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Choose Your Own Adventure: The Many Accounts of the Execution of Anne Boleyn

5/18/2024

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Sepia artistic image of a man holding a sword aloft behind a kneeling Anne Boleyn

Historians rely a lot on primary source evidence to interpret the past. But what do you do when multiple sources tell a different story of what happened? Learn about the many accounts of the execution of Anne Boleyn and consider what they tell us about a major moment in English history with Kristin in this week’s episode of Footnoting History!

Host: Kristin

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Alfred Packer, Notorious Cannibal?

5/4/2024

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Black and white photograph of Packer's face. He is a white man with a long mustache and beard

Alfred, or sometimes Alferd Packer, is one of the most infamous villains in Colorado history. As the story goes, Packer, a trail guide, led his party into disaster and then killed them one by one before consuming their bodies in order to survive. He was arrested, tried, convicted, and then escaped. Once reprehended Packer changed his story once again. And now more recent evidence has emerged that seems to have exonerated him. We’ll try to sort of this out on this week’s episode of Footnoting History.

Host: Josh

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Owney: Star Pup of the US Railway Mail Service

4/20/2024

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Black and white photograph of Owney, a mutt who is likely a terrier, wearing a harness with tokens on it

In the late 1800s, a dog called Owney became a star as he won over the hearts of postal workers across the United States and sometimes, even, beyond. This episode is all about Owney, his adventures, the souvenirs he collected, and his revered place in postal history.

Host: Christine

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Medieval Coroners

4/6/2024

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Medieval illuminated image of a man's body with knives stuck in to various places and types of wounds labeled

If you've watched any significant number of crime dramas you've almost certainly come across a coroner who was probably presented as an experienced medical examiner who, if the hero is lucky, has unearthed a key piece of evidence to solve the case. But did you know that coroners have been investigating death since the end of the twelfth century? Learn more right now on Footnoting History.

Host: Samantha

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Dressing Marie Antoinette

3/23/2024

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Drawing of a man with white ornate hair and a red waistcoat fixing the very high blond hair of Marie Antoinette

Clothes and hair are among the most famous things about Marie Antoinette. But who were the designers behind the drama and what happened to them after the Revolution? And how did anyone actually wear – or afford – their creations? Find out this week on Footnoting History!

Host: Kristin

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Tadeusz Kościuszko, Part II: Life and Legend

3/9/2024

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Portrait of Tadeusz reclining on a seat in front of a window with his hand to his head

How much is it impossible to know about an icon? This episode investigates Tadeusz Kościuszko’s place in historical memory. From the early 19th century onwards, myths coalesced around him and his role in the Polish struggle for independence. Paradoxically, his contemporary fame can make it harder for historians to find facts. As a disabled war veteran who fought for racial and religious equality, moreover, Kościuszko is a figure more complex than the heroic narratives that have often formed around him.

Host: Lucy

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Tadeusz Kościuszko, Part I: International Icon, Revolutionary Hero

2/24/2024

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Portrait of Tadeusz Kościuszko, a white man with dark hair and serious expression, who wears a black jacket, red waistcoat, and white cravat and points to the top left

Tadeusz Kościuszko was a leader in the Age of Revolutions, lending strategic expertise to the Continental Army during the American Revolution, and trying on no fewer than three occasions to secure lasting independence for his native Poland. He also managed to personally offend Napoleon. This podcast gets into lost love, international politics, peasants with pitchforks, the anti-slavery movement, and why Kościuszko crossed the Atlantic so many times.

Host: Lucy

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Harry Washington

2/10/2024

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Portion of a painting where George Washington stands at the right wearing black in front of several enslaved men and women who are tending Mt Vernon

When someone says "Washington" and "revolution" in the same sentence, George immediately comes to mind. But there's another Washington that we should know, one that George Washington enslaved. Harry Washington escaped from his enslavement, fought for the British in during the American Revolution, and eventually fought in his own revolution in Sierra Leone. Let's take another look at the American Revolution in this episode of Footnoting History.

Host: Josh

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Murder and the Mignonette

1/27/2024

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Diagonally-placed text from a news article featuring words like Mignonette and murder

In 1884, a yacht called Mignonette left England for Australia but never reached its destination. After it was lost, those aboard were adrift at sea for weeks, resorting to desperate measures for survival. Here, Christine covers the ill-fated voyage, the murder trial it sparked, and how the story lives on in pop culture.

Host: Christine

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History for the Holidays III

12/9/2023

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Card drawing of a bird drawing a cart carrying holly and walking with a boy who is wearing a hat

A tradition continues! Celebrate with us through this episode about the history surrounding a selection of end-of-the-year holidays.

Hosts: Christine, Kristin, Josh

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The Many Adventures of Pope innocent III

11/25/2023

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Fresco image of Innocent III looking very serious and having reddish hair

One of the most powerful popes of the Middle Ages, Innocent III made sure to have his hand in everything from religious wars like the Crusades to political squabbles with kings. Here, Josh and Christine take a look at some of the most interesting points in the life of the controversial pontiff.

