Speaker 1: You're listening to American Shadows, a production of iHeartRadio and
Speaker 1: Grimm and Mild from Aaron Manky.
Speaker 2: In October of eighteen ninety three, it became clear to
Speaker 2: the readers of the National Police Gazette, a popular men's magazine,
Speaker 2: that America was facing a scourge that challenged the decency
Speaker 2: and the physical well being of Americans. It had been
Speaker 2: introduced in the country almost a decade earlier, and had
Speaker 2: been a plague on women's health and happiness ever since.
Speaker 2: The object of everyone's displeasure the bicycle. That October, the
Speaker 2: men who read the Gazette were confronted by the scandless
Speaker 2: image of aspiring model Angeline Allen riding a bike in
Speaker 2: a stylish bicycle suit. While her jaunt cap, long sleeved
Speaker 2: fitted coat and kneelength bloomers might look conservative to us,
Speaker 2: it was downright and decent in the eyes of many
Speaker 2: Gilded Age Americans. Alan wasn't the first woman to draw
Speaker 2: the ire of the press for riding a bike. The
Speaker 2: bicycle craze that swept the nation was shocking, and everyone
Speaker 2: had an opinion. The bicycle was invented in eighteen seventeen
Speaker 2: and was originally called a swift walker, it had no
Speaker 2: petals and was made of wood with two large wheels
Speaker 2: trimmed with iron rims and leather tires. Though it was
Speaker 2: unwieldy to ride, the invention caught on and it didn't
Speaker 2: take long for people to make improvements. More women joined
Speaker 2: in the merriment in the eighteen eighties thanks to the
Speaker 2: development of the safety bicycle, which had equal sized wheels
Speaker 2: and tires that inflated. For women, the bicycle was a
Speaker 2: vehicle of freedom as well as fun. It allowed them
Speaker 2: a new kind of mobility that never had before, which
Speaker 2: threatened the status quo. The arguments against women bicycling fell
Speaker 2: into two main camps, the moral and the medical. Morally speaking,
Speaker 2: the needed to ride a bicycle was indecent by nineteenth
Speaker 2: century standards. The bicycle suit resembled Alan's bloomers and blouse ensemble,
Speaker 2: and the split legs were seen as sillacious and masculine.
Speaker 2: Organizations like the Women's Rescue League of Boston disparaged female bicyclists,
Speaker 2: claiming the city's sex workers used them to look for
Speaker 2: clients and show off their figures. In Chicago, one man
Speaker 2: would hide in parks and whip women who were peacefully
Speaker 2: cycling in their suits. Aside from the potential for the
Speaker 2: bicycle to lead young women into moral peril, medical professionals
Speaker 2: worried it was too much of a strain on women's health.
Speaker 2: They emphasized a new condition known as bicycle face as
Speaker 2: evidence for their claims. A bicycle face was as sort
Speaker 2: of grimace. Women's faces apparently took on when they were
Speaker 2: exerting themselves, with flushed cheeks, bags under their eyes, and
Speaker 2: an overall look of exhaustion. Bicycling was in short making
Speaker 2: women ugly. Also claimed that there were other potential ailments,
Speaker 2: like the bicycle hump of bicycle wrists, bicycle gums, and
Speaker 2: the bicycle hand, which was a condition that formed because
Speaker 2: women's hands were so much weaker than men's and they
Speaker 2: couldn't handle the eye hand coordination. Though some women voiced
Speaker 2: their own opinions about the bicycle, many of them positive,
Speaker 2: male journalists continued to harp on the dangers of cycling
Speaker 2: for the fairer sex from their lofty newspaper columns and
Speaker 2: medical journals. It would take a spectacular feat and a
Speaker 2: courageous woman to challenge the moralists and the medical men
Speaker 2: and subvert the gender roles that the world plung to
Speaker 2: so closely. I'm lorn vogelbum Welcome to American Shadows. The
Speaker 2: Massachusetts State House sits glittering golden on Beacon Hill, at
Speaker 2: the top of a slope running along the Boston Common.
