Carol Cleveland: The Female Python

Carol Cleveland is a face you’ll recognise if you’re a British comedy fan. She’s been in SO many comedy shows and sketches throughout her career including Monty Python’s Flying Circus.

Carol!!! We are not worthy!

Born in 1945, Carol caught the performance bug at a very young age. After all both her parents were actors and so from the age of just 2, Carol was out booking modelling gigs (because hey, 2 is a totally normal age to be earning living)

Carol’s parents divorced when she was 4 and her Mum got together a dashing US serviceman  named Cleve, which led to the family upping sticks and moving to the USA, where Carol grew up around various Military bases.

Acting! Emotion!

In 1960 Carol and her family moved back to London and Carol immediately signed up to prestigious drama school RADA (The Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts).

Now guys, Carol was at RADA at an AMAZING time!

Her first boyfriend was fellow student Ian McShane, who’s best mate just happened to be John Hurt. She was best mates with Lynda La Plante (Who created the EXCEPTIONAL TV series Prime suspect) and shared a stage with Antony Hopkins and the mighty beardy bellowing Brian Blessed.

We imagine this was most of RADA…

After graduating Carol started treading the boards and appearing in some well-loved cult TV series like The Avengers (no not those ones, the Brit TV series ), The Saint, The Persuaders and Randall & Hopkirk (Deceased).

During her actors ‘resting period’ (AKA when she was  out of work) Carol auditioned to be a Playboy Bunny for the new club in London. She landed the  job and worked under the name Didi in the club based in London during its grand opening in 1966.

BUNNY CAROL!

By 1967 Carol was getting movie gigs. She snagged a bit part in the last film ever directed by Charlie Chaplin, The Countess from Hong Kong which also starred Marlon Brando and Sofia Loren.

After that brush with stardom, Carol landed yet another  bit part as a glamour girl in Salt & Pepper, a Dean Martin and Sammy Davis Jr film about two lads who open a Playboy Bunny style club (in it she gets to be a called a ‘Pepperette’ which is possibly the saddest faux sexy name ever created)

The Glamour Stooge

By the late 60’s Carol’s career started to veer towards comedy. She’d been wasted as a disposal glamour-puss, but now her skills as a seriously funny lady had a chance to shine, thanks to roles in stupidly popular British programmes The Two Ronnie’s and With Morecambe & Wise.

Carol then  worked with comedy legend Spike Milligan on his TV sketch show, Spike referred to Carol as a ‘funny dolly bird’ *rolls eyes* ;after that Carol coined her own name, referring to herself as a ‘Glamour Stooge’

We do too.

As a result of her growing comedy chops she was hired by director John Howard Davies to appear in 4 episodes of this new sketch show he was directing called Monty Python’s Flying Circus (you might have heard of it…)

Carol turned up for her first day shooting without much thought about what she was walking into. She was totally bewildered by the script, especially as most of the sketches tended to have 0 punchlines or even proper endings!

After her first read through Carol called her Mum and told her;

“You know… I’m not sure this will last more than 5 episodes”

Yeah….Carol got that one wrong. Monty Python would become one of the most popular and beloved comedy shows EVER.

One of her first sketches is a fave of mine; the Marriage Guidance Counsellor sketch. The set up is simple, Carol and her hubby (played by Michael Palin) go to see Eric Idle’s marriage guidance counsellor, and by the end of it Carol’s getting off with Eric Idle behind a screen and they tell Mike to piss off.

The cast LOVED her giggle, and the fact that she was up for doing anything. Carol’s contract for the show wasn’t renewed, but the Python boys demanded she be kept on.

They started writing more parts for her. Though they all admitted they weren’t great at writing roles for women, and they played most of the women’s roles themselves.

No one does eye candy like Carol!

She appeared in most of the episodes throughout the 4 series (30 out of 45 to be exact) and she appears in EVERY Monty Python film. She plays a 19 year old virgin in Monty Python & The Holy Grail with Terry Jones teasing her that this must be her most ‘difficult role to date’

She was also brought in for various Monty Python Live shows too. Starting with Monty Python’s First Farewell Tour in 1973.

After some more touring Carol was invited back again to do Monty Python at The Hollywood Bowl in 1980. She was getting ready to go for a swim when she got the call, and she was so excited that she forgot to put on her bathing costume and walked out to the public pool stark naked.

We’ve all been there!

Recently Carol’s been on cult comedy smash Toast of London, playing a US talent agent, AND in 2014 she reunited with all the living Pythons for a live show of some of their mot well loved sketches. We saw it twice, she was THE BEST.

Carol is still working today and says regularly that the only way she’ll stop being in showbiz is if she dies.

I’m so grateful for Carol, she was such an inspiration when I was growing up. She showed the world you can be both pretty AND funny. She held her own in a sea of strong personalities and made her mark on comedy in a fun and sexy way.

WE LOVE YOU CAROL!

That was interesting, where can I find out more? Well Carol has her own hilarious autobiography out PomPoms Up!: From Puberty to Pythons and Beyond. It is hilarious, and she’s had an amazing career so there’s some wonderful anecdotes in it!

Sara Westrop is passionate about making history accessible (and fun!) for everyone. A disabled, queer writer from just outside London, who loves writing about the unsung chapters of history.

The Mother of Modern Tarot: Pamela Colman Smith

Pamela Colman Smith was a gifted artist who had a love of the occult. She illustrated the worlds best known tarot cards, as well as books by Bram Stoker, WB Yeats AND she contributed artworks for the women’s suffrage movement!

