Believe It or Not (Second Series) #8

Believe It or Not (Second Series) #8 (1932)

** 1/2 (out of 4)

Decent entry in the series has Ripley standing in front of a group of people and telling them that he's going to announce a $5,000 contest winner. Before that happens (it never does actually) he tells us some believe it or not stories, which includes the youngest parents in China who happen to be nine and eight years old. We then learn of a woman in Africa who gave birth to her daughter at the age of eight and then became a grandmother at the age of seventeen. We hear a few more stories including those of a couple 119-year-old men living in Missouri who have lived within a couple miles of one another their whole lives yet never met. Also on display is a trick dog who can climb up and down ladders as well as walk across wires. Overall this is a pretty good entry in the series as we get several interesting stories but I do wonder why they kicked it off telling of pre-ten-year-olds having sex and babies. I'm sure this was looked at differently in 1932 but it comes off rather disturbing today.

One of the innumerable random facts that Robert Ripley talks about in this episode of Warner Brothers' BELIEVE IT OR NOT shorts is that at the time, 100 Wall Street was an apartment house, with flats renting for $25 a month. 100 Wall Street has recently been in the news as I write this, with some even more fantastical assertions made, including being a dozen or so stories taller than it actually is, and being fully rented. I am barely able to believe Ripley's assertions; I don't believe former President Trump's.

Which is the primary difference between Ripley's tales, and our modern age. Ripley pulled a few whoppers in his time, but his stuff was meant for amusement.