The Secret Agent
Did That Really Happen?
This week we're traveling back to 1970s Brazil with The Secret Agent! Join us as we learn about deaths at Carnival, the legend of the Hairy Leg, indigenous servants, and more! Sources: Da-Silva, Elidiomar. (2025). A PERNA CABELUDA, DE RECIFE, PERNAMBUCO: POSSÍVEIS DIÁLOGOS COM A ZOOLOGIA CULTURAL - Barbante - Revista Literária (ISSN 2338-1414) (Da-Silva, Elidiomar. 2025). 13. 20-27. 10.5281/zenodo.17655754. Diario de Pernambuco, Issue from 10 December 1975: https://memoria.bn.gov.br/docreader/DocReader.aspx?bib=029033_15&pagfis=78246 Diario de Pernambuco, Issue from 11 December...
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The Ghost Bride
Did That Really Happen?
We don't have a new episode this week, so we're cracking open the Patreon vault and releasing one of our bonus episodes on The Ghost Bride! Join us on our journey to 1890s Malacca, and learn about the ghost bride custom, clothing, currency, and more! Sources: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-37103447 https://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-04-07/ghost-marriages-in-rural-china-continue-to-thrive/9608624 Wenzhang Zhou and Yang Feng, "When Religious Folk Practice Meets Karl Marx: Courts' Response to Ghost Marriage in Modern China," Religions, 14 (2023) Myron L. Cohen, "Souls and Salvation:...
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Good Night, and Good Luck
Did That Really Happen?
**Note: Due to technical difficulties, there were issues affecting Jamie's audio quality this week. We apologize and promise it will be fixed on our next episode.** This week we're traveling back to 1950s America with Good Night, and Good Luck! Join us as we learn about Red Scare-Era figurse like Annie Lee Moss, Joe and Shirley Wershba, Milo Radulovich, Don Hollenbeck, and more! Sources: Loren Ghiglione, Why Don Hollenbeck Fascinated Me Enough to Write His Biography. History News Network. Available at https://www.historynewsnetwork.org/article/why-don-hollenbeck-fascinated-me-enough-to-write-h...
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Blue Moon
Did That Really Happen?
This week we're traveling back to 1940s New York with Blue Moon! Join us as we learn about the relationship between Rogers and Hart, air raid blackouts, EB White, going on the wagon, and more! Sources: https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=%22off+the+wagon%22&year_start=1800&year_end=2022&corpus=en&smoothing=3 https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=%22on+the+wagon%22&year_start=1800&year_end=2022&corpus=en&smoothing=3 Jellinek, Elvin Morton. Phases in the Drinking History of Alcoholics: Analysis of a Survey Conducted by the Grapevine, Official...
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Train Dreams
Did That Really Happen?
This week we're covering the history of the Pacific Northwest from the late 19th century to 1968 with Train Dreams! Join us as we learn about boot memorials, Chinese and Chinese-American railroad workers, women working as fire lookouts, and more! Sources: Dina Gachman, "The History of Lady Lookouts," Smithsonian Magazine, available at https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/female-fire-lookouts-have-been-saving-wilderness-over-century-180977352/ Photo of Hallie Daggett and Her Dog, Fish and Wildlife: https://www.fws.gov/media/hallie-daggett ...
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Hedda
Did That Really Happen?
This week we're traveling back to the 1950s with Hedda! Join us as we learn about pretty little things, 1950s fashion, sparklers, women working as professors, and more! Sources: "Celebrating the Legacy of England's First Female Professor," King's College, available at https://www.kcl.ac.uk/celebrating-legacy-of-englands-first-female-professor "Gender Breakdown for Teachers in History," Making History, available at https://archives.history.ac.uk/makinghistory/resources/statistics/gender.html Peter West, "Five Lessons on Bringing Truth Back to Politics from Britain's First Female Philosophy...
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The Book of Clarence
Did That Really Happen?
This week we're traveling back to first-century Jerusalem with The Book of Clarence! Join us as we learn about Mary Magdalene, Barabbas, Biblical sick burns, and more! Sources: Martínez-Cruz, B., Mendizabal, I., Harmant, C. et al. Origins, admixture and founder lineages in European Roma. Eur J Hum Genet 24, 937–943 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1038/ejhg.2015.201 Gresham D, Morar B, Underhill PA, Passarino G, Lin AA, Wise C, Angelicheva D, Calafell F, Oefner PJ, Shen P, Tournev I, de Pablo R, Kuĉinskas V, Perez-Lezaun A, Marushiakova E, Popov V, Kalaydjieva L. Origins and divergence of the...
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Akira
Did That Really Happen?