And yet, her works are often overlooked; she even gets omitted from her own tarot.

Pamela… WHAT A BABE!

A Well Travelled Lady!

Pamela (known as Pixie to her mates) was born in Pimlico in 1878, her family then moved to Manchester before heading to Kingston, Jamaica when she was 10.

Pixie became engrossed in Jamaican culture and folklore, something that would influence her work throughout her career, she even wrote and illustrated a book of Jamaican folk tales, called Annancy that’s still in print today!

In 1893 her family moved to Brooklyn and Pixie went to the very fancy Avant Garde Pratt institute to study art and illustration.

Sadly she had horrific health issues throughout her three years there and thus never graduated.

BUT Pixie was a ridiculously talented student; even without a degree she immediately started getting paid work as an illustrator (which as any one who has ever done art degree will tell you, is stupidly impressive!)

You betta weeeeerk!

One of Pixies first paid gigs was working with Bram Stoker (Y’know that goth bloke who wrote Dracula)

This proved to be a really enriched and satisfying partnership, with Pixie illustrationshis book on famed Shakespearian actress Ellen Terry and then his final book The Lair of the White Worm.

Pixie had a knack of partnering her work up with equally amazing writers; WB Yeats (imaginatively titled) The Illustrated Verses of William Butler Yeats

A Change of Scenery

Sadly Pixie’s beloved mother passed away in 1896 and needing a change Pixie joined a travelling theatre group as a set designer (as you do)

This period really influenced her artwork with grand theatrics, bold prints and colours galore.

Everyone loves a lovvie!

While doing all these varied projects our girl still found time to support women’s suffrage.

She provided artwork to the cause in America, coming up with bold and simple designs that got the message across.

One of Pamela’s Suffrage Artworks

Her friendship with Bram Stoker and W B Yeats led Pixie to becoming a member of the occult loving group the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, in 1901.

The group, made famous by Alistair Crawley, had a fascination for all things occult, supernatural and weird.

And it’s this world of all things creepy that would influence Pixie in her most famous work!

Oooooooh SPOOKY!

The Raider Waite Smith Tarot

Arthur Edward Waite was a fellow member of Golden Dawn and he took an interest in Pixie’s artwork; see he wanted to created a new tarot deck that would help bring tarot into the mainstream; he reckoned Pixie was the artist for the job!

Quick explanation of what tarot is for those of you unfamiliar: Tarot cards are a deck of usually 78 individual cards used for foretelling and insight. You have the main arcana made up of 22 cards and a set of minor arcana split between wands, swords, pentacles and cups. Each card has a different meaning and by grouping cards selected at random you can compose a story or reading for yourself or another person.

ANYWAY!

Pixie was given free reign to re vamp tarot and she really sunk her teeth into it.

She came up with a set of theatrical cards that really refined each one’s individual meaning. The most astonishing feat is Pixie was able to create the entire deck, almost 80 individual pieces of art in just 6 months!

The Waite-Smith Tarot. All of these designs are from Pixie

Waite wrote a book to accompany the set and it was first published in 1909 by publishing house Rider.

The deck went on to become the most popular and recognised tarot deck in the world, it’s just referred to usually as the Rider Waite Tarot, often omitting Pixies name.

WHICH IS A FUCKING TRAVESTY!

FUCKING FUMING BABES!

As so many of these stories do, Pixie’s had a bit of a shit ending. She moved to Cornwall and died in obscurity as a pauper in 1951.

And yet, in such a short space of time Pixie had an incredibly diverse and interesting career that spanned across multiple art forms.

It’s a travesty that she isn’t recognised for her work, particularly with bringing tarot into the mainstream and giving the cards new life.

That was interesting, how can I find out more?

Well if you fancy reading some of Pamela’s work her storybook Annancy Stories is still in print. And if tarot has peaked your interest Macus Katz and Tali Goodwin have written an interesting guide on the Waite Smith Tarot that includes more of Pamela’s history and influences.

Sara Westrop is passionate about making history accessible (and fun!) for everyone. A disabled, queer writer from just outside London, who loves writing about the unsung chapters of history.

Sister Rosetta Tharpe: The rock & roll pioneer we forgot

Queer muscian, Sister Rosetta Tharpe is FINALLY getting her place in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame this year, and you know what?

IT’S ABOUT BLOODY TIME!

This lady is a damn queen! 

Rosetta was a singer/songwriter who rose to fame in the 30’s and 40’s by fusing gospel with seriously funky rhythms; helping give birth to Rock & Roll.

Sadly her contribution often gets forgotten by mainstream audiences.

Some critics argue this is due to her music not being solely rock & roll as it fused gospel with it…and totally not because she was a black woman…

no comment

But I would argue that there is tons of irrefutable evidence that Rosetta’s pioneering sound, left its mark on future groundbreaking musicians, including Little Richard, Johnny Cash, Elvis, Chuck Berry, Jerry Lee Lewis and countless others.

So lets give the nice lady her due and discover how Rosetta came to forge rock & roll!

In the beginning, there was Rosetta

Rosetta was born in 1915 Arkansas, close to the Mississippi. She was singing gospel music AND learning to play the guitar by the age of 4 (basically a born over achiever)

Realising her daughter had a heck of a talent Rosetta’s mother took her to Chicago to join the evangelical Church of God in Christ ( a church famed for it’s musicians) when she was 6 years old.

