2021

 Fidgety

In 1901, a housecat was sent over Niagara Falls in a barrel. The barrel, made of oak and iron and padded with a mattress, was made for school teacher Annie Edson Taylor. She wanted to test it before her own attempt to see if it would remain intact. It did, and the cat survived, pulled from the barrel seventeen minutes after being released at the top of the falls. Two days later, Taylor made her attempt and became the first recorded successful ride over Niagara. Reports say she was uninjured, but include the detail that she emerged from the barrel bleeding. Soon after, she told reporters, “If it was with my dying breath, I would caution anyone against attempting the feat.”

Niagara Falls is made up of three separate waterfalls. The largest and most iconic, Horseshoe Falls, includes a vertical drop of over 160 ft and is the most powerful waterfall in North America. Going over in a barrel seems to me like an ancient punishment from hell (imagine the claustrophobia, the likelihood of drowning), and yet intentional attempts to survive the stunt are made yearly, yielding a mortality rate of approximently 25%.

On Wikipedia there’s a chart of them all: the survivals in bright green and the fatalities in bright red, as if decorated for Christmas. Fatality, fatality, fatality, survival, fatality, survival, fatality, survival, fatality, fatality. It’s important to note that a large number of deaths at the falls are suicides or accidents. In 1981, a 27-year-old mother dropped her two-month-old son over the falls and he was never found. The accidents are horrible and shocking, but it’s the intentional stunt attempts I find particularly mind-bending.

Why do they do it? Annie Edson Taylor was in pursuit of financial stability, but made little money from the attempt, despite being the first recorded survival. The allure of money and recognition make sense, but there’s a hidden current under it all, something deeply, stupidly human. The thrill from the proximity to death, the brushing up against it.

In 1920, Englishman Charles Stephens attempted the stunt in an oak barrel like Annie’s. He’s listed as a “barber/daredevil”. Stephens refused the suggestion to test his barrel before his attempt. Only his right arm was recovered, still strapped into his “safety harness”. He allegedly performed stunts to support his eleven children.

Greek immigrant and chef George Stathakis went over the falls in a barrel that got stuck behind a sheet of water for eighteen hours in 1930. His air supply was enough for eight hours, and he died of suffocation ten hours before the barrel was recovered. With him in the barrel was his 150 year old pet turtle, who survived.

An inclination towards adventure, even towards danger is an understandable one. With the release of adrenaline comes the release of dopamine. Bravery, courage, these are admirable, glittering traits. We all seek to impress and overcome. Niagara Falls is particularly violent and tortuous, yet simultaneously beautiful and impressive. It’s a powerful natural wonder. A loud, daring, gigantic place, and an overwhelming sight. Its power to kill makes it all the more intriguing. Missionary priest and explorer Father Louis Hennepin wrote in 1678 after visiting the falls, “The temptation to throw one’s self down this incredible precipice is almost too great for resistance.” A 1924 editoral in the Times Herald of Olean, NY, also comments on the strange pull of the place, suggesting that many of those who committed suicide “had no more intention of hurling themselves into Niagara than they had of attempting a trip to Mars.”

Our natural bodies are evolved to identify and react to danger often, even daily. Fear is the most primal response one can experience. Our highly developed nervous systems are practically begging for it, longing to be useful. And yet, in a developed society, the majority of us thankfully don’t experience genuine fear for our lives on a regular basis. A constant sense of safety, while a relief for many, can cultivate deep restlessness for others. Even those of us relieved to be safe might not be able to keep from daydreaming of danger. We’re active animals, too often confined to painfully still and “proper” environments: desk jobs, etiquette, veracity and discipline. Modern society has little room for primal freedoms, resulting in stored up energy and an inclination for excitement. It’s the sort of deep restlessness that gets a person bouncing their leg or fixing their hair, over and over and over again. A dark and wild energy. The urge for action. Arrange and rearrange. Move and feel. Shake it off. Fidget.

