Gabrielle Falloppia is credited with inventing the condom. He didn’t, but he did discover the fallopian tubes, all while battling academic rivals, accusations of heresy, a syphilis epidemic, and the pirates who kidnapped his boyfriend. He has been accused of vivisecting the criminals given to him by the Medicis—that is, dissecting them while they were alive—but he didn’t do that. To be clear, he *did* kill them…just not in that way. It’s all in a day’s work for legendary anatomist Gabrielle Fall...
Aug 08, 2024•53 min•Season 4Ep. 8
Ancient history has traditionally been dominated by the lives of great men, while ancient women are confined to the margins or omitted altogether. In The Missing Thread, award-winning classicist Dr Daisy Dunn pulls these women out of the shadows and puts them center stage, where they belong. This week, we talk about the lives of ancient women: love, marriage, extra-marital relationships, divorce, sex, contraception, same-sex relationships, and even dildos made of bread?! We also talk about women...
Jul 25, 2024•50 min•Season 4Ep. 7
Burned, hanged, and symbolically “executed,” tea was a controversial commodity in 1770s America. This week we talk to Dr James Fichter about tea consumption, bans, the protests like the Boston Tea Party in the years leading up to the Revolutionary War. Dr Fichter’s new book is Tea: Consumption, Politics, and Revolution, 1773-1776.
Jul 10, 2024•58 min•Season 4Ep. 6
Under the 1913 Mental Deficiency Act, Britain imprisoned 50,000 people as “moral imbeciles.” Many of them were young women—working class, poor or unwed mothers, often victims of sexual assault—and most were confined to so-called Mental Deficiency Colonies for the rest of their lives. It was all down to eugenics; as the middle-class birth rate declined, Britain feared the working classes would outbreed their “betters,” so they imprisoned certain sexually active young people to keep them from havi...
Jun 26, 2024•1 hr 5 min•Season 4Ep. 5
Just this week, all but two Senate Republicans voted against the Right to Contraception Act. At the same time, the GOP is calling for a nationwide ban on abortion. But what happens when abortion is banned? It happened in Italy in 1588…but it didn’t work. It was overturned only three years later in 1591. This week, Jess talks to Dr John Christopoulos about Early Modern family planning and the difference between Church doctrine and the sex lives of real people. We cover bans, common practice, extr...
Jun 12, 2024•53 min•Season 4Ep. 4
Nostalgia can be both good and bad—at its best, it manifests in historical reenactment, vintage fashion, and mid-century modern furniture. At its worst, it can drive regressive political policies, fascism, and book bans. But nostalgia itself isn’t a bad thing—it’s a bittersweet, rose-tinted longing for the past, but how did people in the past experience it? In this thoughtful episode, Jess talks to Dr. Agnes Arnold-Forster about historical ideas about nostalgia, nostalgia as a medical condition,...
May 30, 2024•57 min•Season 4Ep. 3
During Josephine McCarty’s trial for murder, she was portrayed as an ordinary woman—a mother of six, she was only looking out for her children when she shot her lover in the face in front of dozens of witnesses. Over the course of her trial, she told the story of her life—she had been a lobbyist, an abortion provider, one of the first female doctors in the United States, and a double agent during the Civil War. Josephine was anything but ordinary, but her experiences mirror those of other ninete...
May 15, 2024•1 hr 17 min•Season 4Ep. 2
This week we welcome back to the show Susan Wands, author of the Arcana Oracle Series. We’re looking at the extraordinary lives of Florence Farr and Ellen Terry, two incredible women who broke all the rules of Victorian society. Divorce! Affairs! Illegitimate children! And best of all—careers! Ellen was an incredibly successful actress, and Florence was an artist and theater producer who became a high-ranking magician and head of the Golden Dawn. Not only did women like Ellen and Florence exist,...
May 01, 2024•51 min•Season 4Ep. 1
Following on from Episode 3.19 on sex toys with Hallie Lieberman, this week we talk to clinical psychologist Dr Eric Sprankle about the history and science of masturbation. We talk about the not-so-sexy origins of graham crackers and Kellogg’s Corn Flakes, bizarre conspiracy theories about porn, semen retention myths, and the Founding Father who thought math would keep you from touching yourself. Does masturbating fight fascism? The answer might surprise you! Eric’s new book is DIY: The Wonderfu...
Mar 13, 2024•47 min•Season 3Ep. 21
Literary nerds rejoice! This week, we have another history/literature episode, looking at sex work in Victorian poetry with Emily Calleja. We’re talking about how sex workers were portrayed, what that can tell us about women’s real-life frustrations, and how it impacted the suffrage movement.
