Latest / Stuff Mom Never Told You / SMNTY Classics: Mary Seacole

Transcript

SMNTY Classics: Mary Seacole · Stuff Mom Never Told You

• 0:05
  Speaker 1: Hey, this is Annie and Samitha, and welcome to stuff
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: I've never told you protection to I heart radio. So
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: we have another female first classic episode that we want
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: to run in this month of March, the months of
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: women's history. And although again we feel like we're always
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: working in that realm, I was gonna say, if you
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: don't realize we talked about women, women's issues and women
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: around the world, you must be new here and welcome.
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: Welcome if you enjoy it. We got on wide earth
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: of content for YouTube. We cover a lot of topics.
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: I was trying to explain the show to somebody the
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: other day and I was like, wow, we really go
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: all over the place. I mean yeah, when I'm pointing
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: at educational stuff, I'm like, well, you go to here, here,
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: and here if you want to try to put that
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: on your classroom stuff. All right, all right, Oh goodness,
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: that's a task I don't want to undertake right now.
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: But one day I was at the beginning of the
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: pandemic working on playlists of ways that people could like
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: find different playlists like if you're like into this thing
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: or if you're into this thing. Uh, and then I
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: never completed it. I did I did, and for this
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: female first, Eaves brought us the story of Mary Sea Coal,
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: which I as with so many things, she wrought us like,
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: I'm so frustrated. I've never heard the story before. It
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: was definitely a story we should tell more often, that
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: people should learn about at a young age, and it's
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: one because we are in a pandemic and we have
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: been for two years. This story has come up a
• 1:42
  Speaker 1: lot in my mind and a lot of conversation with
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: my friends and especially our friend Marissa has been on
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: the show, who is a nurse, and I'll so we'll
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: just bring her up pretty frequently. And I'm it makes
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: me happy that the story is spreading, but we need,
• 1:54
  Speaker 1: we need to get the word out even more. Yes, yes,
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: so please enjoy this classic episode. Hey, this is Annie
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: and Samantha and welcome to Stephane Never told you Protection
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: of I Heart Radio. And it's time today for another
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: female first, which means we are joined by our good
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: friend and co worker Eves Y. Hey, y'all, Hi, how
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: how are you? We haven't seen you in a while.
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: We're in our virtual studios and you have moved right,
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: I have moved. Um, it's been a wild ride so
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: you know, if I sound any different, that's why I
• 2:41
  Speaker 1: am in a new room. I have a new recording
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: set up here. But um, I'm lucky to have moved.
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: I can't complain that I'm in a place where I
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: can stay and I can sleep, and I have shelter
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: over my head, so all is well in that regard.
• 2:55
  Speaker 1: Of course, there's a lot more going on in the world,
• 2:58
  Speaker 1: and I'm also involved in that world. But the small
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: container of a new home feels pretty nice. I like it.
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: There's sort of a running joke during pandemic times when
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: people are interviewed, um are on these kinds of things,
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: they always have books behind them because it's, you know,
• 3:16
  Speaker 1: showing off that you're smart, or it's just it looks
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: nice and you have books behind you, and so do I.
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: But yours look a much more clean than mind you,
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: for someone who has just moved, and I have been
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: here for several years. In mys like it's gonna topple a.
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: Don't give me too much credit because the only thing
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: you see is the books. And the books are one
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: of the first things that I organized, because it was
• 3:39
  Speaker 1: so easy to just say, Okay, here's a box of books.
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: Put it on the shelf, so like that's in order
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: and it looks nice, but you know that's order a
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: monkey chaos. It's just really satisfying to get your books
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: out and were like putting it all in order how
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: you want to do it, whether it's like aesthetically or alphabetically,
• 4:01
  Speaker 1: and then you're like, oh, look I've got books. Yeah,
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: so I promise you is not about me looking smart smarter?
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: Oh yes, sure, just to put that out there. My
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: ego has nothing to do with the books behind me. Sure. Sure.
• 4:20
  Speaker 1: It is a very nice frame. I used to do
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: a lot of videos, so I appreciate there's books on
• 4:25
  Speaker 1: one side kind of offset. And then you've got your microphone.
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: Thank you. Yeah, I didn't expect a composition compliment, but
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: I'm always always ready with that. You know what, Samantha,
• 4:37
  Speaker 1: you look good too. You gotta blur. She's got the
• 4:39
  Speaker 1: skype blur going. I'm just the blur. I don't. I
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: don't actually want you to see what's behind me, because
• 4:43
  Speaker 1: there's nothing about behind me other than maybe some concerned
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: about like how are you living right now, Samantha? What
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: is wrong with you? So I just blur it all
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: out and all you can see is color. Hopefully I
• 4:53
  Speaker 1: stand out in that brightness that might say something about
• 4:57
  Speaker 1: your how you deal with emotions. Yes, I just want
• 5:01
  Speaker 1: to blow it out. I'm not trying to get to
• 5:05
  Speaker 1: in depth. I was. You're getting pretty deep right now.
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: I know. I know, well it was my job for
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: a while. Um. I know, listeners know I'm very annoying
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: when it comes to like fonts and transitions and movies composition.
• 5:19
  Speaker 1: So I gotta let it out sometimes I feel you
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: like I'm mad at it, um and it kind of.
• 5:27
  Speaker 1: Books is a good segue into the person we're talking
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: about today. Actually, so can you tell us who did
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: you bring? Yes, true books is a good segue. Today
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: we'll be talking about Mary se Cole, who has a
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: very very interesting history and biography. So I brought her
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: to the table today because her autobiography has been considered
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: the first one that was written by a black woman
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: in Britain. But there is a huge asterisk on that.
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: I'll go ahead and say the name of the autobiograph,
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: which is the Wonderful Adventures of Mrs s Cole in
• 6:03
  Speaker 1: many Lands, which is a great like a great title. Um.
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: As a person who's an aspiring adventurer, and like just
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: loves the idea of travel, and there are so much
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: culture and history and just social implications that are wrapped
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: up in travel based on like who had access to
• 6:22
  Speaker 1: actually be able to travel. UM was super interested in,
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: you know, the outward appearance of like who she was. UM.
• 6:32
  Speaker 1: But yeah, like I said, there's a huge asterisk on
• 6:35
  Speaker 1: this one because of the controversy that surrounds the truth
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: of her autobiography and what actually happened in her story. UM.
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: So there's a lot we'll get into in that respect. UM.
• 6:49
  Speaker 1: And I think that ties in well to the thing
• 6:51
  Speaker 1: that we usually say in these conversations, which is the
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: disclaimer around what a first is, what a first means.
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: And in Mary's c case, a lot of people wouldn't
• 7:02
  Speaker 1: even say that it's the first, um, because of her
• 7:06
  Speaker 1: history and her ancestry, you know, depending on what side
• 7:10
  Speaker 1: you talked to in this debate. UM. But yeah, I
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: don't want to get to ahead of myself, but I'll
• 7:16
  Speaker 1: just say that I just think it's a great opportunity
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: to talk about what a first actually means, you know,
• 7:23
  Speaker 1: what it means to have sorts of debates like this
• 7:26
  Speaker 1: when it comes to the historical record and biographies. Yeah,
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: I don't want to go I won't go too too
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: deep into that yet. I think I need to actually
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: get into her story first. I love the title. I
• 7:36
  Speaker 1: think that's the first thing. I was like, Oh my gosh,
• 7:38
  Speaker 1: this sname steam so fantastical. But yeah, An, so you're
• 7:42
  Speaker 1: reading more about it. I was like, Oh, that's a
• 7:44
  Speaker 1: lot of intensity in that. Yeah, I was. I've been
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: reading it on and off the book since you suggested
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: it us, and I love, like, not even the chapter titles,
• 7:57
  Speaker 1: but at least from the source I was reading it.