Rosetta was in heaven! Here she could play music everyday; honing her skills as a singer and experimenting with electric guitars.

It was this electric experimentation that led to Rosetta developing distortion techniques that gave birth to Blues Rock.

Rosetta doing her thing!

Rosetta Births Rock & Roll 

When Rosetta was 23 she left the church behind to break out into showbiz and was quickly signed up by Decca Records, where she recorded her ridiculously unique blend of gospel, sensuality and infectiously melodic guitar.

It was the uniqueness made Rosetta into one of the 30’s and 40;s most popular club acts.

Her gospel sound in a seedy cabaret setting was scandalous at the time. This meant that Rosetta was snubbed by religious circles who thought her music evil and her mere act of playing guitar a sin.

Rosetta didn’t care. 

In fact she didn’t care so much that in 1944 she recorded what many music aficionados now believe to be the first Rock & Roll song.

Strange Things Happening Everyday, charted at number 2 in the R&B Chart(then known as the Race Chart) and you can hear how their guitar and piano arrangement influenced Chuck Berry, Little Richard and basically anyone who picked up a guitar after her.

YOU CAN SAY THAT AGAIN! 

The Later Years and Lady Love

In the late 40’s Rosetta met fellow gospel singer and rumored lover Marie Knight.

The ladies took their act on tour…which again proved to be controversial (so nothing new for Rosetta…) see two women touring alone with no men (!) was unheard of, not matter how ideal it sounds.

Sadly this wonderful partnership didn’t last. During one gig poor Marie’s mother and two small children were killed in a house fire.

Marie was devastated and moved away from Rosetta and started focusing on her solo music.

Rosetta and Marie in happier times

After she and Marie parted ways Rosetta hatched an amazing plan.

She’d have a public wedding (sadly to an arsehole of a bloke -which we will get to-) and a concert afterwards; obvs charging tickets for the whole

It all took place in the Griffith stadium in Washington D.C and it was packed to the gills! For those who couldn’t make the day, a recording was released pretty much immediately.

Though the publicity was huge, it didn;’t last for long. Mainly becuase Rosetta’s new husband, Russel Morrison terribly mismanaged her career.

Oh yeah and he was also a cheating bellend. Nice one Russ.

Fucking Russ

Rosetta moves the fuck on

By this time, Rosetta was due a revamp.

Blues legend Muddy Waters did an incredible tour with Rosetta in the mid 1960’s and they performed a gig in Manchester at a disused railway station.

The concert could have been a disaster though as the heavens opened when it was meant to start.

Rosetta was not having that though. She changed her opening number to ‘Didn’t it Rain?’ arriving on the platform by horse and carriage while it was pissing it down and plugging her guitar in with no worries about it electrocuting her live on stage.

Rossetta, aged 47, giving no fucks about deadly electrics

After an entrance like that…Rosetta obviously blew everyone away

Not only that, but she influenced a whole new heap of musicians who’d been in attendance, including Morissey, a couple members of Joy Division and some of the Buzzcocks….so you know, barely anyone important…

The groundbreaking gig was broadcast on UK TV and was cited by critics as a significant cultural event…

You can view her incredible performance here. Try watching this without bouncing around in your seat. Her energy is just incredible!

She plays an amazing guitar solo, then quips with the audience… Pretty good for a woman ain’t it? UNDERSTATEMENT OF THE MILLENIUM!

Rosetta’s Recognition

In the early 1970’s Rosetta had a stroke that stopped her from performing, and a few years later she had her leg amputated because of issues with diabetes.

Rosetta never really recovered from this and she passed away in 973 after suffering another stroke at the age of 58. She was just about to get back in the recording studio.

Same 😭

Heartbreakingly Rosetta was buried without a gravestone, because her family just couldn’t afford one and her funeral was sparsely attended.

Rosetta remained an obscure figure until the turn of the century when her music was rediscovered.

In 2007 she was inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame and a concert was held in 2008 to raise money to get Rosetta a gravestone.

A memorial Rosetta deserved

In 2008 January 11^th was declared ‘Sister Rosetta Tharpe Day’ by the State Governor of Pennsylvania; she was finally getting recognition she so richly deserved.

Then on December 27^th 2017 Rosetta was inaugurated into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as an Early Influencer.

It’s 40+ years late, but they got there eventually, we wouldn’t have rock n blues without this amazing woman. 

Rosetta had the most incredible voice. It’s hard describing it if you’ve not heard her (and seriously we encourage you to seek her out if you haven’t) but her voice is just so joyful and amazingly rich and sumptuous, AND it has magical healing powers. No joke!

What I love about her songs are the underlying message of hope and cheer, she’s telling us ‘Yeah stuff is difficult and a bit shit, but we are gunna carry on anyway and make the fucking best of it!’ So she’s my go to for days I need a good kick up the arse.

This was interesting where can I find out more?

There’s a wonderful documentary on Sister Rosetta Tharpe by Mick Csaky on Youtube, we highly recommend it. https://youtu.be/FKK_EQ4pj9A

Sara Westrop is passionate about making history accessible (and fun!) for everyone. A disabled, queer writer from just outside London, who loves writing about the unsung chapters of history.

The Lore of Murderous Mermaids

Society has been obsessed with these fancy fish ladies for thousands of years, and we’re going to look at some of the legends that gave birth to these aquatic marvels.

