Oswald Levold holds a phenomenally
important role in history. A role so vital yet set against a background so
murky that he has almost entirely been written out our histories.
In the late 18th Century
political turmoil was creating great tension amongst the ruling class. The
French and American Revolutions and the lesser-known Haitian had brought a
state of panic amongst many royal houses.
In January 1799 a secret meeting of the
surviving Royal Heads and key individuals amongst the ruling classes was held
in Bruges. It’s purpose to find ways to suppress the uprisings less they spread
and threaten their way of life. Over two days a plan was developed to implement
a project that would repress the natural desire amongst the poorer classes for
justice and fairness. That plan involved Oswald Levold.
Oswald Levold was the most famous and successful
practitioner of what was known then as the Science of ‘Armarness’ - in simple
terms a belief that smells and odors could influence moods and behaviours.
Popular science of the day was that all diseases were spread through the air as
smells. Oswald Levold believed that odors need not always bring illness and
death but could make life better and that it was possible, using science, to
create such aromas.
Oswald was asked to produce a smell that
could be used to increase the levels of happiness amongst people. It was
explained to him that a happier poorer class would be more content, more
peaceful and able to draw greater pleasure from their lives however hard. He
was to make such quantity that it could be launched into the winds from
hundreds of different places around the globe on a single day to ensure that
not a corner of the earth should be missed.
The science of what Oswald Levold subsequently
produced is lost and that is not by accident for what Oswald did not know was
that the Royal Heads and Rulers had asked his chief rival Claude Penoir to
assist them. They knew that Oswald, with his beliefs, would only produce odors
to improve life. What the Royals really wanted was a smell that would encourage
the poor to rise up against anyone in their midst who talked of unrest, rights,
freedom and justice.
Oswald went back to his business with
sufficient funds to purchase large property in which he could produce the
gallons of liquid required. He moved his company ‘OL Odors of Hope’ from its
little shop in Balham to an area in Seething where he constructed the first
‘factory’ known. Here he renamed his business simply OL so no passer by could
guess what secrets lay inside the factory.
When his liquid was prepared it was taken
to a secret store in London and Oswald Levold leaves this story believing he
had done a good thing for the future well being of man.
It is at this point that Claude Penoir
steps in. A bungling, pompous and vain man he promised the group that with the
addition of further aromas he could turn Oswald’s scent into a rabble-rouser
that would encourage the poor to take issue with each other.
On October 12th 1799 vials of
the liquid were spilled into the winds from the four corners of the earth and
over six hundred places in between. Within hours the scent had circled the
globe. The ‘well to do’ held their kerchiefs to their noses as a suggested
protection lest their baser emotion be aroused but it did no good. The aroma
could percolate anything. The outcome of their grand experiment was not what
they hoped for or expected. Within thirty-six hours the human race had lost the
ability to smell.
It took some time for people to realise and
then understand the implications of the loss. The inability to detect whether
food was ‘off’ was one of the earliest issues which lead to mass illness and
death and a fetid atmosphere that none could realise. Rumours began that this
loss of smell was a direct result of the ‘nobles’ and rather than decreasing
tension a surge in local uprisings began.
In a panic the Royal group called Oswald
Levold back and explained what they had done. They begged him to undo their
mess and put back the world as was. Oswald agreed to try but on the
understanding that he should be richly rewarded and that, after it was done,
his factory should be closed for ever and his name, and that of his company OL,
be expunged from history.
In early 1800 the people of the earth awoke
to the realisation that they could smell again. In the country this was
wonderful, but in the towns the smell was rank. It was from this awareness that
movement to clean up our cities began leading to the public health and drainage
we now enjoy today.
Oswald’s factory was closed and he disappeared,
safe in the belief that his actions would be lost to history forever. But life
is never as simple as that. In Seething the locals still referred his building
as the OLFactory and described the perfumed odors that would emanate from it. From
those few rumours grew a secret tale that travelled the world. Whilst it is
never said out loud it is no accident that his name and work has lived on in
the word that continues describe our sense of smell - olfactory.
Footnote
In 1997, whilst studying the archives of
the Free University of Seething (FUS), Dr J. E. Eva, discovered some early
sketches for what was called the ‘Odors
of Hope machine. An invention to alter moods through the ingestion of aromas
created to improve the mind and soul.’ Its designer - the hitherto unknown
Oswald Levold. It is thanks to Dr J. E. Eva work and that of Professor Roberta
(Bobi) Robson that this story is now told.
Since the discovery the Department of
Heretic, Innuendo and Myth (HIM) has worked with the Department of Historical
Engineering Recreation (HER) to build the machine from the sketches. It will go
on display in 2013 as part of the Free University of Seething’s ‘Celebration of
the Fantastical – a history of the Creative, Remarkable, Amazing, Prodigious
inventions of the past
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