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: Um had like sub chapter titles of what happens in
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: the book, and they're excellent, and you know, I don't
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: know how much of it's true or not, but every
• 8:09
  Speaker 1: king I was like, this woman did so much right, right,
• 8:14
  Speaker 1: oh man traveled everywhere. Yeah, the chapter titles are like
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: very descriptive of what happened in her travels, um so.
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: And and then there are also a lot of questionable fiction.
• 8:26
  Speaker 1: There's a lot of questionable diction in the way that
• 8:28
  Speaker 1: she refers to people and refers to herself. Um. Yeah.
• 8:31
  Speaker 1: So it's one of those things like well, you know,
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: she gets to tell her own story, So there's the
• 8:36
  Speaker 1: line between she's telling her own story and what actually happened, UM,
• 8:40
  Speaker 1: and the bias that can come in in a person's
• 8:42
  Speaker 1: own story, but also the truth of a person's own
• 8:45
  Speaker 1: story that's coming from their own voice. UM. Yeah. So
• 8:50
  Speaker 1: on that note, I guess I could say that she's been,
• 8:53
  Speaker 1: you know, kind of pit it in the same category
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: as Florence Nightingale. And throughout the book. The debate that
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: you know that has come up in terms of her
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: biography is that she never called herself black. So going
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: back to what I said, she's considered to have written
• 9:09
  Speaker 1: the first autobiography by a black woman, Well, she never
• 9:12
  Speaker 1: called herself black. She called herself creole, and she had
• 9:15
  Speaker 1: a mixed race ancestry. And I'm sure that you read
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: this because you were reading the autobiography Annie. But she
• 9:23
  Speaker 1: says in it in one place, I have good Scotch
• 9:26
  Speaker 1: blood coursing in my veins, and that comes near the
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: beginning of it. So she's very clear about you know,
• 9:31
  Speaker 1: her position on this. From the very beginning. She would
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: describe herself as yellow um as she was fair complexioned
• 9:37
  Speaker 1: and um, she had a white father and a mother
• 9:41
  Speaker 1: who was of mixed race. Ancestry as well, whom she
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: called a creole as well. So um, there were also
• 9:48
  Speaker 1: descriptions in the book of black people that were she
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: specifically like there are parts where she says something like,
• 9:54
  Speaker 1: while the good for nothing black cooks, instead of lending
• 9:57
  Speaker 1: me their a would standby and laugh with all their teeth.
• 10:00
  Speaker 1: I just want to call in here that obviously I'm
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: using these quotes out of context. So if you would
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: like to read the book yourself, of that would be
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: great to do so you can see the lines that
• 10:09
  Speaker 1: come around these, because I can't quote the whole book verbatim. Um,
• 10:13
  Speaker 1: but there are a lot of instances where she others
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: people and it's sort of clear that she's not considering
• 10:20
  Speaker 1: them to be within the same group as her. Um.
• 10:23
  Speaker 1: But there are also instances in the book where she
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: seems to be recognizing racial discrimination that she faced and
• 10:28
  Speaker 1: commenting on that, and commenting on issues like slavery, even
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: though that didn't happen so much. But all of that said,
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: it is just I would love to preface the conversation
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: of the conversations that are around her, of all the
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: myths and the myth making that has been happening, and
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: quote unquote campaigns around what her legacy should look like
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: and what people who are supporters of Florence Nightingale want
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: her legacy to be about. So just that's just a preface.
• 11:09
  Speaker 1: We could actually talk about her life and her autobiography now, yeah, yeah,
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: and that's a great preference. And um, I know we'll
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: get to this probably at the end, but there has
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: been sort of a very recent um campaign, as you say,
• 11:25
  Speaker 1: are just sort of recognizing of Mary s Cole and
• 11:30
  Speaker 1: a lot of conversations around that are happening right now.
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: So yeah, and always there are always conversations about, Okay,
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: what were the missing or identified? Are ones that are
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: legacies that were pushed to the bottom because of a
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: person's race because of Mary seacol situation. Was a black woman,
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: which is a conversation that's going around, Well, was her
• 11:51
  Speaker 1: history suppressed or hidden because she was a black woman
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: working within this imperialist space that was Britain and bringing
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: her history backed up in order to recognize that. And
• 12:04
  Speaker 1: on the other hand, people just crediting her saying that
• 12:08
  Speaker 1: you know, she was three quarters white. I'll just start
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: by saying that she was born in Kingston, Jamaica in
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: eighteen o five, so her mother lived there. Her father
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: was white. He was from Scotland. There's a little bit
• 12:20
  Speaker 1: of discrepancy over what his profession actually or his occupation
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: actually was. He's been said that he was an officer
• 12:26
  Speaker 1: in the British Army, but there are conversations around who
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: he actually was. But he was white um. And then
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: there was her mother, who was, like I said earlier,
• 12:34
  Speaker 1: of mixed rass ancestry um and Mary called her mother
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: Creole like her. She supposedly learned her nursing and all
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: her business skills from her mother, who ran a boarding
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: house in Jamaica which was called Blundell Hall. And so
• 12:50
  Speaker 1: yellow fever was like a common disease in the Caribbean
• 12:53
  Speaker 1: at the time. And her mother probably learned the herbal
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: practices that she practiced with on people, and she used
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: on people from enslaved women, who in turn learned from
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: their ancestors. So there was that passing down of herbal
• 13:07
  Speaker 1: medicinal knowledge um. And she married Secol. Herself considered, like
• 13:13
  Speaker 1: I said earlier, consider herself Creole in British rather than Black.
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: And in her autobiography she didn't talk much about the
• 13:21
  Speaker 1: socio political the whole climate that was happening around her
• 13:24
  Speaker 1: um as she was living and working in Jamaica, like
• 13:27
  Speaker 1: the uprising things that were happening that enslaved people were organizing,
• 13:31
  Speaker 1: or the abolition of the slave trade in slavery which
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: happened in the early eighteen hundreds. But she was aware
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: of the situation with slavery in the US, and the
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: um mentioned the people who were escaping and commending them.
• 13:47
  Speaker 1: So when she was born, and just for us to
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: talk about the climate, at the time she was born,
• 13:51
  Speaker 1: slavery was still in practice in Jamaica, and in fact,
• 13:55
  Speaker 1: enslaved people outnumbered white people greatly. On in Jamaica, there
• 13:59
  Speaker 1: were some free people and then there were creoles on
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: the island as well, people of mixed rights ancestry. And
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: Mary herself was born free, and she had this pride
• 14:09
  Speaker 1: to be a British subject, and she was committed to
• 14:13
  Speaker 1: the idea of empire. She really wanted to go to
• 14:16
  Speaker 1: London when she was a child, and she did end
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: up doing that for the first time somewhere early in
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: her life. And she's pretty she's pretty uh, what is it.
