02x10 - Anything for a Buck

[bunniefuu]

[lighthearted music]

- Do you remember
when delivering pizza

in 30 minutes or less

was a dangerous way
to make some dough?

- If it's not delivered
in 30 minutes, it's free?

- People are rooting
against the delivery guy.

They want them to fail.

- You were definitely like,
"Let's try to order pizza

maybe when it's icy or
when there's a snowstorm."

- Or when you could
earn a nice living

digging up the bodies of
those no longer living.

- They're transporting
bodies in wheelbarrows,

throwing them over
their shoulder.

They're putting
'em on horseback.

- A well-preserved, recently
dug up body would get you $700.

That is a lot more than most
people would make in a month.

- Or when dam
workers risked it all

to make some damn good money.

- They placed dynamite
into that wall.

They light the fuse
and swing away,

and do the process over
and over all day for hours.

- This used to be how
American men were.

Get me a rope, a plank,
and pay me seven bucks,

and I'll get that done for you.

- These are the
things we used to do,

for fun, for money,

or maybe out of boredom,

that we'll never see again.

Were they dangerous?

Certainly.

Deadly?

Occasionally.

But boy, wasn't it exciting?

[dramatic music]

[dramatic music]

[dramatic music]

Some say the ultimate
way to get rich quick

was the gold rush of the 1840s.

But a century later,
Americans were in a frenzy

to get their hands on
something else valuable,

something that, it turns out,

was a really bad thing
to put your hands on.

- In the late 1940s,
there's this new resource

that everyone is talking about.

And it's just out there,

in the American West,
waiting to be discovered.

If you can find it, you're
gonna get rich quick.

And what is it?

It's uranium.

[dramatic music]

- Now the US
government's been relying

on imports of uranium
from places like Canada

and the Belgian Congo.

But after the w*r, with an
increase in nuclear testing,

all of a sudden the US
needs a lot more uranium,

and they need it now.

- So the federal government
could build a big prospecting

and mining operation, but
they do something else.

Instead, the Atomic
Energy Commission

basically says to
the American people,

"Get outside and find
us some uranium."

- The Commission starts
running ads in magazines,

trying to say, "Hey, we
will pay you good money

if you go mine this ore for us."

- [Jason] For every pound
of uranium you find,

the government's
gonna pay you $3.50,

or that's effectively $50 today.

If you can find a whole
deposit of uranium,

there's a $10,000 bonus,
equivalent to 150 grand today.

So people are motivated.

- Do you need a special
permit or license to do this?

No, you don't.

But the government did say,

"Hey, if you're looking,
here's 350 million acres,

basically a quarter of the
size of the continental US,

where you should go
look for this stuff,

'cause we're pretty
sure it's here."

- [Henry] It's an official
government-backed treasure hunt,

and Americans jump right in.

- [Natalia] Prospecting is
really grueling work,

but some people make
a fortune doing it.

There's this one
man, Charles Steen,

who lived in this very
modest shack in Utah.

In 1952, he stumbles upon one
of the largest deposits ever.

It's worth $6 billion today.

- [Jason] By the 1950s, America
has gone uranium crazy.

Even comedic
superstar Lucille Ball

has an episode in one
of her TV specials

where she becomes a
uranium prospector.

- Honey!

Honey, you did it!

- I knew it!

- You did it!

- I knew I'd find uranium!

- The idea of
prospecting uranium

has become part of
the pop culture.

- [Rutledge] By the late '60s,

people have brought the
government so much uranium.

It's actually almost


which is twice the
amount of steel weight

that's in the
Golden Gate Bridge.

- [Jason] In exchange for this
work,

the government has paid
out $3 billion to citizens,

which is almost $35
billion in today's money.

That is more than NASA's
current annual budget.

- [Dan] But there's this one
minor difference between this

and the gold rush a century
earlier, or silver, or even oil.

And that is that those
things aren't radioactive.

This stuff is very,
very hazardous.

And you've got all
these people rushing out

and handling it without
any protection at all.

- Today uranium is
handled very differently.

People are wearing, first
of all, protective gear.

They're wearing gloves,

they're wearing
hazardous material suits.

- But the '50s are like this
time of blissful ignorance

about radioactivity or
any environmental hazard.

There's even this
atomic industry film

where a guy is opening up
a can of crushed uranium

and then getting it
all over his fingers

like he's playing with
sand at the beach.

- [Jason] But not surprisingly,

people working most
closely with uranium,

prospectors, truckers, miners,
they start getting sick.

- [Henry] As lung cancer
and respiratory disease

ripple through
uranium mining towns,

the evidence becomes
impossible to ignore.

