Half Century Hangout
We are Half Century Hangout where different perspectives make for better discussions.! John, Luke and Chuck are three guys who grew up differently but became good friends with a lot to talk about. On this show three unique perspectives are brought to the table where we dive into everything from current events to life's big questions. We might not always see eye to eye... But that's exactly why we're here. So grab a seat and join us for honest conversation, unexpected insights, and a few friendly arguments.
Half Century Hangout
Back in Luke's Garage! Part 1
If you like sports, history, and the art of skeptical listening, this one’s for you. Hit play, then tell us your top four team hierarchy, your most convincing theory, and how you separate truth from noise. And don’t miss part two—subscribe, share with a friend, and leave a quick review so others can find the show.
Let's get started, guys.
SPEAKER_01:Let's get started. Here we go.
SPEAKER_03:Here we go. All right. We're back. And uh we're here with Luke and Chuck. Yep. In Luke's garage.
SPEAKER_01:Hanging out. We're back in the back in the saddle, baby.
SPEAKER_02:Back in the saddle.
SPEAKER_01:It's good. You know, I'd like to say that, hey, I missed you guys, but you know what? I see you every day, so I don't miss you, but I miss this.
SPEAKER_02:This is so being back in your garage is is the thing. Like that's that's the that's the fun of. We just spent last what hour or so just kind of hanging out and catching up and talking about stuff that we don't get to talk about at uh you know our job.
SPEAKER_01:So and it's and it's and it's good. We're we're sitting here in the garage and and I've kind of done some remodeling, but Chuck's wearing his Ohio State shirt in the middle of the Michigan stuff. That's out of the show.
SPEAKER_02:Number one, so we made a wager back in the summertime. What what do you remember what that wager was? It was was it you had to wear an Ohio State sweatshirt?
SPEAKER_01:Yes, we were gonna wear each other's thing for the next day of school day or whatever. So I'm looking forward to seeing you in uh oh, in some scarlet? Yeah, scarlet and gray.
SPEAKER_03:Uh you might be wearing is it maze and blue or what is it? Maze and blue maze and blue.
SPEAKER_02:I think this is the year. I am I'm I'm like four years.
SPEAKER_01:Four years in a row now.
SPEAKER_02:Only four years in a row. I thought it was three years in a row. Four. Four years in a row.
SPEAKER_01:Don't be playing the asterisk on stuff. Don't be doing that. You know, sound like little brother over there for a minute. Don't be doing that. They're pretty tough.
SPEAKER_03:Buckeyes? No, the Wolverines. Buckeyes are pretty tough.
SPEAKER_01:Everybody's tough.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:You know, for the most part.
SPEAKER_02:Yep.
SPEAKER_01:But what have you been up to? What have you been doing? What have you been what have you been what have you been doing all this time off? So we haven't talked since June. What's going on?
SPEAKER_03:No, it's been it's July. We did talk in July.
SPEAKER_02:I thought I thought we uh No, it was in July.
SPEAKER_03:Was it?
SPEAKER_00:That's fine.
SPEAKER_03:All right. Yeah. And then we talked about eating in July. Remember that? We had football season. Yeah, I know. That was a big one.
SPEAKER_02:That was the big thing. Football season and you know, kind of ramped up in August and then September, October, obviously. And that just takes so much time. I was talking to Jen, my wife, and I get twenty five hours minimum a week back with football season being over.
SPEAKER_01:Oh yeah. 100%.
SPEAKER_02:Sometimes it's 30 plus, but it's at least 25 hours a week that I get it.
SPEAKER_01:As the AD, I get it right here in November. Two weeks goes back.
SPEAKER_03:Is it two weeks or one?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. It's like there's not a whole lot, you know, somewhere in there, but and and you got all the plays and all that stuff. All the stuff going on. But you know what?
SPEAKER_02:It's concerts, plays, and all that. With all those hours that we're working, it's just there's just not a left lot of time to kind of do this kind of stuff. You know, because once you do the the recording of this podcast, then you've probably got you know a couple hours of editing. I wouldn't know that.
