271 - 4 Hours of Sacred Pausing

On this week’s episode, Karen and Georgia cover Sophie Scholl & the White Rose youth resistance, and the survival story of Ada Blackjack.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:02):
It's our one year Bananaversary. It's been one year of bananas.
That's all the strange news you can handle, with fun
stories and great guests like Karen Kilgarriff and Georgia Hartstark
from a little unknown podcast called My Favorite Murder on
exactly right. So if you like strange stuff and good
friends having a fun time, listen to Bananas. Check out

(00:24):
the Bananas podcast. It's the Bananaversary one year birthday party episode.
It's the Bananaversary.

Speaker 2 (00:47):
Hello and welcome to My Favorite Murder. That's Georgia Hartston.
That's Karen kil Garret And here we go in week
three thousand of the Quarantine.

Speaker 3 (01:00):
We're right near the end. We're right coming right up
on the edge like Felman Louise grasping hands going over
the is.

Speaker 2 (01:11):
You had a moment with Brad Pitt. It was excellent.
He really was.

Speaker 3 (01:18):
I really I remember him entering screen when we saw
that movie in the theater and going like.

Speaker 2 (01:24):
What I'm sorry, excuse me. Legend of the Falls. That's
so he is too right? What's on? He was in
Legend of the Falls too right?

Speaker 3 (01:33):
He was later, Yeah, gorgeous child, I mean a gifted
face absolutely a gifted faced man, which is all you
want in your youth.

Speaker 2 (01:45):
My peak, brad Pit has to be Twelve Monkeys, which
I just think is one of the best still best movies.

Speaker 3 (01:52):
Yeah, it's pretty that's a good watch. Yeah, that's a
great rewatch.

Speaker 2 (01:56):
Deep Cut. I feel like it's not given enough Hurrah
that in And also I love fucking End of the
World movies. But Children of Men. Yes, ah, what's his name?
That's so sexy, Clive Owens. He's just like Zee down
by the world.

Speaker 3 (02:13):
I mean, actually, you know what I'm putting in on
my list because I was scraping my brain. It feels
like we recorded the last episode yesterday, so I was like,
and we talked for so long on the top of
that one that I was like, literally I emptied the
well of anything I'm doing in my life.

Speaker 2 (02:30):
I feel like when we have long talks on one episode,
guaranteed that the next one will be twenty minutes, usually
because we just blurred everything in our entire lives and
brains out and then are left panting on the shore
of podcasting.

Speaker 3 (02:47):
But I was going to say, I have a running
list of movies that if I'm laying on the couch
and I'm not going.

Speaker 2 (02:54):
To watch a Swedish procedural.

Speaker 3 (02:56):
I'm like, okay, but I do have this very solid list,
which is list from our staff, meaning it's a list
from this show. It's a list from kind of everything
where it's just like, oh, that's right, and Children of
Men goes right on that list because that thing.

Speaker 2 (03:11):
Is a tour de force. Uh huh.

Speaker 3 (03:14):
I remember making my dad watch it, and I got
so excited about that continuous shot where they drive by
and then the thing that's on fire goes behind, like yeah,
and that whole thing is almost like a POV of
it if you're there too. And I kept trying to
explain to my dad how cool that was and how
hard it was to do yeah, and he's like, all right,

(03:35):
I get it, You're in the movies.

Speaker 2 (03:38):
I can't wait.

Speaker 3 (03:39):
I was just like, but look, dad, dade.

Speaker 2 (03:41):
I say, look at this thing. There's no cuts. There's
no cut. There's no cuts. I will say too that.
Speaking of getting recommendations from this podcast, from the advertisement
for Mayor of Eastown was really good. The first episode,
of course it is it's Kate Winslet, but also Guy Pierce,

(04:01):
no Guyery it's Guy Fiedi's the love interest Kate Winsley
sexy sexy scene No, the one from Holly Uh guy Pierce,
Guy Peers. Yeah, you're right, who's like, Oh, he's one
of those men that you're like, how do you get
hotter the older you get.

Speaker 3 (04:23):
Banded face, gifted face, gifted actor. But yes, he has
those like he has a perfect nose, eye, cheekbones.

Speaker 2 (04:33):
Yeah, I guess it's the mask area.

Speaker 3 (04:36):
Yeah, it doesn't matter with men what happens to the
mask's it's annoying. Scrape it up and women will like
you more.

Speaker 2 (04:44):
However, with women, yeah, no, No. Kate Winsley looks incredible
though too, Like I think there is a similar age
going on with them, and they're both just like delivering
the hotness.

Speaker 3 (04:55):
But Kate Winslet has always looked like a haunted portrait
of a Victorian like Widow or something. Yes, like she
is from Heavenly Creatures.

Speaker 2 (05:05):
Yes.

Speaker 3 (05:06):
Also, Melanielensky was the coaster and equally beautiful Kate Winsley
when she like, the more she went on, did they
just kept going oh, castor on like a period b Yeah,
look at what she looks like in an mpure waist
dress like.

Speaker 2 (05:20):
Insane, like hoist those fucking dits as high as they'll go,
those milky beautiful breast Excuse me, Wow, Jesus didn't know
I was into that, but apparently I am.

Speaker 3 (05:32):
But hey, if Maret gets it going for you, so
be it.

Speaker 2 (05:36):
It does. And speaking of what you're speaking of, can
I tell you a book I'm reading that halfway through
I cracked the fuck up. It takes place in the
late eighteen hundreds. It's a true story, but it's like
fictionalized in a really, really great way. It feels like
fiction nice. And it's about this woman who's the black widow.
She kills everyone she comes over from Sweden, and so

(06:00):
does her sister. No, don't say it. What I read
this I know so happy through she kills her second husband.
And then Mary's a guy whose last name is Gunnis
Guinness and I realized, wait, her first name is Belle.
It's fucking Balcannis of Triflers need not apply. I didn't
know that until halfway fucking through.

Speaker 3 (06:21):
I don't want to accuse you of anything, please do,
but I have an idea that you might be doing
to me right now what I did to you with
the other book that I read, and then you were like, Hollywood.

Speaker 2 (06:37):
Park, I can I get a witness?

Speaker 1 (06:43):
Is it?

Speaker 2 (06:43):
Am I talking into a black hole? What's happening?

Speaker 3 (06:46):
But no, I read that book and I'm I'm pretty
sure I recommended it, but what I might not.

Speaker 2 (06:51):
It's Climbing the Garden of Spite by Camilla Bruce, and
it is Camilla riveting fucking high five amazing.

Speaker 3 (07:01):
I knew the story. I did this story, but I
still read it going what's going on? And I was like, hey,
she burned down her own candy story, burned everything to
the ground. They burned everything to the ground.

Speaker 2 (07:15):
Everything and then so I don't know if it's part
of the story, but it goes from chapter to chapter
from her from Bell to her poor sister who doesn't
want to believe any of it. So like that's what
this brings the story around, and you're just like, dude,
your sister's a monster. But it also tells of how
she became that way, which I don't know if that's
fictionalized as well, But it's also like heartbreaking.

Speaker 3 (07:35):
It's it's backstory that I wonder. I don't think you
could put in that much detailed backstory and have it be.

Speaker 2 (07:42):
I can't.

Speaker 3 (07:42):
I can't imagine, but I know. But also I think
it's so beautifully lays out what it would be like
to be related to associates totally, because it's the kind
of thing where she just keeps going, no, she wouldn't.

Speaker 2 (07:56):
I can't it. There's no way, there's no way. And
at a time period when death was kind of a
regular thing with children and people died very young, it
wasn't like totally out of the ordinary. But then there's
so many actions that the sister's doing that's so funny. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (08:12):
Yeah, it's really intense. And the details, it was like
all the details I wanted around that story that just
you can't get from those historical stories.

Speaker 2 (08:22):
Yeah, I can't put it down.

Speaker 3 (08:24):
In the Garden of Death, Spite, in the Garden of Spike,
in the Garden of spe Camilla, Bruce, excellent.

Speaker 2 (08:32):
Are you ready for the brag?

Speaker 3 (08:33):
I'm going to drop on you. Then I don't have
anything else. I'm currently reading Moby Dick the Cannon, but
I'm doing it to be trendy, but I'm.

Speaker 2 (08:45):
Reading the cliffs Notes version.

Speaker 3 (08:47):
It was like it was like something people started talking
about on social media and that.

Speaker 2 (08:53):
I was like, can I should read that?

Speaker 3 (08:55):
I hear it like, because people talk all the time
about what beautiful writing is. Every once in a while,
there's someone in my Twitter feed that likes to retweet.
There's a moby dick bot that just will it'll just
tweet like a phrase or a sentence from the book. Oh,
and there's amazing. It'll come up and you're just.

Speaker 2 (09:12):
Like, whoa, that's awesome.

Speaker 4 (09:14):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (09:14):
So then I was like, well, I should just read
this and it actually is at a great amazing reading.

Speaker 2 (09:19):
Okay, because I don't like reading stuff out of guilt
or out of like oh shit, I got to read that.