- [Jason] In 1974, the Atomic
Energy Commission shuts down.

And later, Congress institutes

the Radiation Exposure
Compensation Act,

providing billions for
the people who got sick

and their families.

- [Rutledge] There are still
people looking for

uranium today.

The big difference
is the government is

not encouraging it,

nor are they incentivizing it.

And hopefully those people

are taking some amount of
safety into account here.

- Uranium hunters were
encouraged to chase a fortune

and paid a steep price.

But decades earlier,
there was another job

that offered great
upward mobility,

straight up the
side of a building.

- [Martin] In the early 1900s,

American cities are
action-packed places.

As a result of the
development of concrete,

we have skyscrapers.

The cities are getting taller,
they're getting bigger,

they're thriving,
and they're exciting.

- Banks, hotels, businesses,

they're all competing for
the public's attention.

And this gives rise to
what we call ballyhoo,

these great spectacular events

that capture the
public attention

all to draw
attention to the name

on the front of the building.

- So a new class of
daredevils arises

in order to bring attention
to these businesses,

by climbing up the side
of buildings, for a fee,

with no safety equipment.

- [Brian] Sometimes these
guys, by the way,

they just dressed like they
were going to the office.

They would wear business
shoes and a suit,

so it looked like

they were just crawling
out of the building,

which is actually
a pretty good hook.

- [Edward] Some of these
climbers really understand

showmanship, so they'll often do
various dramatic poses as they

climb, really milking the
attention factor,

getting the crowd
completely into it.

- [Lance] In general, if
someone's doing something

that looks to be crazy,

where you feel that
pumping in your heart

because you think
it's dangerous,

you're gonna stand and look.

I would.

- These climbers

are eventually given
the nickname human flies

because of the way they
seem to defy gravity

while clutching to the
outside of the building.

- This starts out as a handful
of, like, promotional stunts,

but it starts to
become a phenomenon

that spreads from city to city.

- These climbers find
that not only are businesses

eager to get it on it,

but it's actually fairly
easy to get city approval.

- [Martin] If someone was
climbing a building today,

they would have a security
perimeter around the site.

Back then, that's not the case.

The spectators are encouraged

to gather around at the
base of the building.

- [Edward] The famous human
fly was George Polley.

And he was not only
a great climber,

but he also was a great showman.

- [Brian] He would get halfway
up and then pretend to fall.

And the crowd would [gasps].

And then he would just
laugh and keep going.

- [Lance] He climbs a building
in Massachusetts.

And it's so dangerous that
some people can't watch it,

they hide their eyes,

'cause he's just hanging
on by his fingertips.

But when he makes it to the top,

he rides his bicycle around
the edge of the building

as a finale.

[dramatic music]

- [Brian] This was a profession.

They got paid like


which is what other people
made in about a month.

So a guy could
literally be like,

"Honey, I'll be back later,"

go to work, crawl
up, catch 200 bucks.

Living the high life.

- [Henry] Crowds loved to
watch these daredevils for hire

push their luck.

But sometimes that
luck runs out.

- In 1923, a human
fly named Harry Young

climbs the 16-story Hotel
Martinique in Manhattan

for a hundred dollar fee in
order to promote a movie.

Throughout his climb, he
pretends several times

to slip his foot just to
create dramatic effect

and give the people a show.

- [Henry] At the 11th floor,
he does another foot slip,

except this time it's not a gag.

- [Kavitha] His foot actually
slips and he falls

off the building.

He hits a part of
the building's facade

and then plummets down.

The policemen has to force a
bunch of women off the sidewalk

to keep them from getting hit.

Young is k*lled
pretty much instantly.

- [Henry] There are more fatal
falls just like that one,

and officials start
putting their foot down.

- [Lance] New York City becomes
one of the first places

to crack down.

The police start
denying permits.

Then the Great Depression hits

and advertising budgets dry up.

And eventually the
profession of human fly

disappears forever.

- [Martin] If somebody does an
event like this today,

it's under so much safety

that it really doesn't
feel raw and exciting

the way that it must have
felt to people a century ago.

That's something that's
gone the way of the dodo.

- Everyone wants
to get to the top.

Human flies just took
the direct route.

- We've all seen
signs on job sites

that say "X days
without an accident."

Now imagine a job where
they couldn't get past 19.

And that's not 19
without an accident.

I mean 19 without a death.

- [Austin] In the early 1930s,
the Colorado River

is completely unpredictable.

Some years, it's completely
arid and crops fail.

Other years, the
snowfall is so intense

it washes away entire harvests

throughout Arizona
and California

and kills townspeople.

