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4 Times Women in the US Were Actually Arrested for Wearing Pants · Ridiculous History

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  Speaker 1: Ridiculous History is a production of I Heart Radio. Welcome
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  Speaker 1: to the show Ridiculous Historians. We are so happy that
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  Speaker 1: you have joined us today. My name is Ben am
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  Speaker 1: was always joined with our super producer Casey pegram My
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  Speaker 1: trustee co host nol Is on some Adventures and I
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  Speaker 1: have the immense pleasure of welcoming back to the show
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  Speaker 1: our one of our favorite recurring guest, longtime friend of
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  Speaker 1: mine in real life, and then a longtime friend of
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  Speaker 1: the show folks. Hello to Christopher haciotis Ben Casey. Thank
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  Speaker 1: you so much for having me back. It's a real pleasure. Yeah,
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  Speaker 1: I'm glad we worked out that cookie thing. I don't
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  Speaker 1: know what you're talking about, so so uh the bit
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  Speaker 1: of trivia. Here, as Casey and Christopher and I record
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  Speaker 1: today's episode, we are all wearing pants nowadays. That's like
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  Speaker 1: a regular thing you expect when you go out into
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  Speaker 1: the world, that you'll see someone wearing pants. Yeah, I
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  Speaker 1: saw like, at least I don't know, tend people wearing
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  Speaker 1: pants today. Um, they've really caught on, probably more, I
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  Speaker 1: don't know. Yeah. Let me let me paint a picture
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  Speaker 1: though for listeners. Um, I'm sitting here in the studio.
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  Speaker 1: Band is in the studio with me. Casey is right
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  Speaker 1: outside the studio manning the computer and the and the
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  Speaker 1: knobs and the switches and all those things. Um, I
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  Speaker 1: can see. Uh, let's see so our our studio is
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  Speaker 1: covered in sort of a dark gray milk crate sound
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  Speaker 1: absorbing substance. We've got some pens and coffee cups on
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  Speaker 1: the table, We've got microphones. There's a floor lamp behind you,
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  Speaker 1: floor lamp um, some plants, various housecats, little dragon over there.
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  Speaker 1: And then I see sitting across the table from me,
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  Speaker 1: a Rakish gentleman in a blue and brownish plaid shirt,
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  Speaker 1: a little you know, kind of adventurous facial hair, and
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  Speaker 1: I cus, how dare you know? Why? Well, let's move
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  Speaker 1: on outside. I out out the window. I see another
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  Speaker 1: gentleman with some adventurous facial hair and you know, just
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  Speaker 1: really alluring good looks. Also a plaid with a brown
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  Speaker 1: and blue a little more white than maybe yours. Ben,
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  Speaker 1: It's no secret big Plaid runs this podcast. Well, I
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  Speaker 1: don't see, though I'm looking. I don't know if you
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  Speaker 1: guys are wearing pants. Oh, but you know what, it's fine.
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  Speaker 1: I could see all your hands. So I know that
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  Speaker 1: you're not hiding any weapons or no knives or guns whatever.
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  Speaker 1: But you know what I think, in this day, if
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  Speaker 1: you were not wearing pants, if you were wearing something
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  Speaker 1: maybe a little more unexpected, it would still be fine.
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  Speaker 1: That's that's right. If you're wearing something more unexpected, you
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  Speaker 1: will have people react accordingly, barrel um, I guess like
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  Speaker 1: a big pilot monkeys. Yeah. One thing one't common alternative
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  Speaker 1: for a lot of people would be a kilt. Ye like,
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  Speaker 1: it's some people very popular on certain times the year.
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  Speaker 1: I was just up in Franklin, North Carolina, recently, and
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  Speaker 1: they have a Museum of the American Tartan I believe
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  Speaker 1: it's what it was called, the whole museum dedicated to
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  Speaker 1: h two kilts and Scottish patterns. And did you go?
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  Speaker 1: I walked past, it was closed. I was closed. I
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  Speaker 1: was on my way to the Museum of the American
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  Speaker 1: house Cat, which is a little further north in the
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  Speaker 1: North Carolina Mountains. That's not why we're here today, though,
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  Speaker 1: But I would incur anyone listening who's in the vicinity
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  Speaker 1: of western North Carolina, northern Georgia, eastern Tennessee in that
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  Speaker 1: sort of smokey mountain area. Go check out the Museum
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  Speaker 1: of the American house Cat. I am ac on board
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  Speaker 1: and don't know why I haven't done that earlier. Can
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  Speaker 1: I just tell you there's a mummified cat? Yes? Please,
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  Speaker 1: thank you? Now I have to go. Also, just before
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  Speaker 1: we move on, is it is it a pretty robust museum?
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  Speaker 1: Is it something that you could spend a few hours in?
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  Speaker 1: You could? You could? People do love cats. Um, it
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  Speaker 1: is made up for what it lacks in breadth by
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  Speaker 1: significant depth. Okay, there we go. It's a very very
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  Speaker 1: well thought out answer. I'm impressed. I thought about the
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  Speaker 1: Museum of the American house Cat a good amount of
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  Speaker 1: the past week. So so you're you're right. Today we
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  Speaker 1: are regrettably not diving into the fascinating history. Ben. Actually,
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  Speaker 1: you know what, I did bring it up for a reason.
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  Speaker 1: Can I retroactively make that tangent relevant? Yes? Oh? Yes,
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  Speaker 1: because at the Museum of the American Housecat, who is
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  Speaker 1: I promise not a sponsor of this show, but probably
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  Speaker 1: should be. With as much as I've mentioned them in
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  Speaker 1: the past couple of minutes, Um, there are really really
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  Speaker 1: charming paintings of cats wearing say dresses, frilly dresses, frocks, mocks,
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  Speaker 1: you know, any sort of petticoat, ball gowns. Maybe, so
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  Speaker 1: I bring up the idea of a cat wearing a dress, because, um,
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  Speaker 1: sometimes people think it's inappropriate for certain people to wear
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  Speaker 1: certain things. Yes, absolutely, I was was that like ya
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  Speaker 1: sitting for Noel's like tangent, I kind of tie it in. Okay,
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  Speaker 1: I thought you did a great job. Yeah, this is
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  Speaker 1: this is probably one of the best ones we've had
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  Speaker 1: on this show. Uh so surround best. Noel has a
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  Speaker 1: lot to live up to. I do as well. It
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  Speaker 1: is true, Christopher, that we see so very often throughout history,
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  Speaker 1: we see the way that people communicate through dress, or
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  Speaker 1: we see the way that dress is perceived or enforced.