Speaker 3 (09:24):
No, it doesn't work. It doesn't work like homework reading. Yeah,
I won't do it.

Speaker 2 (09:29):
Speaking of homework reading, this is just going right on
to the next and you just pick up a history book.

Speaker 3 (09:34):
Look at this Western sieve instead of like writing them down.

Speaker 2 (09:38):
It just brought all my books into the second bedroom
with me because I was like, fuck it. This one's
called it's a work book that my therapists have justined
called Conquer Your Critical Inner Voice.

Speaker 1 (09:49):
Wow.

Speaker 2 (09:50):
It was like going in that book, well I haven't
cracked it yet. Look, my inner voice just keeps telling
me you can't do it, you can't do it, it
won't work on.

Speaker 3 (09:59):
You get in there, see what happens.

Speaker 2 (10:03):
You know. That's oh yeah, I do.

Speaker 3 (10:06):
Actually the wait speaking of this, that just made me
think of because I so I had some shelves built.
No brag, congratulations. I think I've bragged about this though
on the show before.

Speaker 2 (10:17):
But no, it's important. It's important. It's important to celebrate
your winds.

Speaker 3 (10:22):
Right, And but I don't have any books in the shelves,
right because I have a bunch of books that I
moved when I moved, and then a bunch of them
got moldy because the air conditioning leaked. Right.

Speaker 2 (10:34):
I lost a bunch of books in the in the move. Heartbreaking.
So I told my friend.

Speaker 3 (10:39):
Page that I like lost a bunch of books, and
she's like, okay, I'm going to send you a couple
of starters. She's been sending me like beautiful coffee table books.
Oh my god, Like every day I'll get like a
new thing from a different independent bookstore at a different
city and then it's just like a Vivian Meyer coffee
table book or I mean she sent me a b

(11:01):
I was like, this is the greatest gift. Yes, they're
like beautiful, they look amazing on the shelf. It makes
you look worldly, veriodite, and like, well read. I haven't
opened any of them. I don't know what they're really about.
There's a lot of like architecture books where I'm.

Speaker 2 (11:18):
Like, yeah, yeah, I know architecture. Can moby dick motherfucker
kuz what I can read.

Speaker 3 (11:27):
But I at one point I go and the cool
thing is I can read all of them. And then
she just started laughing because I was like, purely I
want them to fill up these shelves in a very
like yeah, stylish way.

Speaker 2 (11:37):
As a chatchkey obsessed person, I understand, Yeah, you just
don't want empty shelves. No, it looks that looks bad.
Fucking minimalism. Fuck it to hell.

Speaker 3 (11:47):
So one of the books, so she that got me
started this really nice bunch of books, thanks page. But
then I was like, oh, it was her ideas were
making me thing go, oh I need this, I need this.
And one of the books is a book by the
cartoonist Linda Barry of What it.

Speaker 2 (12:07):
Is Yeah, and told me about that.

Speaker 3 (12:10):
Yeah, it's basically Linda Barry's like creative writing book and
if there's anyone out there who is interested in writing
and getting into writing and kind of trying to figure out.

Speaker 2 (12:23):
What you want to write or how you want.

Speaker 3 (12:25):
To write, if get the book what it is by
Linda Barry, and it will help you figure all those
questions out and more. It's like it's also kind of
like a work book where there's she talks about different
things and her different theories and then basically is like,
now do this. Now, make a list of these ten
childhood memories that involve blank. She's the one that did

(12:47):
the thing of you can't remember your phone number, two
phone numbers go, but you can remember your first phone
number from your first house.

Speaker 2 (12:54):
You definitely suggested that to me when we were writing
our first book and I was having an ext potential crisis,
and I definitely picked it up and read half of it,
which was reflective in my chapters in our book. But
it was really helpful.

Speaker 3 (13:09):
It's really beautiful, it's well and just those the things
she has you do actually create nuggets of things you
can then use for writing. They're like little worlds that
bloom because you like remember all that.

Speaker 2 (13:21):
Yeah, writing prompts. I love those, right, It's very cool. Good,
this is our lit episode. Can anyone handle it? Oh?
I'm off Instagram for the week. I shook Vince's hand
and agreed that I wouldn't be on it, but I
will post on the animals pay. I now have two

(13:42):
animal pet Instagram accounts. So you're on Instagram. I'm off.
How's it going? Comments and scrolling and any of that stuff.
It's great. I replaced the Instagram app button on my
phone with like a printer or something. And the amount
of times I've absent mind the least scrolled and opened

(14:04):
the printer has like really taught me something about my automatic.
You know, lizard brain need for stimulation and.

Speaker 3 (14:14):
It's dopamine hit. Do dopamine hits? That's what we want. Yeah,
So that's the setup. I highly recommended everyone, and it's
it's we'll see how it goes.

Speaker 2 (14:24):
I can't imagine it's not going to be positive. How
many days has it been? It was three o'clock on SATURA,
it was a three. It was a Saturday afternoon at
three o'clock, and today's Tuesday afternoon.

Speaker 3 (14:36):
So a couple of days and how much longer you
have to go till Saturday?

Speaker 5 (14:39):
Yeah?

Speaker 2 (14:40):
Good, till Saturday. Maybe I'll go longer. People have gone longer,
I guess, and thrived so they have.

Speaker 3 (14:45):
Well, Chrissy Teakan made it twenty four days, you can
do this.

Speaker 5 (14:49):
I'm no Chrissy Teagan, but I mean, but look, I
think taking breaks from a thing that is not real
and does not exist in reality is a very good idea.

Speaker 2 (15:01):
To then spend time in reality.

Speaker 3 (15:02):
I think, like, find the dopamine hits in reality, I
guess is the goal.

Speaker 2 (15:07):
That's a good point. And I'm also like, when I
have the urge to take a picture or video of something,
usually my pets, I think, why don't you just enjoy
it as is right now without because I do it
and I have all these expectations of like, do something cute,
do that thing you just did, and they never do
what they just did before I hit the camera, and
then so I miss it completely. I think a lot

(15:27):
of people, a probably with kids, have the same issue
where it's like just remember this and how lovely it is?

Speaker 3 (15:33):
Yeah, and then you're not always going what will so
and so think of it?

Speaker 2 (15:37):
It's just like, yeah, you have You're just.

Speaker 3 (15:39):
Kind of in life, which I think now seems social
media makes it seem like that's a little dimmer than
if everybody else was.

Speaker 2 (15:49):
Consuming it. Definitely, what else have you are? How are
you worried? Well?

Speaker 3 (15:54):
You know what I was going to tell you about
was so I think I've told you this already. But
my Canadian friend Jacob Tierney, who's from Later Kenny, he
and I were for a little while doing we would
do movie nights and the recurring theme of the movie
night was Gerard Butler.

Speaker 4 (16:14):
What the French actor? No great actor, Gerard Butler. That's Jippian,
you know him, but he is so you know hits.

Speaker 3 (16:33):
I think we started at three hundred, where I was like,
can we just watch three hundred? I think, oh, I
think it helps people? And he was like, of course
the most recent one. And the reason I'm bringing this
up is because I really was scraping my brain for
a legit recommendation. But I was like, what is the
most what's the movie you've watched recently that you genuinely enjoyed.
I already recommended Manari, So like, if you haven't seen Manari,

(16:54):
I'll re recommend it because clearly I don't lie, and
the Oscars don't lie. It's a beautiful, beautiful, warm, lovely film.
But also you could say a lot of the same
things that you might say about the beautiful film Minari
about Jilard Butler's newest hit film, Greenland, because it is

(17:15):
a movie that about the world ending, and there's something
about that these days, like you were saying before, it's
so satisfying. Yeah, like it's emergency, there's bad shit going
on and it's a survival situation.

Speaker 2 (17:30):
Yeah, that thing we're also entertaining when you have one
single focus and that's to survive the awfulness that has
happened because of decades of the shit that led up
to it. I feel so satisfied with those kinds of movies,
you know, survive its good.

Speaker 3 (17:46):
I would recommend although it's going to cost you twenty bucks,
which is four people going to the movies for five dollars,
or two people go into the movies for ten dollars, or.

Speaker 2 (17:56):
You would have for twenty Well what if three people
and a child go, oh.

Speaker 3 (18:00):
Uh, that's seventeen fifty a matt and they're still getting
a bargain.

Speaker 2 (18:04):
It's a bargain. Okay, thank you, Because I wasn't going
to do it until you broke that down and you're right.
Do you have anything else? Are we scraped clean? I
really don't.

Speaker 3 (18:12):
I've actually also, I haven't been on Twitter in a
while just because it was all very bad.

Speaker 2 (18:18):
Yeah, that's good. Look at us thriving.

Speaker 3 (18:21):
The anti social media plan.

Speaker 2 (18:24):
I think is good.

Speaker 3 (18:24):
It's good to take breaks and practice taking breaks, steph,
and I'm all for it.