• 14:26
  Speaker 1: Nebulous is the word. She's pretty vague about the details
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: of her early life in her autobiography. She kind of
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: breezes through those points, like I'm trying to remember. What
• 14:36
  Speaker 1: she said in her autobiography was something like, we don't
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: need to mention my age, Like she she kind of
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: didn't want her age to come up when she was
• 14:42
  Speaker 1: talking about when she went to London. Yes, she even
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: says something like, give me a widow, give me that right.
• 14:49
  Speaker 1: Not it was very uh, very yeah it was. She
• 14:55
  Speaker 1: didn't want it to be said, but um, it was
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: in her earlier years when she went to London. She
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: ended up going there for some time and then she left. Um. Oh,
• 15:04
  Speaker 1: but I will mention that there was a part where
• 15:06
  Speaker 1: she says she was teased or made fun of because
• 15:09
  Speaker 1: of her complexion, along with a companion who was there
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: with her, who she said was a little bit darker
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: than her. Specifically, she said, I am only a little brown,
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: a few shades duskier than the brunettes whom you all
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: admire so much. But my companion was very dark and
• 15:25
  Speaker 1: affair if I can apply the term to her subject
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: for their rude wit so um. She talks about that experience. Um.
• 15:35
  Speaker 1: When she went to London a year later, she went
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: back to London, UM. And then she brought back with
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: her a bunch of West Indian spices and homemade jams,
• 15:44
  Speaker 1: and she stayed there for a few years. This time
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: so she spent a lot of her earlier years traveling
• 15:49
  Speaker 1: in the Caribbean and Central America, which, as I said earlier,
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: it means that she had access to be able to
• 15:56
  Speaker 1: travel to all those different places. UM. And she ran
• 16:00
  Speaker 1: and taverns, and she ran boarding houses and along the
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: way and learned about medicine UM. And she leaves out
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: a lot of detail in the autobiography, especially of those
• 16:10
  Speaker 1: first years. She details more of her later years in
• 16:14
  Speaker 1: the autobiography, but there, even with the details that are
• 16:18
  Speaker 1: there are often dubious UM and have been called into
• 16:22
  Speaker 1: question after it was after the autobiography was published. So
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: the detailed chronology of her life and exactly how she
• 16:30
  Speaker 1: made a living at this time and this time and
• 16:32
  Speaker 1: all the business ventors that she was in and what
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: she actually sold, what she actually did UM has been
• 16:37
  Speaker 1: called into question. But in her travel she did sell fugus,
• 16:41
  Speaker 1: and she did help her mother and ran boarding houses
• 16:45
  Speaker 1: and worked with her brother, and there's a lot of
• 16:50
  Speaker 1: business ventus and back and forth, one of things that
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: she sold that she was clearly involved in. So yeah,
• 16:58
  Speaker 1: I was trying to do it timeline before this, and
• 17:02
  Speaker 1: I just got so confused and gave up and essentially
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: came to the conclusion she traveled a lot. Yeah, and
• 17:08
  Speaker 1: did a lot of things. Yeah. Yeah, that's basically like, yeah,
• 17:13
  Speaker 1: I think putting together like first it was this and
• 17:16
  Speaker 1: then she went to this place, and then she went
• 17:19
  Speaker 1: to this place. Is it would be very hard to
• 17:22
  Speaker 1: do based on like because there are a lot of
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: things that she said in her own autobiography, the things
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: that other people said about her, quotes about her from
• 17:31
  Speaker 1: military personnel, and then the historians who have done work
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: on her and um, yeah, but she definitely did travel
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: a lot, and she was in Central America, she was
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: in England, and she she traveled. During her travel, she
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: did tend to people and did sell provisions. So she
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: did also Mary n One Sea Cole in eighteen thirty six.
• 17:56
  Speaker 1: He died not long after. He died in eighteen forty four,
• 17:59
  Speaker 1: and around the same time, like during these years, she
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: had some things happened to her, like her mother also died.
• 18:05
  Speaker 1: Her home and a boarding house caught on fire. Um,
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: and she was able to bring back up the boarding
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: house bundle Hall and was up and running with success
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: within a few years. But here's you know, she's still
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: traveling during this time. So in eighteen fifty she joined
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: her brother in present day Panama, and Panama at the
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: time saw a lot of travelers who were on their
• 18:27
  Speaker 1: way to the California Gold Rush, and she went there
• 18:32
  Speaker 1: at the time. Before leaving, she had She talks about
• 18:35
  Speaker 1: in the book how she had all this clothing and
• 18:38
  Speaker 1: foods made, and all these jams and all the sausages.
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: I feel like I'm making up sausages. I can't remember
• 18:45
  Speaker 1: all the foods, she says she had, but she had
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: a bunch of foods and was preparing things. And Panama,
• 18:50
  Speaker 1: she sold supplies to travelers and she ran a boarding
• 18:53
  Speaker 1: house there where she served as a doctress, and that's
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: what she called herself. She didn't call herself a nurse. Um.
• 19:00
  Speaker 1: So she practiced in herbal medicine and followed in the
• 19:03
  Speaker 1: same path as her mom and actually talks in the book,
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: or says in the book how she admired her mom.
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: I can't remember the specific language that she used, but
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: she looked up to her mom and says that she
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: wanted to follow in her path and that was important
• 19:15
  Speaker 1: to her. Yeah, yeah, I think I when I was
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: putting together her story, and you know, you start with
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: her mom was a respected had this boarding house was respected.
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: I don't know that she would use the word doctress.
• 19:31
  Speaker 1: But in medicine, practice medicine, and she um er Segel
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: kind of followed in those same steps. She did those
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: same things. Yeah, she did. And she got a reputation
• 19:43
  Speaker 1: for helping people, um who got in cholera. She says.
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: In the book, she talks about a few of her
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: medicinal recipes, not too many of them, but she talks
• 19:52
  Speaker 1: about giving them water in which cinnamon had been boiled. Um.
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: She talks about to use mercury and mustard, poultices and plaster.
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: But there's not a whole bunch that's known about the
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: exact recipes that she used for her remedies. UM. And
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: she also treated people who were her in fights. And
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: while she was in Panama, she opened a place called
• 20:11
  Speaker 1: the British Hotel, which actually served as a restaurant. And
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: she also around this time when she was in Central America,
• 20:18
  Speaker 1: ran a woman only hotel and just what I put
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: in here because I found it really interesting. On the
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: other podcast, Dad Your Savior, we just did an episode
• 20:27
  Speaker 1: on cinnamon. It was a classic and mustard, and those
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: both have been used medicinally historically, so I personally found
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: that very interesting. Nice. Yeah, um uh, there's a whole
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: conversation about the the practices and the medicines that she
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: actually used on people and her being discredited because of
• 20:50
  Speaker 1: the practices that she used on people and she didn't
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: have any formal nursing training, um, and things like that
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: that we'll get into later. But um, there are a
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: few more um things that she used that are listed
• 21:03
  Speaker 1: in the book as well, um, that you could look up. Yeah,
• 21:06
  Speaker 1: so it's super interesting. Mustard oil, mustard the essential oil,
• 21:12
  Speaker 1: and the mustard being the thing that's helping and yeah,
• 21:14
  Speaker 1: imagine you you know way more about that than I
• 21:16
  Speaker 1: do anything that you just Yeah, it was. It was
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: really interesting because it's not one of those things. Mustard
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: is not something that comes to the forefront of my mind.
