What'sHerName
What’sHerName puts the women back into world history. Hosts Dr. Katie Nelson and Olivia Meikle are professors-turned-podcasters (and sisters!) Weaving interviews with experts into vivid, nuanced biographies, What'sHerName women's history podcast tells the stories of fascinating women you’ve never heard of (but should have). Fascinating and funny, thought-provoking and insightful. New episodes biweekly Mondays.
Episodes
August 4, 2025 • 58 mins
135 years ago, Norwegian immigrant Thea Foss lived in a ramshackle driftwood houseboat on the coast of Tacoma Washington. Kind, capable, and hard-working, she was an anchor for hundreds more immigrants during America's Gilded Age. Thea built the largest maritime company west of the Mississippi- but more than that, she was the heart of the community. (Plus there's a boat parade, a catastrophic fire, and a truly delightful cow.)
Jo...
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July 21, 2025 • 46 mins
In the 3rd century, a mysterious queen ruled the Kingdom of Yamatai (modern-day Japan) with a wise and steady hand. Her reign lasted almost 70 years - but what can we really know about her, when her people never wrote anything down? Anthropologist Laura Miller introduces Olivia to this elusive ancient queen.
Read more about Queen Himiko's continuing "rebirth" as a powerful cultural icon in Laura Miller's fascinating articles "Sear...
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July 7, 2025 • 57 mins
What if we could reopen a primordial spiritual portal, and summon peace on earth? For Eva Palmer Sikelianos in 1920s Greece, world peace wasn't a lofty dream-- it was an achievable goal. The key, Eva believed, was ancient Greek art, returned to Delphi. She had a bold plan, and if she could pull it off, she just might save the world.
Join Katie on location at the Benaki Museum in Athens, with Maria Dimitriadou, Historical Archives...
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June 23, 2025 • 58 mins
At the dawn of the Mughal Empire, a bold and brilliant Princess outlived three Emperors, and managed to create an adventurous, wildly unexpected life for herself during one of the most tumultuous eras in history. And luckily for the rest of us - she wrote it all down!
Award-winning historian Dr. Ruby Lal returns to the podcast to introduce us to the Vagabond Princess, Gulbadan Begum.
Music for this episode provided by Farya Fa...
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June 2, 2025 • 54 mins
The Roman Republic is collapsing and everything hangs in the balance. It's a political game of kill-or-be-killed, and Fulvia did not come to play.
You've heard of Julius Caesar, Mark Antony, and Cleopatra. But have you heard of Fulvia, who was in the eye of that infamous ancient Roman storm?
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Travel with us to ITALY, to walk in Fulvia's footsteps! Our new LOST WOMEN OF ITALY Tour is open for registration!
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May 19, 2025 • 45 mins
Queen Seondeok of Silla was revered for her wisdom, her compassion, and most importantly - her ability to use nature's signs to foretell the future! And with some truly audacious international diplomacy (and a resolute refusal to bend to patriarchal bullying) she would lay the foundations for the unification of The Three Kingdoms - now known as Korea. Karen Wang Diggs, author of The Book of Awesome Asian Women, helps us uncover the...
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May 5, 2025 • 50 mins
150 years ago, Irish farmer Johanna O'Brien created a secret recipe for black pudding. Today, her sausage is beloved by Michelin-star chefs across the world (and the recipe is still secret!).
Join Katie on location with Rory Copplestone at Clonakilty Blackpudding in Cork, to hear about a penniless girl who survived the Great Famine, built a thriving farm, and in her sunset years, created one of Ireland's iconic flavors.
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April 4, 2025 • 44 mins
Nobody knows her real name. But this "Uncontested Pirate Queen of the Western Mediterranean" certainly earned her title: the Sayyida al Hurra, the Free and Independent Woman. From child refugee fleeing the Spanish Inquisition, to ruling Governor of Tetouan, to the Sultana of Morocco - Sayyida was never one to follow the path society had laid out for her.
Author Laura Sook Duncome helps us uncover the mystery of the one and only ac...
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March 21, 2025 • 57 mins
She lived through the worst century in human history: the Black Death, famine, war, death and despair. So it was all the more surprising when Julian of Norwich rose from her deathbed saying she'd received a vision from God: All shall be well. How could that be true when the whole world seems to be falling apart?
Travel with us to 14th century England, to visit famed mystic Julian of Norwich. I know it sounds crazy, she says, but...
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March 8, 2025 • 51 mins
Mary Ware Dennett was one of the most important and influential activist for women's rights, contraception, free speech and sex education in early 20th century America. So why does her nemesis Margaret Sanger get all the attention?