Speaker 2 (18:29):
Sacred pause. I don't think that's what my therapist means
when she tells me about that, but I think that's
what we should call it. Maybe hold on, let me
look that up real quick. It's Oh, it's Tara Brox thing,
and it's a pause in the midst of meditation to
let go of thoughts and reawaken our attention to the breath,
to discontinue whatever we're doing, thinking, talking, walking, right and

(18:51):
planning blah blah blah, worrying, and become wholeheartedly present, attentive,
often physically. Still, that's what we're doing, Brock. You mean
right now?

Speaker 4 (19:02):
No?

Speaker 2 (19:02):
I mean with social media.

Speaker 3 (19:07):
We can. We can, but it's not great. Podcast day,
we can and I want to.

Speaker 2 (19:12):
I don't want to reward you for doing that, but
should we do exactly right? Corner and the very exciting
news that we have to announce. Yeah, very exciting news. Second,
as a build up, yes, great.

Speaker 3 (19:24):
So this week there are lots of great stuff happening
on the network, the exactly right network, by the way,
but just some of the Some of the great ones
are SVU fan worship podcast entitled That's Messed Up. This
is the twentieth episode this week. It went up on
Tuesday four twenty and in celebration, Karen Lisa are joined

(19:49):
by none other than Bob Saget.

Speaker 2 (19:52):
Because he was in season eight of SVU And this
week it's just the bookings. They're killing the book its
grace are so good, Bob Frickin' Saggot.

Speaker 3 (20:04):
And as a as a fan of that show, because
I have watched I believe I've watched every single one
of them at least twice. Pretty sure you meanful House, Yes,
including the current one.

Speaker 2 (20:18):
Oh wow.

Speaker 3 (20:18):
I remember Nora going through a full house face and
me just being like, let me know when you're done.

Speaker 2 (20:23):
I don't want you to talk to me about this anymore.
Do you know that I'm actually friends with Jody Sweeten
on Instagram, who's a murderino. She played Stephanie Tanner the
often suffering middle child. But she was my age and
so all her choreographed jazz dancing that she did on
the show I was like obsessed with. And now she

(20:45):
like reached out and she's a murderino and we're friends
on Instagram, which I just little Georgia would fucking lose
her mind.

Speaker 3 (20:53):
Yeah, invite little Georgia in for some sacred pauses and
some and some so what's happened hands and some step
ball changes.

Speaker 2 (21:03):
Bananas are fucking hilarious funny news podcast hosted by Kurt
and Scotti, is celebrating their one year anniversary by having
guests Karen and Georgia on none other than Me and Karen.
That was the most fun. It was so fun that
I had a migraine when we started, and by the

(21:23):
end of the episode I had laughed it away. It
was just incredible, and I just love those boys and
their fans and the podcast. So check out Bananas.

Speaker 3 (21:34):
It's amazing that it's been a year. It went really fast,
and it feels to me like they've always had that
podcast and they've always been doing it, like they're just
such naturals.

Speaker 2 (21:44):
Definitely, it's really cool.

Speaker 3 (21:46):
Oh and do you need to ride this week, Chris
Fairbanks and I have the legendary comedian Janelle James, who
is truly the funniest, just a joy to talk to.

Speaker 2 (21:58):
She's it's just a it's just a fun one.

Speaker 3 (22:01):
I mean, it's I feel weird plugging my own show,
but I love Jail.

Speaker 2 (22:04):
So much and done it.

Speaker 3 (22:05):
It was just we all were just laughing our asses
off the entire time.

Speaker 2 (22:09):
It was really fun. Can I tell you a quick
side exactly right, family side story. Vince has been golfing
a lot with friends and he just golfed with Chris
Fairbanks the other day, which has Chris talked about it
on our show. Oh and then the Murder Squad has
a story about how in twenty seventeen, three women were

(22:30):
found dead with a three block radius in Lumbertown, North Carolina,
And so there's all these ties to drug addiction and
the deaths are undetermined. Two of our women disappeared, and
so Paul and Billy look into whether the same offend
or could be responsible for all of them. So it's
incredible work they're doing. Please follow and check out the

(22:50):
Murder Squad, which you're probably already doing, but we just
love that and those guys. Wow, three block radius. That's
not good. Nope, that's not good. Nope.

Speaker 3 (23:01):
Oh yeah, And then I just was gonna say on
I said no gifts. This week, Bridger has Cola School,
the Great and Friend of the of the family, Cola Schoola.
It's just such a hilarious episode. They have the funniest
conversation and just delightful, like funny, like witty banter.

Speaker 2 (23:20):
You know, I feel like that's.

Speaker 3 (23:21):
One thing in the Quarantine we've all lost out on,
just kind of like superficial almost like between between strangers
or light acquaintances banter, nothing deep, and it's just it's
just a great one. Those two are just comedy geniuses.
So I'm they are quite a combination. They are quite

(23:44):
a combination. Great, it's a great episode. Cool, all right,
that's our biz.

Speaker 2 (23:49):
Also real quick, in my favorite Murder Store, we have
a bunch of toxic masculinity ruins the party again shirts
and tank tops, classic and brand new styles. And the
spring cleaning clearance sale is on now and first access
goes to the fan cull members, so check that out
before everything sells out.

Speaker 3 (24:08):
And now and now the big announcement, the bit we've
been waiting for truly months and months to tell you
guys about it's gonna be out of the blue.

Speaker 2 (24:18):
We haven't even hinted about this one. We've kept it
under wraps. That's right.

Speaker 3 (24:22):
Everyone knows the great Nick Terry who's been making MFM
animated cartoons of the of little clips of the episodes
for us voluntarily on his own time, out of the
goodness of his heart.

Speaker 2 (24:36):
He's been making listeners and us laugh, and he's been
making my favorite murder meme dreams come true, and just
making these characters out of the just the words we
say that just are so delightful. And I'm sure you
guys have seen them all.

Speaker 3 (24:54):
But guess what we are we have We are yeah,
partnered with Terry and now the exactly Right Network has
their own YouTube channel. We're all twenty three of Nick
Terry's MFM Animated episodes are going to Live plus.

Speaker 2 (25:14):
Plus to entice you guys over to please subscribe, a
brand new episode, never before seen episode of MFM Animated
is going up today, Thursday, April twenty second, and it's
called Snake Den and we've seen it and are overjoyed.
We can't wait for you guys to see this. It's

(25:35):
just a whole new ballgame with Nick Terry at bat,
and we're so excited to be in the outfield catching
those home runs. That doesn't that's not how the least
baseball a group of people doing baseball stuff, home run
and going strike to the top. But you're right in

(25:57):
the way that I don't.

Speaker 3 (26:00):
First, I don't think I've seen one that I didn't
adore and laugh so hard at. And I've talked about
this where I have caught myself showing people MFM animated
completely realizing what a lunatic like monster diva I look like,
of like, look at.

Speaker 2 (26:18):
My thing, but not it's like, how did he do that?
So what I'm doing? It's so it's like we just
love him. You don't realize that it's not our words,
it's the it's the jokes and the like visuals that
he puts in that make it what they are and
so fucking funny and beautiful and these characters he does.
I mean, he's so talented. He's so talented, and we're

(26:41):
together going to put out a bunch of new merch
and it's just going to be a really cool addition
to the MFM family and exactly right.

Speaker 3 (26:49):
So welcome, Yes, so welcome, Nick Terry. We're so glad
to have you and we adore you. Thank you for
all your art. And there's going to be a brand
new one every month from now on.

Speaker 2 (27:01):
So please subscribe to the YouTube page. It's a YouTube
dot com slash exactly right media. Yeah, and we're happy
to be on YouTube as well. We're hoping a lot
of hoping a lot of content will be added to
that in the coming time. Okay, well, I'm really excited

(27:23):
to tell the story this week of Sophie Schole and
the White Rose anti Nazi youth movement. So I got
information from Holocaust Resistance, The White Rose, a lesson and
Dissonant by Jacob G. Hornberger, an article called Sophie Shawl

(27:44):
and the White Rose by Tanya B. Spitzer, a website
called a Mighty Girl by just just said Catherine. I
couldn't find her last name, the website Holocaust Research Project
dot org, an article by Aaron Blackmore, and an article
by Guido Thekbler. And also my research was done this

(28:04):
week by my new researcher, Hailey Gray. So thank you
so much. Okay, in nineteen thirty three, as we all know,
Adolf Hitler in the Nazi regime took control of Germany
and immediately started to take away freedoms that included controlling
young people in order to make sure that they believed

(28:25):
in the Nazi ideology so that they could carry it
on through generations. And in school's textbook had to be
approved by the Nazis, and a lot of the teachers
were actually active members of of Nazi organizations, so they
kept an eye on the goings on of parents through
their students by asking the kids like innocent seeming questions

(28:46):
about their parents and their actions. Well actually then alerting
authorities to any perceived infractions, and I think they got
rewarded for that. So any little thing that they saw
going wrong, they would tell. Any teacher who was down
with the Nazis or refused to incriminate parents via their
students or teach the Nazi approved curriculum were fired or