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  Speaker 1: Right like here in the US nowadays, if someone is
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  Speaker 1: just walking around in public, then other than covering you know,
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  Speaker 1: let's be honest, like Genitalia and and probably nipples counting
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  Speaker 1: there too, nipples, buttocks, right, other than covering those areas,
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  Speaker 1: it's pretty much anything goes. You can kind of wear
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  Speaker 1: what you want. I mean, I to inject a little
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  Speaker 1: bit of socio political cultural reality into that. Many of
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  Speaker 1: us who maybe are you know, white men, for instance,
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  Speaker 1: can get away with stuff absolutely. People from different communities
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  Speaker 1: get polased all the time for what they're wearing when
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  Speaker 1: they get profiled. Yeah, but that is that kind of discrimination,
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  Speaker 1: and that kind of profiling is not legal. It's just
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  Speaker 1: it's just this country does a piss poor job of
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  Speaker 1: actually following the letter of the law in the in
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  Speaker 1: these regards. And you're right, because uh, privilege is a
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  Speaker 1: huge is a huge problematic part of this thing. There's
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  Speaker 1: also throughout the span of human civilization there are examples
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  Speaker 1: of certain clothing types being restricted to certain people based
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  Speaker 1: on socio economic or socio political cast system a hierarchy
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  Speaker 1: for lack of a better word. And today's story is
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  Speaker 1: about one of the most ridiculous related uh, series of
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  Speaker 1: events that that we found that applies in this And
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  Speaker 1: this is something that you introduced me to via our
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  Speaker 1: fantastic peer podcast, Stuff Mom Never Told You. Yeah, Stuff
• 7:54
  Speaker 1: Mom Never Told You is a really terrific show. It's
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  Speaker 1: got a long history here at the company and has
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  Speaker 1: been running for ten plus years um and really dives
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  Speaker 1: into a wide variety of issues relating to a myriad
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: of things that women in today's society face and touches
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  Speaker 1: on history, politics, culture, entertainment, and it really runs the gamut.
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  Speaker 1: So if you're interested in a really well researched, well
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  Speaker 1: thought out conversational show about that, and if it sounds
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  Speaker 1: up your alley, check out Stuff Mom Never Told You listeners,
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  Speaker 1: if you haven't already. But yeah, as we were kind
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  Speaker 1: of poking through the stuff mon I Ever told you archives,
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  Speaker 1: we came across a piece written by former colleague of
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  Speaker 1: ours and it sparked the idea to really dig into
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  Speaker 1: some of these stories about women who have been arrested
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  Speaker 1: for wearing pants. That's why we've been talking about pants
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  Speaker 1: so much, and that's that's it. To be absolutely clear,
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  Speaker 1: the crime they were arrested for was not like stealing
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  Speaker 1: a carriage while wearing pants. It was just wearing pants.
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  Speaker 1: I will also add that these arrests took place in
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  Speaker 1: the United States. Yes, so this is not this isn't like, Okay,
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  Speaker 1: we're talking about some fairly repressive regime in um, you know,
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  Speaker 1: a part of the world that maybe has traditions that
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  Speaker 1: would really really overtly frown on that talking about the
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  Speaker 1: United States. And we're also yeah, we're also not talking
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  Speaker 1: about religious splinter groups or very conservative communities that are
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  Speaker 1: isolated from mainstream US culture. We're talking about the regular,
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  Speaker 1: everyday Jane's and Joe's of this country, and Chris for you,
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  Speaker 1: and I looked through and found a couple of examples.
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  Speaker 1: I propose that we round robin them, you know. And
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  Speaker 1: I also felt, to be completely clear, I felt so
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  Speaker 1: just baffled and and beflummixed to learn that this was
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  Speaker 1: a real thing. It seemed like, you know, and this
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  Speaker 1: is this just highlights MI tremendous ignorance in this regard,
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  Speaker 1: but it seemed like something that people would consider a
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  Speaker 1: big deal much earlier in history. Because these cases are
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  Speaker 1: some of them are distressingly recent. And that's the thing.
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  Speaker 1: These are cases, right, So today we're not talking about
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  Speaker 1: the woman who was arrested for wearing pants. We're talking
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  Speaker 1: about the women, multiple women, in multiple instances, over hundreds
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  Speaker 1: of years in this country, who are arrested specifically for
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  Speaker 1: sporting pants, trousers, uh, you know, dungarees, whatever you want
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  Speaker 1: to call them, pieces of fabric wrapped around two legs
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  Speaker 1: rather than worn as one long sheath like a dress. Right.
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  Speaker 1: The situations range from you know, humorous, the heartbreaking, because
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  Speaker 1: every person we're discussing in today's episode is pretty much
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  Speaker 1: a he in in how they stood up to the
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  Speaker 1: prejudice and discrimination of the time. Christopher, being that you
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  Speaker 1: are returning guests here, would would you like to kick
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  Speaker 1: us off today? Yeah, I'd love to. I'd love to
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  Speaker 1: tell you about the story of Mary Tilts. And there
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  Speaker 1: was a woman who lived in New Jersey in the
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  Speaker 1: mid eighteen hundreds, so we're talking about a good long
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  Speaker 1: time ago. At the time, it was much more traditional
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  Speaker 1: for a woman to wear really kind of full dress, right,
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  Speaker 1: So if you think back to that sort of Victorian fashion,
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  Speaker 1: probably what you're thinking when you're thinking those CPIA toned
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  Speaker 1: photos is fairly accurate. You know, corsets, petticoats, tights, hats,
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  Speaker 1: you know, sort of that Bodice War and a tight outfit.
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  Speaker 1: Mary Tillotson, though, going back to the eight forties, really
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  Speaker 1: started kind of shortening her dresses, at least in eighteen
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  Speaker 1: forty two. The historical record, and a lot of this
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  Speaker 1: comes from a couple of different pieces. Um forgive the
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  Speaker 1: long titles, but that's what academics tend to do. If
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  Speaker 1: this sort of thing sounds fun to you dig into
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  Speaker 1: the Freedom Suit, Feminism and Dress Reform in the United
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  Speaker 1: States seventy five. That's a journal article written by Amy
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  Speaker 1: Kestleman back in uh. There's also a lot of information
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  Speaker 1: that we got from the two thousand three book by
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  Speaker 1: Patricia and Cunningham, Reforming Women's Fashion eighteen fifty to nineteen
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  Speaker 1: twenty Politics, Health and Art. And I say politics, health
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  Speaker 1: and art because that's actually at the heart of Mary
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  Speaker 1: Tillotson's arrest. So the reason that she was changing her
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  Speaker 1: mode of dress, shortening her dress, you know, making it shorter,
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  Speaker 1: taking about a foot off, and switching to what was
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  Speaker 1: known as reform dress. The reform dress was a specific
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  Speaker 1: style where a woman would wear trousers and a short
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  Speaker 1: dress over it. It looked a little bit sort of
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  Speaker 1: like a what we might think of as a work outfits.
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  Speaker 1: This was for health reasons. So Mary Tillotson was part
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  Speaker 1: of a movement called the Dress Reform Society adopting reform dress.
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  Speaker 1: Her impetus was that she was suffering from dyspepsia, indigestion,
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  Speaker 1: really poor health, and thought that if I loosened some
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  Speaker 1: of the scarb it might really offer some health benefits.