Feb 28, 2024•35 min•Season 3Ep. 20
Sex toys have existed for 28,000 years, so why is there still such a stigma around them? This week we’re talking about the history of sex toys from the ancient world to the present, the evolution and cultural significance of the vibrator in the 19th and 20th centuries, Masters and Johnson’s revolutionary research, the ups and downs of the adult entertainment industry, anti-obscenity laws, and censorship. Our guest is Dr Hallie Lieberman, author of Buzz: A Stimulating History of the Sex Toy
Feb 14, 2024•56 min•Season 3Ep. 19
You’ve heard it all before—corsets are dangerous, uncomfortable, a tool of the patriarchy meant to oppress women! But are they? Were they ever? This week on DSH, we talk to biological anthropologist about corsets—how they really affect the body, why women wore them, and the surprising reason men wanted to do away with them at the turn of the 20th century. Rebecca’s new book is The Bad Corset, a translation and critique of Ludovic O’Followell’s influential 1905 anti-corset treatise, Le Corset.
Jan 31, 2024•1 hr•Season 3Ep. 18
In seventeenth-century England, seeing a doctor was a big deal. Before the NHS, people paid doctors, quacks, and even astrological medical practitioners out of pocket for cures that could be dangerous and downright unpleasant. Some people turned to household recipe books to treat themselves at home, but for many serious ailments, this just wasn’t possible. This week, we talk to Dr Jennifer Evans about men’s sexual health in the seventeenth-century—everything from kidney stones and infertility to...
Jan 17, 2024•54 min•Season 3Ep. 17
For women in Renaissance Italy, beauty was everything: it could be a vocation, a way to get ahead, entertainment, or even a weapon. Women of all classes used cosmetics, and many were employed as beauticians, apothecaries, and beauty writers. This week, Jess talks to Professor Jill Burke about Renaissance beauty standards, cosmetics, hair dye, plastic surgery, and how hundreds of women escaped abusive marriages with Aqua Tofana
Jan 03, 2024•1 hr 1 min•Season 3Ep. 16
Between 1848 and 1879, the Oneida Community tried to build heaven in Upstate New York through the principles of communism, free love, and contraception. Under the guidance of charismatic preacher John Humphrey Noyes, the community practiced “complex marriage,” meaning everyone was allowed to sleep with everyone else. But there was a dark side to this seemingly progressive paradise—Noyes was a narcissist who exercised extreme control over the lives of his followers, experimenting with eugenics in...
Dec 13, 2023•47 min•Season 3Ep. 15
What can folklore teach us about history? More than you’d think! This week, Jess talks to Icy Sedgwick about fairies, ghosts, gods, psychopomps, tricksters, banshees, and more. Who was the real Lady Godiva? How did colonialism influence the folklore of the Americas? And why are people so obsessed with Robin Hood? We cover all this and more this week on DSH. Icy is the author of Rebel Folklore: Empowering Tales of Spirits, Witches, and Other Misfits from Anansi to Baba Yaga. For more on Jess’s bi...
Nov 23, 2023•1 hr 7 min•Season 3Ep. 14
He might not be the most famous pirate, but Black Sam Bellamy may have been the most successful: when his ship wrecked in 1717, it took Sam with it, along with an astonishing 4.1 tonnes of gold and treasure. Forbes estimated that at his death, the "Prince of Pirates" was worth more than $120 million. And he did it all for love. This week on the podcast, we talk to Dr Jamie Goodall about Bellamy's doomed romance with the "Witch of Wellfleet," Maria Hallett, his unusual battle tactics, and how the...
Nov 08, 2023•53 min•Season 3Ep. 13
Madame Blavatsky is no longer a household name, but her ideas changed the course of history. A central figure in Victorian Spiritualism, she is credited with starting the New Age movement. She influenced everyone from Aldous Huxley and H.P. Lovecraft to Aleister Crowley and David Bowie. Even Dungeons & Dragons borrows from Blavatsky. Although her “miracles” were debunked in her lifetime, her ideas were far from harmless—her theories about race heavily influenced the Nazis and may have led to...
Oct 27, 2023•55 min•Season 3Ep. 12
Strikes have been in the news more and more lately, but what is a Labor Union and why should we care? Unions have gotten us many of the rights we take for granted today: the eight-hour workday, safer working conditions, better wages, and benefits. Women have played a huge part in this, from teenage girls in the first picket lines, to Mother Jones and Lucy Parsons, to the Uprising of the 20,000 and beyond. This week, we’re talking to journalist and organizer Kim Kelly about the American Labor Mov...
Oct 13, 2023•56 min•Season 3Ep. 11
What did the 18th Century smell like? You probably think of horses and chamber pots, but do you think of tobacco? How about sulfur? This week, we talk to Dr Emily Friedman about common scents in fiction from the Long 18th Century, mentioned by authors like Frances Burney and Jane Austen. We’re talking snuff, smelling salts, taking the waters at Bath, bathing before showers, Queen Charlotte’s bad habits, Marie Antoinette’s perfume, and more! Dr Friedman’s book is Reading Smell in Eighteenth-Centu...