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: And I've been doing a food show for a while
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: and almost everything was used medicinally, um at some point,
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: and mustard as one that was like, huh, because it
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: lasted for a long time. People used mustard medicinally pretty
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: like up into the eight nine hundreds. Yeah, I um,
• 21:44
  Speaker 1: this really is unrelated to the show at all, but
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: I UM, I was looking up mustard essential oil for
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: unrelated reason why it had nothing to do with Mary
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: Sea coal. Um, just because I was trying to figure
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: out I one to make it inhaler that like has
• 22:01
  Speaker 1: properties like what Sabby does for like the signing is clearing,
• 22:06
  Speaker 1: and um figure that like mustard maybe helpful and realizing
• 22:11
  Speaker 1: that it was like toxic in some ways. But anyway,
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: that's like a whole aside um. But yeah, really interesting.
• 22:19
  Speaker 1: Um So yeah, anyway back to the story. I like this,
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: keep talking about all you should look into a Sabby.
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: There was Sabby smoke detector. Things really m with Sabby
• 22:33
  Speaker 1: smoke detector. What is that? Well, I think it's for
• 22:36
  Speaker 1: if if you have trouble hearing, can't hear the Sabby smell, okay,
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: and kind of that feel, Um, we'll wake you up
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: and you know, because you can't hear the alarm, then
• 22:49
  Speaker 1: you'll have that going on. This was Sabby was an
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: episode we did like three years ago, So this is
• 22:54
  Speaker 1: all very rusty dusty in the back of my brain.
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: But you know, maybe further research. But yes, we could
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: go on to the side about horse radish and mustard
• 23:05
  Speaker 1: and the snobby products for a long time. But perhaps
• 23:08
  Speaker 1: let's get back to Mary's Siegel. We have some more
• 23:11
  Speaker 1: of our conversation with Ease, but first we have a
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: quick break for a word from our sponsor, and we're back.
• 23:28
  Speaker 1: Thank you sponsor. So she went back to Jamaica at
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: a point, and then back to Panama, and along the
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: way she continued to treat people and sell goods um
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: but when she learned about Britain's involvement in the Crimean War,
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: which took place from eighteen to eighteen fifty six, she
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: decided to volunteer her services. So, as the story goes,
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: she wanted to be amonga pride and pomp of war.
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: I think she said something like along those lines in
• 23:55
  Speaker 1: her autobiography. But she wanted to volunteer her services and
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: eight people and soldiers and officers in what way that
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: she could during the war. But it's also been said
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: that her motives were more to make money as a
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: businesswoman rather than to aid sick and injured soldiers. So
• 24:13
  Speaker 1: she was what was called a sutler or a person
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: who sold provisions to officers in the military, and so
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: she would sell food and alcohol to officers. And that's,
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: you know, also part of her story and has been
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: debated her true motives for going over and joining the
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: war effort. But as she recounted in her autobiography, she
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: brought letters of reference from British officers in Kingston and
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: people kept turning her down along the way when she
• 24:45
  Speaker 1: was asking to volunteer her services. Um, there was Elizabeth Herbert,
• 24:49
  Speaker 1: who was recruiting nurses on behalf of her husband who
• 24:53
  Speaker 1: was the Secretary at war, who supposedly said that all
• 24:56
  Speaker 1: the nursing positions have been filled. So she went to
• 24:59
  Speaker 1: Turkey any ay and apparently tried to join nurses but
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: was again turned down. And so there are others stories
• 25:08
  Speaker 1: or elements of the story and which she said that
• 25:11
  Speaker 1: she was turned down from a position because they would
• 25:14
  Speaker 1: say the position was filled, and the question was whether
• 25:17
  Speaker 1: it was about her race or not. Um. But in
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: her autobiography there is a part in there where she
• 25:24
  Speaker 1: questions whether her skin color had something to do with
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: why she kept being turned away and said, was it
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: possible that American prejudices against color had some root here.
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: Did these ladies shrink from accepting my aid because my
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: blood float beneath a somewhat duskier skin than There's also
• 25:41
  Speaker 1: the word dusk ear. That's the second time that I've
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: said that in the gloats from her, and it's definitely
• 25:46
  Speaker 1: an interesting choice for darker dusk gear is definitely one
• 25:50
  Speaker 1: of those old, those old things. But um, yeah, that's
• 25:54
  Speaker 1: just an aside. So she she did decide to hit
• 25:58
  Speaker 1: to Balaklava in the Cromere herself, um, and she intended
• 26:02
  Speaker 1: to start the British Hotel. There was these cards or
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: flyers about it, and she wanted it to serve as
• 26:10
  Speaker 1: a mess table and comfortable quarters for sick and convalescent officers.
• 26:15
  Speaker 1: So it's said that because she was funding it with
• 26:18
  Speaker 1: her own money, she could only treat people who could
• 26:21
  Speaker 1: pay her um. But it's also you know, the conversation
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: around that as well as that it was first and
• 26:27
  Speaker 1: foremost a business that really operated as a restaurant in
• 26:30
  Speaker 1: a store for officers who at the top had much
• 26:33
  Speaker 1: more money than soldiers. It could actually pay for all
• 26:37
  Speaker 1: the things that she was offering for purchase. So she did.
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: She did provide supplies and food to officers and also
• 26:45
  Speaker 1: spectators who came to see battles. Yeah, I guess wow,
• 26:52
  Speaker 1: all right, you know before Netflix, Uh interesting, Yeah, it
• 26:58
  Speaker 1: was the thing. And she's been described also as making
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: tea for wounded soldiers and tending to their wounds, and
• 27:07
  Speaker 1: she provided catering for events. So she talks about how
• 27:12
  Speaker 1: during her work she ran into British military personnel whom
• 27:16
  Speaker 1: she had already known from her time in Jamaica, and
• 27:20
  Speaker 1: many people referred to her as mothers sa Cole and
• 27:25
  Speaker 1: viewed her favorably. So when the war ended, she went
• 27:31
  Speaker 1: back to England with little money um, and not in
• 27:35
  Speaker 1: the greatest health. And she talks about how other people
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: returned to England with more money, but she she wasn't
• 27:41
  Speaker 1: set up that way, um, And she had to declare
• 27:44
  Speaker 1: bankruptcy when she went back to England. And there are um,
• 27:49
  Speaker 1: there's information in the press, um a little bit in
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: articles about the bankruptcy proceedings, um, which were possibly because
• 27:57
  Speaker 1: of a venture with a business partner named Thomas Day
• 27:59
  Speaker 1: that went at And this is just one of those
• 28:01
  Speaker 1: things like it's not we're not going to be able
• 28:03
  Speaker 1: to put everything in. But Thomas Day, Um was one
• 28:07
  Speaker 1: of her business partners, was a white man, and a
• 28:11
  Speaker 1: bunch of rumors swirling around this Thomas Day guy, but
• 28:14
  Speaker 1: um them getting to business ventures together that didn't go
• 28:18
  Speaker 1: so hot, him potentially doing things that messed up their
• 28:21
  Speaker 1: business ventures and messed up her money. Um, potentially having
• 28:25
  Speaker 1: a daughter with her. These are all rumors that swirled
• 28:27
  Speaker 1: around Thomas Day. Wow. Yeah, so it's a lot of
• 28:31
  Speaker 1: a lot of stuff like that in in her story.