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  Speaker 1: And for her it did. The thing is, Mary Tillotson
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  Speaker 1: was out in public in Newark in eighteen forties and
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  Speaker 1: she was arrested. The other thing about that is it
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  Speaker 1: wasn't illegal, you know. And this this calls back a
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  Speaker 1: little bit ben to what you mentioned, how there's this
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  Speaker 1: divide between cultural norms and what is or isn't legal.
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  Speaker 1: Mary Tillotson was arrested for wearing pants, not because it
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  Speaker 1: was against the law, but because the police officer in Newark,
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  Speaker 1: New Jersey, assumed it was against the law. He thought,
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  Speaker 1: surely there must be a law against a woman wearing trousers.
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  Speaker 1: Let me lock this woman up. And that's that's the
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  Speaker 1: thing we have to emphasize here. She was arrested and
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  Speaker 1: was doing nothing wrong, and it wasn't as if she were,
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  Speaker 1: you know, just sort of hassled on the street side
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  Speaker 1: and then let go with a warning or whatever. Like.
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  Speaker 1: They took her in, right, yeah, arrested, spent the night
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  Speaker 1: in prison, was eventually released because I was found to
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  Speaker 1: be violating no laws, you know. But that's the thing
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  Speaker 1: that that's what's tricky. I think a lot of times
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  Speaker 1: we talked about interactions with police and the courts. Um.
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  Speaker 1: You know, if a police officer takes you into custody,
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  Speaker 1: it's not like you can just immediately say hey, wait
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  Speaker 1: a minute, there's no law and walk out. You still
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  Speaker 1: have to spend time in prison, You still have to
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  Speaker 1: go through the legal appeals. Like there's a huge hassle
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  Speaker 1: involved in all this stuff, all based solely on one
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  Speaker 1: man's assumption that this this violation of social norms also
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  Speaker 1: carried with an event lation of the law, which is
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  Speaker 1: it's ridiculous, right, it's ridiculous, and and that there is
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  Speaker 1: no system in place at the time too, then immediately
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  Speaker 1: refute those claims, you know, mechanism. Yeah and so so.
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  Speaker 1: Mary Tillison spent time in prison for wearing pants. But
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  Speaker 1: this wasn't just a personal thing for her. Till Itson.
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  Speaker 1: Actually I mentioned that the reform dress styles of trousers
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  Speaker 1: and short dresses for health reasons. It's something that she
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  Speaker 1: adopted as a cause for pretty much the rest of
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  Speaker 1: her life. She helped form the Dress Reform Society in
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  Speaker 1: eighteen seventy the American Free Dress League in eighteen seventy five. Um,
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  Speaker 1: you know, she was part of a movement of really
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  Speaker 1: trying to push forth a more liberated agenda. She was
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  Speaker 1: part of a movement in eighteen sixty eight to try
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  Speaker 1: to vote, which at the time women were not permitted
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  Speaker 1: to do in the United States, among many other people,
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  Speaker 1: and she she even cataloged her whole endeavor in a
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  Speaker 1: book that she wrote called History of the First thirty
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  Speaker 1: five Years of the Science Costume Movement in the United States.
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  Speaker 1: And science Costume is uh, kind of a funny name,
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  Speaker 1: but it was another term for the reformed dress um
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  Speaker 1: outfit because the idea was based on supposedly scientific principles
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  Speaker 1: that given a little more freedom of movement, women would
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  Speaker 1: be healthier. It plays into and some of the authors
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  Speaker 1: of the books that I mentioned earlier bring this up
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  Speaker 1: that Tillotson was part of an early feminist movement and
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  Speaker 1: her peers in that that reform dress movement didn't endeavor
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  Speaker 1: really to push through political reform or economic reform through policy.
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  Speaker 1: It was more to present themselves in their lives as
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  Speaker 1: modes of being and to inspire other people on an
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  Speaker 1: individual basis to adopt that way of living, that way
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  Speaker 1: of dress. And uh, you know, it was it was
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  Speaker 1: a that that specific reform dress. And there are certainly
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  Speaker 1: fashion historians who are much more steep in this than
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  Speaker 1: I am. It only lasted for a couple of years,
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  Speaker 1: and then fashion sort of swung back in the other
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  Speaker 1: direction in the eighteen um sixties, I believe. But it
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  Speaker 1: was the start of something. It was the start of something.
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  Speaker 1: But it also was not the end of till Itson's story,
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  Speaker 1: because she eventually moved to a place Violand New Jersey.
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  Speaker 1: Violin had at the time of reputation as a more
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  Speaker 1: progressive town, at least more progressive than the average bear,
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  Speaker 1: I guess. And you could wear pants. You could wear pants,
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  Speaker 1: which is still so crazy, right, uh? And at that time,
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  Speaker 1: apparently it was. It was considered less controversial. As a
• 17:44
  Speaker 1: local historian put it, the area was more tolerant of
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  Speaker 1: her practice, and it was considered in its day in
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  Speaker 1: the eighteen sixties, it was considered a quote hotbed of
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  Speaker 1: liberal activity. But I like the idea that until Itson
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  Speaker 1: was able to find a place where she could dress
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  Speaker 1: and live as she wanted to live. And while some
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  Speaker 1: people will say that till Itson's medical interests like the
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: so called water cure and stuff, well they may say
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  Speaker 1: that was a little bit I don't know, quackish, or
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  Speaker 1: maybe the science wasn't a million percent there. The truth
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  Speaker 1: of the matter is that her contributions for bravery had
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  Speaker 1: to be inspiring to so many people around the country
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  Speaker 1: who probably looked at this and thought, you know, well,
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  Speaker 1: why do I have to wear a dress? And that
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  Speaker 1: happened in the eighteen forties, and this is you know,
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  Speaker 1: it kind of pushes against the idea of America has
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  Speaker 1: always been the place where where people can do what
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  Speaker 1: they want and are free to live the life they live, right,
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  Speaker 1: you know, it's it's there's there's always that that duality
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  Speaker 1: right of the United States, as it could be in
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  Speaker 1: the United States, as individuals experience it sometimes mm hmmm.
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  Speaker 1: And then you know, while we're in this period, I
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  Speaker 1: propose that we we stay in this area time wise,
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  Speaker 1: right chronologically, and then we go to another Mary. Let's
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  Speaker 1: go to Dr Mary Edwards Walker. She is the first
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  Speaker 1: person to receive the Congressional Medal of Honor in eighteen
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  Speaker 1: sixty five for her service during the Civil War. She
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  Speaker 1: didn't just wake up one day and say I'm going
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  Speaker 1: to wear this pair of pants. In the late eighteen hundreds,
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  Speaker 1: she started wearing clothing overwhelmingly wearing clothing that at the
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  Speaker 1: time was considered clothing only for men, and this led
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  Speaker 1: to her getting arrested multiple times. She has a great
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  Speaker 1: quotation that our colleague Kristen Conger brought to our attention
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  Speaker 1: in an article for Stuff Mom Never Told You, where
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  Speaker 1: Dr Walker says, I am the original new woman. I
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  Speaker 1: have prepared the way for the girl in knickerbockers is
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  Speaker 1: back when people used to say knickerbockers all the time.
