How to Get Back to Australia When You Have No Money

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Ratch Spears came up with the idea of shipping himself from one place to another. In 1849, an enslaved man in Virginia named Henry Brown escaped enslavement using a box labeled dry goods. Reginald Bray sent a turnip with the address carved into it, a half-smoke cigar, and a bowler hat. Phoebe Judge: "I put a stamp on my ass and send myself home"

In 1964, one of the best javelin throwers in Australia traveled to England to see if he could qualify for the Olympics. But, because of an injury, he didn’t make the team - and he couldn’t afford a plane ticket home. So he came up with an idea while working a cargo job at Heathrow Airport: “I saw them shipping animals. And I thought, well, if the dogs can survive it, I could.”

Marcus and Julie McSorley’s book about Reg Spiers is Out of the Box: The Highs and Lows of a Champion Smuggler.

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