(29:07):
sent away to detention camps. The Nazis attempted to teach
German children that arians quote, Arians were superior to Jews,
disabled people, people of color, as well as Roman Gypsies,
which my family were Roman Gypsies and Jews. So that
was rough Aaryan kids were even encouraged by their teachers

(29:29):
to bully Jewish students. Can you imagine fucking adults saying,
go bully children. It's just absurd and inhumane. One Nazi
textbook used for very young children was called trust no
Fox on his green heath and no Jew on his Oath,
and it attempted to spread the word that Jewish people

(29:52):
would murder Germans if given the chance. Aryan kids aged
ten to seventeen were also encouraged to join the Hitler
youth or girls. It was the League of German Girls,
and all other youth groups and organizations were banned. The
boys are trained to be soldiers and the girls are
trained to be mothers and housewives, and both are trained

(30:12):
to be loyal to Hitler. But not every young person
joins the Nazi approved youth groups. Some join anti Nazi
groups like the Idolwis Pirates, who are comprised mostly of
young workers and teenagers, and the group spreads Nazi slogans,
they hide deserters, they assault Nazis, and in nineteen forty
four later they even killed the chief of the Secret Police,

(30:36):
which then unfortunately leads to twelve members being publicly hanged.
Another anti Nazi youth group is the Swing Kids. They
form after the Nazi start banning swing music. You know,
jazz had been popular in the twenties in Germany and
the social political atmosphere had grown darker in the thirties,
so the new widely popular form of jazz swing music

(31:00):
made its way across the Atlantic. But soon the Nazis
you know, realized that the music had black roots, it's
perceived jewishness and lack of restraint, and the dance moves
even began to raise alarms with the government. So though
technically the movement wasn't a political one, the Swing Kids,
aside from not wanting to be controlled or become Nazis themselves,

(31:21):
the Swing Kids did raise red flags with Nazi authorities
as they tended to welcome Jewish teenagers into their groups
and stand up for them, And the Nazis started rolling
out anti jazz propaganda and rules, and then certain artist
records are banned and Germans aren't allowed to listen to
foreign radio stations. But another much more political and anti

(31:42):
Nazi resistance group that formed was called the White Rose,
and one of the key members was named Sophie Schol,
so let me tell you about her. Sofia Magdalena Schol
was born in May of nineteen twenty one to an
upper middle class family in the south of Germany. When
she was ten years old, she and her family moved
to a town called Ulm, where her father worked as

(32:05):
a state auditor and tax consultant and was active in politics.
After the Nazis came to power in January nineteen thirty three, Sophie,
along with her four siblings, enthusiastically joined the National Socialist
Youth Organization. So they were all into it despite their
parents open disdain for the Nazi movement, which they viewed

(32:25):
as evil and Unchristian. Meanwhile, by nineteen thirty six, any
alternative youth group is banned, and then as a teenager,
Sophie believed in the ideals of the movement and anyway
someone's interested, specifically on the focus of nature and communal experiences,
but also, as did the majority of Aryan Germans, the

(32:45):
Shoal siblings believe that Adolf Hitler was leaving Germany and
the German people back to greatness from their trouncing in
World War One. Sophie joined the League of German girls,
and she quickly rose in their ranks, but her parents,
especially her father, became even more critical of the Nazi party.
He viewed the developments in Germany with horror and though

(33:07):
not the norm of the time, because any vocal criticism
was dangerous. Robert the father discussed his views with his kids,
you know, in their house, and told them about the
evils of fascism. And he said, he said, to have
told them quote, all I want for you is to
walk straight and free through life, even when it's hard.

(33:28):
In nineteen thirty seven, several of Sophie's siblings were arrested
for being members of a non Nazi youth group, and
this was a turning point for Sophie's life and ideals,
and that kind of began the process that eventually would
turn her from a proud supporter of the Nazis to
an active resistance fighter. On September one, nineteen thirty nine,

(33:50):
Hitler invades Poland and then two days later, friends in
Britain declare war on Germany. Sophie's older brothers and her
boyfriend were forced to fight on the front line, and
then so After graduating high school in the spring of
nineteen forty she started an apprenticeship to become a kindergarten teacher.
She wanted to study biology and philosophy eventually, but quickly

(34:13):
her dreams were quashed because in nineteen forty one a
policy dictated that she had to serve six months of
auxiliary war service. So she's a free thinker, she's a
nature lover, and she hates being in the war service.
So she finds solace in her own spirituality, led by
the writings of theologian Augustine of Hippo and writing down

(34:37):
her own thoughts as her doubts about the regime continue
to grow. In May nineteen forty two, she moves to
Munich to start studying biology and philosophy, and there her
older brother Hans, is now a medical student at the
same university, and he had already begun to actively question
the system, along with some of his friends, including Christophe Probst,

(35:00):
Alexander Chemoral, Willie Graff, and their psychology and philosophy professor
Kurt huber So. While serving on the Eastern Front, the
group of boys had learned firsthand about the crimes committed
in Poland and Russia, and they had witnessed the violence
with their own eyes, including witnessing the murder of Jewish

(35:20):
civilians by SS troops and the mass graves they were
buried in. And that same year, Sophie's father was sent
to prison after he was overheard calling Hitler quote the
scourge of humanity. So knowing that open descent wasn't an option,
in June nineteen forty two, they began printing and distributing

(35:40):
an anonymous leaflet in and around Munich called the White Rose.
And they don't know for sure, but it might be
based on the fact that there was a flower on
the front of the leaflet. It called upon their fellow
students and the German public to act against the Nazi regime,
which it dangerous in and of itself, and just comp
the same yeah the essays inside it said that it

(36:03):
was time for Germans to rise up and resist the
tyranny of their own government. And at the bottom of
the essay they asked that the public make as many
copies of the leaflet as possible and distribute them. And
their paper and ink were rationed at the time, so
even asking German public to do that was just an
active defiance in itself. It was the first time that

(36:24):
internal dissent against the Nazi regime had surfaced in Germany, so,
not wanting to stay passive anymore, and finding out about
her brother's involvement in the movement, Sophie joins. So At
first they only sent pamphlets via mail. They would get
random addresses through the phone book and just send out thousands,

(36:44):
and they also sent them to professors, booksellers and authors.
The members of the White Rose advocated nonviolent resistance. However,
they advocated sabotage of Hitler's war machine and gave clear
advice in their pamphlets on how to take steps to
do so. So good yeah, one quote is sabotage in
armament plants and war industries. Sabotage at all gatherings, rallies,

(37:09):
public ceremonies and organizations of the National Socialist Party. More
essays were written and leaflets covertly distributed. Also, they started
to use graffiti to spread their word and it started
appearing on the streets and buildings all over Munich reading
down with Hitler, Hitler the mass murderer and Freedom. So

(37:30):
as a woman, Sophie was able to play a key
role in the distribution of pamphlets because as a female,
she was less likely to be randomly stopped and searched
by the SS than her male members of the White Rose,
which is really cool and brave. In the end, the
group were able to distribute thousands of leaflets, reaching households
all over Germany, and despite the Gestapo's best efforts, it

(37:53):
was enabled to catch the perpetrators and they had got
out six pamphlets by the time their luck ran out.
So on February eighteenth, nineteen forty three, as Sophie and
Hans were distributing pamphlets at the University of Munich campus,
they had covertly distributed most of the flyers. They only
had a small stack left, and they went to the

(38:14):
main atrium and climbed the staircase to the top floor,
and there famously Sophie flung the last remaining leaflets into
the air. However, the drop was seen by a janitor.
He happened to be a staunch supporter of the Nazis,
and Hans and Sophie were immediately arrested by the Gestapo.

(38:36):
The draft of the seventh pamphlet was still in hans
bag and it had Christopher Probe's name on it, so
he was arrested that same day. So on February twenty second,
just four days after their arrest, their trial began. No
witnesses were called, none of the defendants were permitted to
give testimony to defend their actions. However, they freely admitted

(38:57):
to everything, but they also attempted to take response's ability
fully in order to protect fellow members of the group.
So the only statement on record belongs to Sophie, who,
regarding the group's actions, declared in court quote, somebody, after all,
had to make a start. What we wrote and said
is also believed by many others. They just don't dare

(39:18):
express themselves as we did. In the middle of the trial,
their father, Robert Schull, forced way into the courtroom, saying
that he was there to defend his children. He was seized,
he was forcibly removed, but the entire courtroom heard him
shout quote, one day there will be another kind of justice.

(39:39):
One day they will go down in history. The judge
declared the three defendants guilty of treason obviously it was
bullshit trial, and that they would be sentenced to death
by guillotine, which is to take place immediately that same day.
The guards allowed Hans and Sophie to have one last
visit with their parents. According to writer Rich Hanser, who

(40:01):
was a psychological warfare specialist in Europe during World War Two,
Sophie told her parents, quote, what we did will cause
waves really quick. Can I tell you she's twenty one
years old at this time.