Just incase you haven’t come across The Little Mermaid and its ilk; what is a mermaid? Well, a mermaid is a creature with the top half of a lady and the bottom half of a big ole fish. The modern name for mermaid comes from the old English Mer, meaning sea and Maid, meaning a young lady; thus mermaid (which way sounds better than ‘sea-young lady’)

Lookin’ Good! Via Giphy

Nowadays one thinks of mermaids as pretty, nice sea folk, with amazing hair, a talent for singing and an adorable habit for falling in love with random Princes. Well… that is not the case, Disney lied to you.

Historically mermaids were associated with bad omens, shipwrecks and of course:

DEATH BY MUCH BLOODY VIOLENCE.

So, let’s start things off by looking at the concept of merfolk as deities.

The Ancient Babylonians had a mergod called Era who was depicted as half man, half fish. He was the god of the sea (handy that being part fish and all) the Syrians decided to copy the Babylonians and created their own merged, Derketo. 

Derketo was depicted in the more traditional way of top half of a lady and bottom half of a fish. This idea was in turn nicked by the Ancient Greeks, who came up with the idea of Sirens. 

Siren’s in Greek mythology often get cited as a starting point for the more recognisable mermaid mythology.

Half female, half bird creatures, they morphed into sexy fish fancies, luring sailors to their death on the rocks by singing sweet songs and flashing their knockers.

The Fisherman and the Syren, by Frederic Leighton, c. 1856–1858. Via Wikipedia

Now for the scary bleak stuff!!! Mermaids ain’t all cuddly folks, for example; they appear in One Thousand and One Nights (a collection of Middle Eastern fairy tales) and are described as having;

‘moon faces and hair like a woman’s, but their hands and feet were in their bellies and they had tails like fishes’

Nice!

Some of these tales included whole underwater societies;  in Abdullah the Fisherman and Abdullah the Merman, the protagonist, Abdullah, gains the ability to breathe underwater; in doing so he comes across a mermaid society that basically functions as a proto communist society…so obvs he decides to hang out with a load of half fish commie chicks.

The Japanese also got in on the mermaid fun (just in a fully nightmarish way!); creating Kappa; who had human like faces….with the rest of their body a mix of monkey, fish and turtle.

The Kappa liked tricking humans into becoming their own fish food by pretending to be nice and friendly, maybe invite you to play some Sudoku, followed by ALL OF THE DEATH. They were particularly partial to a nice, crunchy, small child.

OHSHITOHSHITOHSHIT! Via Giphy

But it wasn’t just Japan coming up with half fish nightmare fuel.

Mami Wata is an African water spirit who appears as a sexy lady or the more traditional part lady part fish. It’s said that Mami Wata steals men from their homes forcing them to become her lovers, she can also be responsible for killing those who don’t give her offerings that please her. She likes mirrors and combs FYI if you ever run into her.

The Russians also joined in the ‘what the fuck, why; party…but being Russia they kept their mermaid lore nice and miserable.

Rusalka are the spirits of young women who had violent deaths, usually by drowning. They appear as shimmery spirits in the water and lure men and young children to their deaths dragging them underwater with their long treacherous ghost hair.

Witold Pruszkowski “Rusałki” 1877 Via Wikipedia

But mermaid lore wasn’t just for the ladies! Scotland has a cracking legend about Mermen. The Blue Men of the Minch (AKA storm kelpies) who live off the coast of the Outer Hebrides. They had blue skin and really bad tempers. For a laugh (and general sea boredom) they enjoyed fucking about with humans; they’d stop you In your little fishing boat, ask a bunch of riddles and if you got them wrong, they’d tear you to pieces….literally…because they’re fun like that.

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In Medieval times it was just accepted as fact that mermaids were real, there’s even an account from the 1400’s of a mermaid being rescued in Holland after getting stuck in a dike.

They moved her to a local lake to recover, teaching her how to speak Dutch and do basic household chores to pass the time, the residents later converted her to Catholicism (yay?)

Now most of us Westerners know mermaids because of Disney.

The Little mermaid has a special place in the hearts of many a girl, but on a recent re-watch (for research) I found myself screaming:

‘SHE’S ONLY 16 TRITON, WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU THINKING LETTING HER MARRY SOME FUCKBOI PRINCE!’

So for me it’s an allegory of really bad parenting.

You’re gunna fuck it all up Ariel. Via Giphy

This was based on the Hans Christian Anderson tale of The Little Mermaid published in 1837.

Hans’ tale is a bit bleaker, because at the end our mermaid doesn’t get her Prince and so, after having her tongue cut out, she dies and becomes foam on the waves. A pretty wanky death. Ah the good old days where everybody was dead or at least maimed by the end of a fairy tale.

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So….with all that historic mermaid lore, the question is: are mermaids real?

Well – No. Historians and anyone with half a brain deciphered that in all likelihood mermaid sightings were just your average curvaceous manatee, being viewed from a distance. Honestly being stuck at sea for months and MONTHS on end would make a manatee look pretty fucking appealing to me to.

Sexy manateeeeeeeeee. Via Giphy

Mermaids have had a bit of a resurgence in the last few years (sadly not manatees though).

They are on your Starbucks mugs, on the big screen (like that live action remake of The Little Mermaid NOBODY asked for), all over glittery stationery, T-Shirts and in story books.

Plus there’s still the odd ‘sighting’ of a mermaid. In Israel in 2009 dozens reported seeing a mermaid leaping out of Haifa Bay and playing around in the waves. The local town offered $1million for proof of the mermaid, but they got bugger all.

