Life and Times of Scrooge McDuck Pt.1

This episode is all about Scrooge McDuck and his ascent to the wealthiest duck in the world. We also go over some of the historical accuracy of Scrooges life, you might be surprised what parts of his tail happened in real life. In this first episode we first learn about the ancient McDuck ancestors, to get an idea of Scrooges heritage. We then move on to his youth in Glasgow followed by his adventures in the Wild West. Lastly we will talk about his stint in Africa and Australia, where high adventure aplenty awaits him.
Scrooges life and heaps of fun facts on this episode of Oft Off Topic
Source is mostly the biography The Life and Times of Scrooge McDuck, by Don Rosa, with some extra research on the side

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Transcript

Shaun: 0:14

The Life and Times of Scrooge McDuck. Yes, Scrooge McDuck, the world's richest adventuring curmudgeon duck and the star of the first comic books. I remember ever reading the Uncle Scrooge comics. That ran for a good long while. I think it's about like 30 years or so. Nate, what do you know about Scrooge McDuck DuckTales?

Nate: 0:32

That's it. No, I mean I knew before I like the Christmas tale. I mean that's really how I've introduced it. Introduction was the Christmas tale, him being Scrooge, and just you know I never really thought too much of after that. I just figured, oh, he's an old Donald Duck, whatever. And then DuckTales came out and he became more of a full fledged character after that, outside of just meh, Christmas, yeah, I'm cranky, raw, bah, humbug. And from there I actually thought, oh OK, he actually seems to be pretty cool. Yeah, and I mean I might have been on the like the late age for watching DuckTales. But I'm sorry, dude, like I was still in high school I liked watching cartoons. So I'd get home from high school I'd still watch some of those, like Disney afternoons, I mean. Whatever, I was a homebody, I prefer, I like cartoons and that was one of them.

Shaun: 1:16

Yep, yeah, and actually that cartoon DuckTales started out in 1988, I believe, a little earlier than I remember it being, but whatever.

Nate: 1:23

Yeah, I guess it is the earlier than I thought. Yeah, because I remember watching it in the 90s.

Shaun: 1:27

Yeah, I remember watching it when it first came out because it was kind of all alone there in this little weekday morning slot and then eventually joined by Darkwing Duck and Rescue Rangers and the such Morning. But yeah, this was when I was on. It was on a weekdays morning at 7 am. That's funny.

Nate: 1:43

I mean, obviously we lived in different states, and when I was watching it it was afternoon, it was after school, oh really.

Shaun: 1:49

We might have had after school too, because the one station I watched it on was a syndicated station, so basically they just kind of showed whatever they wanted whenever.

Nate: 1:56

So it's been on both. Yeah, that makes sense. I mean, yeah, probably syndicated it, just my Fox station decided to show it, you know, after school.

Shaun: 2:03

Yeah, but we're not really going to be talking about DuckTales. We will a little bit at the end, but we're going to be talking more about Scrooge McDuck himself and his history and the stories that he has and all the adventures he went on to, and we'll learn about some history along the way. But before we get to Scrooge McDuck to paint a better picture about his situation, we're going to talk about some of his ancestors. Going a ways back. You ready, nate, as I'm going to be All right.

Shaun: 2:31

The McDuck name goes back a good long, while the earliest McDuck ancestor on record was Scrooge Shaw, who lived roughly around 2050 BC, and his son, prince Don Duck, who himself had a strong of an who had himself an affinity for slave girls, so strong that it put financial strain on the kingdom.

Shaun: 2:49

Scrooge Shaw was the last king of Sagbad, a city in the middle of the in the Middle East that fell when it was assaulted by a young warlord named King Con Con, whose name roughly translates to King, king, king. The army defeated in the city Sack Scrooge Shaw and Prince Don Duck, his heir, managed to escape and fled north. When it comes to the more modern McDuck, as we know, we have to jump ahead to 900 AD, with Sir Eider McDuck, or MacDuch as they were known at the time. He ruled Castle McDuck, which was located in Scotland's dismal Downs. He was killed by the Saxon invasion in 946 AD when he refused to buy arrows for his soldiers to repel the invasion. Lack of arrows in his cheap bait caused the men to say F this and abandon him, as they should have. Yeah right, he's like not going to give you weapons or arrows, arrows or money.

Nate: 3:37

Bye. That was always. Boggles my mind. Whenever someone like people stand next to a leader who's just like not supporting whatsoever, like oh look, all these people are dead because we have a bad leader, well, hopefully his next thing he'll say will will do us good. No man, like at what point?

Shaun: 3:51

do you just go like, hey, this is a bad leader, what if I just shove him off this rampart? And be like whoops, he fell, right. Yeah. Maybe the next person in line will know what they're doing, and if they don't, well then whoops, yeah. I guess that's why leaders have to get that cult mentality going to get the. That's right, yeah.

Shaun: 4:10

The next famous McDuck would be Sir Quackley McDuck. He was live from 1010 AD to 1057 AD. He's famous for receiving a large chest of gold from King Macbeth for allying with him in the war against the English. Quackley would become obsessed with his chest and keeping it safe from bandits, which led to him sealing it up in castle walls for protection, and he also accidentally sealed himself in there too, killing him and, I assume, contributing to an odd smell in that room for a while. This started the legend of the McDuck gold, a story that would inspire future generations of treasure hunters, scrooge included.