Speaker 3 (40:13):
Whoa I know. So it's hard to listen to the
It's like, I'm not riffing with you or whatever, because this,
first of all, this parallels the movie Jojo Rabbit so
much that I almost feel like Taiko a Titi or
whoever I think he wrote it must have known this story.

(40:35):
Absolutely must have, yeah, because it's so similar. But the
idea that you could do anything when the Nazi regime
is in power, I mean, it was so out of control.
It's just like the fact that they did anything is
horrifyingly scary. Yeah, like having that piece of paper in
your hand, even if you didn't weren't the one that
printed it or wrote it.

Speaker 2 (40:56):
Definitely so. In Munich Stadleheim prison, both Hans and Christian
Probes were beheaded, and it said right before his death,
Han shouted long live freedom. One observer described that Sophie
walked to her death, quote without turning a hair, without flinching.
And then they said that her expression was described as

(41:17):
quote clear, and her smile was fresh and unforced, with
something in it that her parents read as triumph. And
at just twenty one years old, Sophie Schul was then beheaded.
After their execution, the Gestapo tracked down and tried and
executed other members of White Rose, including Alex Schmorrol who

(41:39):
was twenty five, Willie Graff who was twenty five, Kurt Huber,
the teacher, who was forty nine, and other students who
participated were either executed or sent to concentration camps. Can
youadine being so afraid of twenty year olds that you
have to send them away or behead them. It's just
says so much more about them than the.

Speaker 3 (42:00):
It's what they were doing to every single person, except
for literally like the person that was standing next to
them wearing the SS uniform.

Speaker 2 (42:07):
It's what they did to everybody. It's insane. So after
their deaths, the copy of the sixth pamphlet was smuggled
out of Germany and delivered to the Allies. It was
retitled The Manifesto of the Students of Munich and Allied
forces dropped millions of copies. Whoa uh huh, and they
spread their words and do you know what year that

(42:29):
It just says after they were put to death, and
that was done in nineteen forty three, so and the
war ended in forty five, so somewhere between there. After
the war, verdicts like those against the Shoals were overturned,
and Germany now considers the White Rose members to be heroes.
And in fact, today there's a square at the University

(42:50):
of Munich that is named after Hans and Sophie Schuhl,
and I know in their streets, squares and schools all
over Germany named in honor of the members of the
White Rose. In total, there were only six leaflets ever
published and distributed by Hans and Sophie schul and their friends.
Four were under the title the White Rose and two

(43:11):
were titled Leaflets of the Resistance. Prison officials later remarked
on Sophie's courage as she walked to her execution. It
said her last words were, quote, such a fine sunny day,
and I have to go. But what does my death
matter if through us thousands of people are awakened and
stirred to action, and that is the story of Sophie

(43:35):
schul and the White Rose. Wow. And there's a couple
of books that you can pick up about it. And
you know, there's many documentaries and books. There's one called
the White Rose, there's one called a Noble Treason, and
one called an Honorable Defeat. There's so much more information
that we had about resistance groups and just so much
to learn from them. Yeah, it makes me makes me proud.

Speaker 3 (44:00):
Yeah it should. It's incredible. And also it's a beautiful
symbol of how small gestures actually can be very big. Yeah,
especially in a situation like that. Yeah, and bravery matters.
Bravery matters, and anyone can yeah do these little gestures.

(44:22):
Are you ready for a survival story?

Speaker 2 (44:24):
Oh? Always and forever.

Speaker 4 (44:26):
Right.

Speaker 3 (44:27):
This is a story that actually j found for me
on the website at liss Obscura, which I love and.

Speaker 2 (44:35):
We use lots on.

Speaker 3 (44:36):
This show because they don't only do lists of amazing,
interesting places that you can go to around the world,
but there's often very cool stories attached to them, and
so this was one of them, and it was it
was on their website recently. So thank you at lis

(44:57):
Obscura for all you do for all of us. If
you've never used that website, get over there because it's amazing.
There's also but I also, Jay is the one who
did the research. He also used Wikipedia, a website called
Litsitelaska dot org, and there's information from the book written
by Jennifer Niven called Ada Blackjack at True Story of

(45:20):
Survival in the Arctic.

Speaker 2 (45:22):
So we'll start here.

Speaker 3 (45:25):
When twenty three year old Anupiate woman, Ada Blackjack agreed
to join a nineteen twenty one Arctic expedition to a remote,
icy island just north of Siberia, she was skeptical. She
was told the four explorers making up the rest of
her crew would be able to hunt enough food to
sustain them for the two year trip, and she was

(45:45):
there to cook and sew clothes out of the hides
and furs leftover from that hunting. But one year into
the trip, things go so terribly wrong that now she's
facing isolation, starvation, and death possibly bipolar bear.

Speaker 2 (46:03):
So let me give you.

Speaker 3 (46:04):
A little background first. Ada Blackjack is born Ada de
Lutuk on May tenth, eighteen ninety eight, in the small
Annupiate settlement of Spruce Creek, Alaska.

Speaker 2 (46:17):
The next closest town is a.

Speaker 3 (46:18):
Little village called Solomon, which is eight miles southwest of
Spruce Creek, and Ada is born the same year at
the Alaskan gold rush begins, so a few thousand gold
seeking settlers move into Solomon. The village developed significantly, and
by nineteen oh four it's grown into a town with
a few saloons, a post office, a phone service, and

(46:41):
a boat that takes daily journeys to the nearest city,
which is Nome, Alaska. So in nineteen oh six, when
Ada is she's only eight years old and she has
about they think either three or four sisters. Her father
gets gravely ill after eating like bad meat, and her

(47:03):
mother's away on a trip, so it leaves her and
her sisters to deal with this emergency by themselves. They
don't have the resources necessary to help him in Spruce
Creek or even in Solomon, so they decide to wrap
up their father in skins to keep them warm, put
them on a dog sled, and try to make it
the thirty mile trip to the hospital that's in Nome.

(47:26):
But before they can get there, Ada's father dies, and
with nothing left to do, the girls have to turn
around and bring their father's body back home.

Speaker 2 (47:36):
Ay.

Speaker 3 (47:37):
So not long after that, in nineteen thirteen, the thriving
village of Solomon is hit by terrible onslaught of coastal storms.
There's winds up to sixty miles an hour, there's waves
forty feet high, and many of the town's resources are
wiped out entirely, including the railroad tracks. And then just
five years later, a flu epidemic sweeps the area, wiping

(47:58):
out even more people, so Solomon's population dwindles from roughly
a thousand people down to just three hundred living in
Solomon and Spruce Creek combined.

Speaker 2 (48:10):
Wow.

Speaker 3 (48:11):
And then just before the flu epidemic, AIDA's mom decides
that she's going to send her to live with Methodist
missionaries in Nome so that she can get an education.
So there she's taught to read and write English up
to a third grade level. She learns basic math. She's
also taught practical household tasks like sewing, cooking, cooking, Methodist

(48:36):
style washing clothes, ironing, basic home ec stuff. And of
course she's taught the Bible because they're missionaries. So even
though her education is useful and practical for growing up
in Nome, she's away from her family, she's cut off
from her culture, and she basically loses her cultural identity

(48:58):
in the process of this education. So she remains in
the city of Nome and she gets part time work
sewing clothes for local miners, and people know her to
be a sweet woman who has a real love for fashion,
and she likes to buy nice clothes. You know that
she can afford with her meager wages, but she's very

(49:19):
shy in private, but those who she does open up
to find her very charming. And she's also very small,
she's just under five feet tall. So in nineteen fourteen,
when she's just sixteen years old, she marries a hunter
and a dog musher named Jack Blackjack. They move out
of the city to a remote part of Seward Peninsula,

(49:41):
and they have three kids, but only one survives past infancy,
a little boy that they named Bennett. But this is
not a loving household. Jack is an abusive husband. He
routinely beats and starves Ada until he finally deserts his
wife and his son just before her twenty third birthday
in nineteen twenty one.

Speaker 2 (50:00):
Oh my god, So she's.

Speaker 3 (50:03):
Finally free from an abusive husband, but Ada is left
with nothing. She's completely broke and she has nowhere else
to go. So she takes her five year old child
and she walks the forty miles to Nome to go
back to her mother's house.

Speaker 2 (50:19):
But Bennett is sick.

Speaker 3 (50:21):
He has tuberculosis and he can't walk for very long,
so Ada carries him.

Speaker 2 (50:27):
For most of that journey. Wow.