There was a more recent one in 2012 Zimbabwe where workers were scared off by mermaids while carrying out maintenance work on reservoirs. The government decided to carry out religious rites on the site and brewed a batch of traditional beer for them. It worked and the boozy mermaids left them to it.

Up for boozin’. Via Giphy

So there you have it, we’ve only lightly touched the tip of the mythos behind mermaids. It’s a pretty complicated backstory, DRENCHED IN THE BLOOD OF MEN, which always makes for a fun family friendly read. Have you got any mermaid lore to tell us? Drop us your mermaid tails (geddit?) in the comments or on the socials!

Sara Westrop is passionate about making history accessible (and fun!) for everyone. A disabled, queer writer from just outside London, who loves writing about the unsung chapters of history.

Hedy Lemarr: the sex symbol that gave us wifi

Hedy Lamarr is a goddess, she was a sultry screen siren who was famous for being one of the first to portray a woman having an ORGASM on-screen! Before the sodding film censorship boards nixed all the fun stuff in the 30’s…

Eat it bitches! Via Giphy

Hedy wasn’t just a Hollywood starlet though, she was also a badass inventor who gave the world frequency hopping which gave us the how-did-we-live-without-it Wi-Fi, GPS and Bluetooth. Honestly I think I’d be dead without them by now, having been eaten by bears after getting lost in IKEA.

Some people (they’re mostly dudes) claim she didn’t really have much of a hand in it and they put her name on the invention patent as she was a well-known celeb. To these people I say;

‘BOLLOCKS YOU CHUFFING BUM BAGS!’

She ain’t bothered. Via Giphy

Hedy was born in Austria in 1914. In the 1920s she was discovered as an actress and worked in the European film industry.

One of her most famous early roles was in Ecstasy (1933) where she portrayed a bored young housewife who gets it on with a big-buff-sexy-worker-man. She appeared nude in the film, but was tricked into doing this by the director (What a fucking surprise). This is also the film where she’s shown having a delightful orgasm on screen.

During her time making these European films, Hedy was trapped in a shitty marriage to an Austrian Arms dealer 15 years her senior.

He was a gross, controlling asshat and you know, A FUCKING NAZI ARMS DEALER, so Hedy decided to ditch the git. Hedy disguised herself as a maid and fled the country running off to Paris where she met Louis B. Meyer, of MGM studios. Louis then whisked her off to become a Hollywood film star.

BYE BITCH! Via Giphy

Hedy lamented only being given roles where she was a sexy, almost mute figure in most of her films; she was getting really really bored. So she decided she’d invent cool stuff on the side.

Hedy was totally self-taught, she’d had no formal training but she did have a brilliant mind and an eye for detail.

She dated the rather eccentric billionaire Howard Hughes for a while and he’d ask her advice when he was building planes. Hedy (being a fucking smart cookie) gave Howard a whole heap of drawings and research which she’d gathered using techniques from birds and told him he should start to go about making his planes more aerodynamic. SMART!

POW! Hitting you with knowledge… and cheekbones! Via Giphy

Her biggest breakthrough idea was based on a torpedo guidance system. You see, during WW2, torpedoes were radio controlled and this created huge problems because the signal could be easily jammed making the torpedo fly off course faster than your drunk Aunty Irene at your cousins wedding.

Hedy (having been married to an arms dealer) had knowledge of how these torpedoes worked AND how they were jammed. So she came up with the idea of frequency hopping to make the signal harder to jam.

This meant that the torpedoes could hit shit more accurately and thus blow up more Nazi’s. HUZZAH!

Hedy then asked her good mate, composer and fellow genius, George Antheil, to help her come up with a machine that could hop between frequencies.

She’s smug because she KNOWS she’s smarter than you. Via Giphy

George made a neat gadget from a tiny self-playing piano mechanism that synched up with radio waves. Each new note = a new radio frequency. Undoubtedly genius! BUT, this nifty gadget is why some argue Hedy gets too much credit for frequency hopping.

I’d disagree. After all Hedy came up with the idea and understood the musicality behind the theory of frequency hopping.

Anyway, Hedy and George both patented the idea in 1942 and gave it to the US navy as part of the war effort. The idea wasn’t immediately picked up by the Navy (dumbasses) and it was left in a pile marked TO DO until 1962 when they finally utilised the system in their fleets.

That’s morse code for ‘ABOUT FUCKING TIME!’ Via Giphy

I cannot express how incredible and important this invention was.

Frequency hoping is the Grandmother of Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and GPS and without it we could not watch amusing videos of cats all day instead of working!

Hedy and George were recognised by the National inventors Hall of Fame in 2014 when they were posthumously inducted. Took their fucking time with that one…

THANK YOU HEDY, WE LOVE YOU!

A truly smart, sassy & sessy lady. Via Giphy

This was really interesting, where can I find out more? I’m glad you asked babes. Richard Rhodes book: Hedy’s Folly: The Life and Breakthrough Inventions of Hedy Lamarr, the Most Beautiful Woman in the World (bit of a fucking mouthful) is a great read if you’re interested in the technical side of things.

Hedy also has a bonkers autobiography called Ecstasy and Me, which is mostly fabricated bollocks from the ghostwriter, but is a great trashy read.

Sara Westrop is passionate about making history accessible (and fun!) for everyone. A disabled, queer writer from just outside London, who loves writing about the unsung chapters of history.

4 hacks to smuggle booze prohibition style

Booze! Who doesn’t love it? Trick question – we all do! But what happens when this universal love suddenly becomes illegal? Well, you drink it anyway…just very craftily.