SPEAKER_01:When we do that, you know, when we do it, our one-hour recording session turns into you know, you know, a couple, two, three hours, you know, we just look back, have a few drinks, and yep.
SPEAKER_03:I wouldn't know about the editing because our our podcast is edited and produced by Chuck Kaiser. None other, none other.
SPEAKER_01:He's other than the OG.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, what about you guys? What's been going on in your world?
SPEAKER_01:I'm kind of in the same world you are. Yeah, for sure. There and doing stuff, but you've got, you know, it's the fall is always busy. We've got a lot of stuff happening, a lot of stuff going on. It's the start of the new school year, so you got all those things happening, you know, and as administration, you just kind of go through things and figure things out and do it. But lots of driving because uh I'm thankful for extra inning playoff baseball. And if you ever would have thought to hear me say that, that's what got me home from Boone that night. Oh, it was the 15-inning Detroit game, and I listened to it the entire time. Yeah, and it was absolutely amazing to listen to baseball on the radio like the old days.
SPEAKER_02:Man, I haven't listened to a baseball game on the radio since the Cincinnati Reds beat the Oakland Athletics in 1990.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. It was definitely a long time because I because I pulled out of the thing. I'm like, I can't just listen to Yacht Rock the whole way. Yeah, I I can't do it. Like I could, but I didn't want to. Yeah. And um, you know, got off the caffeine, so I was like, I can't do that. Yeah, I gotta have something. And I'm like, oh, it's the game. And so I pulled it up on iHeart and went through and found it and listened to it the whole way. Um it took me almost the whole way.
SPEAKER_03:Fifteen innings, didn't it? 15 innings in at like 1230.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, something like that. Because that's about when I pulled back into the school.
SPEAKER_02:So did you know, John, that Luke was off of uh caffeine?
SPEAKER_01:Really? Yeah, I did not know that. Been about it was about since then, so maybe it's been really four or five weeks, four weeks.
SPEAKER_02:What was the um like what was the reason for that?
SPEAKER_01:Uh you know, a while back it was like the uh sleep apnea acid reflux kind of deal. Really? And the caffeine, I think I just started kind of like I never I think I told you that before that I had never drank coffee. And I started drinking coffee. Yeah. And then it was just like I was getting, you know, acid reflux all the time. I'm like, eh, I'm gonna back off and see. So that's been it took like a week, you know, to whatever, clear my system or whatever.
SPEAKER_02:But did you have any headaches and all that kind of stuff?
SPEAKER_01:First week. Yeah, yeah. Oh yeah.
SPEAKER_03:Um I don't know what I'd do without caffeine.
SPEAKER_01:Still get up and still get up and brew it for Becky in the morning, you know. Now in the in the 12 cup uh coffee maker, now I cut it down to six. But it's like uh I just get it, so I get the smell in the morning, and that's you know, smell is just water, and even any soda, if I do, it's it's root beer or it's something with no caffeine in it.
SPEAKER_02:So, feel better?
SPEAKER_01:Um it's getting now, you know, it's cleared through my system. It's it's okay. It's tough some mornings, but we'll get it.
SPEAKER_03:We're good. I did not know that. I could not I could not survive without my tea. We understand that. A lot of ice. You even brought some today. I did. I did.
SPEAKER_02:You take a hike a couple days a couple times a day, don't you?
SPEAKER_03:Well, you know, it gets my steps in and go across the street and get a tea and maybe a yogurt here and there.
SPEAKER_02:What's been going on in your world, John?
SPEAKER_03:Oh, in my world. You know, uh, gosh, since last time, just spent a lot of time with uh helping kids do the what's right, do what's best, and trying to help them be the best version of themselves. Not to be cliche or anything, but no, we would want to do that. Never. Never. Yeah, that's that's about all I've been doing. How's your teams doing?
SPEAKER_02:My teams are doing pretty good. So my fantasy team is so well.