Speaker 3 (50:29):
And once she gets back to Nome, she finds work
sewing and cleaning, but it isn't enough to take care
of herself, her mother, and her sick son together, especially
because of his illness, And then she has to make
the heartbreaking decision to take Bennett to an orphanage so
that they can take care of him and tend his tuberculosis,
which he just can't do. She knows that's what's best

(50:52):
for him, but she also knows that she has to
find a way to make money soon so she can
bring her son back home. And that's when she hears
around town that there's a crew of explorers looking for
a native woman to cook and sew for them on
an upcoming expedition, and they're paying well. So Ada is
determined to get this job. So let me tell you

(51:14):
a little bit about these explorers. Okay, during the late
eighteen hundreds and into the nineteen twenties, rural America is
swept with a popular trend called Chautauqua traveling shows, and
basically they were like a traveling circus, except for these
crews would go from town to town, set up big tents,

(51:34):
charge towns people a small fee, and then the attractions
were teachers, musicians, preachers, showmen, scientists, and it was basically
with the goal of bringing the arts, culture and education
to America's most remote communities. And one such a speaker
on the Chautaqua circuit is a charismatic Icelandic American explorer

(51:58):
named Ville hallamer Stephenson. So this guy dazzles his audience
with his tales about venturing by sea to the Arctic
wilds and hunting and surviving in the harsh, desolate landscapes,
and people love him. He draws huge crowds and he
inspires young boys everywhere to follow his adventures. And one

(52:21):
such boy is a boy named Fred Mauer of Ohio
who always had a strong yearning for adventure to the
point where he, when he's eighteen years old, joins the
crew of a ship and Shortly after that, in nineteen
oh six, Stephenson he visits this ship that's Fred's working
on as a guest, and the two meet and they

(52:44):
start a friendship. So Stephenson is convinced that there's an
entire undiscovered continent further north and he wants to be
the one to find it, So in nineteen twelve, he
recruits Fred as a crew member for his nineteen thirteen
Canadian Arctic expedition, a boarder ship called the Carluck. But
what was supposed to be a journey to discover new

(53:06):
lands up north aboard the Carluck becomes a nightmare when
the ship gets trapped in an ice floe just one
month after setting sail. And if that's not bad enough,
Stephenson abandons his crew and makes his way to the
Alaskan mainland by foot across the ice.

Speaker 2 (53:25):
Well.

Speaker 3 (53:26):
Everyone else is left to fend for themselves on the
harsh Wrangel Island.

Speaker 2 (53:32):
Which is just north of Siberia. Goodbye. Isn't that like
a huge no no when you're captaining anything to fucking
later day your entire crew?

Speaker 3 (53:42):
I mean, any gel who's seen Titanic knows you got
to go down with that ship when you're the captain
and this guy bailed and yeah left everybody. In fact,
out of the twenty five crew members, eleven of them
die on this island. Fred Maher is one of these survivors.
So he actually got to the island and then ended

(54:04):
up living. He's incredibly disillusioned, he's sick and starving, and
he goes back home to Ohio to recover.

Speaker 2 (54:11):
Now, the.

Speaker 3 (54:15):
Remaining crew members and the Canadian government all assumed that
Stephenson is dead because he just walked off onto the
ice in a way.

Speaker 2 (54:24):
He's getting cigarettes. He was just gonna grab something.

Speaker 3 (54:27):
Yeah right, I'll be right back, brb guys. Two years later,
another ship's crew spot Stephenson on the icy beach of
Cape Kellett, Canada. So's he just found a spot and
just started living there. He'd been living in the Arctic
on his own the whole time, and upon his rescue,

(54:48):
he tells crew member Lorne Knight, who will return later,
it's just as easy to live up here as it
is down home, if you know how. Lauren eventually ends
up joining Stephenson's crew as well.

Speaker 2 (55:00):
So clearly he was very charismatic and smooth talker.

Speaker 3 (55:06):
Okay, so Fred Maher, the guy that goes to Ohio
that lived through the abandoned abandonment. When he gets back
to full health, he forgets all about that because he
just wants to go be an explorer and an adventure again.
So he goes meets back up with Stephenson on the

(55:27):
Shataqua circuit and he becomes his opening act. In nineteen twenty,
Stephenson is called away from his Chattaqua show, so he
has Lorne Knight take his place, and so Knight and
Fred Maher becomes fast friends. And then a third young man,
nineteen year old Milton Harvey Gaale, joined Stephenson's team as

(55:49):
the show projectionist. So now he has like this little
band of employees that think he's the greatest and follow
him around and hang on his every word. Yeah, even
though Stephenson never set foot on Wrangel Island himself, that's
just where the crew ended up, it becomes this huge
point of interest for him and basically he's decided that

(56:13):
he wants to claim it for England.

Speaker 2 (56:17):
Okay, So.

Speaker 3 (56:20):
Basically the six months that his mostly Canadian shipwrecked crew
spent on the island was the longest anyone had ever
inhabited it, but he thinks that's his reason that he
should be able to lay claim to it.

Speaker 2 (56:31):
He just needs to get back to it and like
claim it man.

Speaker 3 (56:35):
He believes the island has a lot of potential to
be an air base for people traveling from North America
to northeastern Europe, and even though neither Canada nor Britain
have any interest in it, Stephanson talks about wanting to
go to Wrangle, and his three young employees are all
completely down to join him. The problem is that, given

(56:57):
his prior shipwreck with the Calik, Canada does not want
to fund this trip, and realizing that no one in
his current crew is British or Canadian, which is the
way he thinks he's going to get money from Canada,
he recruits a Canadian student.

Speaker 2 (57:14):
In March nineteen twenty one.

Speaker 3 (57:16):
He sends a Universe a letter to the University of
Toronto asking for a suitable student to join their ranks,
and they send twenty year old Alan Rudyard Crawford, who
hasn't graduated, doesn't have any experience, but is very smart
as an excellent student, and he really wants to be
an explorer, so that's fine.

Speaker 2 (57:35):
For Stefan. Do you think everyone hated him and they
was just like take old, what's his face over there?

Speaker 3 (57:40):
I mean it would be a good way. It would
be like, oh, a two year Arctic exploration. You know who,
you know who has to go, you know who's really smart. Unfortunately,
his idea of pulling in a Canadian to get Canadian
money that doesn't work. He can't Stephenson can't get government funding,

(58:01):
but he is dead set on getting there, so he
pays for the whole trip himself, and he figures once
the island is claimed, Canada or Britain will pay him
for it. So in the summer of nineteen twenty one,
Stephenson and his crew hash out the plan. They're going
to meet up in Nome and they're going to set
sail for Wrangel Island from no Alaska. Because of his

(58:24):
status as a Canadian citizen, Crawford, the twenty year old,
is named the captain of the show. Oooh no, experience
doesn't know anything about it, but that's just so a
Canadian is involved in Canada will give him money, have
a big old. But it's yeah, it's not a great
plan for Arctic exploration. I don't think I'm not an expert,

(58:47):
but it's only a name because Louren Knight is the
one with actual sailing experience. Annie's also almost thirty, so
he'll really be this ship's captain. The most shocking piece
of information that I found reading this story is that
Stephenson will not actually.

Speaker 2 (59:05):
Be joining them.

Speaker 3 (59:06):
He's not going to go on the trip. He's just
sending the boys. He makes so much money off of
his books and off of the speeches on the Chakola
Circuit that he decides he doesn't need to.

Speaker 2 (59:17):
Go on anymore expeditions, so he just sends ass whole
other people for real. It's he's the worst.

Speaker 3 (59:26):
Stephenson advises the group that they only need to bring
six months worth of food and supplies with them because
they'll just be able to live off the land for their.

Speaker 2 (59:35):
Two years stay there.

Speaker 3 (59:36):
He's never been to this island, but that's uh, that's
his advice. He just says that they need native women
who they can hire, who can sew for like snow
outfits for them so that they'll stay warm in the wintertime.
It's very specific, basically, like use the whole animal. When

(01:00:02):
you hunt, you eat, and then you take their furs
and pelts and skins, and you make clothes for yourself
and you'll be fine. So it's late summer of nineteen
twenty one, and this is when twenty three year old
Ada Blackjack hears that the crew is hiring a seamstress.
And she also hears they're paying fifty dollars a month.

(01:00:23):
This is far more than she's been making. It's a
huge chance to make a big chunk of money and
go get her son out of the orphanage. She jumps
at the opportunity. The crew immediately likes her. It's a
huge plus that she can speak and write and read English,
so they hire her. They give her money to purchase supplies,
and they ask her to report to the docs on

(01:00:43):
September ninth, nineteen twenty one, as will the rest of
the seamstresses that they have hired. But when Ada arrives
on September ninth, she notices none of the other women
have shown up really and that doesn't sit well with her,
so she tries to back out, but the expedition team
convinces her to stay. They tell her that the boat,

(01:01:03):
which is called the Silver Wave, is going to stop
at a settlement on the way that's like north of Nome,
that's going to pick up some other seamstresses. She's still skeptical,
but she does not want to break her promise, and
it's a rare chance to make such a large sum
of money that she might normally not have, so she

(01:01:24):
agrees to go. So the crew consists of Alan Crawford
who's twenty. That's the Canadian student, Lorne Knight who's twenty eight.
He's going to be the captain, Fred Maher he's the first,
he's the original, he's already been through this before and
he's going back for more. And then Milton Gale who's nineteen,
and Ada who's twenty three, and a cat named Victoria

(01:01:47):
really huh oh yeah, it's an old sailor tradition.