Speaker 2: On June twenty fifth of eighteen ninety four, a crowd
Speaker 2: of about five hundred gathered to watch a spectacle. But
Speaker 2: it wasn't a parade or a speech they were looking for.
Speaker 2: It was a small woman in long skirts standing next
Speaker 2: to a bicycle. She was known as Annie Londonderry, and
Speaker 2: she had a bet to win. A decade earlier, in
Speaker 2: eighteen eighty four, a British man named Thomas Stevens cycled
Speaker 2: around the world, and in eighteen eighty nine Nellie Bly
Speaker 2: went around the world in seventy two days via the
Speaker 2: traditional travel methods, beating the fictional record, But due to
Speaker 2: financial constraints and the general attitude toward the fair sex
Speaker 2: on bikes, no woman had tried to repeat Stephen's trip
Speaker 2: until Annie. Admittedly she was an unlikely candidate. Her real
Speaker 2: name was Annie Kopschowski, a twenty four year old Jewish immigrant.
Speaker 2: Her family had moved to Boston when she was a child,
Speaker 2: and she grew up in the West End along with
Speaker 2: immigrants from all over Europe, at least a quarter of
Speaker 2: whom were Jewish. Though many of Europe's Jewish pop relation
Speaker 2: had immigrated to America in the eighteen hundreds to escape
Speaker 2: pogroms and discrimination, they didn't find a warm welcome here.
Speaker 2: Anti Semitism was on the rise across the nation, including
Speaker 2: in Boston, so Jewish families stuck together in neighborhoods like
Speaker 2: the West End. Tenement housing dominated the skyline, and the
Speaker 2: buildings were connected by thin laundry lines strung clothes flapping
Speaker 2: in the breeze if anyone could look up. That is.
Speaker 2: The streets were paphazardly paved with disjointed cobblestones, and you
Speaker 2: were more than likely to turn your ankle if you
Speaker 2: weren't paying attention. Annie's whole life was in the West End.
Speaker 2: Her husband, Max Kopchowski, was a devout Orthodox Jew who
Speaker 2: worked as a peddler to help support the family, but
Speaker 2: spent most of his time in prayer to keep from
Speaker 2: sliding further into poverty. Annie got a job going door
Speaker 2: to door selling advertisements in local newspapers, developing a charming
Speaker 2: demeanor and excellent sales skills. Annie was a go getter
Speaker 2: and willing to do whatever it took to make a
Speaker 2: name for herself and support her family, which is how
Speaker 2: she came to be a part of the convoluted wager
Speaker 2: that would send her from pillar to post. According to
Speaker 2: one story, it was a bet between two wealthy Bostonians
Speaker 2: that a woman couldn't cycle around the world. The terms
Speaker 2: were simple. Annie would cycle around the world in fifteen
Speaker 2: months or less and return with five thousand dollars that
Speaker 2: she earned on the road. She wasn't allowed to accept charity.
Speaker 2: If she won, she would receive ten thousand dollars, and
Speaker 2: if she lost, she'd get nothing. That morning in June,
Speaker 2: the gathered crowd likely sized Annie up and wondered how
Speaker 2: she would pull off such a feat. None of them
Speaker 2: knew that Annie had never ridden a bicycle aside from
Speaker 2: three lessons before that day at the courthouse. Standing at
Speaker 2: five foot three inches and about one hundred pounds, Annie
Speaker 2: would have to pilot a forty two pound Columbia bicycle
Speaker 2: around the world. The bike was part of several advertisements
Speaker 2: she was using to fund her trip, she would be
Speaker 2: showcasing the name brand bike and had paper advertisements pinned
Speaker 2: to her front and back. Even her new surname, Londonderry,
Speaker 2: was part of a new Hampshire Water Company promotion, though
Speaker 2: some theorized she changed it to avoid rampant anti semitism.
Speaker 2: The twenty fifth was her official start date, but Annie
Speaker 2: didn't leave Boston until the twenty seventh, and was seen
Speaker 2: off by a small crowd that didn't include her family.