• 28:34
  Speaker 1: But there were creditors who were looking for Mary c.
• 28:37
  Speaker 1: Cole for payment, and yeah, there are articles about her
• 28:41
  Speaker 1: her going through bankruptcy. But there's also this whole super
• 28:47
  Speaker 1: interesting element of fundraising that happened around Mary se Coal
• 28:51
  Speaker 1: because when work got out of her financial troubles, a
• 28:55
  Speaker 1: fund was set up for her. UM though she apparently
• 28:58
  Speaker 1: didn't get much money out of it, A bunch of
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: fundraisers for her continue to pop up. But this included
• 29:03
  Speaker 1: later in her life. UM, there was a benefit held
• 29:06
  Speaker 1: in her honor that supposedly had tens of thousands of
• 29:09
  Speaker 1: people show up and pay like a certain amount to
• 29:12
  Speaker 1: get in. UM. So there are a bunch of these
• 29:15
  Speaker 1: efforts that happened around raising money for Mary Sea Coal
• 29:21
  Speaker 1: and kind of um, people who are attesting to her
• 29:25
  Speaker 1: reputation and other people who didn't want to donate money
• 29:30
  Speaker 1: to her necessarily. Um, but that was a large part
• 29:34
  Speaker 1: of her her later life, and she was able to
• 29:36
  Speaker 1: make money from some of those fundraising efforts. Yeah. I
• 29:41
  Speaker 1: was reading about those and and um, as you say,
• 29:45
  Speaker 1: a lot of information around this is sort of I
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: don't know how true that is, but one of the
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: things I was reading said there was like a four
• 29:52
  Speaker 1: day fundraiser for her. Yeah, and like thousands attended and
• 29:57
  Speaker 1: thousands of dollars was raised. Wow. Yeah, interesting, Uh huh.
• 30:03
  Speaker 1: There's a lot of um praise that happens in her
• 30:07
  Speaker 1: around other people who were speaking of her as saying
• 30:10
  Speaker 1: she was, you know, the motherly Sea Coal figure. Um,
• 30:13
  Speaker 1: she took care of me. I loved for her to
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: be around, and that's been called into question as well.
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: You know, there was a lot of that around surrounding her,
• 30:23
  Speaker 1: and also on these fundraisers were pretty like they happened
• 30:27
  Speaker 1: from time to time, happened occasionally, but this was around
• 30:31
  Speaker 1: this time too, after she went back when her autobiography
• 30:34
  Speaker 1: was published, which was it was published in eighteen fifty seven, UM,
• 30:38
  Speaker 1: and it was dedicated to Major General Lord Rokeby, who
• 30:42
  Speaker 1: was a commander of the first Vision in Crimea. It
• 30:44
  Speaker 1: also contained an intro by Times correspondent William Howard Russell.
• 30:49
  Speaker 1: He has one of those praising quotes, um, and we'll
• 30:53
  Speaker 1: get to that later, um. But he's also supposedly wrote
• 30:58
  Speaker 1: praising quotes about her as well. And in the book
• 31:01
  Speaker 1: she details her travels and her experiences in the Crimean War.
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: She talks a little bit about the first half of
• 31:08
  Speaker 1: our life, um, but then she spends more time on
• 31:11
  Speaker 1: her years in Panama, even more time on her life
• 31:13
  Speaker 1: and Crimea, and in the end she talks about going
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: back to England. So she did get some recognition and
• 31:19
  Speaker 1: money from the autobiography and it got some good reviews. Yeah.
• 31:24
  Speaker 1: So that's the quick and dirty version of all of
• 31:28
  Speaker 1: the travels that Mary s Cole went through and the
• 31:32
  Speaker 1: things that she said she did when it came to
• 31:33
  Speaker 1: healing people. Um. She spent her later years in Jamaican
• 31:38
  Speaker 1: England UM, and apparently aligned herself with a lot of
• 31:41
  Speaker 1: people in the royal circle and upper circles. And you know,
• 31:47
  Speaker 1: she even was able to get property through her fundraising
• 31:51
  Speaker 1: efforts later in life, and she died in May of
• 31:56
  Speaker 1: UM and she was buried in St Mary's Roman Catholic
• 31:59
  Speaker 1: Cemetery and canceled Green in London. So that's the short
• 32:04
  Speaker 1: of her actual biography. But there then there's all the
• 32:09
  Speaker 1: controversy around what happened the bringing back of her legacy
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: arts talking about her legacy again, how she's kind of
• 32:17
  Speaker 1: re emerged in these times, and her inclusion and curriculums.
• 32:23
  Speaker 1: There are sources and bused that have been made of
• 32:27
  Speaker 1: her showing that she got several medals of including the
• 32:32
  Speaker 1: French Legion of Honor, but she herself never claimed that
• 32:36
  Speaker 1: she want any but there are a lot of sources
• 32:37
  Speaker 1: who that say she got this medal and she got
• 32:40
  Speaker 1: the Cromia medal, and but that none of those have
• 32:44
  Speaker 1: ever been attributed to her, and most likely she did
• 32:47
  Speaker 1: not get those because you know, even the Crowmia metal
• 32:50
  Speaker 1: required her to have served. So that's part of one
• 32:54
  Speaker 1: of those things that there's been debate over and people
• 32:56
  Speaker 1: are trying to correct the misinformation that's going around owned
• 33:00
  Speaker 1: about her. UM. Since her autobiography was published, there have
• 33:04
  Speaker 1: been more editions of it that were published as well,
• 33:07
  Speaker 1: with different introductions. So, as you said Annie earlier, there
• 33:12
  Speaker 1: are a lot more people who have raised her legacy
• 33:15
  Speaker 1: to the forefront, and that has also brought up people
• 33:19
  Speaker 1: who are questioning the use of bringing her legacy to
• 33:23
  Speaker 1: the forefront again and what she actually did. And part
• 33:26
  Speaker 1: of that is because of Florence Nightingale, who wound her
• 33:30
  Speaker 1: way into Mary see Cole's story in some parts. So
• 33:34
  Speaker 1: there stories about how Nightingale didn't approve of the alcohol
• 33:40
  Speaker 1: that she sold to soldiers or officers, um that she
• 33:45
  Speaker 1: wasn't supposed to do that that it was improper, and
• 33:48
  Speaker 1: her being turned down by nighting Gale because she was black.
• 33:53
  Speaker 1: There have been other instances um specifically one where the
• 33:58
  Speaker 1: BBC and a show or in a program called Horrible
• 34:01
  Speaker 1: Histories portrayed see Cool in a certain way and portray
• 34:05
  Speaker 1: Nightingale in a way where it made her look racist.
• 34:07
  Speaker 1: She pushed Sea Cool out of the way because and
• 34:10
  Speaker 1: she was just as a nurse. There's a bunch of
• 34:11
  Speaker 1: controversy over the portrayals of nighting Gale in relation to
• 34:17
  Speaker 1: See Coal that put Nightingale in an unfavorable light essentially,
• 34:21
  Speaker 1: So there all the critics of Sea Cool and the
• 34:25
  Speaker 1: Supporters of Nightingale have said that Secol's role in the
• 34:29
  Speaker 1: Crimean War has been really overhyped. So they have claimed
• 34:33
  Speaker 1: that like her treatments weren't as effective as they've been portrayed.