SPEAKER_01:We're not talking about that one. No, I'm talking about this this hierarchy of your rooting for teams, those four things.
SPEAKER_03:Okay, so it's you root for Nebraska? Oh my god. Really?
SPEAKER_02:Seriously. Here is my hierarchy. The uh the Ohio State Buckeyes obviously are numbered. When did that start? Started way back. Go back way back, way back. Whatever. So they are number one, haven't lost the game. Pretty dominant. Old Patricia, uh, what's Matt Patricia's name? He's it I'm killing people on the defense. So he's throwing some stuff at him that people have never seen before. At where?
SPEAKER_01:At the Lions. Yeah, he did. I remember those.
SPEAKER_02:They're glad to be rid of him. Um I heard, I heard you told me that actually. But I'm glad he's at the Buckeyes because I think I think he's doing really good. So that's my number one team. My number two team, I think, uh, would be um anybody who plays Michigan.
SPEAKER_01:And uh which I get that. So right now you're good. I understand your hierarchy right now.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah we're good. Okay, this is where the rest goes ahead. Four teams. I don't know how you got a hierarchy there.
SPEAKER_02:My number three team would be Iowa. Like I root for Iowa because I live in Iowa, Council Blessed, Iowa. I live in Iowa, so I root for Iowa University. Wait for it. Wait for it. Why don't you root for Iowa State? Number that's my number five team. So my number four team would be Nebraska. Oh my gosh, you got five teams? Yes, my number five team would be Nebraska because.
SPEAKER_03:Or number five is Nebraska or number four. Number four.
SPEAKER_02:Number four. Okay. All right, all right. So if if Nebraska's playing Ohio State, obviously I'm rooting for Ohio State. If Nebraska's playing Michigan, I'm rooting for Nebraska.
SPEAKER_01:But if I'm but let me back this up though. So you just said that you root for Iowa because you live in Iowa.
SPEAKER_02:Right.
SPEAKER_01:But yet Nebraska comes in at number four, even though Iowa State is number five and you live in Iowa. How does that happen?
SPEAKER_02:Because I'm just not much into Iowa State. I'm just not. Like, I mean, I like Matt Campbell, but I'm not like hugely into Iowa State.
SPEAKER_01:I just don't think, and this is where I'm gonna, you know, this is not sports radio, folks, but I'm gonna tell you right now it is, is that there is no way that you can have Iowa and Nebraska in the same hierarchy of borders.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, there is like it's a border state, though. It doesn't matter.
SPEAKER_01:That's like me saying I root for Michigan and down at number four, it's Ohio State. But that's ridiculous.
SPEAKER_02:I think it's completely different because the hatred for Michigan uh toward Ohio State is way different than the hatred for Nebraska towards the baloney.
SPEAKER_01:How many people here cannot stand the whole thing? It's on the Friday, it's Black Friday game. Yeah, I know, but they can't stand each other. And you know what? Iowa finally has an offense, and they're gonna so who are you rooting for in Iowa, Nebraska? Iowa, Nebraska. I'm rooting for Iowa because that's my number three team. Because they're three, but yeah, then you get a backlog and say, well, Nebraska wins, they were my number four, so I'm still good.
SPEAKER_02:I don't know. In that game, I'm rooting for the boy. So that's just the way it works. Then the number five.
SPEAKER_01:This came out, folks, as a Facebook post, and I and I almost jumped off of my uh the back of my garage just because I was like, I need to I need to injure myself and make sure that I'm okay because I couldn't understand. Wait, the back of your garage is like two feet off his feet. Yeah, exactly. I'm not saying that's that big. I wasn't like jumping to my deck. It wasn't like that. It was just like I wanted to bruise myself and say, hey, you know, come on. Oh my god. But anyway, yeah, we're gonna we're excited because we're gonna go uh um looking at a couple head a couple weeks ahead, we're going to see uh Michigan play Northwestern. Okay. It's at Wrigley Field. That would be a fun game. That's why we're going because you know what? I worked at Northwestern. I know we've said this. So, you know, do I still root for them? Not really, like except when they were playing Nebraska last week. But the idea was they're going in Wrigley Field. I'm not a Cubs fan either, but it's it's a state, it's a historical stadium. It's cool, and I've never seen a football game at Wrigley Field, which they play one every year in Nebraska or Nebraska. Northwestern is playing there because um their stadium is not done yet. So they have that cool stadium right now that's like the I think it's the soccer field or the lacrosse field, and it's right on Lake Michigan while their stadium is being redone.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:And I was thinking about going there, but then I'm like, oh, they're playing Michigan at Wrigley Field. We're going.