During the prohibition you could be fined thousands and even thrown in jail if you were caught with alcohol, so smuggling booze became serious business.

And its only slightly very illegal!

Now first step for smuggling alcohol – you need to get alcohol to smuggle.

Whilst some breweries got through prohibition by making ‘near beer’ (anywhere from 2 – 0.5% alcohol) those who kept on making the strong stuff had to go deep underground. Operating in woods or under the guise of farms and other out of the way businesses.

It was vital that these suppliers remained unknown and untraceable for police.

This wasn’t an easy task – keeping entire breweries secret required some James Bond level covert operations! Bar sneaking and guns, we all know that James Bond is nothing without wierd gadgets from Q…with that in mind I present:

Cow Shoes

No these are not lift shoes (a ‘la Tom Cruise) they are in fact designed to make the wearers footprints look like cow hooves.

The idea was that any cops looking to try and trace bootleggers to their supplier would lose them when a persons footprints suddenly turned into a cows….which I guess that was a totally normal occurrence in the 1920s and early 30s, as was cattle going for lone forest jaunts…

I don’t know, I’m not a cow historian *shrug*

Cow shoes weren’t the only method to throw off police. Bootleggers also pimped their rides into supped up cars that were easily able outrun the po po. They even went so far as to build a cross country underwater cable car to outfox the fuzz.

Yep, that’s right:

 A cross country underwater cable car… made of torpedoes

Detroit was a bootleggers dream, mainly because it sat right next to Canada, land of maple, manners and legal alcohol!

But how to transport this booze to the US? A boat could was very visible (therefore very catchable) and swimming it over seemed like a whole deal. So naturally an underwater system was built

From Popular Science, March 1932

Torpedoes were filled with liqueur and then attached to a mile-long underwater cable line, running from Canada to Detroit. Thanks to the quick motor running the cable line, a 1932 edition of Popular Science estimates that around 40 torpedoes worth of hooch were transported to America every hour.

That is an impressive amount of definitely tainted illegal booze

As well as torpedo underwater pipelines, bootleggers also had more, erm…homespun ways of smuggling alcohol:

Stuffing booze in random crap

The imagination of bootleggers was apparently endless. Sadly rather than using this imagination for writing the next great American novel, they funneled their skills into putting alcohol into anything they could get there hands on.

Here are just some of the things Alcohol was smuggled in:

• Eggs
• Tinned ‘food’
• Walking canes
• Bibles
• Tailors dummies
• Christmas trees
• Pig carcasses

I fear Babe may not have made it to the city during prohibition

But no matter how ingenious (or mean to pigs) the smuggle, the bootleggers always got caught…welll…unless they were women.

The riot girls of rum running

For some reason police just didn’t seem to suspect women of smuggling booze and even when they were caught, they were let off really lightly (seriously, one woman’s sentence was actually to attend church each Sunday for 2 years…)

Unsurprisingly some women took advantage of this and made serious coin.

Marie Waite (AKA Spanish Marie) was one of these women. Marie single handedly created an entire convey to move tons of alcohol from Havana to Florida’s Key West. Through her active prohibition years she raked in at least $1 million, which in 1920s money, is some Gatsby-esque shit. 

Marie wasn’t alone. Female bootleggers even created a guide to smuggling booze on ones person. From flasks attached to thighs to full on aprons ladden with whisky bottles, their creativity for creating clothes made of cocktails knew no bounds.

The world of female ‘rum running’ was a really diverse one. This open – yet illegal trade -allowed women from all walks of life to make their fortune, as one journalist put it:

‘Some are bold, brainy and beautiful, some hard-boiled and homely, some white, some black, some brown. (But) All are thorns in the sides of Prohibition’

 

This was interesting, where can i find out more? Well, I really need you guys to help me on this one! I’m struggling to find any really amazing books on women in prohibition, in particular, female rum runners…if you know if any, hit me up in the comments or on our Twitter! 

How brothels built America

Fact: Sex workers helped build America. These women came to the Wild West/The Old West (whatever you want to go with) and smashed every expectation of womanhood.

They became business oligarchs, they built entire communities and forged their own independence.

It’s a one hell of a tale! But before we dive it it, let’s quickly knock out the basics:

How did the West come to be?

Around the mid 1800s there was a huge boom in the amount of land being built in the South West of America. Most of this land was built for mining. As new sources for coal and metal mining were discovered, towns sprung up overnight to house the influx of workers that appeared to mine it.

Suddenly you had entire towns with 1000’s of men and maybe a dozen or so women. Now you don’t have to be good at maths to see that the ratio here is a little off.

Having spotted the er…supply and demand issue, business minded women start arriving in these towns and setting up shop as sex workers.

Soon these women were earning in one day what they might otherwise earn in a week as a factory worker or clerk.

GOOD buisness

There were of course risks….a lot of risks. But in the Old West it was these women were effectively working at the same risk level as a working men had. Communities, rules and laws were still being worked out, which meant that murder, beating and work caused incidents/deaths we’re sadly not rare hazards for any gender or line of work!

Yes the risks were high, BUT the clients were many, the going was good and soon the cash was flowing!

So, women started opening their own brothels. This in turn led to women buying land, companies and eventually building business empires of their own.

The original boss bitches  

Soon entire towns revolved around one damn good brothel.

This wasn’t luck. The ladies running these brothels had business smarts for days. Seriously they could have smashed The Apprentice (and probably Donald Trump too…)

One of the best examples of this is Mattie Silks: 

Mattie Silks: admittedly looking v awkward here

A small town girl, Mattie opened her first brothel at just 19. This made her the youngest madam in America.