Speaker 2: Her husband and children adored her, so it must have
Speaker 2: been devastating for them to lose her for over a year. Instead,
Speaker 2: a close friend and a handful of newspapermen were there
Speaker 2: to record annie send off, armed with a pistol, a
Speaker 2: change of clothes, and the money she'd received from advertisers.
Speaker 2: Annie was off like a kite, as one paper put it,
Speaker 2: Although her brother was the reporter and might have been biased,
Speaker 2: the Boston Post's description of her wobbling down Beacon Street
Speaker 2: was probably more accurate. Bumping, jolting and peddling for her life.
Speaker 2: Annie was starting a journey that could change perceptions of
Speaker 2: women forever, and her first stop, the Big Apple. Anyone
Speaker 2: who's ridden a bicycle competitively or otherwise knows that weight matters,
Speaker 2: and so as Annie trundled along unpaved roads toward New
Speaker 2: York City by way of Providence, Rhode Island, she had
Speaker 2: to account for every extra pound of baggage on top
Speaker 2: of that forty two pound bike. In addition to her
Speaker 2: lack of experience, this meant it was slow going. She
Speaker 2: managed to make it to New York by July second,
Speaker 2: with plans to leave for Washington, d C. In a
Speaker 2: few days. All of this was put on hold for
Speaker 2: nearly a month so Annie could make more money. She
Speaker 2: was nothing if not practical, and newspaper articles showed how
Speaker 2: she had shed her original plans and her wardrobe when
Speaker 2: the need arose. Her bicycling skills had improved, and as
Speaker 2: she left New York on July twenty eighth with a
Speaker 2: new itinerary, she donned a new skirt suit with bloomers underneath. Scandalously,
Speaker 2: she didn't wear a corset and could easily lift her
Speaker 2: skirt and pitnant away from the petals. July twenty eighth
Speaker 2: was one of the hottest days on record in New York,
Speaker 2: reaching ninety eight degrees, and in the middle of the
Speaker 2: city it was likely hotter still. Despite the heat, though
Speaker 2: weight of her bike and endless hills, Annie made good
Speaker 2: time to Buffalo. There she recovered before cycling along Lake
Speaker 2: Eurie and made her way to Chicago, arriving on September
Speaker 2: twenty fourth. Annie was scarcely recognizable by the time she
Speaker 2: had reached Chicago. She traded in her original Columbia bicycle
Speaker 2: for a lighter Sterling bike, which was half the weight.
Speaker 2: The bike and accompanying banners were another advertising scheme to
Speaker 2: help keep her afloat. Annie was seen off from City
Speaker 2: Hall on October fourteenth of eighteen ninety four, riding out
Speaker 2: of Chicago much more smoothly than she had in Boston.
Speaker 2: She was joined along the way by packs of bicyclists,
Speaker 2: predominantly men, but some women too. In fact, the Lady
Speaker 2: Cyclist Club of Chicago escorted her for a portion of
Speaker 2: her trip. Annie's original plan was to continue west to
Speaker 2: San Francisco and from there to Asia and Europe. However,
Speaker 2: it was only growing colder. Annie was getting faster on
Speaker 2: her bike, but cycling through the winter on the Great
Speaker 2: Plains was a dismal prospect, so she turned around and
Speaker 2: headed back to New York. She sold nick knacks and
Speaker 2: lectured along the way to make money and earn bed
Speaker 2: and board. Whenever she stopped, the newspapers commented on her progress,
Speaker 2: and when she returned to Buffalo, she decided she'd trade
Speaker 2: in her bloomers for a man's cycling suit. She likely
Speaker 2: cut a dashing figure, but the moralists were horrified at
Speaker 2: the shocking site. Annie didn't care. She wore that outfit
Speaker 2: for the rest of the trip, slowly chipping away at
Speaker 2: the public's perceptions of femininity. Annie made it back to
Speaker 2: New York City and in November of eighteen ninety four
Speaker 2: ordered a steamer set for l' of France. It's unclear
Speaker 2: whether the French had heard about her wager, but she
Speaker 2: hardly got a warm welcome. Her bike was impounded and
Speaker 2: her money was confiscated. A Luckily, a friend from the
Speaker 2: passage stepped in and Annie, the bike, and her possessions
Speaker 2: were sent to Paris, arriving on December fourth to a
Speaker 2: raucous perception. The people were fascinated, but the press was vicious.