We’ve reached a point where many of our daily routines and occupations include an extreme amount of minute detail: selecting a brand of toothpaste, counting loose change, checking the timestamp of an email. We’ve channeled our immense mental power into solving millions of tiny problems to keep our mundane lives running. The itty-bitty nuances and the endless decisions prevent us from going mad. They give us a sense of purpose, because what else could? We don’t have to worry about outrunning the predator or capturing the prey. We must invent other things to worry about. 

But what happens then? When our primal reactions are applied to our mundane tasks? It’s a strange result. Your boss puts you on the spot during a meeting, and a surge of animalistic adrenaline is released, as if you’ve just heard the growl of an impending jungle cat eager to rip you to shreds. And yes, it’s uncomfortable. You’re sweating in a Monday morning meeting. It’s misplaced. Your body responds to a completely safe situation by feeding you the illusion of imminent death. It’s what it was built to do. We can’t easily reprogram ourselves, but we could put our bodies in situations they naturally crave: life threatening ones. 

The thing about deciding to put your life on the line, whether it be by scaling the face of El Capitan without ropes or walking a wire between the twin towers or climbing into the oak and iron barrel at the top of Niagara Falls, is that everything becomes very simple. There is only one effort: to remain alive. It doesn’t matter if you’re good at your job or kind or smart or attractive. It’s the most crystal-clear experience one could have. There are no clouds: how does my hair look or sorry I’m running a few minutes late. There’s no selection of running shoes, payment plans, or sides to go with your sandwich. There is living or dying. There is a simplicity that is maybe kind of beautiful for how simple it is.

So if you’re going to break out, why not go big? Why not wade towards one of the world’s most powerful natural wonders, which already includes a built-in dare? Of course, one can’t deny the appeal of attention for many of these daredevils. It’s a wonderful thing to be watched and wondered about. It’s the opposite of being forgotten and left alone (a genuine fear for many of us). Therefore, there’s a slew of daring attempts made with the aim of media attention. In 1990, Jessie Sharp attempted to weather the falls in a whitewater canoe. He confidently made a dinner reservation at a restaurant 4 miles downstream. Sharp refused the suggestion to wear a helmet or lifejacket, as he wanted to be more recognizable for the cameras. His body was never found.

Even if only a select few oddballs out of the population try weathering the falls, plenty more certainly would love to watch. There’s a reason the media angle works: it’s entertaining. Those of us witnessing dangerous events get to indulge in the fear factor: adrenaline, dopamine, etc, without putting ourselves at risk. Then again, some of us can’t even watch. Those chemicals are powerful, and it’s a fine line between enjoyable and unbearable discomfort. Maybe there is barely a line at all.

The feat’s seemingly random survivability is frightening. Charles Stephens, mentioned earlier, with his oak barrel and “safety harness” was dismembered, while Kirk Jones survived swimming over the falls with no protection at all, during an intoxicated suicide attempt in 2003. Czech stuntman Karl Soucek survived his 1984 trip in a barrel, only receiving minor injuries on his face from his wristwatch, as the force of impact with the water slammed his wrist into his face. I got the oddest sense of kinship from this detail: I once only became injured in a serious car accident from the airbag shoving my wristwatch into my cheekbone. The grand terror of Niagara Falls, or a freeway car collision, simplified to getting hit in the face by your own watch. I don’t wear one anymore, I wonder if Soucek does.

People will continue to throw themselves over Niagara Falls: in barrels, in canoes, in their T-shirts. No amount of analysis will change that. You can read this essay, and reread this essay, and check out that awfully fascinating and extensive Christmas-themed Wikipedia chart, but people will continue to go. There is something about the sum of gravity, of great height, and the human heart and the human mind and the human body that results in a percentage of the living deciding to throw themselves over that edge. And somehow it remains a popular destination, a romantic destination, even. Somewhere people love to visit, and gather, and gawk. We can consider ourselves separate from the “crazy people”, but maybe in all of our mundane, domestic lives is a secret pleasure, a morbid fascination with the worst fates imaginable. Peering over the impossibly high ledge can satiate it for some. For others, it’s not enough.