Shaun: 4:42

It also should be noted that in this era, the McDucks were famed warriors on the battlefield. Why, you ask? I'm glad you did, because the McDucks were only about waist high to the average person at the time and armor wasn't exactly designed to make looking down easy. So, basically the McDucks would just charge in close enough to where their opponent couldn't see them and just wailed away. They basically pulled an odd job from Golden and Ion the 64. It sounds like Yep, they even have pictures of them, just like the McDucks, just running in, just swinging away at somebody's crotch while they were just, you know, couldn't figure out what was going on. Sounds kind of terrifying if you think about it. It does.

Nate: 5:12

Like quick take them out before they get too close.

Shaun: 5:14

Yeah, you didn't do it. So it was said that the McDucks were fearsome warriors who feared no man or woman, except maybe the tax collector. So they've been cheap for a while Around. The same time was Sir Murdock McDuck who patented the Longbow. He agreed to sell Longbow's cheap to the English to fend off the Norman invasion. But what he didn't tell the English was these bows didn't come with arrows and that the English needed to buy those arrows at a huge markup. And this is one of the early instances of a massive McDuck moneymaker via shifty means. Murdock McDuck would also eventually be killed by his own invention. He's also the man that's typically credited with changing the name from Mac to the more famed familiar McDuck. Yeah, I'm not sure how you pronounce, but it's a Mac, m, a, c, d, u, I, c, h, so I assume Mac.

Nate: 6:00

Yeah, overall, without actually like someone from the screwed I don't know university.

Shaun: 6:06

he's like no, it's it like this the way I'm saying is probably horribly offensive to the Scottish, or it's dead on, I'm not sure which. The McDuck clans prosperity would last until the death of Sir stuffed McDuck in 1175. Because of that point, his son, roast McDuck, would take over his head the clan and basically gave over their entire fortune to William the lion, king of Scotland, as tribute for his war against Richard the first of England. This would lead to clan McDuck becoming financially destitute. Roast McDuck's foolish patriotism was only eclipsed by his lust for food, as one day in 1205, he raided King William's royal pantry and ate himself to death, just like Elvira's pet turkeys would do some 785 years later. See our Elvira episode for more on that.

Shaun: 6:48

In the year 1440, we have Sir Donald McDuck. Nope, not that one. He was known as Black Donald because of his foul temper still not the same Donald. He was famous for inventing the sport of golf, the hammer throw and caber toss. Unfortunately, his temper while playing golf was so bad that he got the sport banned by King James II of Scotland in 1457, which, that turns out, is a real historic thing. King James II banned golf because it was distracting his archers from practicing. The ban was in effect until 1502 for 45 years. He also banned football too. Apparently, his troops were not busy training and they're busy playing golf and football, so he was like nope, these are outlawed.

Nate: 7:25

Or just discipline what they do like they're playing golf. Get them.

Shaun: 7:29

Yeah right, they're playing golf. Kill them all, Wait, and their family yeah.

Nate: 7:37

Use his child's head as golf balls.

Shaun: 7:42

We now take a big jump forward to what we now know as the modern McDuck era and go to the early 18th century with Loxley McDuck who teamed up with famed Scottish bandit Rob Roy, and their edict was Rob from the rich and give to the poor. Loxley McDuck was ousted from the crew when he couldn't manage to give to the poor after robbing the rich.

Nate: 8:00

Well, I mean that kind of goes with the rest of the mold.

Shaun: 8:04

Yeah, yeah, it really does.

Nate: 8:05

I mean technically, he's also poor.

Shaun: 8:08

Yeah yeah, I was kind of thinking well, I'm poor, rob from the rich and give to myself, tell I'm rich, then you got to rob yourself. It's a conundrum. It is conundrum Also. In the 1700s was successful sea merchant Captain Hugh Seafoam McDuck. However, a bad business deal saw Seafoam losing his entire business in all of his possessions, save for his golden dentures and silver pocket watch. These would later be family heirlooms for the McDucks. It's rumored that Seafoam McDuck would later fight and die in the American Revolution. Thank you for our freedoms, seafoam McDuck.

Shaun: 8:44

We now skip ahead to 1867, glasgow, scotland, and finally our subject of today's episode, scrooge McDuck. He was the first child of Fergus and Downey McDuck. He had two younger sisters, matilda and Hortense McDuck. Hortense would eventually give birth to another famous adventurer seeking duck named Donald. We'll talk about him a little bit more later. The McDuck family resided in Glasgow at this time, as their family castle was in ruins by this point, abandoned in part to the belief that it was haunted by ghost towns. The area around the castle wasn't the most inhabitable land either, with quicksand aplenty and earthworms wielding nail bats attacking birds. That's what they show in the comic panel. I'm not even kidding you. What, yeah?

Nate: 9:23

Like what kind of acid ship are you on about?

Shaun: 9:28

Yeah, they actually show how rough and tumble that area was. Just wandering along and bam, right in the foot, you get it with the nail bat from a worm. Scrooge's dad, fergus, would take young Scrooge to this derelict castle, point to it and say son, maybe you'll be the one to pull us out of poverty and restore Castle McDuck to its former glory. To help him achieve this destiny, his father made him a shoe shine kit and gave it to Scrooge as a birthday present and said now go make your fortune. Essentially and here's where the story of Scrooge's Scrooge McDuck's lucky dime happens On his first day out, scrooge was approached by a ditch digger with the most mud-encrusted boots you'd ever seen. Scrooge worked himself to exhaustion making the boots look brand new for the ditch digger. And then Scrooge was paid with one shiny American dime. This peeped Scrooge like you wouldn't believe why. Because an American dime was useless in Scotland and no one accepted that as currency, so he had essentially busted his butt for free.