SPEAKER_02:How long have they been working on Northwestern's field?
SPEAKER_01:Uh this this will be the so that's gonna be ready next fall, two years they've been in the okay, yeah. So the last game I saw Ryan Field.
SPEAKER_02:Last game I saw where Northwestern was um playing at Wrigley Field, it was the weirdest sideline experience.
SPEAKER_01:Well, it is because because it goes from home plate to right field. Yeah. So our seats are like on the third base side, but close to third base, so you're kind of close to the sideline. But if you're in left field, you're along with the side. You're way along the way. You're out there, but it's cool though. It's it's just a cool thing. But the end zone is actually, I think, maybe a uh tick shorter on each side. Is it because there's only so much room. I mean, you can't stack everything in there, yeah. But you know, it'll be fun. So we're going, me and the boys are going. It'll be it'll be a good time. When what we can is that's the 15th, November 15th, yeah. Nice. So it'll be good. We're we're looking forward to it. I think it'll be fun, and I think that, you know, and you know, like I said, we're not sports radio, but yeah that week, that game last week, Nebraska Northwestern. Yeah, you know, Nebraska pulled it out. And you know, here's the thing, and I and I don't often say this on the on our podcast, but I've been relatively successful this year betting against the spread because Nebraska doesn't cover very often. Yeah, so that's been fun because there's uh our SRO at the school, you know, I give them a few.
SPEAKER_02:He's the big Nebraska guy.
SPEAKER_01:But it's it's a good time, it it's fun, and and we're looking forward to it. And you know, the NFL has been doing its thing, and it's always just the fall is always a big time for us. I mean, we I love the fall, it's my favorite season. I haven't been able to get out hunting yet because we don't have any time. I don't have any time to do the podcast, but it's like you know, we go through and do our thing and it and it's fun, it's good. So um but we're happy to be back, we're happy to be here and doing it because you know, we enjoy doing this. It's not we love that the people listen to us and do our thing, and we've had some people like, when are you doing your next one? Which is cool to hear.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, I've had a few people reach out to me. You know, um Ryan Higgins, he reached out to me and said, uh, hey, are you guys done? Or are you just like on pause? I'm like, we're on pause.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, we're just on pause for a little bit, which is fine, and we'll pick it up over the winter and we'll we'll do our stuff as we go, but it's it's cool to get back in. And you know, when we had first said when we spoke in July, I guess was the last time somewhere in there, end of June, early July, it was somewhere in there. Um, we had talked about our next episode was going to be something a little bit different where we talked about I don't want to go full blown and say it was conspiracy theories, but it was about like true or false. Like, is this factual or is this fiction? Right, you know, kind of things that you that you talked about, things that people you know do.
SPEAKER_03:We're all we're all curious, right? Oh, and we're like, yeah, is this true?
SPEAKER_02:We live in we live in such an age of um where information is easily gotten. Yeah. And if you're easily created one, create 100%. But if you're scrolling TikTok or Facebook or whatever social media you might be on, there's always something that comes across where you're like, is that true? You know, and I I think it's fun to kind of kind of work in some of those some of those types of things.
SPEAKER_03:So and I think we've got uh oh. Did you hear that? What was that noise?
SPEAKER_02:I heard that. That was pop a top. That was a pop-up.
