Speaker 1: Okay, I've got a question for you because I know
Speaker 1: this is like this would be a challenge. I was
Speaker 1: just eating one of my chocolate orange truffles delicious um,
Speaker 1: and it's I was like, man, this is really trying
Speaker 1: to save him because we got like six when we
Speaker 1: were in California. Fancy chocolates. Orange truffle one of my favorites.
Speaker 1: And you strongly dislike chocolate plus almost anything else but
Speaker 1: peanut butter, especially fruit. Yeah, well yeah, I don't like orange,
Speaker 1: I don't like mint and chocolate. But here's what I
Speaker 1: was thinking. I was like, man, this would be my
Speaker 1: scene if there was like a zombie apocalypse and I
Speaker 1: hadn't had this would be these would be my twinkies
Speaker 1: right the zombie land. I found a chocolate orange truffle
Speaker 1: and ate it. After like you know, six months of
Speaker 1: not having you know, having to eat rats and whatever
Speaker 1: canned beans I could find. Yeah, I'd be like this
Speaker 1: this is it was all about rats and beans. So
Speaker 1: if there was a zombie apocalypse and you hadn't had
Speaker 1: like human food, you know, you've been eating dog food
Speaker 1: and you know, whatever water you can scrape out of
Speaker 1: a gutter, grape out of a gutter. What a dismal
Speaker 1: future you have planned for me? But then you finally
Speaker 1: found like a chocolate orange truffle. Would it be delectable
Speaker 1: to you? Or would you be like, god, damn it,
Speaker 1: I mean it would I would be mad, like wow,
Speaker 1: this is sort of a what's that thing where they
Speaker 1: say like a gift with the left hand or something
Speaker 1: where it's not really a gift actually occurs. It's like
Speaker 1: a monkey poth thing where it's like, he'll get sort
Speaker 1: of what you want, but not really version you hate. Alright,
Speaker 1: so I don't know. I would still eat it, certainly,
Speaker 1: but I would I begrudge it for not being a
Speaker 1: delicious peanut butter confection or something with caramel perhaps, or
Speaker 1: a butter cream. Even so, you'd be acceptable to need
Speaker 1: dog food and you're still in the back of your
Speaker 1: mind going to be like, well, this could be a
Speaker 1: better chocolate than what I got. I'm a spoiled bit,
Speaker 1: all right, fair, It's good that you know yourself. I
Speaker 1: like what I like. I don't care what conditions in
Speaker 1: which brings us to today's story. Well that he said
Speaker 1: that I sound crazy, not crazy, just entitled. Okay, well
Speaker 1: enough now, well We're so glad to be back to
Speaker 1: our usual ridiculous romance show after spending all that time
Speaker 1: in the Crypti Bugs and Andy Addicts, Booky Addicts. You
Speaker 1: got possessed by those demons briefly. That was really messy
Speaker 1: around the house. Happens all the time. I gotta scrubble
Speaker 1: all those blood messages off the wall. But but we're
Speaker 1: back to straight history now. Straight history started kicking it
Speaker 1: off with a lesbian story. Well, I mean, I guess
Speaker 1: non supernatural natural historical history. Yeah, this story takes place
Speaker 1: in the eighteen eighties when two Apache warriors, Lowsen and Tadaste,
Speaker 1: came together over a struggle against US forces who were
Speaker 1: working to take their land and force them under reservations.
Speaker 1: And I do want to say right now, if you've
Speaker 1: looked at the title of the episode, it's Lowsen and Tadaste.
Speaker 1: It's not. I don't know what white person heard this
Speaker 1: woman's name and wrote it and spelled it like they did,
Speaker 1: but it's pronunciations I found are Tadaste not da Teste. Well,
Speaker 1: while sources on their actual romance are sparse, these two
Speaker 1: shared an intimate love for each other in the midst
Speaker 1: of constant war. They fought alongside some of the most
Speaker 1: renowned APACHE leaders in history, like Victoria and Geronimo, and
Speaker 1: they used their brilliant strength and special abilities to save
Speaker 1: Apache lives for decades. This one's so exciting. Let's do it,
Speaker 1: hey their French come listen well, Elia and Diana got
Speaker 1: some stories to tell. There's no matchmaking a romantic tips.
Speaker 1: It's just about ridiculous relationships, a lover, it might be
Speaker 1: any type of person at all. And abstract concept are
Speaker 1: a concrete wall. But if there's a story, were the
Speaker 1: Second Glance show Ridiculous Rolevance a production if I Heart Radio.