• 34:37
  Speaker 1: She didn't really actually save a bunch of lives, but
• 34:39
  Speaker 1: that her care was comforting to people who were sick
• 34:42
  Speaker 1: and or who were hurt. But her actual use and
• 34:48
  Speaker 1: benefit or if you want to put in those terms
• 34:50
  Speaker 1: of production, but you know, her actual what she did
• 34:53
  Speaker 1: for people was hyped up to discredit Florence Nightingale, who
• 34:57
  Speaker 1: doesn't look the best in Seacole's biographies. And it's been
• 35:00
  Speaker 1: said that some of that misinformation has been circulated so
• 35:03
  Speaker 1: that she can replace Nightingale as quote, the founder of
• 35:07
  Speaker 1: modern profession of nursing, So she wasn't there. They also
• 35:10
  Speaker 1: say that se Coel wasn't a nurse. Um though places
• 35:13
  Speaker 1: like the BBC, as I was talking about earlier in
• 35:16
  Speaker 1: that program Horrible History, has a portrayed her as such. Um.
• 35:20
  Speaker 1: So some of those people even went to the BBC
• 35:22
  Speaker 1: and said, hey, look, this portrayal of Sequel isn't correct,
• 35:27
  Speaker 1: like you need to fix it and makes Nightingale look bad.
• 35:30
  Speaker 1: Um and The BBC fought that complaint for a while
• 35:34
  Speaker 1: but said that ultimately said that the portrayal of Nightingale
• 35:37
  Speaker 1: was inaccurate. But there have been people who have been
• 35:41
  Speaker 1: very vocal about what they say is the myth making
• 35:44
  Speaker 1: around se col So. Specifically, there was a professor in
• 35:48
  Speaker 1: a former MP in Canada. Her name was Lin McDonald um.
• 35:52
  Speaker 1: So she's been super vocal about it um and she
• 35:56
  Speaker 1: was involved and I think co founded the Nightingale Society.
• 35:59
  Speaker 1: She has a bunch of videos on the issue, and
• 36:02
  Speaker 1: she's one of the people who really puts forward the
• 36:04
  Speaker 1: idea that yes, se Cole was really kind and generous,
• 36:10
  Speaker 1: but she didn't save a bunch of lives, you know,
• 36:13
  Speaker 1: she did things like Tanta sports injuries. She said that
• 36:16
  Speaker 1: she wasn't actually a battlefield nurse as some people make
• 36:18
  Speaker 1: her seem um and doesn't deserve to be treated as
• 36:23
  Speaker 1: a pioneer in nursing um. So they kind of what
• 36:26
  Speaker 1: they do is portray her as an opportunistic businesswoman, basically
• 36:30
  Speaker 1: as a sutler character instead of the nurse character who
• 36:35
  Speaker 1: has when we're looking at if we're going to look
• 36:38
  Speaker 1: at her legacy in terms of that kind of characterization, Um,
• 36:42
  Speaker 1: but who happened to be good at comforting military personnel
• 36:45
  Speaker 1: who needed it, So she was They say, yes, she
• 36:49
  Speaker 1: could have been this mother see cool figure who did
• 36:52
  Speaker 1: help treat people, but kind of downplay the importance and
• 36:56
  Speaker 1: the actual impact of the work that she did. Um
• 37:00
  Speaker 1: and say, well, you can't discredit Florence Nightingale's legacy and
• 37:07
  Speaker 1: history two make Sea cool look better in any way.
• 37:12
  Speaker 1: That's kind of the angle that that they come from.
• 37:15
  Speaker 1: So yeah, that's the whole, the whole part of the
• 37:19
  Speaker 1: way that people look back at, um Sea calls legacy. Yeah,
• 37:24
  Speaker 1: I find that I find that fascinating. You've probably run
• 37:28
  Speaker 1: into this more than I have eves, since you're more
• 37:30
  Speaker 1: into like history world than I am. But um, just
• 37:35
  Speaker 1: how many times in history we've hitted female historical figures
• 37:40
  Speaker 1: against each other instead of kind of just looking at
• 37:44
  Speaker 1: this story and this story, what did this person do?
• 37:47
  Speaker 1: What did this person do? Instead it's like, well, who
• 37:51
  Speaker 1: is the mother of modern nursing or whatever it is,
• 37:54
  Speaker 1: which you should definitely examine those relationships. But I just
• 38:00
  Speaker 1: find it, um sort of telling that that happens a
• 38:05
  Speaker 1: lot with um women in history, right, Yeah, and hasn't
• 38:12
  Speaker 1: stopped today. You know, that's still that thing that happens
• 38:15
  Speaker 1: in for instance, like the rap industry, are different artistry
• 38:19
  Speaker 1: industries where women are pitted against each other, um, and
• 38:24
  Speaker 1: in this case, um, the whole. Yeah, it's kind of
• 38:28
  Speaker 1: like a Florence Nightingale versus Mary c cold beef that
• 38:33
  Speaker 1: we're we're putting on them from the future, not that
• 38:38
  Speaker 1: not necessarily happened while they were both alive, but yeah,
• 38:43
  Speaker 1: it's the It's definitely something that there's a thread of
• 38:47
  Speaker 1: when you're looking looking back at history and how women
• 38:49
  Speaker 1: were pitted against each other. Yeah, and I do think
• 38:53
  Speaker 1: like as we as we always say about first and like, um,
• 38:58
  Speaker 1: how how many first were raised and all of the
• 39:00
  Speaker 1: stuff that happened to lead up to it first and
• 39:03
  Speaker 1: the erasure of um, women of color and black women
• 39:07
  Speaker 1: specifically when it comes to white women, Like, I think
• 39:09
  Speaker 1: that's totally a conversation worth having always. It's just funny
• 39:13
  Speaker 1: to me that it becomes like you can't take this
• 39:18
  Speaker 1: away from Florence starting Gale, right, it doesn't have a
• 39:22
  Speaker 1: bigger conversation and that it not only does it talk
• 39:25
  Speaker 1: about the erasure of what when another did, which is like,
• 39:29
  Speaker 1: why can't we just celebrate that both they did something
• 39:32
  Speaker 1: and it approved and it was something to be credited for.
• 39:35
  Speaker 1: But on top of that, like that conversation that we
• 39:37
  Speaker 1: continue to have his but why is there such limited
• 39:39
  Speaker 1: space that we have to have an argument about who's
• 39:42
  Speaker 1: worth talking about instead of actually just bringing in the
• 39:45
  Speaker 1: holes like this is an amazing thing. Let's celebrate all
• 39:47
  Speaker 1: of this. There's enough space for everyone. Why not, right?