- [Jason] The government decides
to fix this problem

by going really big.

They set out to construct

a massive concrete
wall 60 stories high.

Not only that,

they're gonna have this
wall generate electricity,

which will feed millions
of homes in the southwest.

- [Henry] This wall
is the Hoover Dam.

- Construction
begins on the dam,

and the working
conditions are tough.

People drown in
the Colorado River,

they're hit by moving
trucks, objects fall on them.

It's incredibly dangerous.

- [Henry] But the most
treacherous job of all

is what's called a high scaler.

- The high scaler's job

is to clear the canyon
walls of any loose rock

so that the dam can be built
onto smooth, stable bedrock.

So that means loading
yourself up with gear

and then climbing
down the canyon walls.

- [Henry] The only thing
standing between these men

and an 800 foot drop
is a single rope

and a whole lot of nerve.

- [Hakeem] Once they're down,

a jackhammer has to
be lowered to them

to clear away loose rocks,

but they also have to
drill holes into the wall.

And then they place
dynamite into that wall.

They light the fuse and swing
away at just the right time

so that the dynamite can
explode and they don't get hurt.

And then they go
and do the process

over and over all day for hours.

- No safety, no anything.

Like, this used to be
how American men were.

"You need to clip some of that?

Yeah, get me a rope, a plank,
and pay me seven bucks,

and I'll get that done for you."

Could you imagine that today?

No way.

- [Henry] But they're not
just getting the job done,

they're putting on a show.

[explosions booming]

- Tourists drive from
all over the place

to watch these men who,
at this size and distance,

look like insects.

Journalists marvel at
the three-ring circus

that is the Hoover
Dam being built.

- [Jason] They have little
contests with each other.

Some of them decide to
push out from the wall

as far as they
can on their rope.

They're daring each other
to outdo one another.

And the fact that safety
foreman are few and far between

means there's really no one
there to tell them to stop.

- [Don] But as construction
moves along,

the glamour of being a
high scaler begins to fade.

- [Hakeem] The work is nonstop.

They work eight hours a
day, seven days a week,

all year long.

You're gonna get mentally tired,

and that's gonna lead to errors.

- [Don] Fatigue makes it
easy to lose your wits,

raising the chances that you
won't anchor yourself properly,

plummeting 800
feet to your death.

Oh, and you can also get
blown up by the dynamite

if you aren't careful.

- [Henry] By today's
construction standards,

the final death
toll is stunning.

- [Austin] 96 deaths are
officially accounted for

in the construction of the dam,

but some experts think that's
actually an under count.

Regardless, it's a
staggering amount of lives

and amounts to about
one death every 19 days.

- [Brian] It's always easy to
look back on times that have

gone by and judge them from
a modern perspective.

And I think that's a mistake.

The dam had to get
built for America.

They took pride in their work.

They were taking pride
in their country.

There was a work ethic that
just isn't really around today

in the same way.

[dramatic music]

- It just goes to
show that some careers

didn't come with a safety net.

And in other jobs, you just
had to go with the flow,

even if that meant you were
heading right toward the rapids.

- [Edward] In the late 19th
century, America is absolutely

exploding in every possible
way,

population-wise,
industrialization.

And all of those things lead
to a huge demand for wood.

And the biggest
concentration of lumber

is in the Upper Midwest,

where there's just vast,
seemingly inexhaustible forests.

- [Henry] Of course
cutting down the trees

is only half the equation.

There's still this small matter

of moving them
across the country.

- [Lance] Railroads haven't
gotten there yet.

They don't have roads.

But rivers are a great path.

Every winter crews cut
down millions of trees,

stack them along the
sides of the rivers.

In the spring, when
the river opens up,

they dump these
logs into the river

and just float them downstream.

- [Henry] But this lumber

can't be left to just
float on its own.

Even one stuck log
can stop the flow,

shutting down mills
a hundred miles away.

- That's where these
log drivers come in,

or, as they like to call
themselves, river pigs.

So these river pigs are
basically like lumberjacks

wearing spiked boots.

They've got this big
lever called a peavey.

And the idea is that when
they see logs stuck together,

they'll jam it in there,
they'll pry them apart,

and they keep the logs
moving going down the river,

which also means they're
going down the river.

- [Kavitha] These guys have
to be strong enough

to actually handle the lumber,

but they also have to be
nimble and agile enough

to balance on the logs
and hop from log to log

as these logs are
spinning in the water.

- [Henry] River pigs are
some of the highest paid men

in the industry.

- [Rutledge] The notoriety of
the river pigs is for real.

I mean, people will
come from miles and miles

just to watch them do their job.