Speaker 1: In the mid eighteen hundreds, there were at least seven
Speaker 1: Apache bands spread across an area known as a Pachariah
Speaker 1: in a region that we now know as eastern Arizona
Speaker 1: and more or less southwest New Mexico. Now. One of
Speaker 1: these bands was called the Chehenna Apache, and they were
Speaker 1: also known as the Red Paint People because of the
Speaker 1: red band of clay paint they wore on their faces
Speaker 1: during ceremonies. This was a matriarchal culture and according to
Speaker 1: a quote on history dot Com from Joey Padilla, the
Speaker 1: medicine man from the Mescalero Apache Reservation in New Mexico. Quote,
Speaker 1: the Apaches always had a woman with them. She stood
Speaker 1: right behind the man with a knife or a gun.
Speaker 1: If the man went down, you had to deal with
Speaker 1: the woman too. Behind every great man is a woman
Speaker 1: with a knife. Bath Now ranty. A girl was born
Speaker 1: here who would become known as Lowsen. Lowson's brother was Victorio,
Speaker 1: and he would grow up to be the chief, and
Speaker 1: the two of them grew up best buds because lows
Speaker 1: In was just basically the ultimate badass. Her name means
Speaker 1: dexterous horse thief because a dexterous horse. So she would
Speaker 1: sneak into enemy camps totally undetected and like sneak back
Speaker 1: out with all their horses, which was partly a hilarious
Speaker 1: prank and partly a brilliant strategy of tactics because now
Speaker 1: we got horses and you don't know. So Lowson was
Speaker 1: a badass. She was just incredibly skilled at a bunch
Speaker 1: of different things. And she is considered by some to
Speaker 1: have been a two spirited person. In a Bustle article,
Speaker 1: Arin Wise from the g Karrea Apache says that quote
Speaker 1: too spirit is a name for people in Indigenous culture
Speaker 1: who carry the duality between the sacred feminine and sacred
Speaker 1: masculine within them, though definitions vary per indigenous nation and person. Yeah,
Speaker 1: this is interesting because I always, you know, had a
Speaker 1: had a very cursory understanding of what too spirit it was,
Speaker 1: and often compared it to non binary or gender fluid
Speaker 1: or something like that. But apparently within the different cultures
Speaker 1: it can mean a number of different things. Doesn't really
Speaker 1: have a direct translation to, uh, you know how you
Speaker 1: and I might talk about gender in our culture. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's interesting. Yeah, now wise rights quote I was told
Speaker 1: my entire life that there were no Apache women who
Speaker 1: were that way, and Encyclopedia dot Com says that female
Speaker 1: bodied two spirit status was never documented among the Apaches,
Speaker 1: but quote Losen's career parallels those of such women in
Speaker 1: other tribes. Basically, lows And just crushed gender norms, Like
Speaker 1: that's kind of what it boils down to. In the
Speaker 1: Quality of Folk, Encyclopedia of Gay Folk Life, author Mickey
Speaker 1: Weims says that Lowsen just never cared about the traditional
Speaker 1: roles of Apache women. She was tough and quote more
Speaker 1: masculine than other men. In her tribe, and when she
Speaker 1: wasn't out on a raid, she was just rough housing
Speaker 1: with the other guys and earning their respect as an athlete. Okay,
Speaker 1: all right. When she was twelve, she went through the
Speaker 1: usual puberty rights, which included a feast before her being
Speaker 1: sent into the mountains, and according to oral history, she
Speaker 1: gained supernatural powers on this journey, the ability to heal
Speaker 1: wounds and to locate enemy armies. That's pretty dope compass
Speaker 1: for your enemy, right right. And this, from what I
Speaker 1: could tell, these kinds of skills were typically more for men,
Speaker 1: Like generally you'd have medicine men more often than medicine women,
Speaker 1: And so that was another way that she was kind
Speaker 1: of shaking things up. Yeah, and she became an incredible
Speaker 1: medicine woman with this vast knowledge of the medicinal properties
Speaker 1: of plants and minerals. But she didn't just go out
Speaker 1: with her people to heal them. She was also one
Speaker 1: of the most badass warriors they had. She could ride, fight, shoot,
Speaker 1: rope and steal with the best of them, and her
Speaker 1: detection powers saved their asses time and time again. I