• 39:51
  Speaker 1: I think that's a really great point. You bring up Samantha,
• 39:53
  Speaker 1: just because in thinking about the arguments that people have
• 39:57
  Speaker 1: against there are people. These people are you know, her her,
• 40:01
  Speaker 1: We should they shouldn't necessarily include her incurriculum, is what
• 40:05
  Speaker 1: I was trying to say earlier when I'm gonna get
• 40:07
  Speaker 1: the work right. But um, that they shouldn't necessarily include
• 40:10
  Speaker 1: her in curriculum. And there was this fight over whether
• 40:12
  Speaker 1: she should be taken out of curriculum because of the
• 40:15
  Speaker 1: way that the supposed misinformation that has been going around
• 40:19
  Speaker 1: about her. But I think it's a great point because
• 40:22
  Speaker 1: the points like, oh, well, she didn't necessarily save a
• 40:25
  Speaker 1: bunch of lives. She just made people feel better. It's like,
• 40:29
  Speaker 1: and there's nothing wrong with that. Both and can be okay,
• 40:33
  Speaker 1: both and are valuable, and it kind of devalues it
• 40:38
  Speaker 1: makes the work that people do when it comes to healing,
• 40:42
  Speaker 1: when it comes to treating people. Um, it devalues some
• 40:45
  Speaker 1: work over the next um and in this specific case,
• 40:49
  Speaker 1: values the work of a white woman over UM, a
• 40:54
  Speaker 1: woman with black ancestry. UM. And I think that, Um,
• 41:00
  Speaker 1: it's just so many layers to the conversation around Mary
• 41:04
  Speaker 1: see Cole, because there's the element of race itself with
• 41:08
  Speaker 1: and I didn't even get to the other side of people.
• 41:11
  Speaker 1: So I'll get I'll get to that right now before
• 41:14
  Speaker 1: I even dig deeper into that side, so I can
• 41:17
  Speaker 1: explain that and make it clear because there was is
• 41:20
  Speaker 1: another side. These people who I was mentioning earlier, who
• 41:23
  Speaker 1: are critics of the way that her legacy is being proposed.
• 41:26
  Speaker 1: A lot of those people are protectors of Florence Nightingale's legacy,
• 41:30
  Speaker 1: which should be said for sure, UM. But there are
• 41:32
  Speaker 1: the people on the other hand who have said that
• 41:36
  Speaker 1: her history has been erased and overshadowed by Nightingales. UM.
• 41:41
  Speaker 1: But then there are people who aren't even talking about Nightingale.
• 41:44
  Speaker 1: They're just like, well, Secal's legacy deserves to be talked
• 41:48
  Speaker 1: about right now. Um. And there are people who do
• 41:52
  Speaker 1: view her as a black woman and say that her
• 41:55
  Speaker 1: accomplishments should be viewed in that light, and they reject
• 41:59
  Speaker 1: the view that at Nightingale supporters put forth, saying that
• 42:03
  Speaker 1: that downplays and discredits people who used herbal remedies to
• 42:08
  Speaker 1: help people and other traditional practices in healing, and that
• 42:12
  Speaker 1: she did really have success in medicine and in minor
• 42:16
  Speaker 1: surgery um. And that all the moves to remove her
• 42:21
  Speaker 1: from curriculum and to strip away her blackness and claims
• 42:25
  Speaker 1: that her accomplishments are exaggerated are just kind of strategies
• 42:29
  Speaker 1: to remove her contributions from Britain and that historical record
• 42:34
  Speaker 1: and discredit all the things that she actually did do.
• 42:38
  Speaker 1: So you know, they're calling into question her critics are
• 42:42
  Speaker 1: calling into question that anything she did ever was important,
• 42:47
  Speaker 1: even if they say, oh, yeah, this happened. She definitely
• 42:49
  Speaker 1: helped people, But does it really matter? Do we really
• 42:52
  Speaker 1: need to talk about it? Um? And so there are
• 42:56
  Speaker 1: the issues of well, there's her race, um, questions over
• 43:01
  Speaker 1: percentages over her race, of that she was three quarters
• 43:04
  Speaker 1: wide and only one quote unquote quadroon, and that she
• 43:08
  Speaker 1: really was very fair skinned um and did have privilege.
• 43:13
  Speaker 1: And then there's the issue of her not calling herself
• 43:18
  Speaker 1: black at all. And then there's the issue well, you know,
• 43:22
  Speaker 1: we still need to recognize the things that she actually
• 43:25
  Speaker 1: did when it came to treating people. Um And even
• 43:29
  Speaker 1: if it wasn't to the extent of saving thousands of lives,
• 43:35
  Speaker 1: did she actually leave an impact on the people that
• 43:40
  Speaker 1: were involved or that she treated um. So yeah, I
• 43:44
  Speaker 1: think it's just so many layers to it, um, which
• 43:47
  Speaker 1: makes her history just so complicated and as very tangible
• 43:55
  Speaker 1: and real example of that, there is a statue of
• 43:57
  Speaker 1: her at St. Thomas's Hospital and len did which is
• 44:01
  Speaker 1: affiliated with Nightingale, which Nightingale's folks took as kind of
• 44:04
  Speaker 1: a fight to them, they're like, why Sea Coel here?
• 44:08
  Speaker 1: She didn't do anything? And on it there's a quote
• 44:11
  Speaker 1: that's attributed to the Times correspondent who I spoke of earlier,
• 44:15
  Speaker 1: William Howard Russell, and the quote was, I trust that
• 44:19
  Speaker 1: England will not forget one who nursed her sick, who
• 44:22
  Speaker 1: sought out her wounded to aid and sucker them, and
• 44:24
  Speaker 1: who performed the last offices for some of her illustrious dead.
• 44:29
  Speaker 1: So that's one of those praising quotes that comes from
• 44:31
  Speaker 1: someone else and speaking about Sea coal Um and that's
• 44:34
  Speaker 1: on the statue, and there was a whole debate over
• 44:39
  Speaker 1: why that statue should be there, whether it should be there,
• 44:42
  Speaker 1: and that Sea Coel shouldn't be honored in that way
• 44:44
  Speaker 1: at the hospital because of Nightingale's legacy that's wrapped up
• 44:48
  Speaker 1: in the hospital. That sounds like a narrowed version of
• 44:51
  Speaker 1: all lives matter. I mean, I know that's good kind
• 44:53
  Speaker 1: of a generalization, but just like why are you? It's
• 44:56
  Speaker 1: not one against another. It's that we're focusing on something
• 44:59
  Speaker 1: that as significant at a time, whatever it may be,
• 45:03
  Speaker 1: and that we gave credit to that not a lot
• 45:05
  Speaker 1: of people know about and that should be celebrated and
• 45:08
  Speaker 1: it's worth celebrating. It's not like a slight to anyone else.
• 45:12
  Speaker 1: Is not to slap you in the face, to be
• 45:13
  Speaker 1: like ha ha, see, we're not about you. And it's
• 45:16
  Speaker 1: such a like a weird like conversation, especially because Mary
• 45:20
  Speaker 1: Seckel maybe she wasn't as medically um knowledgeable as Nightingale.
• 45:25
  Speaker 1: I don't know, but what I hear as a social worker,
• 45:28
  Speaker 1: I'm like what we have discovered as of late, and
• 45:30
  Speaker 1: I'm not know, I'm just stretching, is that if mental
• 45:33
  Speaker 1: health is not taken care of, that physical health may
• 45:36
  Speaker 1: not be taken care of either as much medical procedures
• 45:38
  Speaker 1: that can happen. And it sounds like Mary Seckel did
• 45:41
  Speaker 1: kind of all of that, Like not only did she
• 45:44
  Speaker 1: try to bring the medical aspect, but she also gave
• 45:46
  Speaker 1: the mental health, loving nurturing aspect as well. That was
• 45:49
  Speaker 1: a little bit more unheard of at that time of crisis,
• 45:54
  Speaker 1: you know. And I'm like, why can't we credit her
• 45:55
  Speaker 1: for that? Right? And oh, I love that point because
• 45:59
  Speaker 1: it's something that people wouldn't necessarily have had the language
• 46:02
  Speaker 1: for at the time, Like she wouldn't have been saying
• 46:05
  Speaker 1: mental health and quotes, but she would have been performing that.