Shaun: 10:21

At this moment, scrooge realized that there would be those in life who would take advantage of him. So right there he decided he needed to be smarter than the Smarties, sharper than the Sharpies and tougher than the Toughies. And thus was born the Scrooge McDuck grindset mentality we all know. And what Scrooge did didn't know. And also I didn't know this too, because this was in the DuckTales episode, this whole boot thing. But uh, this whole thing was actually orchestrated by Scrooge's dad. Earlier Fergus had met up with Bert the Ditch Digger and gave him that useless coin, said take this and pay my son with it. And uh, that way he will learn a valuable lesson. And turns out kinda worked like a charm. Little childhood trauma for the better, I guess. I mean I guess it worked out.

Shaun: 10:58

Yeah, it kinda worked out. Or Scrooge could have gotten despondent and thrown himself off a bridge. You never really know.

Nate: 11:03

I'm sorry it worked out alright, Cause the other lesson is work hard, get taken advantage of.

Shaun: 11:09

Yeah, work hard and get screwed Right. There's definitely two ways to go about that. Once Scrooge learned to work smarter and not harder, the money started to roll in. He optimized his shoe-shining operation to his full potential and eventually would start selling Pete Moss to rich people as a fuel source for their fires. First he started out selling wood to poor people and that didn't turn out to be great uh money maker. And then he was like hey, wait a minute, if I sell fancy stuff to rich people, I could make a huge markup. Yeah, you will, yeah yeah, that's, very true.

Shaun: 11:39

Look at NFTs for an example of that.

Nate: 11:44

Yeah, for a hot second. I wanted to get an FT. I'll take advantage of this, but I didn't strike with an iron top. I could have made some NFTs, sold them for crazy, but now that that's like that, that market's way dead. I knew it was BS from the very start, cause, I mean thinking about for half a second, you're like, oh, same thing with like crypto. Like man I should, I just struck with an iron top, but I didn't.

Shaun: 12:08

I didn't really hear about till it was already kind of wide known and yeah, I mean, had I jumped in by the time I finally heard about it, I would screwed, so I never even touched it and Bitcoin the original Bitcoin first came out, I saw a thing where it was like, hey, you can sign up to be one of the initial buyers of it, but the thing was, in order to be an initial buyer, let's see, the Bitcoins were only 25 bucks each, but to prove you're a serious investor, I think you had to buy them a thousand at a time to be an initial buyer. So you need like 25 grand, maybe it's 2500. I think it's 25 grand. So, to buy them, like right at the beginning, you kind of had to have money to buy them, turns out, or a bunch of people investing in it, and now it's all worthless.

Shaun: 12:46

Yep, well, I got worth a whole. Well, it's worth more than 25 bucks now, though. So, hmm, actual Bitcoin is, I think yeah, I think it's still like 1500 bucks each or something like that. I thought I would like. Basically, like you know, crashed nothing.

Nate: 12:59

Um, depends on which Bitcoin you're talking about, because to be honest again, I am very, very like inept when it comes to that stuff, so I'm not speaking by any, from any authority whatsoever.

Shaun: 13:11

One Bitcoin is worth 43,000 bucks, so if you bought it at $25, you would be way ahead. Oh, there you go. Yep, it is down to 0.08% today, though, so there's Bitcoin.

Nate: 13:24

And I learned something new, because, again, only pay attention when it's big news, that's it.

Shaun: 13:29

Also one thing with the NFTs in order to make an NFT, you actually had to buy it onto the blockchain, so it did cost money to make an NFT. So you need to plop down like a couple hundred bucks. I think of your own money, yep.

Nate: 13:41

Yeah.

Shaun: 13:42

So that was something I learned about. It, too, is because it was like why not just throw anything up? But no, apparently you had to like buy a spot on the blockchain, so it was like forever kept in digital space. I'm kind of like oversimplifying, but it didn't involve that.

Nate: 13:55

Yeah, well, thanks for oversimplifying, because I, you know it's not like I'm not intelligent enough to pick it up. Yeah, I don't care you don't care enough yeah. Yes, I don't care enough to put the brain power to fully understand it.

Shaun: 14:07

It's going to say explain to me like I'm five, because that's the attention span I have for this subject.

Nate: 14:10

Yeah, out of a five, because I'm not going to get into it.

Shaun: 14:14

I definitely don't care All right Back to Scrooge McDuck and his Bitcoin investments. One day, while collecting Pete Moss near Castle McDuck, scrooge was beset by local hooligans from the Whiskerville clan. Scrooge took refuge in Castle McDuck to avoid a sound thrashing, and there he encountered the ghost of his ancestor, sir Quackley McDuck. He was the one that they kinda look like dogs.

Nate: 14:37

Oh, the Beagle like the Beagle boys.

Shaun: 14:39

They do have a great.

Nate: 14:39

Beagle boys yep, the same kind of like. I hate to say race, but like what are they? Like species, I guess?

Shaun: 14:46

Yeah, you guys see like species, because the vast majority of dogs in this book are the bad guys, if I recall.

Nate: 14:52

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely Like. They definitely look like all of them, look like the Beagle boys, you know, without masks and like various beards, although I did find some interesting. I noticed something interesting in that in the comics of Ribb, when, like, so you have your ducks and then, yeah, there's some other you know species out there, but like, by and large they were like, mainly like the Beagle boy. People I got a lot of them were, especially if they're bad guys and they're pigs, of course, but like I always I noticed that, but then when they ever went to like black people, they were just black people.

