulder of the road, looking up at the
[5:42] Speaker 2: painted marquee of the general store with an expression somewhere
[5:46] Speaker 2: between horror and awe. A few feet away, two young
[5:50] Speaker 2: girls in gingham dresses sat sipping from glass soda bottles.
[5:54] Speaker 2: Farmers and their families poured in and out of the
[5:56] Speaker 2: red storefront, arms laden with paper grocery bags and smiles
[6:00] Speaker 2: on their faces. And above it all hung a sign
[6:03] Speaker 2: with hand painted script that read ag Low General Store
[6:07] Speaker 2: The scene was nothing short of picturesque and everyday American
[6:11] Speaker 2: general store bustling with everyday Americans going about their everyday business.
[6:16] Speaker 2: Only Otto and Earnest knew the truth that none of this,
[6:20] Speaker 2: not the general store, or the families, or the girls
[6:23] Speaker 2: sipping cola were real. Thirteen years earlier, around nineteen thirty seven,
[6:28] Speaker 2: Otto and Ernest sat across from one another feeling very
[6:31] Speaker 2: pleased with themselves. Their industry was a cutthroat one. Deception, betrayal,
[6:37] Speaker 2: and most significantly, copycats were common pitfalls of their profession.
[6:41] Speaker 2: But that day, in the offices of General Drafting Company,
[6:45] Speaker 2: Otto and Ernest had an idea to overcome even the
[6:48] Speaker 2: sneakiest copycat artists. Okay, cartography, the science and art of
[6:53] Speaker 2: making maps may not be the first thing that comes
[6:56] Speaker 2: to mind when you think of unscrupulous business, but if
[6:59] Speaker 2: you asked Otto in Earnest, they would say that you
[7:01] Speaker 2: couldn't be more wrong. The world of map making hadn't
[7:05] Speaker 2: always been so lucrative, but as automobiles grew in popularity
[7:08] Speaker 2: through the nineteen thirties and forties, so too did the
[7:12] Speaker 2: need for road maps. And as the need for those
[7:14] Speaker 2: maps grew, so did the need for people looking to
[7:17] Speaker 2: take advantage of that business. After all, it's not as
[7:21] Speaker 2: if someone could prove a map was stolen or copied.
[7:24] Speaker 2: If they were accurate, then all maps kind of showed
[7:27] Speaker 2: the same thing, the same towns and the same cities
[7:30] Speaker 2: and the same roads, except for Aglow. Otto and Ernest's
[7:34] Speaker 2: brilliant idea. A copyright trap was an extra town, one
[7:39] Speaker 2: entirely made up by Otto and Earnest near the Catskills
[7:43] Speaker 2: at the intersection of New York two O six and
[7:46] Speaker 2: Rockefeller Road. Of course, Aglow wasn't a real place. Motorists
[7:51] Speaker 2: who were passing through Aglow would see a dirt road
[7:54] Speaker 2: intersection and a few scrubby patches of grass. This meant
[7:57] Speaker 2: any other maps that cropped up with the ma arker
[8:00] Speaker 2: for Aglow would be easy to identify as copyright infringement.
[8:04] Speaker 2: The name itself was a private joke, an anagram of
[8:08] Speaker 2: their initials Alpers g Lindberg, Otto, Ernest or Aglow. In
[8:14] Speaker 2: nineteen fifty, the Aglo Trap snagged its first prey. Rival
[8:18] Speaker 2: map company ran McNally published their map of New York
[8:21] Speaker 2: that included you guessed it, Aglow, Otto and Ernest were
[8:25] Speaker 2: thrilled by this. Not only had their plan worked, but
[8:28] Speaker 2: they had caught the massive corporation red handed. General Drafting
[8:32] Speaker 2: Company filed a lawsuit against ran McNally for copyright infringement,
[8:37] Speaker 2: expecting an easy victory in court and a sizable paycheck
[8:41] Speaker 2: for their trouble. But Rand McNally responded to the lawsuit. No,
[8:45] Speaker 2: they said, we didn't copy your map. We'd sent someone
[8:48] Speaker 2: out to Aglow and there's a real town there. What's more,
[8:52] Speaker 2: they told Auto and Earnest that the Delaware County offices
[8:55] Speaker 2: had records of Aglow. There was a gas station, a
[8:59] Speaker 2: general store, a fishing lodge, and a sparse collection of houses.
[9:03] Speaker 2: It seems that someone whose identity is now lost to
[9:06] Speaker 2: time actually arrived in the false town of Aglow after
[9:10] Speaker 2: finding it on one of Otto and Earnest's maps purchased
[9:13] Speaker 2: from the General Drafting Company. And when this individual saw
[9:16] Speaker 2: the dirt road intersection and empty acres, they interpreted the
[9:20] Speaker 2: non existent town as a land of opportunity and built
[9:24] Speaker 2: a town in that spot. This person must have assumed
[9:27] Speaker 2: that the name Aglow was in the official census record,
[9:30] Speaker 2: and so that's the name that this person and all
[9:32] Speaker 2: preceding businesses gave to their operations there the Aglow General Store,
[9:37] Speaker 2: Aglow gas Station, Aglow Fishing Lodge. I think you get
[9:41] Speaker 2: the idea, And so Otto and Ernest went and saw
[9:44] Speaker 2: the place for themselves, and they were shocked by what
[9:46] Speaker 2: they found. In their imaginative attempt to deter copycats, they
[9:50] Speaker 2: had somehow accidentally created a real town. Of course, Rand
[9:55] Speaker 2: McNally was found not guilty. The town of Aglow flourished
[9:58] Speaker 2: as much as a ton of a one hundred people
[10:00] Speaker 2: or so can. Around nineteen sixty, the general store closed,
[10:04] Speaker 2: than the gas station, than the lodge. Aglow fell into disrepair,
[10:08] Speaker 2: then eventually vanished, reverting back to that scrubby patch of
[10:12] Speaker 2: grass and a dirt road intersection that Otto and Ernest
[10:15] Speaker 2: had originally imagined. But the ghost of Aglow haunted most
[10:19] Speaker 2: other maps for decades. Heck, up until twenty eighteen, it
[10:22] Speaker 2: was still searchable on Google or Apple Maps. New generations
[10:26] Speaker 2: continued falling for the old trick, and Aglow gained popularity
[10:30] Speaker 2: after its appearance in John Green's novel Paper Towns. Once again,
[10:35] Speaker 2: the town of Aglow seems to thrive best in fiction.
[10:42] Speaker 2: I hope you enjoyed today's guided tour through the Cabinet
[10:45] Speaker 2: of Curiosities. This show was created by me Aaron Mankey
[10:48] Speaker 2: in partnership with iHeart Podcasts, researched and written by the
[10:52] Speaker 2: Grim and Mild team, and produced by Jesse Funk. Learn
[10:55] Speaker 2: more about the show and the people who make it
[10:58] Speaker 2: over at Grimandmild dot com slash Curiosities. You'll also find
[11:02] Speaker 2: a link to the official Cabinet of Curiosity's hardcover book,
[11:05] Speaker 2: available in bookstores and online, as well as ebook and audiobook.
[11:09] Speaker 2: And if you're looking for an ad free option, consider
[11:12] Speaker 2: joining our Patreon. It's all the same stories, but without
[11:15] Speaker 2: the interruption for a small monthly fee. Learn more and
[11:18] Speaker 2: sign up over at patreon dot com slash Grimandmild, and
[11:23] Speaker 2: until next time, stay curious.

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