- If I told you that
there's a bunch of dudes

who can ride logs down a river,

I think even in the 21st
century you kind of wanna watch.

I wanna watch it right now.

Some of them do headstands,
they do somersaults,

they jump from log to log.

They're deeply, deeply badass.

- [Rutledge] If you're a kid at
this time,

you know there's not
Evel Knievel yet.

These guys are daredevils.

- [Henry] But
rolling on the river

is not all fortune and glory.

- [Lance] It sounds exciting,
but it's actually

quite grueling.

These log drives can
last for weeks at a time.

People are working
maybe 16 hours a day.

You know, the river doesn't
stop, the logs don't stop.

- [Kavitha] The living
conditions are not great,

even the kitchen floats
downstream along with you.

And everything is
just wet all the time,

so there's mold and
vermin everywhere.

- But that's nothing compared

to the real risks
these men are facing.

They're running around on
undulating logs all day.

One false step and
you can fall in.

The logs are heavy.

They can weigh up
to 4,000 pounds.

So you might get
crushed between them

or you might get trapped beneath
them in the freezing water.

- [Rutledge] There's a really
high chance that if you go

under, you might
never be seen again.

Now keep in mind
this is pre-OSHA.

Like, people don't know

about workplace health
standards at all.

So it's really just like,

"Oh, yeah, did John
show up for lunch?

I guess he's still alive.

Cool, good job."

Like, that was it.

- [Henry] Eventually the
end comes for river pigs,

but not because
it's too dangerous.

- Road and automotive
technology develops

and trucks become the
primary way to haul logs.

And many of the old growth
forest are cut down.

- [Edward] With all these
changes,

the river pig as an
occupation is gone,

and with it, the heroism,
the bravado, the risk taking,

and the cool factor that
was associated with them.

- Sometimes if you
wanna make a living,

you gotta be willing to
go in over your head.

- Some jobs aren't for everyone,

which you may know if you've
ever worked a night shift.

That was certainly
true in the old days

when one occupation
gave the dead of night

a whole new meaning.

- [Natalia] By the early 1800s,
medicine is really becoming a

field in a more official sense.

And some of the innovations

that they come up
with at that time

are things we still use today.

Take the stethoscope,
anesthesia.

- This expl*si*n
in medical research

leads to more people
enrolling in medical schools.

Now, the medical schools

can't provide effective
instruction without cadavers.

- At this period,
life expectancy is up,

executions are down.

All of that means that
there are fewer bodies

available for study.

- Medical schools
turn to grave robbers,

or the way cooler
name, resurrection men.

- [Henry] Resurrection
men work in crews

with a simple business
model: dig up bodies,

sell them to medical
schools, collect the cash.

- [Austin] These crews are
extremely professional.

They're not just going
and digging up corpses,

they're getting the freshest
bodies as quickly as possible.

- But it's not like the
old like Frankenstein

where they were
digging the bodies

and there's a big pile of dirt.

These guys wanted
to be efficient.

So what they did was
they dug like a strip

at the top of the
grave six feet down,

broke through to the coffin,
put hooks under the armpits,

and then hoisted them
right up in the grave.

I mean, they were in
and out of that cemetery



And then they would
try to fill it in

and even put the flowers back on

so that nobody would catch 'em.

- These grave robbers

have to get these bodies
from the grave site

to the medical school,

and they have all sorts
of ways of doing that.

They're transporting
bodies in wheelbarrows.

They're putting them in sacks

and throwing them
over their shoulder.

They're putting
'em on horseback.

- Sometimes they would
just dress them up,

put a big coat on
'em, put a hat on 'em,

and put 'em next
to him in a wagon,

and just start clapping
through the city.

And everybody just thinks,
"Oh, his buddy's drunk."

Meanwhile, he's traipsing
around town with a corpse.

It's like "Weekend at Bernie's."

- [Natalia] This is a very
lucrative business.

A well-preserved, recently
dug up body in 1800

would get you $25.

That's $700 in today's money.

That is a lot more than most
people would make in a month,

certainly more than the guy

who dug that grave
to begin with.

- [Henry] But while resurrection
men are busy digging,

grieving families decide to
fight back with a little help.

- Inventors realized

that there's real possibility
here for innovation.

And so they invent some
accessories, if you will,

to make these
graves more secure.

And those are booby traps.

- [Austin] One invented in the


coffin torpedo.

It's actually just
a loaded shotgun

cradled around the
deceased's arms

that when the coffin lid opens,
bam, goodbye, grave robber.

- [Natalia] Other coffin booby
traps are right in the soil,

like almost a landmine.