Shaun: 15:29

So like huh, I don't know if this is true.

Nate: 15:32

I don't know those accents at all, but I just kind of raised my eyebrow and I didn't linger long, but it was kind of like huh, that's interesting.

Shaun: 15:40

Well, maybe the whole time for him is messed up, and that is actually all. The black people are very early man and before early man was nothing but like anthropomorphic animal.

Nate: 15:47

There you go. It's a stress, I'll take it Okay, cool.

Shaun: 15:51

Makes sense to me. Anyways, scrooge encountered his ancestor Quackly McDuck the one who sealed himself up in the wall to hide Macbeth's treasure, and the two would have a heart to heart chat about Scrooge's heritage and how he needs to be the one to restore the clan to glory. Upon seeing Scrooge's lucky dime, the ghost said that's it, that's your sign. Go to America, the land of opportunity, and seek out your uncle Pothole, who owns a river, but both there and build your fortune, young duck. I'm kind of paraphrasing, but that's basically what he said.

Nate: 16:22

Although I do have something to say, like about all that like at the end of that comic and get you over for it. Back to the comic. At the end of that comic, he's like go forth and do this and he leaves, and then another ghost I can't remember who it was. They're like oh you know, why did you just give him this treasure Right here? He's like no, he needs to learn the benefit of hard work. It's like okay, you know, that's all good and well, but then Scrooge proceeds to go out into the world and do everything he can to get rich quick. Like, yeah, he's working, but he's like I'm going to try to find treasure. I'm going to do this. Like he's not going to. I'm going to get a job and work for 30 years and try to build up my equity. No, he's just like I need to, like I'm going to work really hard to find the quickest way to get rich.

Shaun: 17:04

He's just swinging for them. Home runs Exactly Just like swing hard fast enough.

Nate: 17:08

Go for gold, go for diamonds, go for this, go for that.

Shaun: 17:13

It's like I'm not.

Nate: 17:14

I'm not saying he didn't work hard, but he was definitely trying to make like the quickest route there.

Shaun: 17:19

See, there's two things that can happen in life. When you swing it for the fences, you succeed and become Scrooge McDuck, or you fail and become the great Antonio. There you go.

Nate: 17:25

Yep, I thought about the entire time like that was like that kind of dawn on me. Every like storyline of Scrooge McDuck I'd hit, I'm like here he goes again, trying to get rich quick is like completely ignoring what they are missing, the lesson they are trying to teach him originally.

Shaun: 17:46

Slow and steady does not win the race. No, just balls to the wall. Speed will do it. So Scrooge doubled down on his shoe shine business and started saving all the money he could for America. He would help out his parents by giving them money for household expenses, but always insisted on a receipt for tax purposes. Actually, that's kind of smart in a way. Yeah.

Nate: 18:06

Yeah, I won't argue that one. I mean honestly like think of his family. His family kind of annoy me too, because I mean the little jump in the comics, like they I get. He becomes a dick for various reasons. I'm sure will hit, but he becomes a dick near that. You know, as he gets older and he gets back or he goes back to business town, they're like who do you think you are, you asshole? And he's like hey, fuck you guys. They're like right, how could he talk to us that way?

Shaun: 18:32

Like uh, depressed us now Fuck all of us.

Nate: 18:36

Yeah right, even his sister is like I can't believe you're acting this way Like bitch. Look at what you're wearing. You're not exactly like not taking his money Ha.

Shaun: 18:51

Yeah, when they really need money, the first thing they do is wire him We'll get in that with you.

Nate: 18:57

Yeah, I'm trying not to jump too far ahead Soon.

Shaun: 19:00

preparation and opportunity met and a job opened up for a cabin boy on a cattle ship from Scotland to New Orleans. Scrooge left his money with his parents, insisting he only needed his lucky dime to see him through. His parents did insist on, however, giving him two family heirlooms the Golden Dentures and Silver Pocket watch of his great grandpa, Seafoam McDuck, the one who lost his shipping empire to a shady contract. Nothing is really known how the ship voyage went for young Scrooge probably fine, or possibly the 13 year old Scrooge was passed around as a plaything by the adult.

Nate: 19:29

I don't know, ever know the truth. I don't think the comic books would have shown how Scrooge would have done with the fleshlight. Ha ha ha.

Shaun: 19:38

Go hear about feathery fleshlight. I've got uses for you. 1881, Scrooge lands in New Orleans, but he doesn't stay there as he heads north to his uncle's last known location, Louisville, Kentucky. And he arrives just in time for the sixth ever Kentucky Derby. Thus the town is hopping with people there. He finds his uncle Pothole at a bar in a CD-part down gambling little money. He has Pothole offers to hire both Scrooge and Ratchet Gearloose, the grandfather of Gyro Gearloose from DuckTales, to go after some gold on a sunken government riverboat. He offers them a staggering 30 cents a day for their services, which in today's money translates to about $10 a day. Scrooge's uncle is going to pay them. Scrooge actually didn't find this offer unfair. In fact he admired his uncle for being so frugal and accepted the deal, making note that he too should pay his help as little as possible. I know that's a good lesson to learn, right there.

Nate: 20:31

Yeah, it didn't seem like a great lesson really.

Shaun: 20:33

Yeah Well, long story short, they went up competing with the Beagle boys for this treasure and in the end our ducks don't get the gold the government gets that back but they do get a reward for helping capture the notorious fugitive. The Beagle boys Won't be the last time they run into each other either.