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  Speaker 1: And Dr Walker's journey is pretty amazing. In eighteen sixty six,
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  Speaker 1: she actually became president of the organization you mentioned earlier,
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  Speaker 1: the National Dress Reform Association, and she was, you know,
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  Speaker 1: getting arrested by these jerk police officers. She would get
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  Speaker 1: ridiculed from people not just opponents of the dress reform movement,
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  Speaker 1: but also people who had advocated some degree of it,
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  Speaker 1: who had said, look, I just want to wear pants
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  Speaker 1: walking around with a suit. That's a bit extreme, don't
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  Speaker 1: you think, doctor Well, I mean that that's one of
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  Speaker 1: the struggles, right, that that she and so many other
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  Speaker 1: people who are looking to push society forward in a
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  Speaker 1: in a way that they think would benefit more people
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: always struggle with right. It's it's incrementalism versus massive sweet change.
• 21:00
  Speaker 1: It's yeah, I get you, but do you have to
• 21:03
  Speaker 1: go that far? Which works for some people and doesn't
• 21:06
  Speaker 1: for others. A lot of people want to take that
• 21:08
  Speaker 1: moon shot. I guess yeah, I think I think you're
• 21:10
  Speaker 1: absolutely right there. Walker's story does not end entirely happily,
• 21:16
  Speaker 1: but it ends with a sort of prescience. So by
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: the time she passes away in nineteen nineteen, she has
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: been somewhat isolated from the larger feminist movement because she
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: was seeing and this comes from a great article on
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: weird history dot Org by R. E. Fulton. Dr. Walker
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: was seen as not this pioneer, not this harbinger of
• 21:44
  Speaker 1: a new era of equality, but she was seen more
• 21:48
  Speaker 1: as an eccentric and an odd duck because the people
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: who would have logically been her allies and her partners
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: in this sort of movement, we're concerned earned that her
• 22:01
  Speaker 1: dress was so unusual for the time that she was
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: weakening the the arguments that they were they were attempting
• 22:11
  Speaker 1: to have the changes they were attempting to make, so
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: they would think, you know, you're you're taking it too far.
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: People should wear what they want, but why are you
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: walking around in a top coat and a hat that
• 22:23
  Speaker 1: mail doctors wear, and she continued to say, well, you
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: know what, women being people should be able to address
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: however they want, work wherever they want, and you know,
• 22:36
  Speaker 1: do whatever they want in general. So walker story ended
• 22:41
  Speaker 1: with with another quote this is from were History out
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: a word that I thought was pretty powerful. She says,
• 22:48
  Speaker 1: I have got to die before people will know who
• 22:51
  Speaker 1: I am and what I have done. It is a
• 22:54
  Speaker 1: shame that people who lead reforms in this world are
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: not appreciated until after they are dead. Then the world
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: pays its tributes. And for a time, um, you know,
• 23:04
  Speaker 1: we said that she passed away in her name was
• 23:08
  Speaker 1: deleted from the Army Medal of Honor role in nine seventeen,
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: and it wasn't restored until nineteen seventy seven. That's really
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: a shame. I mean, it's a shame. For a while,
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: it's heartening that that her stories come back up and
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: resurfaced that I think, in particular, her story really underscores
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: how malleable the stories we tell as a society can be. Right.
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: Who we lionize, who we put on pedestals, These are
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: always always, always conscious choices. It's not like someone is
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: intrinsically a hero or not. Right, it's it's those of
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: us around them who tell stories about them, especially after
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: they're gone, and kind of what we imbue them with. Yeah,
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: I mean, but that's what that's why we're talking about
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: these women. That's why we sit in these booths and
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: chat about all these different figures, because it's it's really
• 24:06
  Speaker 1: important to kind of uncover who they are, what they
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: mean to the world, what they mean to societies and
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: cultures which can change. And also a lot of it's
• 24:15
  Speaker 1: really ridiculous. It's easy though, right when we are talking
• 24:23
  Speaker 1: about history to say this is the way things were
• 24:27
  Speaker 1: a hundred and fifty years ago, this is the way
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: It's not like that anymore. But let's let's jump ahead
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: a couple more decades, right, Let's let's go straight into
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: the twentieth century. And I'd like to talk to you
• 24:38
  Speaker 1: and uh and and listeners, if you haven't heard history,
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: it's this one, thankfully, is a little more lighthearted. There's
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: no um serious repercussions. But in In Night there's a
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: woman named Helen Huluk. She went through something really similar,
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: you know, And I think a lot of times when
• 24:56
  Speaker 1: people think about social reformers or people who are pushing
• 25:01
  Speaker 1: society to move forward. They say these are professional activists
• 25:06
  Speaker 1: or their agitators, or like this is their primary goal
• 25:10
  Speaker 1: is to really disrupt. Right, But we're talking about a
• 25:13
  Speaker 1: kindergarten teacher and a kindergarten teacher who wasn't even pushed
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: into this activist role that I'm about to kind of
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: lay out for you. She was trying to do a
• 25:25
  Speaker 1: good thing. So Helen hulk l a resident, and a
• 25:29
  Speaker 1: lot of what we know about who Look comes from
• 25:32
  Speaker 1: the l A Times reporting at the time, but also
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: some retrospective that have been published uh in in the
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: intervening years. So who Look witnessed a burglary in her neighborhood,
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: and so she, as as a potential witness of a crime,
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: was called to court to testify against these two suspects. Right.
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: So she's a citizen, a kindergarten teacher, doing her civic
• 25:58
  Speaker 1: duty to help the victim of a crime. So she
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: shows up in court in downtown Los Angeles UH courtroom
• 26:08
  Speaker 1: run by Judge Arthur S. Garon. The thing is she
• 26:12
  Speaker 1: is wearing blue flannel trousers and for the judge, this
• 26:18
  Speaker 1: is a big no no, right, right, right. The judge
• 26:23
  Speaker 1: is now completely distracted right from this, this entire original crime.
• 26:30
  Speaker 1: In his mind, there's a new crime that demands immediate attention.
• 26:35
  Speaker 1: And I gotta say, this guy sounds like a super curmudgeon. Yeah,
• 26:40
  Speaker 1: Judge Garn basically says to who, look, if you are
• 26:45
  Speaker 1: dressed like that in of all things trousers, you can't
• 26:50
  Speaker 1: testify in my court. And so he orders her to
• 26:53
  Speaker 1: leave and come back wearing what he says is appropriate
• 26:56
  Speaker 1: for the setting. You know, and this is the sort
• 26:58
  Speaker 1: of thing like, yeah, it's situational, yes, more a's and
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: standards change over time. Yes, what is acceptable to us
• 27:06
  Speaker 1: today may a hundred years ago look outrageous. Um, And
• 27:12
  Speaker 1: what people wear a hundred years from now made to
• 27:15
  Speaker 1: us look like the sort of thing you would wear
• 27:17
  Speaker 1: at the beach. I don't know, but um, you know,
• 27:20
  Speaker 1: I the the l A Times has images of miss Hulok.