So if you dug too
close to the body,

they would explode
and k*ll you too.

- [Brian] I guess that's why
resurrection men

worked in teams.

'Cause if somebody
went down in the field,

hey, that's an
easy night of work.

- [Henry] But the
money is too good,

so it doesn't stop until
someone really snatches

the wrong body.

- In 1878 in Ohio,

there's a congressman,
John Scott Harrison,

whose body is snatched
from his grave.

Not only is he a congressman,

he is the son of
former president

William Henry Harrison,

and the father of future
president Benjamin Harrison.

Now a very powerful
family has fallen victim

to the resurrection men and
they're very angry about it.

- [J Mack] Soon after, it
becomes ill*gal,

and now there are
legal pipelines

for obtaining cadavers,

through unidentified bodies

that they get from hospitals,

prisons, and almshouses.

- It's the end of an era,

no more corpses riding shotgun

on a horse and carriage
through the streets,

which is kind of something
I'd actually like to see.

No more "Weekend at
Bernie's" shenanigans.

Another promising
trade just dries up.

- Back then, the dead
were just another way

to make a living.

But if you think
that was unpleasant,

there was another 19th
century job that truly stank.

- [Don] In the late 1800s,

American cities'
populations are booming.

But a lot of people also
means a lot of something

that nobody wants to
deal with, human waste.

- [Adam] Most people that could
not afford indoor plumbing

used what we would
call an outhouse.

It's sort of a cabin with a
wooden plank in it to be a seat,

it's got a hole in it,

and it goes to a pit
called the privy.

- How do cities deal with
getting rid of all this waste?

Well, they didn't use pipes.

They used people.

There is a job known
as the night soil crew.

At night, when
everyone's asleep,

the crew comes out with
their carts and their dippers

and they scoop out
the human waste,

so when everybody wakes
up in the morning,

they can start all over
refilling the latrines.

- [Henry] The job is vital
for cities to function,

but for the workers,
it's the pits.

- A professional would
go to where the tank is

and they would ladle
the human waste

into a bucket.

And then they would haul
it away bucket by bucket.

However, larger residences
or tenement blocks

might have a tank
that was 20 feet deep,

which means that a ladder
would have to go into the tank.

A human being would
go down that ladder

and haul up months and
months of excrement

one bucket at a time.

- You know, the one bright spot

is these guys got
paid pretty well.

They weren't the richest dudes.

They would also get
a bottle of gin,

which they needed to
be drunk to do the job.

- [Henry] And down on
the foul smelling muck,

invisible dangers lurk.

- [Hakeem] These privy vaults
are deep and unventilated,

and that means that the gases
from the human waste build up.

We're talking poisonous
gases like methane,

hydrogen sulfide.

So if a human being is in there

and these poisonous gases
have displaced the oxygen,

they could pass out.

And what happens next?

They fall into the
waste and drown,

in human waste.

What a way to go.

- But wait, it gets worse.

Hazardous gases can also
cause explosions in the pits.

And there's this huge risk
of disease and infection

just from being around
human waste all the time.

- [Henry] Toxic gases,
explosions, drowning in waste;

eventually governments
get the hint.

- By the 1890s, New
York and Brooklyn

actually create a sewage system.

There's like pipes
in the ground.

So there is finally a
place for all of this,

you know, prodigious poop to go.

- [Adam] History flushes away
the privy, the outhouse,

and the livelihoods of
the night soil workers.

But we forever are
grateful for their service,

for their selflessness,

and for truly answering
the call of duty.

- So indoor plumbing eventually
put the night soil men

out of business.

I've gotta think it
was partially a relief.

- It has never been easier to
keep up with current events.

With a swipe of a finger,

your phone brings
you up on the latest.

But there was a time
when delivering the news

was practically
an extreme sport.

- [Don] In the 1950s, every
morning around 5:00 AM,

you hear the whirr
of a bicycle chain,

and thump after thump

as something lands on
neighborhood porches.

Moving from block to
block is a kid with a bike

and a bag of newspapers,

a worker as common
as any mailman,

a paperboy.

- [Henry] And even though it
means waking up before dawn,

in those days, it's a
job lots of kids want.

- [Brian] As a former paperboy,
I have to tell you,

there is something
to being like,

"Hey, man, I have
responsibility.

Like, I am a business person."

- [Don] I was 10 years old when
I started being a paperboy.

And you're getting
paid real money,

usually between


which doesn't sound like much,

but in today's money, that's
about 40 to a hundred dollars.

That makes you the man.

- [Brian] I was walking around
like making it rain on people.

"Hey, you want some pizza?