Nate: 20:49

Yeah real quick about like the uncle and stuff. When you said that, the first thing that popped my head and it's super nerdy it reminded me of the Ferengi from Star Trek. They're like, yeah, and the Ferengi, the way they look at it is like when you exploit your workers, you, the Ferengi, the race don't want to stop the exploitation. Their goal is to become the exploiter. So it sounds like Scrooge took the same thing. He was like oh, I don't want to stop this exploitation, I want to become the person who is doing yeah, right, Remember it takes two to be an exploiter, one to exploit and the other to get exploited.

Shaun: 21:21

It's just much on them. It is my job to see if I screw you over. It's your job to not get screwed over. Let's see how this works. As his share of the reward, scrooge gets a silver dollar from his uncle. And when Scrooge doesn't want to spend that dollar right away, his uncle scolds him and says don't be a sap, lad, spend your money. Do you want to wind up with a whole coal bin of the day and stuff? This, of course, was where Scrooge got the money bin idea, and it's also where Scrooge starts to realize that maybe it's not the money that's the true treasure, but it's the memories of the adventure along the way.

Shaun: 21:49

Pothole takes on Scrooge as his apprentice on the mighty Mississippi, and when Pothole retires, he sells Scrooge his riverboat and then spends the rest of his days writing dime stored venture novels, starring himself as a badass, and Scrooge is the lack what he's always rescuing. Scrooge starts. Scrooge starts a shipping company and becomes known as the master of the Mississippi. However, the railroads were taking off, so business was dwindling in a hurry. This wouldn't matter in the end, because two years after going to jail, the Beagle Boys are released and he immediately robs Scrooge and blow up his riverboat Sad times. Beagle Boys do get arrested again out of the deal, but Scrooge now has no boat and no belongings, other than his lucky dime, the golden dentures and a silver pocket watch that he came to America with. On deterred, scrooge heeds the words of Horace Greeley go west, young man, and decides to take his hand at being a cowboy.

Nate: 22:33

Yeah, that world really does kind of reward shittiness. Yeah, sure, the Beagle Boys were caught, but they're like so much luck Bye. We got these guys. They're in trouble, but all the damage done to you, well, I guess you should do about something about that, it should be you.

Shaun: 22:49

Well, it's the land of opportunity. Go figure something out. Scrooge lands a job as a fireman on the Wabash cannonball, a train heading out west. Also by firemen we mean the dude who feeds the coal fires for the train, and by the Wabash cannonball we actually mean the fictional train from a country song from back in the 20s. Its legend is that it's a train which was a death coach that appeared at the death of a hobo to carry its his soul to its reward. So apparently this is like a ghost train that takes away people to the afterlife. Kind of cool. Apparently, just hobos, though Only hobos, only hobos. It's got to be a weird smelling train, dead hobo train, and that was a criteria of a hobo.

Nate: 23:29

What if they just became hobos? Are they good, or like you had to be live on their X amount of time? Or what if you actually had the option to stop being a hobo? They're leaving your family waiting for you. Well you were a hobo, but you were technically a hobo. You were a volunteer hobo.

Shaun: 23:45

If you are in the hobos union, that's what counts. You have to show your hobo union card to the conductor and he'll let you on the train. You lose your hobo union card if you have a family or if you work the same job for more than one month at a time. I don't make the rules, but there you go.

Nate: 24:01

Yeah, you're yearly dues. Was singing 99 bottle of beer in the wall the whole way through. Huh, oh no, jimmy Crackcourt, sorry. I was just recently saw Peewee's big adventure, so the thing that said Peewee leaping from the train was when the guy was singing Jimmy Crackcourt, and I don't care too long.

Shaun: 24:21

I cannot take this have you ever heard the whole lyrics.

Shaun: 24:25

That song Is the same thing over and over again. No, not really. It's about a slave like chasing away the blue tail flies from his master while he eats. Oh well, I had no idea. Yeah, and chase away the blue tail fly, do, do, do, do, do, do, do, yeah, anyways, yeah, yeah. It's an actual whole log song with like multiple verses in this and that on his train trip west, scrooge encounters an inventor selling the perfect food Square eggs delicious, nutritious and highly portable. And I found this amusing because lately I've been seeing square egg makers for sale online. Basically the thing you like, hardboiled and egg and just put in this little press that turns into a square. It's very dumb, is very dumb.

Nate: 25:05

Is very dumb.

Shaun: 25:07

The idea for square eggs has been around for a while. The man that is selling the square eggs claim they come from a lost valley in the Andes and are laid by square chickens who are raised by square men. That seems like a cool place to be. Maybe that's Minecraft land, now they think about it.

Nate: 25:20

It must be Minecraft land and I can't imagine it be pleasant to live Fucking square egg.

Shaun: 25:24

Well, I mean, if you got a square cloaca, maybe just.

Nate: 25:28

Yeah, it's true, shoot.

Shaun: 25:29

Yeah, don't quit. Yeah, they just kind of lay them in nice little pyramid shapes.

Nate: 25:36

Don't, don't, don't be really easy to collect those.

Shaun: 25:39

Yeah, this is true, they won't roll away anywhere. The train screws is on is also robbed by the legendary outlaws, the Jesse James and the James gang. However, when they try to rob Scrooge, he goes psychoducky and kicks their butt and after whooping the James gang, they proclaim that they're going back to Missouri and going to rethink their lives of crime. Unfortunately for Scrooge, during this kerfuffle he winds up getting thrown off the train and finds himself stranded in the wild, wild west. And it's pretty convincing, he's going to die until a cattle driver run by a fellow Scotsman named Murdo arrives and they give him a job as a cattle driver for the ranch. And Murdo sounds like some sort of D tier Marvel villain. It would be like fighting Alpha Flight or something. I am Murdo the merciless, the murder. Yeah, there we go. Murder of the merciless. You got to have that alliteration.