Returning guest Stephanie Gorton helps Olivia unravel the mystery of this fascinating, forward-thinking woman.
Music featured in this episode provided by Asher Fulero, Kevin Macleod, The Mini Vandals,...
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February 21, 2025 • 56 mins
She prevented war and death on an immense scale, in acts that could earn the Nobel Peace Prize today. But History enshrined Sisi, Empress of Austria, as a vain beauty queen. The smear campaign was personal, not political: it started with her own tyrannical mother-in-law. Can Sisi conquer her own self-doubt, and drag draconian Austria into the modern world?
Our guest is Nancy Goldstone, author of The Rebel Empresses: Elisabeth of ...
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February 8, 2025 • 58 mins
When world-famous strongman Eugen Sandow finally met his match, nobody expected it to be at the hands of an 18 year old girl. But whether it was bending metal bars, beating horses in a tug-of-war, or hefting her own husband over her head with one arm, German strongwoman Katie Sandwina would continue to shatter records (and Victorian gender norms) for another forty years. Guest Haley Shapley, author of Strong Like Her, introduces Ol...
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January 22, 2025 • 59 mins
A pirate ship jammed with treasure. The worst storm to ever hit Cape Cod. The mythical shipwreck-- 280 years later, found. Everything in this swashbuckling tale (full of impossible things that really did happen) occurred because of Maria Hallett. Did she turn witch, to curse her lover's ship, or to save it?
Join us on location at Real Pirates Museum in Salem, MA.
Music featured in this episode includes: Blow the Wind Southerly b...
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January 8, 2025 • 53 mins
How did two ordinary 18th century Anglo-Irish sisters end up gallivanting around the European continent, fraternizing with all the most radical and revolutionary minds of the Enlightenment, and becoming BFFs with a Russian Princess? Guest Dr. Alexis Wolf introduces Olivia to the astonishing lives of Katherine and Martha Wilmot.
Music for this episode provided by Amanda Setlik Wilson, Killarney, and Tatyana Kalmokova.
Learn more ab...
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December 16, 2024 • 49 mins
Travel to snowy Victorian Maine in this year's Christmas Special, as Katie reads from the memoirs of Sarah Orne Jewett. An immensely famous and beloved novelist in her day, Sarah wrote wholesome tales of the country folk of Maine, where as a child she had accompanied her physician father on his rounds.
Find a massive collection of Sarah Orne Jewett's works collected by the Sarah Orne Jewett Text Project HERE.
Our What'sHerName ...
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November 3, 2024 • 40 mins
Zeynab Pasha was one of the most influential voices during several crises of 19th century Iranian history. From the Bread Crisis to the Tobacco Protests and the lead up to Iran's Constitutional Revolution, she led the way in taking back the power of the people. She was legendary, and then she disappeared - literally and figuratively.
Author Afarin Bellisario helps us rediscover the life of this incredible woman.
Music featured i...
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October 16, 2024 • 55 mins
If you knew the recipe for an undetectable poison, would you use it? What about giving it to women with abusive husbands? Giulia Tofana's legendary poison Aqua Tofana was famed and feared in 17th-century Rome. But just how many terrible husbands can drop dead, before the Pope gets suspicious?
In this year's Halloween Special, our guests are Gaia Aloisi and Ted Blackburn, the creators of Aqua Tofana, a new electronic opera about th...
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October 5, 2024 • 57 mins
When Sigrid Schultz was offered a job as a reporter in Berlin, Germany in 1919, she had no idea how her life was about to change - or how her work would change the world.
Returning guest Pamela Toler introduces us to this indomitable woman, who was one of the first to raise the alarm about the Nazis, one of the last to leave as WWII made reporting impossible, and the first woman in history to head an American News Bureau.
Music i...
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September 18, 2024 • 56 mins
Whenever Teresa Lim asked about a striking woman she saw in old family photos, she was told 'That's Aunt Fanny; she was unfortunate.' So naturally, Teresa Lim spent years excavating Aunt Fanny's life in 1920s Singapore. It's a story of three devoted sisters, ghost husbands, working-class Chinese feminists, and sworn spinsters.
Turns out, Fanny was very fortunate indeed...until History arrived at her front door.
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September 4, 2024 • 61 mins
Throughout the 1920s, three sisters dominated the Australian film scene. The phenomenal filmmaking team of Isabel, Phyllis, and Paulette McDonagh reigned supreme as the undisputed Queens of Silent Cinema... until the talkies arrived to turn everything upside down.
Award-winning author Mandy Sayer tells Olivia all about Those Dashing McDonagh Sisters, whose lives were every bit as dramatic (and as complicated) as any Hollywood fil...
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