• 27:25
  Speaker 1: These are these are just pants, They're long, they're not
• 27:27
  Speaker 1: particularly outrageous unless you are a judge, I suppose. And
• 27:32
  Speaker 1: they're not like ray Ver Jinko's or something you know
• 27:35
  Speaker 1: now that that truly would be an outrage. So so
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: he sends her home, come back, says the judge, when
• 27:43
  Speaker 1: you know, whatever you're wearing does not offend me. So
• 27:47
  Speaker 1: and she does return, doesn't she? Well, she does um
• 27:49
  Speaker 1: And she's quoted in the newspaper that day of saying,
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: you tell the judge I will stand on my rights
• 27:54
  Speaker 1: if he orders me to change into address, I won't
• 27:57
  Speaker 1: do it. I like slacks. They're comfortable. I know. I mean,
• 28:04
  Speaker 1: who more sensible and utilitarian than a kindergarten teacher? Right,
• 28:09
  Speaker 1: you were chasing five year olds all the time, Slacks
• 28:12
  Speaker 1: seemed like a good choice to me. The judge, for
• 28:15
  Speaker 1: his part, said quote, I don't set styles, but costumes
• 28:20
  Speaker 1: acceptable at the beach are not acceptable in formal courtroom procedure.
• 28:24
  Speaker 1: Slacks are not the proper attiring court. It's tough sometimes
• 28:29
  Speaker 1: to be a judge. Poor, poor poor judge. That's so.
• 28:35
  Speaker 1: I mean, that has some stinky subtext, you know, like, hey,
• 28:40
  Speaker 1: sorry for me, guys. And I get I get the
• 28:43
  Speaker 1: idea that in nanny courts in the US and abroad,
• 28:48
  Speaker 1: there is a uh an expected level of of a
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: little bit of formality, right, I mean, sure, you know
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: it's it's courts. Like I've been to court. I dressed
• 28:59
  Speaker 1: up a little miser than I might otherwise because you're
• 29:01
  Speaker 1: a formal setting. But um yeah, I mean this wasn't
• 29:05
  Speaker 1: a casual outfit. And even the detectives, it's not like
• 29:08
  Speaker 1: they were The detectives who were investigating the crime were
• 29:13
  Speaker 1: the ones who brought her forth, so they didn't see
• 29:15
  Speaker 1: there was a problem. But the judge center Off said,
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: quote again, when the young woman returned, then I'll be
• 29:21
  Speaker 1: prepared to test just how far I can go and
• 29:24
  Speaker 1: maintaining the dignity in my courtroom. But who look on
• 29:28
  Speaker 1: on her way out, said and I'll not sacrifice my
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: comfort and freedom to the extent of wearing a dress. Uh.
• 29:35
  Speaker 1: And then the the l A Times goes on to say,
• 29:37
  Speaker 1: Miss Houlak retorted as she clicked out of the Hall
• 29:39
  Speaker 1: of Justice in her blue flannel slacks. Um, so you know,
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: there was a little back and forth between the two
• 29:46
  Speaker 1: of them, and who looks ordered to return, which she does.
• 29:49
  Speaker 1: She returns to court five days later when the rescheduling
• 29:52
  Speaker 1: has happened, And the thing is she is wearing, Ben,
• 29:55
  Speaker 1: can you guess what she's wearing? Uh gonna go out
• 29:58
  Speaker 1: on a crazy limb and say are they slacks? They
• 30:02
  Speaker 1: are slacks? Yes, yeah, who who look returned she's stuck
• 30:05
  Speaker 1: to her guns. And uh, let me just quote a
• 30:08
  Speaker 1: little bit from the Times. So, in a scathing denunciation
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: of slacks, which he prosaically termed pants as courtroom attire
• 30:17
  Speaker 1: for women, Garn yesterday again forbade Helen, who look kindergarten
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: teacher to testify as a witness while dressed in a
• 30:24
  Speaker 1: green and orange leisure attire. And the paper goes on
• 30:28
  Speaker 1: to quote Garen again, the last time you were in
• 30:32
  Speaker 1: this court dressed as you are now and reclining on
• 30:35
  Speaker 1: your neck on the back of your chair, you drew
• 30:37
  Speaker 1: more attention from spectators, prisoners and court attaches than the
• 30:42
  Speaker 1: legal business at hand. You were requested to return and
• 30:45
  Speaker 1: garb acceptable to courtroom procedure. Today you come back dressed
• 30:50
  Speaker 1: in pants and openly defined the court and its duties
• 30:53
  Speaker 1: to conduct judicial proceedings. It's time a decision was reached
• 30:57
  Speaker 1: on this matter and on the power the court has
• 30:59
  Speaker 1: to maintain what it considers orderly conduct. And here's where,
• 31:04
  Speaker 1: here's where we get to the threat. Yeah, so he
• 31:08
  Speaker 1: wraps up and says, the court hereby orders and directs
• 31:12
  Speaker 1: you to return tomorrow in accepted dress. So this is
• 31:15
  Speaker 1: for the third time, the third visit. Garin says, if
• 31:18
  Speaker 1: you insist on wearing slacks again, you will be prevented
• 31:21
  Speaker 1: from testifying because that would hinder the administration of justice,
• 31:26
  Speaker 1: but be prepared to be punished according to law for
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: contempt of court. And this is not an argument that
• 31:32
  Speaker 1: will sound unfamiliar to many of our female listeners. Right.
• 31:35
  Speaker 1: I don't know if you've ever been in a schoolroom
• 31:38
  Speaker 1: or you have any uh nieces especially who get told
• 31:42
  Speaker 1: their attire is too distracting in school. The boys can't
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: concentrate on school, right, they can't do their work because
• 31:50
  Speaker 1: you know, the women and their bodies are too distracting.
• 31:53
  Speaker 1: It puts the onus of regulating men's attention on what
• 31:59
  Speaker 1: women choose to air. Which that's a that's a burden
• 32:02
  Speaker 1: and not one that I think it's fair. But this
• 32:05
  Speaker 1: isn't something new. This isn't something that school kids today
• 32:07
  Speaker 1: are dealing with. It goes back here to the thirties
• 32:09
  Speaker 1: where the judge is saying, you showed up here in
• 32:12
  Speaker 1: your blue flannel slacks, ma'am, and it was too distracting.
• 32:16
  Speaker 1: The prisoners, the court attache, everyone was just looking at you.