I'm getting you some pizza.

You want a comic book?

I got it."

You were the most popular
kid in the neighborhood.

- [Henry] Paperboy
isn't just a job,

it's an American institution.

- [Martin] By 1950, a half a
million American kids

are running a paper route.

By 1980, it's over a million.

-[Don] The paperboy becomes
iconic,

becomes as American as
baseball and apple pie.

They're on the cover of
the Saturday Evening Post.

They're on TV shows like
"Leave It to Beaver."

[dramatic music]

- [Henry] But is the job
as romantic as we remember?

- I have memories of
terrible weather conditions

and going out in the
winter, in the rain.

And you had a responsibility

to get this product
to the customer.

- [Brian] They're almost
like the US Mail,

rain, sleet, hail, those
papers gotta get out,

and you're in a bike, baby,

with a 50-pound bag
slung over your back,

and you're in a snowstorm.

And you know if you don't get
it to Mrs. Crabapple's house,

she's gonna scream at you the
next time you're there.

Not only do you have a weather,

not only do you
have a 50-pound bag,

you also have people driving
to work in the morning,

bleary-eyed, not paying
attention to the road.

- [Don] Remember, there's not a
lot of light in those days.

It's kind of pitch black.

A kid on a bike is hard
for drivers to see.

- [Edward] And these boys are
not wearing helmets.

There are no bicycle helmets
for all intents and purposes.

So you can get hit by a car
and suffer tremendous injury.

- So you get a lot of
kids with broken bones,

a lot of concussions,

and the government
classifies these workers

as independent contractors.

That's how they get
around child labor laws.

They're working every day
with none of the protections

that are afforded
to working people.

- [Henry] No
helmet, no benefits,

and often seemingly
no end to the route.

- [Don] Suburban sprawl is
everywhere by the late 1960s.

And a route that used
to be just a few blocks

suddenly covers miles
of looping streets

in these developments,
sometimes even across highways.

- [Edward] So no longer
is it a


in the morning,

it's a much bigger job
that is sort of outpacing

what a typical paperboy
might be able to do.

- [Martin] The paperboy kind of
falls by the wayside,

to be replaced by an
adult in an automobile.

- [Brian] So we lost
the paperboy.

You lost the work
ethic part of it.

You lost the
independence of a kid.

What is better than
being on your bike,

riding through, and your
friends would come with you,

and you deliver papers?

I mean, you can't even get
kids out of the house anymore,

let alone on their
own doing business.

- The paper route
proved a kid with a bike

could make serious money,

but what about the
teenager with a car

and a job that rewarded them
for driving like a maniac?

[dramatic music]

- [Austin] In the 1960s,

the idea of getting pizza
delivered to your home

is an alien concept
to most of America.

Pizza is looked at as a dine-in
restaurant kind of food.

- [Adam] In Michigan, a scrappy
little pizza chain

is born in the ashes of a
restaurant called Dominic's,

and it becomes Domino's.

And in 1979, they create
a delivery campaign

that is nothing short
of revolutionary.

Your pizza will arrive in


- [Announcer] One call from you

sets Domino's Pizza in motion.

- As you can imagine,
people went nuts.

If it's not delivered in


Like, this was revolutionary.

- [Jason] I remember when they
came out with this guarantee,

it was exciting.

You're like, okay, you've
ordered, and it is 6:05.

And then if they
show up at 6:20,

you're like, "Oh, damn it,
we have to pay for this."

- [Henry] On the strength of
the new campaign, sales soar,

and Domino's grows
rapidly in the '80s.

But delivering
everywhere in 30 minutes

requires some
outside-the-box driving.

- Each store has to make and
box the pizza in 10 minutes,

leaving 20 minutes to
get to your location.

- And that's regardless
of your address.

You may be at the complete
edge of the delivery zone.

- Drivers, who are mostly
teenagers and college kids,

they're running red lights,
speeding through intersections,

driving in weather they
should not be driving in,

anything to make this delivery.

- Some people are rooting
against the delivery guy.

They want them to fail.

They deliberately give the
driver wrong directions.

They don't answer
the door right away.

- [Jason] If you had a
Domino's in your area,

you were definitely like,
"Let's try to order a pizza

maybe when it's icy or
when there's a snowstorm."

It's like trying to game
out how you can make sure

it was gonna take
them 30 minutes.

- Domino's does what it can
to mitigate these hazards.

The franchisee manual
says, in all caps,

fast delivery does not come

from speeding or
reckless driving.

- [Nicole] I think back then, if
I had been old enough,

I would've been a
Domino's delivery driver.

I would've loved it.

