BONUS: The Legacy of Emperor Norton

Liam Heffernan: 00:00:00

Hello and welcome to this bonus episode of a history recorded straight after our recently published episode, who was the Emperor of the United States? I'm joined now by the guest from that episode, John Lumiere, founder of the Emperor Norton Trust. John, welcome back.

John Lumea: 00:00:18

Thanks.

Liam Heffernan: 00:00:20

It always feels weird saying that, considering we literally just like record this straight afterwards. But it was really great to have you join me for this and such a fascinating episode.

And anyone that's listening to this, by the way, that hasn't heard the main one is probably very confused about the whole idea of an emperor. So go check out that episode first and then come back to this. But a couple of things just to touch on that we didn't have time to discuss.

First of all, it kind of introduces this idea of like, America as a very non monarchic nation. But he seemed to develop some influence and some sort of following after declaring himself Emperor.

So do you think America will ever move towards the idea of a monarchy?

John Lumea: 00:01:11

It's hard to see it.

ne in particular, I think, in: 1874

So he sort of saw himself, seems to have seen himself as an emergency figure. It was only because, you know, the country seemed to be. Seemed to be careening towards sort of chaos. And you had the sort of national constitution.

You had 33 different states with their own constitutions. You had all these sort of pressing issues.

Not just the slavery question, there are all kinds of questions of commerce and immigration that were coming to the fore. And he felt like there just needed to be one person with ultimate authority to be able to sort of bring some order out of this situation.

But he, he didn't see that as a permanent solution, but he thought it was. It was temporarily necessary.

Liam Heffernan: 00:02:42

So, yeah, fair enough. So. So the short answer is, anyone who's thinking, oh, you know, maybe America will have a king one day. Probably not. Probably. Yeah, yeah. I mean, if.

Let's just hypothesize and I guess fantasize for a second here if you could be the emperor or the king or whatever you want to call Yourself of anywhere, where would it be?

John Lumea: 00:03:06

Oh, my goodness, I couldn't possibly. I mean, I'm not even emperor of my own house. You know, it's, you know, it's not a desire that I have, you know, to sort of do that.

I mean, I guess everybody, you know, it's funny. One of the.

One of the apocryphal lines that gets told in a lot of the early stories of Emperor Gordon was that even before he declared himself, he was disillusioned with the American former government and would say something to the effect, well, if I were emperor, then everything would get sorted, everything would be all right, you know, So I think.

I think everybody, you know, or a lot of people probably, you know, have the desire to have some way to sort of have their voice heard in a more efficient and maybe direct way, you know, than often seems possible. So, you know, it's not hard to understand the desire, but I think the actual, as they say, you know, heavy. Heavy is the head that wears the crown.

Right?

Liam Heffernan: 00:04:24

Yeah, yeah, exactly. But I think what's really. What was really interesting from talking to you in the main episode was I think when you.

When you think of someone who declares themselves emperor, you think of someone incredibly narcissistic, maybe a little bit crazy. But, you know, he wasn't like that. He actually seems like a good guy who wanted to trigger some positive change in America.

John Lumea: 00:04:50

Yes.

w, when he dies in January of: 1880

No doubt many curiosity seekers and who had never seen him before just wanted to lay their eyes on this person everyone was talking about, you know. But the point was that the people who came to see him represented all walks of life.

You know, the privilege, the high, the low, the trust funders, the working class kids.

Everybody, you know, sort of came and really were able to sort of see, well, this was really something we had and we probably will not see its life again.

Liam Heffernan: 00:05:48

Yeah, I mean, he's definitely a character, and maybe this is gonna be hard for you to pinpoint, but just as a final note, what is your favorite moment from Emperor Norton's life?

John Lumea: 00:06:03

Oh, it's hard to pin a favorite. The one that I often point to, which I. Which I think sort of gets at his. Gets at his real. His sort of driving spirit.

that came out in February of: 1861

And one of the stories that gets told is that Emperor Norton was this sort of ecumenical figure who wore a blue suit sometimes and a gray suit sometimes. I'm not sure how true that is because he seems to have had union sympathies all along.

But in this moment, there was a, there was a, there was an organizational meeting for this big rally that was to take place, and he was there. Right. And so they're trying to sort of build out all the, you know, like, it doesn't have to be complicated. It doesn't have to be.

Let's not overthink this. We just have to do this, this, this, this, and this.

And one of the things that was on that list was, you know, we got, we gotta have, you know, somebody to carry the flag.

And so what was reported in the paper the next day was, you know, the gentleman who wishes to be known as Emperor Norton stepped forward at this point and said, I will hold that flag. And I think, I think that says a lot about sort of what his real spirit was.

And he always kind of wanted to sort of bring people together and really wanted to be seen as somebody who was there for the public. And that seems to be what he wants.

Liam Heffernan: 00:07:40

Yeah, it's a lovely way of summing up the guy that we've, we've just been speaking about for the last hour and, and a nice preview for anyone that hasn't seen the main episode. So go, go and check that out right now if you haven't. And John, again, thank you so much for joining me for this.

This is without doubt one of the more offbeat topics that we've, we've had on the podcast and it's been a lot of fun to do do remind everyone where they can go and learn more about you and the Emperor Norton Trust.

John Lumea: 00:08:11

Thank you, Liam. Thank you so much. Yes, it's emperornortontrust.org, all one word, emperornortantrust.org or they can reach me johnperennortontrust.org Wonderful.

Liam Heffernan: 00:08:25

Thank you so much, John. And to those of you listening, do remember everything that we talked about is in the show notes, so follow the links there to learn more.

And remember to rate, review and follow the podcast as well so that you never miss an episode. And if you really like what you hear, you can support us from as little as $1. Again, information is all in the show notes.

Thank you as always for listening and goodbye.