Speaker 2 (01:01:53):
It's good luck to have a cat on board. Oh
and also probably catches mice vermin.

Speaker 3 (01:01:58):
Yep, then the vermin don't get into your snacks.

Speaker 4 (01:02:03):
Right.

Speaker 2 (01:02:04):
It's a Tom and Jerry cartoon essentially, right.

Speaker 3 (01:02:07):
They set sail that day, September ninth, nineteen twenty one.
So everyone in Nome told these guys the waters are
too rough and icy and they will not make it
to the island.

Speaker 2 (01:02:17):
But they're like, no, no, we're fine, and.

Speaker 3 (01:02:19):
Six days later they do arrive there. So Wrangel Island
sits about eighty seven miles north of the coast of Siberia,
so it's way up there. It's ninety three miles long
and fifty miles wide. In their first year on the island,
the crew acclimates nicely, so they start they start out

(01:02:40):
living in a tent, but then they build themselves a
snowhouse that's really sturdy, and the men's days are spent
venturing around the island, setting up photography equipment, taking photos
of the land to document their findings. The men, of
course also hunt, and then Ada takes all of the
pelts and the skins and so's clothing for them out

(01:03:03):
of the leftover furs and hides. Any concerns about whether
or not there'd be enough animal life on the island
to sustain them disappear quickly. They survive mostly on the
food rations that they brought, and then in the spring
of nineteen twenty two, the men are able to hunt
over thirty seals, ten polar bears, and a bunch of

(01:03:27):
geese and ducks. Wow, which is kind of disturbing and
upsetting to think about that panting, but it was It
had to happen for their survival so that they could
have this island.

Speaker 2 (01:03:40):
How do you even kill a polar bear? That seems impossible.
I guess like you killus.

Speaker 3 (01:03:46):
You wrestle it to the ground and then you strangle
it with your hands. Still the main may the best
man or bear win? Nope, they have big guns. So
everyone in this team keeps a journal during their stay,
and Ada's entries are simple and benign, at first, describing

(01:04:08):
how they first got to Wrangle island, how it looked
very large to her, but then she was told it
was just a very small island, which it was. But
as the summer of nineteen twenty two comes to an
end and the weather turns colder, the availability of fresh
meat starts to decline, and Stephenson, who's back home with

(01:04:31):
his feet up by the fire, he promised to send
another ship called the Teddy Bear to drop off more
supplies by the summer's end, So the crew rates patiently
for that delivery, but the ice is grown too thick
in the water surrounding the island, and the Teddy Bear
is forced to turn back without dropping off supplies. So

(01:04:53):
now as winter approaches, the crew is left to fend
for themselves, and by January of nineteen twenty three, they're starving.
To make matters worse, as the winter progresses, the typically
strong you know, captain alpha male type Night gets scurvy,

(01:05:13):
but he's determined to still be of use, so he
insists that he should try to cross the ice to
Siberia to go get help, and so he grabs Crawford
and they set out on January eighth, Only they're only
gone two weeks and then Night scurvy forces them to
turn around and come back. Oh so, now it's the

(01:05:34):
end of January. The crew situation is dire, and with
no other choice Crawford, Mauer, and Gayale they all decide
to venture to Siberia themselves for help, and they leave
Ada to care for Lorne Night with scurvy until they.

Speaker 2 (01:05:51):
Can return with rescuers. Wow.

Speaker 3 (01:05:54):
So now she's alone on the island with the sick
guy and she talks about the crew's plan and her
journal and she basically says they promised that they would
come back after they got to know him with a ship,
and if they couldn't get there with a ship, they
would come over with a dog team next winter. They

(01:06:16):
left with a team of five dogs and a big
sled of supplies.

Speaker 2 (01:06:21):
But even if the men make the.

Speaker 3 (01:06:22):
Trip successfully, a year's wait is a very long time
for Aida and Lauren to fend for themselves, especially because
Lauren is too sick to do anything at all. He
can only be he's basically being catered to. And Aida,
who if she had grown up with her family and
in her village, she would have actually had a bunch
of skills that would have been really helpful, but they

(01:06:45):
basically had been taught out of her by the missionaries.
So February nineteen twenty three, Lorn Night is bed ridden.
He's covered in bed sores. Ada has to learn how
to hunt and trap on her own while tending to
a sick and bitter man, soothing his bed sores with
bags of warm sand by his feet and pillows stuffed

(01:07:05):
with oatmeal. But his Knight's illness gets worse, so does
his treatment of Aida. He's angry at himself for being useless,
so he takes it out on her, constantly berating her
for the tiniest things. He tells her she isn't doing
a good enough job taking care of him, even though
she's learning how to do difficult tasks with no formal training,

(01:07:26):
and the highest stakes possible their survival. So she's keeping
them fed, she's going out there and hunting, she's doing
all the work. She's tending to him, and he's criticizing her.
Of course, Ada writes in her journal that night quote
never stops to think how much it's hard for women
to take four men's places. She's cleaning out his bedpan,

(01:07:49):
and he's criticizing her.

Speaker 2 (01:07:50):
Fuck you.

Speaker 3 (01:07:52):
So five months, for five months, Ada's persistence, her nursing,
her hunting, and her cooking.

Speaker 2 (01:07:58):
Skills keep the two of them going.

Speaker 3 (01:08:00):
Until June of nineteen twenty three, of full five months
since the other three crew members left for Siberia. Then,
on June twenty third, nineteen twenty three, Lorne Knight finally
passes away. Ada marks the date in her journal. He
died on June twenty third. I don't know what time
he died anyway, I write the date just to let

(01:08:20):
mister Stephenson know what month he died and on what date.

Speaker 2 (01:08:26):
So she's unable to move his body.

Speaker 3 (01:08:29):
So there's a dead body in their snowhouse and she
can't move it. She's too small and he's too big, obviously,
so she leaves him in his sleeping bag, and she
builds a wall of boxes around him to prevent wild
animals from getting to the body. And then she takes
all her stuff and moves from the snowhouse to the

(01:08:49):
supply tent and she lives there basically to get away
from a So now she's kind of has a tiny
bit easier because she doesn't have to tend to like
an angry sick man. But she is now completely alone
and isolated on this tiny island in the dead of

(01:09:11):
winter with no food. But one thought keeps her going,
which is the thought of being reunited with her son.
Her drive to hold him in her arms again and
ignites a flame within her, and she is determined to survive,
but the odds are stacked against her because did I
mention that there are polar bears on the island?

Speaker 2 (01:09:33):
So I forgot about those guys.

Speaker 3 (01:09:36):
They're real good smellers, real big teeth. Loves some meat,
love fresh meat. So Ada keeps a gun and ammunition
close to her bed at all times. She has a
couple close calls, and she later recounts an occasion where
she was hunting seals and she accidentally comes too close
to a polar bear cub, and so the mama bear

(01:09:59):
goes on the tech and Ada says, I turned and
ran just as hard as I could until I got
to my tent. I was just about ready to faint
when I got there too, So she.

Speaker 2 (01:10:09):
Outran a polar bear. God girl.

Speaker 3 (01:10:12):
So miraculously Ada survives this winter alone. And then the
warmer the weather gets, the more animal life comes back
to the island, which means more food for her. So
by this summer, she's taught herself to set fox traps.
She's gotten good at really accurate at shooting birds. She's

(01:10:32):
even built herself a lookout above her tent so she
can stand up on it and spot polar bears as
they're coming.

Speaker 2 (01:10:39):
Wow. She keep herself safe, thriving.

Speaker 3 (01:10:43):
Yes, that's the word jay use.

Speaker 2 (01:10:47):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:10:47):
She even builds herself a little boat out of driftwood
in campus, and she takes their photography equipment huh and
that they were using to take pictures of the island,
and she takes portraits of herself around the camp. I'm
going to show you, Oh my god, Yeah, I must
show you because share.

Speaker 2 (01:11:10):
Look I want to see it, badass, she is, Yeah,
I can see it. Look at her.

Speaker 3 (01:11:15):
Honey, Wait now I think because now I'm going to
share another one.

Speaker 2 (01:11:22):
Never, I've never used to use this technology before, and
I don't know how to use it. Oh look at her.

Speaker 3 (01:11:29):
Look at the fashion she made. That that's gorgeous. And
that's her taking pictures of herself deserted on a frozen
fucking tundra trying to pass the time.

Speaker 2 (01:11:39):
That smile. Size it all. She's like, yeah, yes, that's me.
That's right. Check this code out.

Speaker 3 (01:11:47):
Amazing she made it, and the little gloves and the.

Speaker 2 (01:11:52):
She's awesome.

Speaker 4 (01:11:53):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:11:54):
Wow, you guys listening that these pictures are in the
Atlas Obscura article, So go when you go read it,
you'll see the pictures Ada took of herself to pass
the time. It's the greatest. AIDA's alone on Wrangell Island
for a full three months and she manages to thrive
without the men today.

Speaker 2 (01:12:13):
Finally, on August.