Shaun: 26:24

Fun side note the horse he was given, scrooge, named Hortense after his sister, because they both have horrible tempers. Hortense, of course, the mother of Donald Duck, another horrible tempered duck. One day, while traveling through the Dakotas, the prize bull that they're traveling with gets rustled from the drive and Scrooge is sent out to find it. And on his adventure he comes across a lone cowboy in the two talk. Scrooge thinks this cowboy is a fellow city slicker seeking fortune just like himself. But the stranger explains that he was actually born rich and was a lawyer and a politician before he decided to settle down at his ranch at the Maltese Cross and take his hand at being an adventurous cowboy. Scrooge laments that it must be nice to be born into wealth and the stranger explains to Scrooge that being born into wealth is no accomplishment, but taking yourself from rags to riches certainly is. And this was kind of another moment that lit a fire under McDuck's tail, feather saying like hey, if I make my own money by myself, that makes me better than other people. Hear that Elon Musk, meh.

Nate: 27:18

No Catholic diamonds for you.

Shaun: 27:20

Yeah right, the stranger helps Scrooge find the bull at long last. And as a parting word, scrooge says to the stranger say you've got a real gift of gab, you should go back into politics. To which the stranger replies maybe I will, maybe I will. And in case you couldn't tell from the description, this man was the one and only Teddy Roosevelt. Scrooge is kind of like a uh old time forest gump just running across every famous person in history.

Shaun: 27:43

An old time Cassandra Peterson, that's true. She continued to work for the Scotsmen on his Montana or cattle ranch and quickly became known as Buck McDuck, one of the best cattle punchers in all of Montana. Unfortunately for all involved, the age of homesteading and barbed wire was now upon us and the age of free range cattle was coming to an end, as was the ranch Scrooge worked on. He and the other workers were let go, now unemployed. But, however, montana was currently experiencing a silver rush. So Scrooge headed to Butte and bought himself a plot of land in hopes of finding silver, which he did not. But he actually found a copper vein instead, which this would have actually been pretty bad news of his few years prior, because copper wasn't worth a whole lot at the time. But this new fangle technology called the electricity was spreading across the land and the electric companies needed as much copper as they could get to lay all that wire. So Scrooge uses his grandfather's gold dentures to buy some mining equipment and starts right away mining his claim, which is slow going, until he meets millionaire Howard Rockerduck, who teaches him the proper way to mine copper. He also meets Howard's spoiled and insufferable son, john Rockerduck, and later on these two would become better billionaire rivals.

Shaun: 28:57

Howard Rockerduck, though, however, helps Scrooge profit off something called the Apex Law.

Shaun: 29:01

So basically, the Apex Law is, you know, when you got those veins of ore that just kind of stretch for miles and miles, yep, well, basically the Apex Law in Montana said that if you owned the property that that vein was the closest to the surface on, you owned that entire vein, no matter how long it was. Well, turns out, scrooge's property was in the right place to lay claim to the biggest copper vein around and one of the biggest copper veins ever found in history, and that was the vein that ran directly underneath the Anaconda Hill copper mine. This vein actually contained one-third the world's copper at the time. So all of a sudden, scrooge yep, scrooge's property is at the highest point of that vein and that means he owns that entire copper vein. So now Scrooge is dreaming of these millions he's going to make off this copper ore. But that dream would have to be scheduled, as he immediately gets a letter from his father in Scotland declaring a family emergency. And Scrooge needs to return post haste.

Nate: 29:54

Well you bypass a pretty decent chunk of that story where it's like, oh, you're like, oh, yeah, he got received a letter, never mind the fact that they had a fucking mortal combat there, you know. There's like, oh, if one of those things where, like, fucking, where those old college TV shows or whatever, where they're like, okay, whoever claims this first, and so they're like having a big battle royale for all these people trying to beat each other up to get this vein. Even the point where they brought the judge out there at least he's the carnage is like well, you're the last one conscious, so I guess it's yours. It's like what kind of death race 2000 bullshit is this Like? Oh, yeah, it's yours, whatever you win.

Shaun: 30:31

Oh, that's kind of how things worked back then. It was like, hey, you get these sticks and you get to run out to a plot of land, and if you get your stick there first, you get that plot of land.

Nate: 30:37

But you know, people show up at the same time.

Shaun: 30:41

I believe Tom Cruise and Far and Away did this. That's true, yeah, but yes, I did skip over that part. There are some things I had to edit for time out, of course yeah that's why you're here helping out.

Shaun: 30:53

But yes, scrooge did come by this by beating the crap out of a bunch of other people, more or less. So, anyways, the Anaconda Copper Mine bought Scrooge out for a mere $10,000 and Scrooge was on his way back to Scotland. As he's leaving, his ship passes by the Statue of Liberty being constructed on Liberty Island. So, by the way, this Anaconda Copper Mine thing, it's actually based off of a real story. So the Anaconda Copper Mine had won the biggest Copper Veins ever found and some dude with some money decided he was going to buy this tiny abandoned parcel of land that was way off in the corner, there's nobody even knew about.