Speaker 2: The papers mercilessly picked at Annie, commenting on her sacrificing
Speaker 2: her womanhood and becoming sexless. Fate worse than death for
Speaker 2: a woman, or so they believed. They hounded her choice
Speaker 2: of dress, her masculinity, and her americanness. Still, any press
Speaker 2: seemed to be good press because the public didn't care.
Speaker 2: Annie received plenty of advertising opportunities, and, like in the States,
Speaker 2: cycling clubs joined her throughout her ride. She was never alone. Still,
Speaker 2: it was a difficult trip between the snow drifts and
Speaker 2: the mud. Annie struggled through the French countryside and injured
Speaker 2: her achilles tendon before she hit Marseilles. She had to
Speaker 2: paddle with only one foot. She stayed for five days
Speaker 2: in Marseille to recover and earn enough for a steamer
Speaker 2: passage through the Suez Canal. While on board, she made
Speaker 2: short stops in Alexandria, Jerusalem, Port Said and Yemen. To
Speaker 2: honor the terms of the bet and keep her injury
Speaker 2: from getting worse, Annie took other forms of transportation to
Speaker 2: these places and then rode her bike through the city gates.
Speaker 2: The press continued their non stop bullying, but Annie set
Speaker 2: her sights on Asia. She had no idea what lay
Speaker 2: ahead for her, not until she set foot in Singapore. Though,
Speaker 2: nothing could have been worse than Annie's disastrous arrival in France.
Speaker 2: Singapore wasn't much better. A newspapers mocked her, bet, her suit,
Speaker 2: and her posture, saying she was addicted either to a
Speaker 2: sewing machine or a bicycle. To them, she was both
Speaker 2: sexless and overly sexual, which was a tough needle to thread.
Speaker 2: She wasn't in Singapore long, heading to Sri Lanka, Saigon,
Speaker 2: and Hong Kong before making her way to Shanghai. Saigon
Speaker 2: specifically seemed to find Annie fascinating, and someone even wrote
Speaker 2: a poem to celebrate her endeavor. To them, she was radiant,
Speaker 2: bold and audacious, which was a far cry from how
Speaker 2: most of the press had portrayed her during her journey.
Speaker 2: While most of the world might not have changed their opinions,
Speaker 2: Annie was making an impact. Unfortunately, much of her trip
Speaker 2: through China, Korea, and Japan wouldn't be so pleasant. The
Speaker 2: First Sino Japanese War began on August first of eighteen
Speaker 2: ninety four. It would last nearly a year. The Qing
Speaker 2: Dynasty of China and the Meiji Empire of Japan were
Speaker 2: fighting over control of Korea. Japan's decisive victory sent shockwaves
Speaker 2: through the area and signaled to the international community that
Speaker 2: the Qing dynasty may be failing, but a new empire
Speaker 2: was on the world. Annie arrived in the area when
Speaker 2: the war was really getting off the ground, and later
Speaker 2: gave interviews and lectures about what she had seen. Much
Speaker 2: of it was colored by Western anti Asian sentiments. Annie
Speaker 2: claimed that when she was in Nagasaki she had met
Speaker 2: two journalists who would cover the battles happening in Port
Speaker 2: Arthur and Way Highway. She joined them still on her
Speaker 2: bicycle while they rode horses, and although they might not
Speaker 2: have been allowed on the front lines, they could still
Speaker 2: see the horrors of war. In a later interview, Annie
Speaker 2: claimed that after the battle at Way Highway, she and
Speaker 2: her guide fell into a frozen river and Chinese troops
Speaker 2: began shooting at them in the water. They escaped, but
Speaker 2: Annie was shot in the shoulder and had to be treated.