• 32:19
  Speaker 1: Instead of thinking about the law, which is entirely absurd. Also,
• 32:26
  Speaker 1: by the way, Hulick is fantastic in interviews, and the
• 32:31
  Speaker 1: author of the l A Times piece is having so
• 32:34
  Speaker 1: much fun writing this too. The you know, sort of
• 32:37
  Speaker 1: vivid language that they're using heavily implies to me that
• 32:41
  Speaker 1: they are also on who looks side from the way
• 32:44
  Speaker 1: they write. And she has this one quote where she says, listen,
• 32:50
  Speaker 1: I've worn slacks since I was fifteen. I don't own
• 32:53
  Speaker 1: address except a formal If he wants me to appear
• 32:56
  Speaker 1: in a formal gown, that's okay with me. I'll come
• 33:00
  Speaker 1: back and slacks. And if he puts me in jail,
• 33:02
  Speaker 1: I hope it will help to free women forever of
• 33:05
  Speaker 1: anti slackis um. I love that. Yeah, anti slackism. Yeah,
• 33:10
  Speaker 1: it's it's on its surface ridiculous, but is entirely the point. Right,
• 33:17
  Speaker 1: And there's one crucial piece that we we should make
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: sure to hit. In all of the cases we've discussed,
• 33:26
  Speaker 1: when these people have been arrested, it was not uncommon
• 33:30
  Speaker 1: for them to be forced to put on her dress
• 33:33
  Speaker 1: in jail or in prison. Right, Yeah, you got to prison,
• 33:38
  Speaker 1: you put on whatever the prison tells you to put
• 33:40
  Speaker 1: on and that's what happened to Hulok. Right, So she
• 33:42
  Speaker 1: showed up the third day after the judge said please
• 33:46
  Speaker 1: come back, and she was again wearing slacks. So yeah,
• 33:49
  Speaker 1: at this point there is a little bit of contrarianism,
• 33:51
  Speaker 1: but it's in who looks defense, uh, not illegal in
• 33:55
  Speaker 1: any way there are Again, this is a situation where
• 33:58
  Speaker 1: there are no laws preventing the wearing the explicit wearing
• 34:01
  Speaker 1: of trousers or slacks. This reveals a lot more about
• 34:05
  Speaker 1: garin where he just feels the propriety of his courtroom
• 34:08
  Speaker 1: has been violated. And so when Huluk is arrested, it's
• 34:11
  Speaker 1: not explicitly for wearing slacks. She is arrested for contempt
• 34:16
  Speaker 1: of court. And let's take a second there, because contempt
• 34:19
  Speaker 1: of court, which is a fairly familiar phrase, I think
• 34:23
  Speaker 1: to anyone, even if you don't have a lot of
• 34:26
  Speaker 1: legal experience, you've heard that phrase being used. Yeah, Casey,
• 34:30
  Speaker 1: you've heard that, right of course. For more Casey, have
• 34:34
  Speaker 1: you ever held someone in contempt on this show? Oh,
• 34:38
  Speaker 1: I'm gonna have to plead the fifth on that one.
• 34:40
  Speaker 1: Would would that be like contempt of producer? Yes? Yeah,
• 34:45
  Speaker 1: I've seen the way he's raised eyebrows through that window.
• 34:47
  Speaker 1: We've gotten close. We've gotten close and sometimes you know, uh,
• 34:50
  Speaker 1: it's a it's a very close working relationship. And I'm
• 34:54
  Speaker 1: not gonna lie, man, there's we've been a logger heads before,
• 34:57
  Speaker 1: you know, we have. We have different opinions, but I
• 35:01
  Speaker 1: like to think at the end of the day, there's
• 35:03
  Speaker 1: some there's some mutual respect. Where am I going with us? No, Casey,
• 35:08
  Speaker 1: like barely? How about Ben? Now you're starting to get
• 35:11
  Speaker 1: to like contempt of sitting co host. Let me let
• 35:15
  Speaker 1: me just say, can I be the one to say?
• 35:17
  Speaker 1: Please Casey on the case? Hey, So, contempt of court
• 35:23
  Speaker 1: in in actual courtroom proceedings is pretty broad. All contempt
• 35:29
  Speaker 1: of court really means is that you have been seen
• 35:33
  Speaker 1: or someone some individual has been seen as being disobedient
• 35:37
  Speaker 1: or somehow disrespectful towards the court and its officers, even
• 35:43
  Speaker 1: as loose as define the authority, or somehow offending the
• 35:48
  Speaker 1: dignity of court. So people can be held in contempt
• 35:53
  Speaker 1: for any number of things, right, speaking out of turn,
• 35:56
  Speaker 1: very loudly, insisting on that being combat out of with
• 36:00
  Speaker 1: the judge, things like that. Right, this contempt charge comes
• 36:05
  Speaker 1: about because, as you said, Christopher, it's not really, it's
• 36:08
  Speaker 1: not against the law for people who wear pants. So
• 36:15
  Speaker 1: the story of Houlik and the trousers in the courtroom
• 36:19
  Speaker 1: almost ends there. She serves her five days in prison,
• 36:24
  Speaker 1: and a couple of months later comes back finally to
• 36:27
  Speaker 1: testify as to what she witnessed in this burglary. Remember
• 36:31
  Speaker 1: that's the original reason she was in court was to
• 36:34
  Speaker 1: help out a fellow citizen. Um she volunteered to come
• 36:38
  Speaker 1: as a witness. Yeah, But at the time when she
• 36:40
  Speaker 1: came back a couple of months later, basically I think
• 36:42
  Speaker 1: she felt her point had been made, and she did
• 36:45
  Speaker 1: arrive in address. So I couldn't find anything in the
• 36:49
  Speaker 1: Times where she was quoted as to this. But maybe
• 36:52
  Speaker 1: I'm speculating here that she she felt, Okay, now I'm
• 36:56
  Speaker 1: I am here in court too, really or of a
• 37:00
  Speaker 1: civic purpose, and perhaps at the moment my anti slacktivist
• 37:06
  Speaker 1: pushback is getting in the way of doing that. I see,
• 37:09
  Speaker 1: I see your point there. It also didn't hurt that
• 37:13
  Speaker 1: hundreds of people wrote to the courthouse protesting the treatment
• 37:18
  Speaker 1: of Helen Hulick, and eventually this led to well, this
• 37:21
  Speaker 1: played a role in the judge's contempt ruling being overturned
• 37:26
  Speaker 1: or is contempt citation? Yeah, so she she did have
• 37:29
  Speaker 1: to serve some time, but you know, an official record
• 37:32
  Speaker 1: expunged and all that. Yeah, yeah, and what what style?
• 37:36
  Speaker 1: I just I love the way Elen hulik Is is
• 37:40
  Speaker 1: talking to reporters this entire time. We've got the Los
• 37:43
  Speaker 1: Angeles Times articles from the time, and in addition to
• 37:47
  Speaker 1: those great quotes which you've been so ably worked your
• 37:50
  Speaker 1: way through, we've also got images of Hulk, so you
• 37:53
  Speaker 1: can judge for yourself how outrageous is this outfit. Will
• 37:57
  Speaker 1: post a link to that on Ridiculous Historians, the Facebook
• 38:01
  Speaker 1: group for for folks who are enjoying the show. You
• 38:05
  Speaker 1: can find lots of other like minded people and um
• 38:08
  Speaker 1: all sorts of ancillary stuff about about these things. But Ben, yes,
• 38:12
  Speaker 1: I've told you two stories. You've told me one that's true.
• 38:16
  Speaker 1: I have one more, and I think you're going to
• 38:19
  Speaker 1: like it. This is the story of Emma snod Grass.