Shaun: 31:24

And turns out that, yep, that one was the absolute closest to the surface level of the vein. So this dude owned that giant copper mine that owned, you know, one third of all the world's copper at the time. Well, the mining company repeatedly tried to sue the dude, but the loss hit with the loss in. And hey, the guys just like nope, this is my vein now. And because it held up in court, the mine had to shut down and because of this it put 80% of Montana's state workforce out of work. 80% of everybody who worked in Montana was out of work because of this action, oh wow. And also, if you think about no unemployment back then either.

Nate: 31:57

So hmm, Well, couldn't the boy, the kid, that guy's like oh guess what, so I own it. You guys just lease it out for me and give me a bunch of money and you keep on. But I guess it doesn't mean I thank you too much.

Shaun: 32:08

Actually, what happened is eventually the dude, after he waited long enough in the mining company, was like well, we can't get him back through legal means, we'll just have to buy him out. And the dude basically got $12 million out of the deal to be bought out and he probably drank it all away and died of a stomach hemorrhage brought on by cirrhosis at the age of 44.

Nate: 32:26

Oh, I forget. He died of a stomach hemorrhage from big stabbed repeatedly.

Shaun: 32:31

By angry miners who I hadn't worked for those few months.

Nate: 32:34

I mean I'm surprised he lived that long, like no joke, like back in the day where I mean it wasn't exactly like CSI rolling around.

Shaun: 32:41

Yeah right, there's no bigger pressure.

Nate: 32:44

Yeah, there's one dude put 80% of the workforce out of work. He's mysteriously vanishing, like yesterday.

Shaun: 32:51

You think that's exactly what would have happened. If anything, the mining company would have done it, because all they got to do is just like shove him off a cliff and then, when people find his budget be like huh.

Nate: 32:59

Oh no, we were about to offer to buy him out in the shape that he died horribly. He accidentally fell down.

Shaun: 33:08

After being scalped repeatedly as you got like the hatchet behind your back. Who could have done?

Nate: 33:12

this my favorite lines from one of the best shows ever the. Oh God, totally lost it. I'll lose it now it is right there. I can see it in my head. It's a blackadder. Black adders were the best shows ever. I encourage anybody listening to please go watch it. But one of the episodes in the guys like oh yeah, I've come here, he's like a voter person and he's like, yeah, I'm here because the guy before me he accidentally, horrifically, chopped his own head off while shaving. He was just like, uh yeah, he's like whoops, I'd shot my own head off. It's all good, it was an accident, self-inflicted, it was fine.

Shaun: 33:52

My hands never were the sturdiest.

Nate: 33:55

But like, oh, there's someone else who was also accidentally brutally stabbed in the back 15 times while shaving, and no one. It was like yeah, that checks that.

Shaun: 34:08

That's fine yeah.

Nate: 34:08

Right.

Shaun: 34:09

I'm like I'm gonna do it. It's not like you can go dust for prints or anything back then I know DNA testing.

Nate: 34:15

Just take my word for it. I mean honestly, like seriously. I mean I know I'm probably copying some comedies, but unless they found you standing there with a knife in your hand, it was a decent chance you'd get away with it.

Shaun: 34:25

Pretty much. I mean, they would just be as likely to pick somebody that they didn't like and throw them in prison for the crime. But it was, I can't get away. He'd be like, hey, it could have been two people who caught this murder, stabby Jones or Thieving John. Well, thieving John stole from me last week, so fuck him. Yeah, let's get him.

Shaun: 34:42

It's now 1885, and it's been five years since Scrooge left for America to build his fortune. And now he's on his way back home to Scotland with only $10,000 to his name. Better than nothing, but not the fortune he had dreamed of. When Scrooge gets back to Scotland, he finds that the tax man has cometh and is going to repossess Castle McDuck. Luckily, scrooge's $10,000 is enough to pay up the taxes and prepay for a few more years. So, crisis averted, yay. But now Scrooge is right back to square one. But he has a new target in mind to make himself wealthy via gold. And now there's a fair amount of it to be had in the Transvaulon South Africa. And in case you weren't aware of the Transvaulon South Africa, it's think Northeastern Southern Africa for an idea we were talking about. So, yeah, think of the bottom of Africa and just slowly go up northeast just to hear from that, back off a little bit, yeah, sort of like in that little armpit area of Africa.

Shaun: 35:33

Okay yeah, yeah, that was his best way to describe it. As he's traveling through this region, he comes across a duck tied to a water buffalo. Scrooge jumps to his aid and rescues him. The stranger explains that he got tied to the buffalo during a freak roping accident and offers his services a guide for the harsh wilds of Africa. Scrooge agrees and the two start traveling together, right up until this mysterious stranger steals everything Scrooge owns in the middle of the night and leaves Scrooge out in the wilds to die.

Shaun: 35:59

See, what Scrooge didn't know was the reason this duck was tied to the buffalo was not because of some sort of haphazard lassoing incident, but nope, it's because that duck was caught trying to steal from the local diamond mine that wasn't far away. Scrooge is pissed, and when pretty much every animal animal of note from Africa tries to gang up on him, he goes psychoducky again and proceeds to beat the crackers out of giraffes, rhinos, elephants and eventually capturing a lion and riding it all the way to town claiming it ain't nothing he ain't dealt with before while in America. And if he can whoop those animals, he can whoop these.

Nate: 36:30

Yeah, less is don't fuck with Scrooge McDuck.

Shaun: 36:32

Yeah, they kind of insinuate throughout this comic that you know, when he goes like gets full on, pissed off, he's like Goku levels of strong, just unstoppable. That would be kind of a fun one to watch Goku versus Scrooge McDuck. Well, yeah, it'd be brief but it'd be fun. It'd be brief but fun. Well, I mean, scrooge McDuck can go by cartoon logic, so that changes the fight a little bit.

