Unreal Hollow Earth Drawings, Part 2

Season 6, Episode 1,   Mar 10, 07:11 AM

There’s Admiral Byrd’s strange stories with a lot of ties to sci fi and politics of the time, and then the imaginings of John Symmes drawn as a kind of diagram of the workings of his “Symmes holes” and the subsequent five “liveable” or inhabitable concentric levels of his fictional version of planet earth. Was he trying to put his stake in the ice to be involved in the race to explore the poles? The great polar adventure?

Come with me my friends into the strange “inner world” of—one of the unreal hollow earth drawings. I decided I needed to narrow down to one drawing for our story. Captain John Cleves’s Symmes jr, (captain of the U.S. Army, starting as an Ensign in 1802, and honorably discharged 13 years later in 1815 as a captain). After that he tried working as a trader, but that didn’t work out so he embraced his theory of the Hollow Earth. In fact he did more than give his theory a big hug. 

In 1818, Captain Symmes made a declaration (of the conclusion of his hypothesis)—before gathering and analyzing the data. In his conclusion (minus the data), he pledged his belief on his very life… but, he had the scientific process out of order. And the zeal he had for his idea wasn’t coming from science...

The drawing of the Symmes concentric spheres theory, shows a jawbreaker-like layer upon layer, imagined-view, of the inside of the earth—illustrating Symmes’ ideas of what the internal “levels” of the earth could have looked like.

The drawing of the Symmes hole was done in pen and ink with the “hole” cutting through the arctic circle. Eight countries cross into the Arctic circle, but the drawing showed the earth cored like a baked apple; minus the filling. He was betting there was an enormous hole that went right through the earth, pole to pole, and the drawing showed the imagined layers inside. 

I was feeling sure of my research and --no holes– then wha?!? An article from the  Smithsonian magazine explained in  “A Mysteriously Massive Hole in Antarctic Ice Has Returned” article there are these things, these holes, called polynyas. You’re kidding me, right?

Quote “hole the size of Maine has opened in the wintertime sea ice surrounding Antarctica. Though these holes, called polynyas, are not uncommon around Earth's southernmost continent, one hasn't been spotted in this location since the 1970's, reports Heather Brady of National Geographic.”1.

If I'm not mistaken, one of the causes of these massive ice holes is an upwelling of warm water caused by the likes of a cyclone—baby hurricane’s.  The polynyas are not a Symmes hole...

Listen to this episode for the rest of the story!

Image Source: "Sectional View of the earth Showing the Opening at the Poles, a diagram from Symzonia by Capt. Adam Seaborn (probably a pseudonym used by Capt. John Cleves Symmes)" as seen in The Public Domain Review, Essays, Stories of a Hollow Earth By Peter Fitting, October 10, 2011 
https://publicdomainreview.org/essay/stories-of-a-hollow-earth/ 

1. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/return-massive-ice-hole-antarctica-has-baffled-scientists-180965246/

Whispering Gallery Podcast Music:
  • Toy Piano Boogie (restored), by The Piccadilly Pipers; Clem Moorman, Edward McKlaine sourced from us.archive.org
Audio: Music and Sound FX Resource: Freesound.org Please note, not all files downloaded were used (they were my best guess at what I might need at the time of production). Thank you to the talented audio artists who share their files! They help me tell the Whispering Gallery podcast stories with a lot of atmosphere!

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