• 38:24
  Speaker 1: So she became when she was only seventeen years old,
• 38:29
  Speaker 1: huge news story throughout the United States because despite being
• 38:33
  Speaker 1: arrested multiple times in Boston for wearing pants, she persisted
• 38:39
  Speaker 1: She continued to do that, and her father was an
• 38:44
  Speaker 1: official with the New York City Police. Each time she
• 38:47
  Speaker 1: was arrested, she would be forced to you know, put
• 38:51
  Speaker 1: on address, and then she would be returned to New
• 38:55
  Speaker 1: York from Boston. Quote properly attired. But then fast forward
• 39:00
  Speaker 1: a few weeks, she's right back. She's taking further wearing
• 39:05
  Speaker 1: a frock coat, glazed cap, striped pantaloons and so on.
• 39:09
  Speaker 1: And uh, someone quoted, I think this was the Boston
• 39:12
  Speaker 1: Harold said, has the appearance of a quite a good
• 39:16
  Speaker 1: looking young man, and the Boston Harold had been reporting
• 39:20
  Speaker 1: on her multiple times. They also said that she would
• 39:24
  Speaker 1: be acting in what they felt was manner most appropriate
• 39:28
  Speaker 1: for young ne'er do wells. They said she quote used
• 39:32
  Speaker 1: to circulate in all the drinking houses, made several violent
• 39:35
  Speaker 1: attempts to talk horse that's some slang we missed, and
• 39:40
  Speaker 1: do other things for which quote unquote fast boys are noted.
• 39:44
  Speaker 1: She had called herself George Green and gotten a job
• 39:48
  Speaker 1: at a clothing store in New York. She was arrested there,
• 39:52
  Speaker 1: and each time she was arrested, they you know, make
• 39:56
  Speaker 1: her take off the clothes she's comfortable with put on
• 39:58
  Speaker 1: a dress and then they send her back to her dad.
• 40:01
  Speaker 1: I think it's because he is in law enforcement that
• 40:05
  Speaker 1: she is not having to deal with some of the
• 40:08
  Speaker 1: same treatment, or the same level of treatment that a
• 40:11
  Speaker 1: lot of other people in her situation had. So Snodgrass though,
• 40:15
  Speaker 1: I mean her story, we're back in the eighteen fifties
• 40:19
  Speaker 1: for this, right. Oh yes, that's absolutely correct. Uh, she
• 40:23
  Speaker 1: was really making headlines in eighteen fifty two or so.
• 40:28
  Speaker 1: I still am. I am curious about what talking horse is.
• 40:33
  Speaker 1: I imagine it's it's a talking smack. I don't know,
• 40:38
  Speaker 1: talking horse. Uh yeah, just maybe maybe um rough talk,
• 40:42
  Speaker 1: boys talk or something like that. I don't know. Well,
• 40:46
  Speaker 1: it's funny. One thing in that that newspaper that you
• 40:50
  Speaker 1: quoted about her appearance. Another thing that they used to
• 40:54
  Speaker 1: describe her. They said, quote, she is a practical woman's
• 40:58
  Speaker 1: rights girl, as though you know, and you know what
• 41:02
  Speaker 1: that means, you know, basically just capital w capital our
• 41:05
  Speaker 1: woman's rights and oh goodness, yea. The fragility of like
• 41:12
  Speaker 1: that patriarchy really exposes itself when you're so threatened by
• 41:17
  Speaker 1: a woman who's choosing to wear pants, but to the
• 41:20
  Speaker 1: point where she's arrested and it's it's tricky. Um. Also
• 41:24
  Speaker 1: the condescension that is just dripping off that phrase and
• 41:29
  Speaker 1: the pearl clutching, you know. It's. Yeah, this story is
• 41:33
  Speaker 1: important because it encounters some other larger problematic things about
• 41:38
  Speaker 1: the US of that time, you know, that remain problematic
• 41:41
  Speaker 1: in the modern day. Uh, you know, the idea of
• 41:44
  Speaker 1: how someone wishes to identify as an individual. Right, going
• 41:49
  Speaker 1: back to Dr Walker's thing, Um, maybe people should do
• 41:52
  Speaker 1: what they want where what they want. You know. She
• 41:54
  Speaker 1: had also been continually sort of rebelling against her father,
• 41:59
  Speaker 1: who was either a captain or assistant captain in New York.
• 42:04
  Speaker 1: When she was released to her father's recognianance, one time,
• 42:09
  Speaker 1: she just high tailed it back to Boston. She was
• 42:12
  Speaker 1: dressed in what were items of traditional women's clothing, and
• 42:16
  Speaker 1: she went to a place called the Washington Coffee House,
• 42:18
  Speaker 1: where she had rented a room. She left the place
• 42:22
  Speaker 1: in women's clothes, according to one report, but returned wearing
• 42:28
  Speaker 1: clothes that would be traditionally associated with dudes. I think
• 42:32
  Speaker 1: every time somebody gave her these you know, ridiculous charges
• 42:36
  Speaker 1: or arrest it sort of inspired her to double down.
• 42:40
  Speaker 1: You know what I mean, Well, I mean what I
• 42:41
  Speaker 1: what I think it's just really fun about Um the
• 42:44
  Speaker 1: Emma Snodgrass story is that, so she's a teenager, right,
• 42:47
  Speaker 1: show me a teenager who's not doing rebellious things in
• 42:50
  Speaker 1: the context of a society or a family. So you
• 42:53
  Speaker 1: can you can look at this story as just sort
• 42:54
  Speaker 1: of the antics of a of a teenaged person, which
• 42:58
  Speaker 1: is often celebrated when it's a young boy or a
• 43:02
  Speaker 1: teenage guy. Right. So we look at people like Huckleberry Finn,
• 43:07
  Speaker 1: for instance, if we're talking similar time frames, who is
• 43:10
  Speaker 1: really celebrated for thumbing his nose at societal rules and
• 43:14
  Speaker 1: doing what he thinks is best and living the life
• 43:17
  Speaker 1: he wants to live in that sort of American folk
• 43:20
  Speaker 1: hero way. But the ability to operate in that mode
• 43:23
  Speaker 1: is often extended only to men, right. And so especially
• 43:27
  Speaker 1: with Emma Snodgrass, some of what we've talked about today
• 43:31
  Speaker 1: dealt primarily with dress and just fashion, but Um Snodgrass
• 43:37
  Speaker 1: and and her case really it veers not only into
• 43:40
  Speaker 1: dress but also action and what's appropriate for one gender,
• 43:45
  Speaker 1: what's the way to behave That's something that I think
• 43:48
  Speaker 1: it illustrates really well that situations like this where we're
• 43:52
  Speaker 1: policing dress and what's appropriate. It runs the gamut, and
• 43:56
  Speaker 1: and there's so so much crossover and so many is
• 43:59
  Speaker 1: some's made on the parts of the authorities about you know,
• 44:05
  Speaker 1: what could be a slippery slope for instance, Yeah, exactly.