SPEAKER_01:I think that I think that the big thing that we look at is again in our day and age where we look at it, is like you said, things are so easily like you get it instantly. Everybody wants the instant kickback. Yep. And I think that when we look at it, just like you said, John, it's so quickly created as well. Yeah. So we have to filter, it's not just like, well, did you get that info off of Wikipedia? You know, like we used to say, even like four or five years ago. Right. And then you say, well, that's not really real, like they don't know what they're talking about. But now it's almost like every outlet that we have, yeah. You have to do your due dil due diligence to make sure that it's real.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, Wikipedia might actually be more true than some of the other stuff, right?
SPEAKER_02:I remember there was a day when Wikipedia was like one of those things that you don't trust. But right, it seems like over the last maybe 10 years that's kind of improved, and um people appreciate their there you go. That one sounds a little different. That does.
SPEAKER_01:But I think that I think that one of the things like like as an example, we could start with what's one of the biggest you know, conspiracy theories that we think of in the United States that's well what's one of the biggest conspiracy theories that you think of? And it and it could be like let's just start with one. Let's just say JFK. JFK, okay. You could start with that, and you can say, how many different theories have you heard? Yeah. There's so many different things. Was he a was he a patzy? Was he this? Was it the mob? Was it right?
SPEAKER_03:Who whoever wasn't too long ago that there was a Senate hearing or or something that they talked about the JFK files that got released, yeah, and all that. I mean, it wasn't very long ago that that happened.
SPEAKER_01:And it's a it's a lot of stuff like that where I think that when we talk about these things, that if it's historical, right? If it's something that happened, you know, in the 60s or even earlier, yeah, at some point files get released, right? Information gets released. And then you almost have to be almost more cautious because just like anything else, people read something and they comment, right? Or they take it a certain way, or they dissect it a certain way. So you have to say, Hey, do I believe the way that this guy is turning this? You know, much like we have to be worried sometimes when people turn the Bible, right? So kind of the same thing. Sure. So you have to really go through these things and say it. So I think we just kind of were talking about it one day. We were chatting about stuff, and so we kind of came up with a few ideas. We said, Yeah, we should probably just do under. Do we do we think it's true? Do we think it's not true? Do we think it's kind of malarky? You know, what do we think?
SPEAKER_02:So, what's one you want to dive into?
SPEAKER_01:Well, you're here in my garage and you see his picture on my wall over here. Yep. Right? So I'm just gonna go scratching his eye. And you actually, yeah, he's scratching his eye with his middle finger, and it's and it's even here. It's it's mine is Jimmy Hoffa, okay?
SPEAKER_02:And I'm just gonna realize it was his middle finger.
SPEAKER_01:It's great. Didn't you really in that picture, which is one of my favorite pictures of all time, he's in front of the Congress and he's flipping off Bobby Kennedy. That's what he's doing, which which makes the picture even better. Okay.
SPEAKER_02:So here you're talking about Bobby Kennedy Sr., obviously. Yes.
SPEAKER_01:So you're talking about Oh, yeah. So you're talking about somebody at the time who was one of the most powerful individuals in the country, the leader of the Teamsters, which at the time was the largest union in the country.
SPEAKER_02:Right.
SPEAKER_01:And if the Teamsters went down, nobody got anything. There was no goods, there was no nothing. Everything they could shut the country down in a day if they wanted to. But, you know, he was in deep with the mob. Like that's how Vegas got built. Let's not put things aside, right? They dipped into the Teamsters retirement fund, they got money. Vegas is being built up. I mean, it's the mob and they were tied together. Did he know too much? If you watch the movie The Irishman, you watch you watch through it, it's a great movie. But once they get to about the point where they fly out of Ohio to go in when Ed Sheeran goes, you know, it's kind of like uh I don't know if that's right. You know, after that it was conjecture, and everything after that is. But that usually is the way the mob works, is that they're not gonna leave trails. That's kind of their idea, right? Okay. So living up and growing in Detroit, growing up in Detroit, that was a big thing. So it was 1975. The moccasin, for those of you that care. That's where the last place he was seen after that, it's all conjecture. They're digging up people's yards. Right. This phone number that's here, that's people had that's a bumper sticker. And I have it here in the bar for those of you who can't see it, but that's the bumper sticker that people had. If you've got a clue, tell us where and call us. And they were digging up people's yards. There was a farm they dug up. They're not gonna find them. They're never gonna find them. And now almost everybody that was involved in that story is dead. Okay, but to me, that was one of those things where is it fact or fiction? You look at it, there's great uh info on both sides of it. I think they just hired some dudes in the mafia like they would, and they got rid of them.