• 46:09
  Speaker 1: Here's the line she says, I do not think that
• 46:12
  Speaker 1: we hot blooded creoles sorrow less for showing it so impetuously.
• 46:17
  Speaker 1: But I do think that the sharp edge of our
• 46:19
  Speaker 1: grief wears down sooner than their's, who preserve an outward
• 46:23
  Speaker 1: demeanor of calmness and nurse their woes secretly in their hearts.
• 46:27
  Speaker 1: And I'm like, oh my gosh, you're talking about black anger.
• 46:30
  Speaker 1: You're talking about perceptions of black anger. And notwithstanding all
• 46:34
  Speaker 1: of the black women's anger, specifically UM and pain and
• 46:40
  Speaker 1: black women's pain and the way that we show it,
• 46:42
  Speaker 1: in the way that it's perceived and the way that
• 46:43
  Speaker 1: it's treated. And I'm like, well, I need to read
• 46:46
  Speaker 1: that line like so many more times, because there's a
• 46:49
  Speaker 1: lot that can be called into question in the way
• 46:51
  Speaker 1: that she spoke about other people and looked at other
• 46:54
  Speaker 1: people and viewed them as not part of the group
• 46:57
  Speaker 1: that she was part of. UM. But I totally agree
• 47:02
  Speaker 1: with what you're saying, Samantha, where it's like in an
• 47:04
  Speaker 1: explicit and not so explicit went At the same time,
• 47:06
  Speaker 1: the people who are criticizing the work that she did do,
• 47:10
  Speaker 1: they're recognizing the fact that they that she did address
• 47:13
  Speaker 1: mental health and she did make people feel better and
• 47:16
  Speaker 1: she did help people, but saying that that's not worthy
• 47:20
  Speaker 1: of our praise and our recognition. So I think that
• 47:24
  Speaker 1: in a way devalues. I mean, there's a lot that
• 47:28
  Speaker 1: can be said about, you know, the criticism itself, but
• 47:31
  Speaker 1: the fact that they acknowledge that she did work and
• 47:34
  Speaker 1: devaluate at the same time, I think take some credibility
• 47:37
  Speaker 1: away from anything that may actually be credible that they're
• 47:41
  Speaker 1: calling into question. Agreed, Yeah, agreed as well. We concur
• 47:51
  Speaker 1: we do have a little bit more for your listeners,
• 47:52
  Speaker 1: but first we have one more cup break for worksimoor sponsor,
• 48:09
  Speaker 1: and we're back, Thank you, sponsor. I just think, um,
• 48:12
  Speaker 1: we were talking about Lucy Parsons, but Mary se Coel
• 48:15
  Speaker 1: just kind of brings up a lot of issues that
• 48:17
  Speaker 1: are happening today and in different aspect and different time frame,
• 48:21
  Speaker 1: and it's just weary some I guess, but at the
• 48:24
  Speaker 1: same time like validating, like, yeah, this has been a thing,
• 48:28
  Speaker 1: and this has been a conversation and it's just in
• 48:30
  Speaker 1: a different narrative. And this is why it's so important
• 48:32
  Speaker 1: that we do look at the history of what has
• 48:34
  Speaker 1: happened and what is happening then what is happening now
• 48:37
  Speaker 1: in that same level of her, whether practices and medicine,
• 48:41
  Speaker 1: whether it's being acknowledged. And I read the information that
• 48:44
  Speaker 1: she was talking about the fact that Americans were more
• 48:47
  Speaker 1: um racists towards her or prejudice towards her, and she
• 48:50
  Speaker 1: noted that it was Americans, which is really sad um
• 48:54
  Speaker 1: in every way because it seems like it really hasn't changed.
• 48:59
  Speaker 1: Maybe I'm just who caught up in everything that's bad here. Yes, yeah,
• 49:05
  Speaker 1: there was a part two I think where if I'm
• 49:08
  Speaker 1: remembering correctly, I think where she said something along the
• 49:11
  Speaker 1: lines of could it be that here in London, when
• 49:13
  Speaker 1: she was in London, they have the same prejudices that
• 49:16
  Speaker 1: they have in America. Um. Yeah, so yes, Uh it's
• 49:22
  Speaker 1: funny because I mean there's obviously the conversation about racism
• 49:27
  Speaker 1: that's explicit and racism that's veiled, and um, all of
• 49:30
  Speaker 1: those conversations and uh um yeah, I think that goes
• 49:36
  Speaker 1: deep because you know, she presented she was very fair skinned,
• 49:40
  Speaker 1: so she presented in one way and also says that
• 49:43
  Speaker 1: she had experiences of being treated as a black woman.
• 49:47
  Speaker 1: So yeah, yeah, there's a lot of unpack it is.
• 49:53
  Speaker 1: It's very um complex and nuanced conversation happening around her
• 49:59
  Speaker 1: and the and the book. We'll say, from what I've read,
• 50:02
  Speaker 1: is enjoyable and it didn't make me think a lot.
• 50:04
  Speaker 1: And also if anyone, if I you're like on the
• 50:07
  Speaker 1: fence about reading it, one of the chapter like subtitles
• 50:12
  Speaker 1: is I am taken for a spy and they're at
• 50:14
  Speaker 1: lose my temper, So come on, come on, it's time yeah, yeah,
• 50:23
  Speaker 1: and I feel like as a society we definitely like
• 50:25
  Speaker 1: to we don't like complexity and nuance a lot of times,
• 50:29
  Speaker 1: we just like the bite size headline thing. So I'm
• 50:31
  Speaker 1: glad we're having this conversation now. I think it's really important. Agreed. Well,
• 50:38
  Speaker 1: thank you so much as always, Eves. Such a pleasure,
• 50:43
  Speaker 1: Always learned so much, Always love seeing you and hearing
• 50:45
  Speaker 1: you you too. Where can the good listeners find you?
• 50:52
  Speaker 1: You can find me on social media. Um. You can
• 50:55
  Speaker 1: also hear me on This Day in History Class, a
• 50:57
  Speaker 1: podcast about history. Um. But yeah, you can find me
• 50:59
  Speaker 1: on social media. I'm at Eve's Jeff Coke. You can
• 51:03
  Speaker 1: also look up This Day in History Classes socials. They're
• 51:07
  Speaker 1: all T D I h C podcast and yeah, that's
• 51:13
  Speaker 1: about it. Yeah, and definitely go check all those things
• 51:17
  Speaker 1: out if you haven't already. And if you'd like to
• 51:20
  Speaker 1: contact us, you can. Our email is Stuff Media, mom
• 51:24
  Speaker 1: Stuff that I Heart media dot com. You can find
• 51:26
  Speaker 1: us on Twitter at mom Stuff podcast or on Instagram
• 51:28
  Speaker 1: at Stuff I've Never Told You. Thanks as always to
• 51:30
  Speaker 1: our super producer Andrew Howard. Thanks again to you, Eves,
• 51:36
  Speaker 1: and thanks to everyone for listening Stuff I've Never Told
• 51:39
  Speaker 1: you the production of I Heart Radio from more podcasts
• 51:41
  Speaker 1: from my heart Radio is the hear radio app, Apple podcast,
• 51:44
  Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.