Speaker 2: As they fled the area, the pair were captured by
Speaker 2: Japanese soldiers and held him sell for three days. Annie
Speaker 2: said that she watched her guide die because of his
Speaker 2: injuries and saw a Chinese prisoner executed right in front
Speaker 2: of her. She said she wasn't allowed out until a
Speaker 2: French consul sent troops for her. She left the war
Speaker 2: behind and boarded a ship to San Francisco on March
Speaker 2: twenty fifth of eighteen ninety five. By the time she
Speaker 2: had landed, she was already a symbol of everything a
Speaker 2: woman could accomplish and a model for female independence and liberation,
Speaker 2: and she still had half a continent across. She stayed
Speaker 2: in San Francisco for two and a half weeks before
Speaker 2: setting off across the west for Chicago. While most of
Speaker 2: what she had faced up until that point hadn't been easy,
Speaker 2: this last leg of her journey was the most excruciating.
Speaker 2: Annie said she was held up at gunpoint by two
Speaker 2: highwaymen on the California border, and while she managed to
Speaker 2: get away, the experience was traumatizing and disaster struck again
Speaker 2: literally when a runaway team of horses trampled her in
Speaker 2: a companion cyclist. Annie was black and blue all over,
Speaker 2: but completed twenty two miles of her journey that day
Speaker 2: she had a lecture to give. While cycling across the
Speaker 2: Great American Desert, one of Annie's wheels broke and she
Speaker 2: was forced to walk nearly sixty miles to the nearest town,
Speaker 2: dragging her bike along the way.
Speaker 1: So it could be fixed.
Speaker 2: Oh once she was off again, she received warm welcomes
Speaker 2: throughout Arizona and New Mexico, though as ever the newspapers
Speaker 2: were stand offish at best. Then a large herd of
Speaker 2: pigs in Iowa caused her to crash and forced her
Speaker 2: to cycle to the nearest doctor eighteen miles away with
Speaker 2: a broken arm, and unfortunately it was set wrong and
Speaker 2: later had to be rebroken to heal properly. Annie rolled
Speaker 2: into Chicago on Thursday, September twelfth of eighteen ninety five,
Speaker 2: just fourteen days under her deadline. Her arm was still
Speaker 2: broken and she was sore, but she had done something
Speaker 2: no one thought was possible. A lone woman had cycled
Speaker 2: around the world at a time when most Americans thought
Speaker 2: lifting a hair brush might be too strenuous. She had
Speaker 2: seen deserts, prairies, and mountains and conquered them all. Or
Speaker 2: had she around the world is such a loose turn
Speaker 2: of phrase. When we think of going all around the world,
Speaker 2: we probably think of something more all encompassing than Annie's trip.
Speaker 2: Annie collected her ten thousand dollars prize in Chicago and
Speaker 2: returned home to Boston in September, where she wrote an
Speaker 2: account of her now world famous ride. Most of the
Speaker 2: accounts about Annie and her ride came from Annie herself,
Speaker 2: via her articles and lectures, which were then popularized by
Speaker 2: journalists who loved the wild story she told, and therein
Speaker 2: lies the problem. Annie's story is inconsistent at best. Her
Speaker 2: French adventure is shrouded in obscurity. She frequently stated that
Speaker 2: she had been to certain places, but there was no
Speaker 2: evidence to support her claim other than her own word.
Speaker 2: Annie's lectures, especially those surrounding the First Sino Japanese War,
Speaker 2: were rife with racism and hyperbole. Annie probably never saw
Speaker 2: anyone get tortured or executed. She likely didn't have to
Speaker 2: be rescued by a company of frenchmen because no one
Speaker 2: would have let her near the front lines to begin with.