It's a new year, so it's time for our New Year's tradition of taking a look at movies that tried to predict the future. This year, we're traveling to the year 2019 with Akira! Join us as we learn about the Tokyo Olympics, biker gangs, technical schools, riots, and more! Sources: 2020 Host City Election Announcement: https://www.olympics.com/ioc/2020-host-city-election Image of the Stadium: https://www.insidethegames.biz/articles/1087204/olympic-stadium-for-tokyo-2020-completed' January 2019 image, Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Kokuritsu_Kasumigaoka_Rikujo_Kyogijo-23a.jpg...
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Frankenstein (2025)
Did That Really Happen?
This week we're traveling back to the 19th century with Guillermo del Toro's Frankenstein! Join us as we learn about syphilis, big-ass blunderbusses, the Evelyn Tables, Arctic expeditions, and more! Sources: An account of divers schemes of arteries and veins, dissected from adult human bodies, and given to the repository of the Royal Society by John Evelyn, Esq; F. R. S. To which are subjoyn'd a description of the extremities of those vessels, and the manner the blood is seen, by the microscope, to pass from the arteries to the veins in quadrupeds when living: with some chirurgical...
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The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman
Did That Really Happen?
This week we're traveling back to a full century of American history with The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman! Join us as we learn about naming of enslaved people, "paddy rollers", Black communities in East Texas, and more! Sources: Sparks, Elmer E, and Celia Black. Interview with Celia Black, Tyler, Texas. Tyler, Texas, November , 10, 1974. Pdf. https://www.loc.gov/item/afc1975009_afs17476/. Sparks, Elmer E, and Charlie Smith. Interview with Charlie Smith, Bartow, Florida. Bartow, Florida, None , 3, 1975. Pdf. https://www.loc.gov/item/afc1975023_afs17510/. Jennifer Davis, "A Voice from the...
info_outlineThis week we're going back to 18th century France with Marie Antoinette! Join us as we learn about Marie' and Louis' not great sex life, giving birth in public, Marie's journey to France, scandalous pamphlets, and more!
Sources:
Cara Mia DiMassa, "That Austrian Woman," Los Angeles Times (2001). https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2001-oct-21-bk-59630-story.html
Antonia Fraser, Marie Antoinette: The Journey (audiobook)
John Hardman, Marie-Antoinette: The Making of a French Queen (Yale University Press, 2019) https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctvnwbx1c
Charlotte Hodgman, "16 things you (probably) didn't know about the rituals behind royal births, from the medieval era to the present day," History Extra, available at https://www.historyextra.com/period/medieval/royal-births-rituals-queens-lying-in-audiences-holy-girdle/
Antonia Fraser, Marie Antoinette: The Journey. First Anchor Books, 2001
Leah Price, "Vies Privees et Scadaleuses: Marie-Antoinette and the Public Eye," The Eighteenth Century 33, no.2 (1992): 176-92. https://www.jstor.org/stable/41467542
Pierre Saint-Amand, "Terrorizing Marie Antoinette," translated by Jennifer Curtiss Gage, Critical Inquiry 20, no.3 (1994): 379-400. https://www.jstor.org/stable/1343862
Nancy Barker, ""Let Them Eat Cake": The Mythical Marie Antoinette and the French Revolution," The Historian 55, no.4 (1993): 709-24. https://www.jstor.org/stable/24448793
Jill H. Casid, "Queer(y)ing Georgic: Utility, Pleasure, and Marie-Antoinette's Ornamented Farm," Eighteenth-Century Studies 30, no.3 (1997): 304-18. https://www.jstor.org/stable/30054251
https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/P_1993-1212-21?selectedImageId=97366001
Antonia Fraser, Marie Antoinette: The Journey. First Anchor Books, 2001
https://en.chateauversailles.fr/discover/history/key-dates/first-visit-holy-roman-emperor-joseph-ii-1777
Fogg RN, Boorjian SA. 1122 THE SEXUAL DYSFUNCTION OF LOUIS XVI: A CONSEQUENCE OF ANATOMY, INTERNATIONAL POLITICS, OR NAÏVETÉ? Journal of Urology [Internet]. 2010 Apr 1 [cited 2025 Aug 1];183(4S):e434. Available from: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.juro.2010.02.2319
The Making of Marie Antoinette
Roger Ebert, "Pretty in Pink" (2006) https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/marie-antoinette-2006
Rotten Tomatoes, https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/1158195-marie_antoinette/reviews
Anthony Quinn, The Independent, https://www.the-independent.com/arts-entertainment/films/reviews/marie-antoinette-12a-420757.html
Wiki: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marie_Antoinette_(2006_film)
Kirsten Dunst Breaks Down Her Career, from 'Bring It On' to 'Spider-Man'| Vanity Fair; https://youtu.be/SOzoNKWrsKU?si=pHS4NRPCft0dpLI5
Kirsten Dunst Breaks Down Her Most Iconic Characters; https://youtu.be/pev4mrWUatA?si=NFS4hXZ6JJrLHgWE
Sofia Coppola Shares Her Rich Film Archival | W Magazine; https://youtu.be/u6p_PuXq9hE?si=KjyXP2U_xVb8hOZt