She invested her profits back into the business, as well as growing her income and holdings by buying real estate and land.

These buisness smarts meant that in just a few years Mattie was running one of Denvers most popular brothels. Patrons were greeted with luxury surroundings and a full orchestra – because this wasn’t just sex…it was Silk sex, and it was classy AF.

But Mattie didn’t stop at having a leading chain of high end brothels. She paid her staff a salary that made them some of the highest paid women in the country.

Yes Mattie pay it back!! 

OK, so, by now you might be thinking – sure these women created businesses that made them some of the richest women in the country and bought tons of new income to the growing West. But is that really building America? Don’t you need stuff like, schools, hospitals and churches, as well as places to have sexy time?

Why yes.

And they did that too.

These women had made themselves pillars in their communities. They weren’t just there for the money, they wanted to make a difference.

Following the 1906 San Francisco earthquake, Diamond Jessie Hayman, opened her brothel doors to feed, clothe and shelter anyone that needed help. And Diamond Jessie was far from alone!

Here are just a few examples of how America’s sex workers made a difference:

Lou Graham, donated money to build up Seattle’s schools and also saved countless businesses and banks during a period of depression.

Anna Wilson’s will requested that her huge mansion be turned into Omaha’s first emergency hospital.

And former slave turned influential brothel owner, Mary Ellen “Mammy” Pleasant, campaigned tirelessly for the de-segregation of streetcars in San Francisco.

These women were doing way more for their communities than just providing cash and a good time. They were building them up, and turning them for shit holes to sustainable home steads!

Mary Ellen Pleasant

And you best believe these communities didn’t forget the women that helped make them!

In 1890, Wyoming refused to become a US state, if it’s women were not allowed to keep the vote (which they had been granted in 1869) saying:

‘We will remain out of the Union one hundred years rather than come in without the women’ 

Yes Wyoming!!! 

This was really interesting where can I find out more? I’d suggest checking out A Renegade History of the United States, by Thaddeus Russell (great name!), it has an amazing section on this.

Mata Hari: Super spy or innocent femme fatale?

Mata Hari’s life has blockbuster written all over it-honestly it’s Oscar bait at its finest:

A small town girl finds international fame as an exotic dancer at the turn of the 20th century. She takes lovers from across Europe and is privy to secrets of global superpowers.

But her glittering world comes crashing down when she is discovered to be a German spy. She is captured, imprisoned and takes her final bow in front of a firing squad in a small corner of France.

It’s Hollywood gold dust! A blockbuster bio pic in the making (seriously someone give Baz Luhrman a call) but is it actually true?

Eeeeer kinda but no….

Born Margaretha Geertruida Zelle in 1876. Mata was born and raised in the Netherlands. Her Dad made some incredibly canny investments which allowed Mata and her siblings a very comfortable and happy childhood. Everything was great!

…and then her Dad lost all his money and a year later Mata’s Mum died.

via giphy

Things were already pretty shit, when Mata’s Dad decided to reveal himself as the literal worst.

As soon as the funeral was over, he shrugged off his old family and started a new one. Sending Mata far away to live with a Godfather she barely knew. At just 15, Mata was on her own.

But she was hardy, she picked herself up and decided to pick up a profession – training to be a teacher.

Unfortunately when it rains it pours and the headteacher of her school had a thing for teenage Mata and he wasn’t taking no for an answer.

The ‘affair’ was quickly discovered. The headmaster kept his job (naturally) and a shamed Mata was sent packing. Returning to her severely pissed off Godfather.

Yeah, don’t look for the logic in this via giphy

Ok so the job hadn’t panned out, but work wasn’t the only thing that could get a girl money and the hell out of dodge. So Mata turned to the Lonely Hearts pages.

Aged 18 Mata married Rudolph “John” MacLeod, a twice her age, almost constantly drunk officer in the East Indies Army. I think you’ve probably guessed after that description- but- Rudolph was a notorious dick.

Great moustache. Still a dick.

Rudolph was jealous (despite constantly sleeping with anything that moved) and an all around abusive drunk who regularly beat his wife.

Despite the numerous marital issues, the couple had two children, Norman and Non and the whole family moved to Indonesia where Rudolph was now based.

As with everything until this point…tragedy soon struck.

Seriously, it’s going to be a never ending stream of shit via giphy

In 1899 Mata awoke to the sound of screams. Immediately she ran to check on her children, only to find both Norman and Non convulsing in intense pain, a doctor was called but it was to late for Mata’s eldest. Two year old Norman died in front of her.

The cause of Norman’s death was shrouded in mystery. Locals theorised that the boy had been poisoned either by a soldier that Rudolph had ruthlessly beaten or by the child’s own Nanny (who Rudolph endlessly harassed). A more modern theory is that the children were being treated for syphilis (caught thanks to dear daddy Rudolph) and were accidentally given an overdose of medication.

It always comes back to Rudolph!

The couple were barely hanging on by a thread and just couldn’t continue after Norman’s death.

Rudolph drank even more and blamed his wife for their sons death. Mata descended into a deep depression, struggling just to get through each day. Yet somehow, she clawed her way back to life and found the strength to finally leave her husband.

Don’t get too excited, it’s all about to go to shit again! via giphy

But Rudolph wasn’t done being a monumental ass hat just yet! Mata had custody of Non, but (of course) Rudolph wasn’t paying his half in full. This was pretty shitty behaviour, escalated dramatically when Rudolph never returned Non after a scheduled visit.