Speaker 2: Even the wild stories of her time in the American
Speaker 2: West more closely resembled a dime novel than reality. It's
Speaker 2: difficult to know what was real and what's fiction when
Speaker 2: stories about Annie's adventures solely came from her. The Singapore
Speaker 2: Straight Times might have put it best when they remarked,
Speaker 2: we fancy she exaggerates in reference to Annie's claim that
Speaker 2: fifty thousand people saw her off from Marseilles. Even her
Speaker 2: official biographer, her great grand nephew, Peter Jutelin, admits that
Speaker 2: the information we have about Annie is elusive at best.
Speaker 2: We don't even know if there was a wager that
Speaker 2: sent Annie on this quest, where the money that she
Speaker 2: claimed came from, or anything in between. The fact is
Speaker 2: Annie's an unreliable narrator and she built her own story,
Speaker 2: using the media to spread it. Despite this deceit, it
Speaker 2: doesn't seem to be a case of wilful dishonesty. Its
Speaker 2: American myth making. At its finest. America thrives on our
Speaker 2: folk heroes, and what could be more American than a
Speaker 2: woman who had never ridden a bicycle before and challenging
Speaker 2: the standards of her day and accomplishing something incredible. Annie
Speaker 2: completely subverted gender roles in the eighteen hundreds and proved
Speaker 2: the moralists and the medical men wrong. The women weren't
Speaker 2: fragile creatures who needed to be coddled every step of
Speaker 2: their lives. They could take on harrowing journeys and come
Speaker 2: out the other side stronger for it. Annie gave women
Speaker 2: across the nation a glimpse of the changes they were
Speaker 2: clamoring for socially, politically, and athletically. She tackled the stigmas
Speaker 2: associated with being born female and flouted them publicly. Because
Speaker 2: of women like Annie, the bicycle became a means of
Speaker 2: freedom for women in a whole new way, and more
Speaker 2: women began to seize opportunities that were once considered out
Speaker 2: of reach. So the questions that were left with are simple.
Speaker 2: Does the end justify the means? Does it matter that
Speaker 2: Annie might have lied about parts of her journey and
Speaker 2: used the media to do it. Everyone will have their opinions,
Speaker 2: but it seems that the answer is right in front
Speaker 2: of us. Just look outside on a sunny day and
Speaker 2: watch the people of all kinds passing by. There's more
Speaker 2: to this story. Stick around after this brief sponsor break
Speaker 2: to hear all about it. It's hard to imagine a
Speaker 2: more apt entry to the world for the Great Sanduena
Speaker 2: than in the back of a circus wagon. That may
Speaker 2: be a tall tail, but Katie Brumback, born in eighteen
Speaker 2: eighty four in Vienna, came by her profession honestly, as
Speaker 2: both her parents were circus performers, and she happily followed
Speaker 2: them into the business. She was a strong child and
Speaker 2: began performing early, practicing handstands balanced on her father's steady
Speaker 2: hands at just two years old. By the time she
Speaker 2: was a teenager, she was part of her father's act
Speaker 2: and traveled Europe with him, astounding crowds as they took
Speaker 2: in the latest in a long line of strong men.
Speaker 2: Her father was very proud of her skills and her strength,
Speaker 2: even reworking the act to show her off. When she
Speaker 2: was sixteen, her father stepped in front of a crowd
Speaker 2: to offer one hundred marks to any man who managed
Speaker 2: to pin her to the mat. According to the stories,
Speaker 2: no one ever collected, but one challenger managed to win
Speaker 2: a very different prize. A cocky young man named Max
Speaker 2: Hayman age nineteen stepped up to wrestle Katie. He later recalled,
Speaker 2: she tossed him high in the air with no effort,
Speaker 2: and the next thing he knew, he was flat on
Speaker 2: his back with a pretty girl looking down at him.