Speaker 3 (01:12:14):
Twentieth, nineteen twenty three, a schooner called the Donaldson, which
is captained by one of Stephenson's colleagues, a man named
Harold Noise. Noise noise, Oice Oice, It makes its way
to the island and they rescue Ada. She survived for

(01:12:35):
two years in the Arctic wilderness, and eventually she will
learn that she is the five person crew's only survivor.
So the three that went to get help all die whoa,
and the crew of the Donaldson is astonished by her
survival skills. One crew member later says that Ada quote
mastered her environment so far that it seems likely she

(01:12:59):
could have lived there another year, although the isolation would
have been a dreadful experience. So when she finally arrives
back in Nome, of course there's a flurry of attention,
all the locals and there's media. Stephenson issues her payment,
which is of course a lot by her standards, because
it's two years at fifty bucks a month, so that's awesome,

(01:13:21):
but she still gets less than she was promised, so
he short shrifts her. This sob after all that, and
I wrote, it's too bad they didn't have Twitter back then.
She could have just taken right to see. But Ada
doesn't care about any of the attention. She doesn't like
any of the attention, and she doesn't even complain about

(01:13:43):
getting stiffed because she just wants to get her son
Bennett back. With money in hand, she heads straight for
the orphanage and she finally gets to hold her son again.

Speaker 2 (01:13:52):
She takes into a.

Speaker 3 (01:13:53):
Hospital down at Seattle that's better equipped to treat his TV,
and while he's never cured of the illness entirely, the
treatment in Seattle allows him to recover and grow.

Speaker 2 (01:14:03):
Into adulthood amazing.

Speaker 3 (01:14:06):
Meanwhile, Stephenson does what he does best, which is he
capitalizes on Ada's survival story very typical, exploiting it for
his own personal gain. He brags to the papers about
how he hand picked her for his crew, while Captain
Noise asserts himself as the real hero for finding and
rescuing her from the island. Great guys, good job, everybody,

(01:14:30):
good job all around.

Speaker 2 (01:14:31):
Great.

Speaker 3 (01:14:32):
Did you get your credit? Did you get your credit?
Does it feel good or does it not feel good? Well,
that's your work to do. Later, Ada, still shy and
not wanting the attention, agrees to very few interviews, but
during one of the rare ones, a reporter calls her brave,
and she replies, brave.

Speaker 2 (01:14:50):
I don't know about that, but I would never give
up Pope. While I'm still alive.

Speaker 3 (01:14:55):
The paper's dub Ada the female Robinson Crusoe popular book
at the time racist book. While the others criticize her
for not taking better care of Night, she actually gets
criticized for not keeping him alive.

Speaker 2 (01:15:10):
Youw There are people who.

Speaker 3 (01:15:12):
Claim that she could have done more to save him,
but her journal entries make it clear he was very
ungrateful and that she did everything she could.

Speaker 2 (01:15:20):
To help him.

Speaker 3 (01:15:22):
Despite the popularity of the story, Ada receives no further
compensation for her troubles beyond her regular pay for the
trip and of the various newspaper articles, stories, and books
that were written about her or cite her at the time,
she gets no compensation, doesn't no one throws her money
at all, and she basically remains poor.

Speaker 2 (01:15:44):
For the rest of her life.

Speaker 3 (01:15:46):
But she does go on to live a long life,
and after she reunites with her son Bennett, she marries
another man by the last name Johnson, and they have
a child together, her second son, Billy black Jack Johnson,
and they raise the boys together in Seward. Eventually, she
divorces her second husband and again she's left with nothing,

(01:16:08):
so again she's forced to take her boys to an
orphanage until she's back on our feet again. She works
and saves up money. She gets her boys back and
they all move to Nome, where she gets a job
hurting reindeer for money. And then she also uses the
skills that she learned on Wrangele Island to hunt and

(01:16:29):
trap her own food and feed her family.

Speaker 2 (01:16:31):
That's so cool.

Speaker 3 (01:16:32):
Her son, Billy, who grows up healthy, eventually moves out
on his own, but Ada continues caring for Bennett until
nineteen seventy two, when he dies of a stroke at
age fifty eight.

Speaker 2 (01:16:44):
About a decade.

Speaker 3 (01:16:45):
Later, on May twenty ninth, nineteen eighty three, Ada herself
passes away in a state retirement home called the Pioneer
Home in Palmer, Alaska. She's buried in Anchorage in a
grave beside her son Bennett, and her family remembers her fondly.
Before passing away himself. On June twenty second, two thousand
and three, at age seventy eight, Ada's second son, Billy

(01:17:05):
Blackjack Johnson, said this about his mother quote, I consider
my mother Ada Blackjack to be one of the most
loving mothers in this world and one of the greatest
heroines in the history of Arctic exploration. She survived against
all odds.

Speaker 2 (01:17:20):
It's a wonderful.

Speaker 3 (01:17:21):
Story that should not be lost of her self discovery
and her cultural reawakening. And it's a story of a
mother fighting to survive, to live so she could carry
on with her son Bennett and help him fight the
illness that was consuming him. She succeeded and I was
born later. Her story of survival and the Arctic will
be a great chapter in the history of the Arctic

(01:17:42):
and Alaska. Time is running out, and soon this chapter
will fade away unless we care enough to make a
record of it. That was from litzite Alaska dot org
that quote, and that is the amazing survival story of
Ada Blackjack, one of the greatest heroines of our Arctic exploration.

Speaker 2 (01:18:01):
Oh my god, Aida Aida too did it? That's too
bad ass strong women in this episode. Great China. I'm
looking really nice the photo right now, I've hearts up
on the screenstone. She's just the most badass looking woman
I've ever seen, and I'm in awe.

Speaker 3 (01:18:24):
I'm just going to really quickly rewrite the end of
that story where Stephenson gives her the money she deserves
for staying alive and handling shit, and then she gets
to start her own line of clothes, oh, because she
was already doing it and clearly, like you know what.

Speaker 2 (01:18:40):
I mean, like she made that fucking coat. I would
wear that immediately. It's so cute and it's functional of course,
and gets you know, number one on the New York
Times bestseller list and the top of Amazon.

Speaker 3 (01:18:54):
Well true, except it was pretty much like I shot
a fox.

Speaker 5 (01:18:58):
I think it was real standard fair sounds to me,
just literally the details.

Speaker 2 (01:19:03):
Of the day, nothing but the credit. I think.

Speaker 3 (01:19:06):
I do love the idea that she does deserve the credit.
She deserves to be on the bestseller list, just for
just for handling polar bears.

Speaker 2 (01:19:15):
Yeah, how about the bestseller Life, the number one bestseller
of Life, number one? Ada got great job, great job,
thank you, And all right, that was a good one.

Speaker 3 (01:19:29):
Got it done?

Speaker 2 (01:19:30):
Did it? We did it three and a half hours
long this time. Next don't worry. Next week we'll go
four hours just for the hell of it.

Speaker 3 (01:19:38):
Was that your new podcast on your new podcast, my
new podcast called four hours of silence, four hours of
sacred pausing.

Speaker 2 (01:19:48):
Yeah, well, let's ass this monumental day.

Speaker 3 (01:19:57):
Earlier this week, we got very good news here in
America because Derek Chauvan actually got prosecuted for murder in
the death of George Floyd. He murdered him in the
street and he's actually he was found guilty by the jury.

(01:20:20):
The thing that I was reading that I think was
the most kind of that was affecting me the most
on social media was people saying, everyone's talking about that
this is this, you know, defining moment in America, when actually,
this is what's supposed to happen when you kill somebody. Yep,
it's it's standard. It should happen every time.

Speaker 2 (01:20:39):
It's a human being being being held accountable for their
actions against another human being, and that's all that's been
asked time and time again for a very long time. Yeah,
it's very good. I almost started crying when I saw it.
I got chills. I was really hopeful for it. But
of course we're all really scared that it wasn't going

(01:20:59):
to turn out this way, and.

Speaker 3 (01:21:03):
You know, yeah, there's there's good reason to be scared,
but yeah, just some just justice actually took place. Definitely,
I don't know, I don't even know why we're saying it,
but we're not going to not talk about it. We
can't not talk about it. Also, there's no way to
encapsulate any of this in a SoundBite way.

Speaker 2 (01:21:23):
Right, So and yeah, exactly, all right, Well I think
that's our fucking array obviously. Yeah, it's a cute.

Speaker 3 (01:21:31):
I mean, ultimately we're both sighing and we're very worried
about how we're stating this, but ultimately this is forward movement.

Speaker 2 (01:21:40):
It's not enough, but it's good. It is good. Yeah,
it's very good. Definitely. Well, yeah, thank you guys for
listening and being here and giving us a little platform
to talk our shit, And thank you Steven Ray Morris
are an incredible audio engineer for supporting us for five
frickin years and stay sexy and don't get murdered. Good Bye, Elvis.

(01:22:07):
Do you want a cookie?

Speaker 5 (01:22:08):
M