That would've just been another
notch to the racing resume.

- [Adam] If they can't meet
that 30 minute window,

that location has
to eat the cost.

In terms of a marketing
ploy, it's brilliant.

But in terms of
running a business,

it is a wildly
unforgiving proposition.

- [Austin] By 1989, there are
over 20 delivery fatalities

nationwide.

And in St. Louis,
a $79 million award

is given to a woman
who was injured

by a driver running a red light.

- So the company, they
can't continue the policy.

Founder Tom Monaghan, he
calls a press conference

and lets everyone know
the 30-minute guarantee

has come to an end.

- [Adam] Now, today, globally,
Domino's is still the dominant

name when it comes
to pizza delivery.

It is still getting
to you pretty quickly,

but it's getting to you safely

and it's keeping
the public safe.

- [Jason] But even though it
got out of control,

that 30-minute guarantee
made pizza delivery

like combat sport.

It was exciting.

Every time you ordered a pizza,

something magical could happen.

- So the next time you
order delivery from an app,

remember the trailblazing
pizza drivers of the 1980s.

- In the era of silent films,

Hollywood knew that thrilling
visuals were everything.

But decades before CGI,

the danger wasn't just
part of the story,

it was part of the job.

- [Jason] In the 1920s,
Americans have become obsessed

with Hollywood movies.

There are now 20,000 movie
theaters in the country.

That has doubled the amount
of public high schools.

- [Lance] The studios in
Hollywood, they have one

important job, and that is they
have to feed that beast.

They have to churn out movies.

And to do that,
they need actors.

- [Henry] Aspiring actors
flock to Los Angeles,

and what they find
is an industry

that prizes spectacle
above all else.

- [Austin] This is the silent
film era.

There's no dialogue.

So to draw an audience, films
have to be larger than life.

That means a lot of stunts.

- [Jason] Today, before any
action-packed scene happens,

all these experts weigh in
on how to make a scene safe.

And typically there
is a trained stunt man

to step in for the
actor to do it.

- [Rutledge] Back then, movie
makers really have to put actors

in these real situations.

They could be dangling
from cliffs or in a fire,

jumping from a train.

And there's no CGI at this time,
so you can't fake anything.

It is as dangerous as it gets.

[train whistling]

- [Natalia] In the 1920s, safety
standards effectively

did not exist.

Producers and directors are
sort of making things up

as they go along.

- [Rutledge] They're just like,

"No, someone's gotta jump
off this moving horse.

It's gonna be you."

Plain and simple.

[lighthearted music]

- [Austin] In 1928, "Steamboat
Bill Jr,"

one of the most iconic
film scenes of all time,

Buster Keaton stands in
front of a two-story house

whose front is blown
over by a cyclone,

and it topples perfectly over,

slotting him through an
open window unscathed.

[dramatic music]

But that was the real
front of a building

falling over the
real Buster Keaton.

- [Rutledge] No one had ever
seen anything like it before.

I mean, they only
had one shot at it.

And it worked.

- [Henry] But playing
fast and loose with stunts

doesn't always have
a Hollywood ending.

- In 1925, during the filming
of the movie "Ben-Hur,"

a wheel came off
one of the chariots

and the driver was k*lled.

In 1928, during the
filming of "Noah's Ark,"


water were released

and three extras are drowned.

- [Jason] Between 1925 and 1930,
there are 10,000 incidents

of people being
injured on movie sets.

There are actually 55 deaths.

- [Rutledge] If there's an
accident on a set,

it's just like,

"Okay, well, we're gonna need
a different person to do that.

Let's move on, all right?"

The show must go on.

- [Henry] Even after
the silent era,

Hollywood keeps
playing with fire.

- [Jason] In "The Wizard of Oz,"


Margaret Hamilton,

who's playing the Wicked
Witch of the West,

she's got her famous
line where she says,

"I'll get you, my pretty,
and your little dog too."

And then she's supposed to
spin around in a puff of smoke,

disappear, and then
there's an expl*si*n.

The crew accidentally
sets off the explosions

before she's out of harm's way,

and her costume catches on fire.

- To make matters worse, her
iconic green makeup is toxic.

If it burns, it will
melt to her skin.

So crew members frantically try
to, one, put out the flames,

and two, scrub her of the makeup

so she doesn't get
further injured.

She does survive, but walks
away with third degree burns.

- [Lance] Over the decades,

Hollywood just starts to
take safety more seriously.

Accidents still occur,
injuries, even some deaths,

but they are far less common.

- [Jason] Some of the scenes
that Buster Keaton shot

and some of these guys shot,

a hundred years later,
they're still amazing

and captivating to watch
because it's all real.