Speaker 2: There was nothing left for him to do, but professor
Speaker 2: is love right then and there, and the two decided
Speaker 2: to marry, and Max became Katie's manager. A Max adored
Speaker 2: his wife and they happily spent time tucked in each
Speaker 2: other's arms, or maybe he and hers. Katie was six
Speaker 2: feet tall and two hundred and ten pounds, while Max
Speaker 2: was five ten and about one hundred and sixty Neither
Speaker 2: seemed to mind the size difference. Katie said it would
Speaker 2: make their children stronger. She even folded him into her
Speaker 2: act literally and figuratively a by cheerfully tossing him around
Speaker 2: like she'd done the night they first met. In the
Speaker 2: early twentieth century, the couple came to America to try
Speaker 2: new territory, and in nineteen oh two, Katie stepped up
Speaker 2: to challenge one of the greatest strong men of the day,
Speaker 2: a man named Sandow. The crowd watched in awe as
Speaker 2: Katie hefted a three hundred pound barbell over her head
Speaker 2: while Sandow struggled to bring it chest high. From then on,
Speaker 2: Katie was known as the Great Sanduena, the strongest woman
Speaker 2: in the world. She headlined on the audeville circuit, and
Speaker 2: the couple had their son, Teddy Roosevelt Sanduina while on
Speaker 2: tour in nineteen oh six, They allegedly telegrammed President Roosevelt
Speaker 2: himself for permission to name their son after him. Performing
Speaker 2: while pregnant was no problem for Katie. On the day
Speaker 2: their son was born, she had already done two shows
Speaker 2: in Sioux City, Iowa, uplifting a group of circus performers
Speaker 2: with a combined weight of three hundred and forty six pounds.
Speaker 2: By nineteen eleven, Katy was headlining for the Ringling Brothers
Speaker 2: and Bartam and Bailey combined shows, one of the most
Speaker 2: famous circuses to ever exist. Katy was the unquestionable star,
Speaker 2: but no one reaches those heights alone. The circus brought
Speaker 2: on Cake Carew, a writer and artist, to act as
Speaker 2: Katie's pr staff and cultivate her celebrity status further. Carew
Speaker 2: was tasked with drawing cartoons and writing reviews of Katie's
Speaker 2: performances that would appeal to the public and pull them
Speaker 2: to her shows. Carew could have played on perceptions of
Speaker 2: athletic women as masculine or sexless. Look at how the
Speaker 2: press treated any Londonderry, but instead she dragged them to
Speaker 2: a new point of view. Katy wasn't just strong, she
Speaker 2: was graceful, beautiful, and talented. Her measurements perfectly matched what
Speaker 2: was considered scientific perfection. She was the Samson like Venus.
Speaker 2: Katie was a goddess to any who beheld her, and
Speaker 2: the public couldn't get enough praise of everything, from Katie's looks,
Speaker 2: to her act to her domesticity flooded the newspapers, and
Speaker 2: much like Annie a crew in, Katie knew how to
Speaker 2: make the press work for them, and the media wrote
Speaker 2: about her beauty as much as her strength, portraying her
Speaker 2: as a gentle domestic woman who happened to be able
Speaker 2: to bench press four men at once. Katie stood up
Speaker 2: for women every chance she got. As a staunch suffragist.
Speaker 2: She even boasted to the public that any anti suffragist
Speaker 2: who challenged her would be sorry. Katie performed in Europe
Speaker 2: and America until she was in her sixties, before settling
Speaker 2: down to run a bar with her husband and queen. Strangely,
Speaker 2: they've never had any trouble with rowdy patrons. The Great
Speaker 2: Sandwena passed away in January of nineteen fifty two, having
Speaker 2: lived her whole life, proving that not only could she
Speaker 2: survive a man's world, but she could do everything they
Speaker 2: did and more. American Shadows is hosted by Lauren Vogelbaum.
Speaker 2: This episode was written by Alie Stead, researched by Alex Robinson,
Speaker 2: fact checked by Jamie Vargas, and produced by Jesse Funk
Speaker 2: and Trevor Young, with executive producers Aaron Minke, Alex Williams,
Speaker 2: and Matt Frederick. To learn more about the show, visit
Speaker 2: grimminmild dot com. Four more podcasts from my Heart Radio,
Speaker 2: visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen
Speaker 2: to your favorite shows.