Mata didn’t have the connections or funds (after all she’d essentially been a single mum) to fight for her daughter.

Worse, when she confronted Rudolph, he came at her with a bread knife; Mata narrowly escaped the encounter with her life.

It was one knock too many and Mata lost her will to fight. So she gave up. Hoping that Rudolph would do right by their daughter, Mata did what felt like the only option left to her – she ran away.

‘I thought all women who ran away from their husbands went to Paris’

Surrounded by the glittering lights of Paris Mata worked to reinvent herself. She joined the circus, entertaining the masses as a horse rider.

With the circus not paying much, Mata needed to earn extra to support herself, so made up the rest by posing as an artists model and dancing on the side.

And it was this dancing that would be her making.

When told audiences that when she’d lived in Indonesia she had trained with local dancers.And it was these ‘exotic’ moves she bought to Paris.

Presenting Mata Hari

Mata Hari was born and Margaretha Geertruida Zelle was all but dead.

Mata was a Princess of noble Indian birth, raised in Indonesia and trained from childhood in the ancient art of dance. Her near naked dances weren’t for titalation – they were sacred religious acts.

Now this is obviously entirely horse shit concucted by Magaretha…but damn it sold tickets!!

Soon Mata was an independently wealthy woman, a huge achievement in this period.

via giphy

With money came men. Dazzled by Mata’s beauty and mystery, Europes most powerful men flocked to her side. With the ability to speak multiple languages, as well as a fast wit and ambitious streak – Mata had her pick.

She chose military men. Girl apparently had a type. 

As WW1 dawned Mata was reaching her late thirties. With younger imitators snapping at her heels, she slowed down on the dancing and instead supported herself as a courtesan, sleeping with some of Europes military mights.

She hopped from country to country, living a lavish strings free life. But when wartime hit this had to change.

Well….it should have changed.

Mata continued flitting from country to country (thanks to her neutral Netherlands passport) she slept with high ups from across Europe, no matter what side they fell on.

Now I think we can all agree: this was not a smart plan.

via giphy

Ok now here’s the thing: this next part is a bit of a cluster fuck. See some historians think Mata was a spy, some don’t and some think she was passing on information on the odd occasion but wasn’t a spy.

See what I mean…cluster fuck. So let’s just focus on the concrete facts here!

We know that Mata had access to all kinds of information from pretty much every major player in WW1 (because she was in the bed of pretty much every military higher up)

In 1916 Mata was detained during a jaunt to London and taken to Scotland Yard for questioning. The British had been tipped off by French Authorities that Mata was a German spy, an accusation she refuted under interrogation.

Extract from Mata Hari’s interrogation (released in 2016 you can find the whole thing in the National Archives)

But Britain and France weren’t convinced and at such a delicate time in global politics, these weren’t exactly people you wanted gunning for you.

Though not concrete, there was anecdotal evidence to support the spy theory.

In 1914 the Germans supposedly offered Mata money in return for secrets of those she bedded and the French had put forward a similar offer.

So was Mata a spy? A double agent? Just trying to see what she could get?

Who knows at this point there are so many different theories and strings to keep track of!        

So with the spy theory still hanging over her, Mata was released from Scotland Yard.

Free? Sadly no.

The heat was too much and Europes political powerhouses from all sides were keen to get their hands clean of the embarrassing tangled web that had become Mata Hari.

The French intercepted a (almost definitely purposefully leaked) German message detailing the actions of spy H21. The French figured this spy was Mara Hari and so on February 13th 1917 French officers marched into her Paris hotel room and arrested her.

‘I am innocent….someone is fooling me’

Mata Hari’s trial was, at best, a joke. At worst a formal slut shaming exercise.

Mata admitted to taking German funds to spy, but argued that she hadn’t actually carried out these acts. She just took the money.

The French weren’t having this and claimed that her actions directly resulted in the deaths of up to 50,000 men.

I think it’s worth noting here that at this point the war was not going well for the French. They were suffering massive losses and their men were turning against them.

The French needed a fall guy. So they created the ultimate villainess.  

Not only was Mara Hari on trial for spying but her lifestyle was on trial. Her accusers claimed she regularly bathed in milk at a time when there wasn’t enough for French children to drink. Her bed hopping and sensual dancing proved her lack of morals, which itself was proof she would be happy to spy.

There was never going to be a good outcome of this for Mata. And there wasn’t, she was sentenced to death.

Picture of Mata Hari whilst incarcerated

On October 15th 1917 Mata Hari woke at dawn in a small corner of France. She wrote two letters; one to her daughter Non. Then she dressed and was led outside to where a firing squad were waiting.

Mata refused a blindfold and stood unbound, staring directly at her executioners. Shots were fired and she fell. Her final curtain call.

Mata Hari’s story is one that shows just how easily manipulated history can be.

Once held up as an example of loose morals and villainy, documents released to time in with the WW1 centennial show a very different story. One that is still being pieced together.

Personally I don’t think she was a spy. I do think she was privy to a silly amount of information from all sides and I think she occasionally leaked this information to whatever side she was with at the time.

But this isn’t Hollywood. Mata Hari wasn’t a master spy. She was just a person, who had flaws and made some really shitty choices that she paid the ultimate price for.

This was interesting, where can I find out more? Check out Pam Shipman’s book, Femme Fatale which gives even more background on Mata’s early life.