[dramatic music]

- I can tell you,
every actor today

owes something to
those early pioneers.

They filmed in black and white

and they went home
black and blue.

- Did you know that
there was a time

when giving blood
wasn't a donation,

it was a paycheck.

And while it sounded
like easy money,

it could take a lot out of you.

- [Kavitha] Innovation often
comes out of w*r.

And during World w*r II,
blood transfusions are used

in a widespread way
for the first time.

After the w*r ends,

blood transfusions then become
a common medical procedure

used on civilians.

- [Dan] But here's the problem.

Blood transfusions only work
if somebody donates blood.

And after the w*r ends,

people are way less
motivated to donate,

and so there's just
a lot less available.

The supply is not
meeting the demand.

So the solution is simple,
throw money at the problem.

- [Don] Across the country,
commercial blood banks

and clinics open up,
offering cash for a pint.

A man might make a quick $5
just by rolling up his sleeve,

maybe even 10.

That's $145 in today's money
for something that your body

just automatically keeps making.

How easy is that?

- And thus is born a new job

called the professional
blood donor.

If I'm getting paid $150 for
my blood, I would take it,

you know what I mean?

Like, I can see why people
jumped on this bandwagon.

- [Henry] And once the
cash starts flowing,

so does the blood.

- [Don] There are some rules
about how often you can donate,

but donors try to
slip under the radar

by going to different clinics
to keep the cash rolling in.

And even when they get busted,

some blood banks like
to look the other way

to keep the supply flowing.

- There's some pro donors
that end up going every week,

sometimes even every few days,

because in their mind it's
like, what's the problem?

My body's gonna make more.

- Donating blood
multiple times a week,

it's terrible for your body.

Modern guidelines say
wait at least eight weeks

in between blood donations.

So if you're giving blood
multiple times a week,

even once a week,

you can imagine you're
like a video game character

and your health meter

just keeps running lower
and lower and lower.

- [Dan] Low blood supply
means low iron,

and that means constant fatigue.

So you've got donors

who are sometimes so weak
that they're fainting

when they go to give more blood.

But there's also some really
weird symptoms that happen,

like restless leg syndrome,

or really brittle nails,
or the urge to eat ice.

Isn't that weird?

- [J Mack] People with low
iron have pica,

and people with pica crave
weird things like dirt.

So they will end up going
into their own backyards

and just grabbing a handful
of dirt and just eating it.

And they know it's crazy,
but their body is craving it.

- [Dan] The other big issue is
the lack of sterilization.

I mean, today, we have
disposable needles,

disposable tubes,
disposable bags.

Anything associated with
blood is like a one-time use.

But in the '50s, a lot of
the gear is getting reused.

And so you've got glass,
you've got rubber,

and they get washed, but
not always perfectly.

And if it doesn't get
properly sterilized,

there's just this massive
risk of infection.

- [Henry] But at least
the donors are cashing in

on bleeding themselves dry.

But what's in it for
the blood recipients

are some things they
didn't sign up for.

[dramatic music]

- It's important to be
able to screen this blood

to make sure that you are
not unintentionally giving

a disease to the person
who's already in a bad place

and needs a blood transfusion.

But the major problem
is in the '50s and '60s,

we can't test for a
lot of these diseases.

At this time, there's only
one that we can test for,

which is syphilis.

So that's good.

But what about all
the other things?

- [Dan] Doctors know there's
risk of other diseases,

like hepatitis, but they
don't have tests for them.

So all they can do is
just ask the donor,

"Hey, do you have hepatitis?"

And hope that they know
and tell you the truth.

- They're not gonna say,
"Yes, I have this thing.

Don't take my blood.

Don't give me money."

In the '50s and '60s,
there's about a 17% chance

that you will
transmit hepatitis B

to somebody who greatly
needs that blood.

- [Henry] By the late 1960s,
it's too hard to ignore

that this blood trade
is risky business,

so they decide to
stop the bleeding.

- The federal government
steps up in 1972.

The FDA puts much more
restrictive regulations

on blood banks.

It mandates more thorough
testing for disease.

It limits the amount
people can donate.

Today, that's about every 56
days, about six times a year.

And most importantly,
a new government policy

prohibits paying
for whole blood.

In other words, no
more blood money.

- Sure, the old
ways to make a buck

were a little unorthodox.

Whether you were dangling
off a skyscraper,

riding logs through the rapids,

or draining your veins for cash,

the math was always the same.

The bigger the risk,
the bigger the reward.

And maybe that's what
made our hazardous history

worth every penny.

[dramatic music]