• 44:08
  Speaker 1: And this slippery slope fear can so often be trotted
• 44:13
  Speaker 1: out when people don't have a otherwise valid reason for
• 44:19
  Speaker 1: their problem. Okay, this is a terrible example vaguely related.
• 44:24
  Speaker 1: It's it's similar to the situations wherein every year two
• 44:29
  Speaker 1: in the US, there's going to be a usually a politician,
• 44:34
  Speaker 1: one strip or another who says A and B and
• 44:37
  Speaker 1: C is going wrong. Things are really going terribly And
• 44:41
  Speaker 1: part of that is because people are saying happy Holidays
• 44:43
  Speaker 1: instead of Merry Christmas. And it's a slippery slope that
• 44:47
  Speaker 1: will lead us on the road to ruin. You know
• 44:50
  Speaker 1: what I mean, we will we will say happy holidays
• 44:53
  Speaker 1: one week, next week, dogs and cats sleeping together. We're
• 44:57
  Speaker 1: on the path paved with good intentions. St too inferno.
• 45:02
  Speaker 1: And it's weird because that kind of escalation of an argument,
• 45:06
  Speaker 1: at least as it's applied to you know, some of
• 45:08
  Speaker 1: the fragile, masculine patriarchs of the day. Here, it seems
• 45:14
  Speaker 1: silly when we look back with the benefit of retrospect,
• 45:17
  Speaker 1: but we also have to remember as ridiculous as these
• 45:21
  Speaker 1: forces were when they were persecuting these people, they were
• 45:25
  Speaker 1: really messing with, in some cases, ruining these people's lives.
• 45:30
  Speaker 1: You know. Yeah, it's no light thing to go to jail.
• 45:32
  Speaker 1: It's no. Yeah, it's not something a lot of people
• 45:35
  Speaker 1: do for fun, right. Most people, uh, if they want
• 45:38
  Speaker 1: to go somewhere for a weekend, will probably choose like
• 45:41
  Speaker 1: the beach or the mountains. Yeah, And there are plenty
• 45:44
  Speaker 1: of ways we can draw lines from what was going
• 45:47
  Speaker 1: on in the forties, fifties, and sixties, and in the
• 45:50
  Speaker 1: hula case in the thirties, all the way up to
• 45:53
  Speaker 1: today in in other countries and other societies that you know,
• 45:57
  Speaker 1: maybe have more restrictive traditions of what women wear. But
• 46:01
  Speaker 1: even today, people make assumptions based on what they think
• 46:04
  Speaker 1: a person should be wearing, or based on what they're wearing,
• 46:08
  Speaker 1: make assumptions about the kind of person they are or
• 46:11
  Speaker 1: the kind of threat they pose. And the authorities can
• 46:14
  Speaker 1: act in one way, individuals can act in another. It's
• 46:18
  Speaker 1: ridiculous to talk about some of these things as being
• 46:20
  Speaker 1: kind of lighthearted and silly, but they have real ramifications
• 46:23
  Speaker 1: in both a historical and contemporary context. And I'd like
• 46:27
  Speaker 1: to save a little bit of Emma Snodgrass's story for
• 46:32
  Speaker 1: another day, because I think we could make her life
• 46:35
  Speaker 1: story its own episode. What do you say, She's a
• 46:39
  Speaker 1: she's a solid case. There's there's a lot to dig
• 46:41
  Speaker 1: into with with Snodgrass. So that is just the beginning
• 46:45
  Speaker 1: of the snod Grass story. And that is the conclusion
• 46:48
  Speaker 1: of today's episode, but not our show. You can find Casey, Noel, Christopher,
• 46:55
  Speaker 1: some of our other guests and I on this show
• 46:57
  Speaker 1: twice a week until Big Plaid shuts us down. I
• 47:00
  Speaker 1: can't believe you brought that back. Uh. And in the meantime,
• 47:04
  Speaker 1: I like to thank you so much for joining us today,
• 47:07
  Speaker 1: Christopher haciotas dude, thanks for coming back on the show.
• 47:12
  Speaker 1: You know you always you always sound a little bit
• 47:14
  Speaker 1: irritated with us, but you keep returning do I? Oh,
• 47:16
  Speaker 1: I don't mean to. I look, I I just wanted to, somehow,
• 47:21
  Speaker 1: some way get on a podcast and talk about the
• 47:25
  Speaker 1: Museum of the American house Cat, which I did at
• 47:28
  Speaker 1: the beginning of this episode and I'm doing again now.
• 47:31
  Speaker 1: And if I had to go through the uh the
• 47:34
  Speaker 1: rigamar role of learning and really digging into some really
• 47:38
  Speaker 1: cool history and sharing it with you, Ben and the
• 47:41
  Speaker 1: rest of you ridiculous historians. I'm only happy well said,
• 47:45
  Speaker 1: well said, so thank you. Likewise, Christopher, it's always it's
• 47:49
  Speaker 1: always a pleasure. Every time you are on the show
• 47:52
  Speaker 1: and one of us is abroad or traveling, the person
• 47:56
  Speaker 1: who missed out gets just a tinge of envy because,
• 48:00
  Speaker 1: as you know, our partner got to hang out with you,
• 48:03
  Speaker 1: which is it's kind of a big deal between Nolan.
• 48:06
  Speaker 1: I'm just gonna be honest, let's all get together. Then
• 48:09
  Speaker 1: sometimes yeah, let's all get together. Let's get the band
• 48:11
  Speaker 1: back together. So, as Christopher pointed out, we are all
• 48:14
  Speaker 1: over the internet. You can find us some ridiculous historians
• 48:17
  Speaker 1: of Facebook, you can find us on Twitter, you can
• 48:20
  Speaker 1: find us on Instagram. We've often started wrapping up the
• 48:24
  Speaker 1: show with questions, what are some other pioneering people in
• 48:30
  Speaker 1: this in this same kind of thematic sphere, What are
• 48:35
  Speaker 1: something that you know of that you think your fellow
• 48:37
  Speaker 1: listeners would enjoy learning more about, Because again, we can
• 48:41
  Speaker 1: look back in this in and say, regardless of what
• 48:46
  Speaker 1: year it is, there's so many other crazy things wrong
• 48:51
  Speaker 1: with the world. Why would you care that someone decided
• 48:54
  Speaker 1: to wear pants? You know what I mean. But we
• 48:56
  Speaker 1: have to remember these these kinds of battles, their heart won,
• 49:02
  Speaker 1: and they make a difference. They make a tremendous impact
• 49:06
  Speaker 1: on the world in which we live today. Then I
• 49:09
  Speaker 1: totally agree with you. And as we wrap up, as
• 49:11
  Speaker 1: we both stand up, I don't care if you're wearing
• 49:14
  Speaker 1: pants or not. Okay, well you might. You might want
• 49:17
  Speaker 1: to leave before me then, because it was yeah, all right,
• 49:20
  Speaker 1: I'm out of here. We'll see you next time, folks.
• 49:25
  Speaker 1: For more podcasts from My Heart Radio, visit the I
• 49:27
  Speaker 1: Heart Radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you listen to
• 49:30
  Speaker 1: your favorite shows.