Sep 28, 2023•1 hr 8 min•Season 3Ep. 10
“The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas” was a hit musical on Broadway, later made into a movie starring Dolly Parton and Burt Reynolds. But what about the Chicken Ranch, the real brothel the story was based on? This week, we talk to Jayme Lynn Blaschke about the history of sex work in Texas, the first brothels in La Grange, poultry as payment, and Miss Edna, the last madam of the Chicken Ranch. Jayme is the author of “Inside the Chicken Ranch: The Definitive Account of the Best Little Whorehouse.”
Sep 13, 2023•57 min•Season 3Ep. 9
While WWI was fought overseas, there was another war closer to home—a war on women known as “The American Plan.” Under the American Plan, tens of thousands of women were detained and injected with toxic chemicals based on their perceived ability to spread venereal disease, all in the name of protecting our soldiers. This week, our guest is comedian and sex-worker rights advocate Kaytlin Bailey, host of the Oldest Profession Podcast. We are talking about the history of sex work in America, the Ma...
Sep 01, 2023•36 min•Season 3Ep. 8
Nineteenth century France was a “nation on drugs”: psychotropic drugs were widely used and easily accessible for everything from everyday pain and mental issues to surgeries and brothel visits. This week, we talk to Dr Sara Black about the rise of Opium, Morphine, Cocaine, Ether, Chloroform, and Hashish—how they were researched and normalized until they were used by most of the country. We’re talking medical history, obstetrics, aphrodisiacs, psychiatric care, recreational use, philosophy and mo...
Aug 16, 2023•50 min•Season 3Ep. 7
The history of New York City isn’t only found in its museums—it’s in the names you find all over the city. This week, we talk to Rebecca Bratspies, author of Naming Gotham, about some of the remarkable people who leant their names to New York’s infrastructure: Anne Hutchinson, Adriaen van der Donck, Casimir Pulaski, Tadeusz Kościuszko, William Cullen Bryant, John Jacob Astor, and more. [minor correction: Rebecca mentions Mrs. Astor’s “top 200,” but meant to say “400”]
Aug 03, 2023•47 min•Season 3Ep. 6
George Remus was an infamous bootlegger in Jazz Age America, so wealthy and ostentatious that he is thought to be the real-life inspiration for Jay Gatsby. This week, we talk to Abbott Kahler about his bootlegging business, toxic marriage, legendary parties, and the bad-ass woman who wouldn’t rest until he was behind bars. Abbott’s book is The Ghosts of Eden Park: The Bootleg King, the Women Who Pursued Him, and the Murder that Shocked Jazz Age America
Jul 19, 2023•45 min•Season 3Ep. 5
Whales have been in the news all week, but it’s not the first time they’ve attacked ships. This week, Jess talks about the 19th century whaling industry, historical whale attacks, and the tragic sinking of the Essex in 1820. We cover the real-life inspiration for Moby Dick, an enormous white whale who sunk twenty ships off the coast of Chile. There’s even a bonus segment on whale products in Civil War era makeup courtesy of Godey’s Lady’s Book, 1863.
Jun 22, 2023•25 min•Season 3Ep. 4
Many historical love stories take you up until the wedding with the presumed happily-ever-after, but what happens next? What if things go wrong? This week, our guest is Dr. Jacqueline Beatty, author of In Dependence: Women and the Patriarchal State in Revolutionary America. We cover 18th century marriage, divorce, financial dependence, women's networks, and how women played into society's perception of them as weak to get what they wanted.
Jun 07, 2023•51 min•Season 3Ep. 3
Between 1827 and 1832, one ship—the Black Joke—captured thirteen slave ships and freed an incredible 3,000 people. The true story of the Black Joke is about so much more than one ship; today we also talk about diversity among sailors, gay relationships in the British navy, Britain’s complicated relationship with the slave trade, and how slavery was finally abolished. Our guest is historian and Jeopardy champion AE Rooks, author of the Mountbatten Maritime Media Awards’ Best Book of 2022, The Bla...
May 24, 2023•1 hr 23 min•Season 3Ep. 2
We are kicking off Season Three with an extra-long episode with Andrea Janes and Leanna Renee Hieber, historical ghost tour guides and authors of A Haunted History of Invisible Women: True Stories of America's Ghosts. From the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire to the Winchester Mystery House, we cover a lot of ground, discussing theoretical physics and the Stone Tape theory, famous ghosts, and the everyday horror of living as a woman in 19th-century America. What can ghost stories tell us about r...
May 10, 2023•1 hr 18 min•Season 3Ep. 1
America is experiencing a crisis of “bad history,” with fake history being used to justify regressive policy decisions while real history is being removed from schools and libraries. Why is it happening, and what are the dangers of fake history? For the Season 2 finale, our guests are Princeton history professors Dr Kevin Kruse and Dr Julian Zelizer, editors of New York Times Bestseller Myth America: Historians Take on the Biggest Legends and Lies About Our Past. This episode covers everything f...
Apr 26, 2023•51 min•Season 2Ep. 20