Nate: 36:53

Yes. However, goku's died like what? Four times he's just like oh he's dead, oh he's back.

Shaun: 37:00

Well see, scrooge McDuck will buy up all the Sentsu bean farms and or Dragon Ball farms or whatever the fuck. Scrooge rides his lion to the nearest town and quickly finds the thief at the bar bragging about how he fought off Scrooge and his bandits. Well, scrooge ain't none too happy, so he drags the thief out in the streets and molasses and feathers him, because there's no tar handy and all they had was molasses. Then Scrooge drags him to jail and gets him to confess, gets his stuff back and next thing, you know, scrooge is on his way with the thief, safely behind bars. This was the first time, but not the last time, scrooge would run across the thief named Flintheart Glomgold Dun dun dun.

Nate: 37:33

Is it the main villain from, like one of his villains from DuckTales?

Shaun: 37:36

Yep, that is, as the other old Scottish cranky duck that wears the kilt. Yep, that is Flintheart Glomgold. Three years and no luck finding gold for Scrooge. He decides to give up in Africa and then go heads on over to try his luck in Australia, specifically remote western town named Pison Bluff, where he arrives in 1893. So he mucks around for about three years before he winds up rescuing an aborigine man who's being robbed by a bushwhacker. The aboriginal man introduces himself as a shaman from the north who is on a walkabout to the sacred caves to read a dream tale. He says he'd be honored if his new friend Scrooge would accompany him. And Scrooge greys him, follows him along, hoping to soak in some new knowledge about the land, preferably on the topic of locating gold.

Nate: 38:17

Wait time out. I think I just realized something 1893? Like how old is Duck Scrooge McDuck?

Shaun: 38:23

He was born in 1867.

Nate: 38:26

So like when we were watching him as kids, he was like over 100 years old, yes, like in canon.

Shaun: 38:33

Yeah, yeah, sort of, yeah, sort of. Well, I should get into his whole age and everything pretty soon.

Nate: 38:39

I mean, I get it. I get it as a character Like sure, Mickey Mouse is always perpetually like I'd say 20 something, why not. Or like in the fucking Huey, Dewey and Louie are perpetually like 10, sure, whatever. But like in canon, like in real life, he's like over, well, over 100 years old. That's what made me pause.

Shaun: 38:58

It just now dawns on, you like wait a minute?

Nate: 39:02

Yeah, you know, he said that day like wait time out. Holy shit, what the fuck man.

Shaun: 39:08

I say born in 1867, you're like that tracks. I was like wait a minute.

Nate: 39:12

Well, yeah, it took me like a little bit of time. I probably it's like the light bulb turn on, hold up.

Shaun: 39:21

Yeah, scrooge McDuck is one old ducky, as you can see. He's probably, you know, using weird witchcraft and whatnot, using his money to give himself young youthful. It's swimming in the money that does it. Yeah, maybe he's just keeping the. Maybe that's why he keeps you and Dewey and Louie around. He's just draining them for their youth, yeah that's very true, yeah.

Nate: 39:42

Or it's a curse, like if they get older, he gets older. So it's kind of like what was it? Gray Dorian Gray? Oh yeah, with the painting up in the attic? Yeah, that doesn't. It doesn't exactly work, but you know what? Fuck it, I'm rolling with it.

Shaun: 39:55

Yeah, you just want to have Dorian Gray reference Dance drink.

Nate: 40:00

I'm smart. Look at me, I read a book. I did, yeah, classic literature.

Shaun: 40:05

I didn't read the book, I just know of it. Yeah, I read a comic book that was based off of that book. So Scrooge and the Shaman descend by a rope down to a hole where they explore a secret cave and the shaman explains all sorts of stuff to Scrooge like time is meaningless and not all, as it seems. Yeti, yeti, yeti. But then Scrooge gets a peek at their whole the tribe's Holy Relic and Opal the size of a melon. Naturally, scrooge tries to immediately buy this off the guy who refuses. And then suddenly that bush wacker from earlier he shows up, steals that Opal and strands Scrooge and the Shaman in the cave. Thankfully, in a weird twist of eight, scrooge gets unfree by blowing an emu mating, calling to didgeridoo, until a lonely male emu shows up. They have a lasso that and have it pulled them out of the cave.

Shaun: 40:47

I don't know what a didgeridoo playing sounding like a horny emu sounds like, but anyways, scrooge pursues the blue bush wacker and eventually gets the Opal back and has a small crisis of conscience on whether he wants to return the stone or not. It was worth millions after all, and you could just say he wasn't able to get it back. But Scrooge does take the Hyrule and returns the Opal. And using the prophecy written on the cave walls, the Shaman deduces that they use Scrooge's lucky dime to reflect sunlight upon the Shaman's seen crystal. It'll show Scrooge where he should go next.

Shaun: 41:14

And when they do, they see a wall of shimmering color. Scrooge immediately recognizes it as the northern lights he would sometimes see in Montana. Thus Alaska is his next logical step. The Shaman thought it looked like pretty drapes, meaning Scrooge should be an interior decorator. Fate would have been much different if he went down that route. It would have indeed. And that's gonna do it for this first episode on the life and times of Scrooge McDuck Tune in next episode as we continue his adventure to become the richest duck in the world by trying his hand at Mining Gold and the Klondike. Lots more adventure and fun facts ahead. On the next episode of Off To Off Topic.