Hosts: Christine and Josh

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The Kościuszko Squadron: Liberty and Modernity in the Aftermath of WWI

11/11/2023

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World Wat I poster featuring a plane in action

What ties together a Revolutionary War hero, a Hollywood film director, and twentieth-century Poland’s quest for political independence? The Kościuszko Squadron (7. Eskadra Lotnicza) was an international flying squad, whose airmen included former prisoners of war, idealistic Americans, and international adventurers. The Polish-Soviet War is a conflict that, having taken place in the shadow of the First World War, is largely overlooked in the US today. But at the time, the conflict and the Kościuszko Squadron, named after Tadeusz Kościuszko, generated international enthusiasm and publications from Polish-American presses. This podcast explores this flamboyant, neglected history.

Host: Lucy

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History for Halloween X

10/28/2023

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Drawing of a stage production where a ghostly image is made by shadows on a screen

It's hard to believe but here we are celebrating a decade of creepy stories from history for our favorite scary holiday!

Hosts: Christine, Kristin, Lucy

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Further Reading

The Witchcraft Trial of Alice Kyteler

10/14/2023

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Photograph of an Irish castle

In 1324, a woman named Alice Kyteler was accused of witchcraft in Kilkenny, Ireland. Her story is mysterious and fascinating and considered a landmark case in the history of European witch trials. Find out what happened – or didn’t – this week on Footnoting History!

Host: Kristin

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Further Reading

Leo Frank and the Murder of Mary Phagan

9/30/2023

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Black and white photograph of Leo Frank wearing a light suit and flat brimmed hat

In 1913, Leo Frank was arrested for the murder of 13-year-old Mary Phagan in Atlanta, Georgia. Two years later, he, too, was dead. In this episode, Christine explores the complicated case and its perhaps unexpected musical theatre legacy.

Host: Christine

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Further Reading

The Cold Truth: A History of Refrigeration

9/16/2023

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Black and white photograph of a woman in a plaid dress with short hair showing off and old white refrigerator

Ever stopped to think about how amazing it is that you have this box, in your home, that keeps food cold? Reliable, at-home refrigeration is pretty new to history – and utterly transformative of how we live. Learn about how this technology came to be so commonplace – and how it changed the world, this week on Footnoting History!

Host: Kristin

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Further Reading

Titus Oates, a Popish Plot, and the Mysterious Murder of Sir Edmund Berry Godfrey

9/2/2023

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Image of Titus Oates in the stocks

In the summer of 1678 a defrocked preacher named Titus Oates claimed to have knowledge of a Catholic plot to kill King Charles II and to replace him with his crypto-Catholic brother. At first the story gained no traction, reported as it was by a man of dubious reputation, but when Sir Edmund Berry Godfrey (the man who had first investigated Oates’ story) was found dead people started listening. This week we’ll lay it all out for you: who was Titus Oats? What’s the deal with Godfrey’s death? And what happened when people came to believe that there was a plot against Charles?

Host: Samantha

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Further Reading

A Royal Son: Geoffrey, duke of Brittany

8/19/2023

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Of the four sons of King Henry II of England and Queen Eleanor of Aquitaine who lived to adulthood, only one was never called king. In this episode we look at the life of Geoffrey, duke of Brittany, including why he has a reputation for being conniving and the fates of the children he left behind.

Host: Christine

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Further Reading

True Crime on Stage in Shakespeare's England

8/5/2023

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The Witch of Edmonton play cover advertisement

In the often-chaotic society of sixteenth-century England, many people enthusiastically consumed true crime narratives in songs, news, and theater plays. Then as now, true crime narratives often centered on community crime-solving as a way of dealing with sensational and upsetting violence. Whether in the form of domestic tragedies or elaborate revenge dramas, true crime played to packed houses in the theaters of Elizabethan London. Amid religious and political upheaval, the popularity of true crime attested not just to evolving habits of media consumption, but also to powerful desires for communal order and mutual responsibility. In this episode, Lucy and guest host Dr. Rachel Clark examine true love, strong hate, and swift revenge – and why audiences tend to love a good murder.

Hosts: Lucy and Rachel

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Further Reading

Wyatt Earp and a Heavyweight Fix

7/22/2023

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Black and white photograph of an older Earp sitting in a wooden chair

In 1896, retired from his life in the so-called "Wild West," Wyatt Earp was asked to referee a boxing match. But not just any boxing match - a bout that would determine the new heavyweight champion. Two legendary boxers, Bob Fitzsimmons and Tom Sharkey, duked it out in San Francisco. The legendary lawman Earp allegedly fixed the fight. On this episode of Footnoting History, come along from a walk through the seedy underbelly of illegal prizefighting and learn how Earp found himself at the center of tremendous controversy.

Host: Josh

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