SPEAKER_02:And so you you think that Jimmy Hoffa, his disappearance is a is a mafia hit. 100%. So why would the mafia want to take him out?
SPEAKER_01:Because he was going to um he had come back like you know, you you think about it, he was he got sentenced to to jail and he was in federal prison. Nixon pardoned him. He comes out with the idea that he was never gonna be the um the president of the Teamsters again, but he had real strong ideas about what this is and what this is, and the mob knew that he knew stuff that they didn't want. Well, he probably didn't want they didn't want one out, yeah. That's what I mean. So they they thought he was gonna yap, which is what they do with everybody. I mean, if you they think you're gonna be a rat, well, nobody, no crime. And there's no way.
SPEAKER_02:Who were the uh who were the big players in the in the mafia back then?
SPEAKER_01:Well, it was in, you know, it was in the Detroit area, which which is where it happened. It was Tony Giacaloni and all these guys that were there that that that you know everybody had an alibi. Like it was actually kind of funny because Tony Giacaloni is a guy that was there that was a big mob guy in in Detroit at the time. And he belonged to something called the Southfield Athletic Club. And he was there sometimes, but on that day, he made sure he was there, and there was at least 40 people that said he came up and said hi to me that day. Like they know, they know what they're doing. Like they're not, you know. So that's just the one for me that I grew up with, and I've always kind of been really enamored with. And so I read a lot of stuff. I I watch a lot of documentaries about it, I listen to podcasts about it. There's a guy named Bernstein in in Detroit that does a great podcast about it. Uh-huh. And they keep going with it. Like it's still not solved. It's it's obviously it's not solved, right? But it's it's great stuff.
SPEAKER_02:It seems like the thing with um with Hoffa always seems to resurface because as I you guys know I scroll scroll TikTok. Yeah. And so as I scroll TikTok, occasionally I see things about Hoffa. And even recently, within the last probably 18 months, there's well, it's because of the anniversary, because it was like it was it was 50 years.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, and so there was something that came up where they dug up somebody's yard or some piece of ground somewhere, and it ended up not being anything but so there was the the the big story, and I'll just end it with this one for this part is that um the big three towers in Detroit, downtown Detroit, on the river, it's called the Renaissance Center, which was then owned by General Motors. But at the time it was a hotel, it was this big thing. Like he went up in the in the the elevators were on the outside of the building, it was glass, it was beautiful, it was right in the lakefront, right? Or on the riverfront, right, you know, facing Windsor. And um Tony Giacaloni, the head of the Detroit mob at the time when he was going, they there's and there's a witness, right? I don't know how good he is, right? But he had said that he was going to interview for a job because they were hiring at the Renaissance Center when they were building it, and that he went in there and he got him.
SPEAKER_02:He just caught a fly. I did.
SPEAKER_01:Luke just caught a flyer. He caught him, and then the thing was that they they saw they always thought one of the things was that he's buried in the concrete under the Renaissance Center. So when Tony Giacaloni was going to court, which the courthouse was down the road, every morning when he'd walk by and go, Hey Jimmy, he'd he'd wave. Damn. So that's you know, you're never gonna find out. Now the Renaissance Center, I believe, is it at least they're talking about tearing it down, so people are like, Oh, we need to tear it down at sea. But there, yeah.
SPEAKER_02:As you can tell, we were having a good time hanging out in Luke's garage. So we got a little bit carried away with our conversation. We had to split this episode up into two parts. So be sure to check out part two. Peace out.