Speaker 1: bet it got to a point where the life I
Speaker 1: ain't going out unless low and okay, okay, I guess
Speaker 1: we're staying home tonight leftovers. How would you have at
Speaker 1: twelve years old if someone was like, okay, Diana, we're
Speaker 1: going to have a big feast and then you're going
Speaker 1: off to the mountains. You're going to go off to
Speaker 1: Stone Mountain all by yourself, and you got to take
Speaker 1: care of yourself for a week and make your way
Speaker 1: back home. How would you have done? I mean I
Speaker 1: would have been fine. I guess admitted that if I
Speaker 1: was eating rats, I would still begrudged. A dark chocolate
Speaker 1: orange truffle come in my way. That makes me think
Speaker 1: you wouldn't be fine. That's what I'm saying. You would
Speaker 1: not farewell. I think you know what I'm torn. I
Speaker 1: don't think. I think I would complain about it a lot,
Speaker 1: but I do think that I would come through. I
Speaker 1: think I would come through. I have had to take
Speaker 1: care of myself many a time in the past. So
Speaker 1: you would come back with like dirt all over you,
Speaker 1: blood war pain on your face, like you've murdered your
Speaker 1: way back home again, and you'd be like, that's sucking, sucked,
Speaker 1: and I want a latte right now. Exactlylike lows and
Speaker 1: he was probably like, that was hell a good time.
Speaker 1: Let's do it again. I feel alive. Annual trip, I
Speaker 1: would be like, I'm gonna go chill by the fire.
Speaker 1: All y'all owe me one meal. Is it someone's job
Speaker 1: in our band of people to watch Brooklyn nine a
Speaker 1: couple more times? Because I'm willing to volunteer. That is
Speaker 1: clearly my purpose. All right well. History dot Com cites
Speaker 1: Harlan Geronimo, who's the great grandson of Geronimo, as saying
Speaker 1: that quote lows In would lift her hands and walk
Speaker 1: in a circle until the veins in her arms turned
Speaker 1: dark blue, indicating the direction from which the enemy would
Speaker 1: approach now wise rights. In their article that in ceremony
Speaker 1: quote Lowsen would sing, extend her arms and turn in
Speaker 1: a circle until her palms tingled, and then that's what
Speaker 1: told her which direction the enemies were in, so whether
Speaker 1: her hands were actually changing color or not. She turned
Speaker 1: around and was like, I got a feeling there over there,
Speaker 1: and she was right often enough that, like you said,
Speaker 1: everyone was like, we gotta get lows In out here.
Speaker 1: They really respected this power that she had. She would
Speaker 1: pray to the apache's highest deity usen for guidance and
Speaker 1: once they knew where the enemies were, and she also
Speaker 1: apparently knew how far away they were. She was also
Speaker 1: a head strategist and counselor and fighter in the battles
Speaker 1: that would follow her. Brother. Chief Victorio said of her quote,
Speaker 1: lows In is as my right hand, strong as a man,
Speaker 1: braver than most, and cunning in strategy. Lows In is
Speaker 1: a shield to her people. Super cool. I do want
Speaker 1: to put out to Chief Victorio and everyone that if
Speaker 1: a woman is as strong as a man, she's as
Speaker 1: strong as a woman, because that's how strong a woman is.
Speaker 1: So it's like, you know, take the compliment, but also
Speaker 1: you know, just check check yourself. That's why I should
Speaker 1: be by weight. There's some very big women out there
Speaker 1: who could beat the ship out of a small man. Look,
Speaker 1: I know some small women out there who could beat
Speaker 1: the ship out of a large man. Quite frank you,
Speaker 1: some small, small men and women can sometimes be the
Speaker 1: scariest fighters that you'll ever be up against. You regularly
Speaker 1: physically overpower me, and I don't like him because we
Speaker 1: won't give it up. That's the thing. Like little terriers.
Speaker 1: Once the fight begins. I got a winner. I'm dead,
Speaker 1: that's it, and I got two choices. That's so. I
Speaker 1: gotta just to grab on your ankles with my teeth. Damn,
Speaker 1: I gotta watch my ankles. Yeah, watch out, yeah, right,
Speaker 1: like my teeth can handle that. After dental work, then
Speaker 1: you need to watch your ankles, your teeth, or your
Speaker 1: biggest weakness. If I can't escape you, I go for
Speaker 1: the teeth. Please, don't govern my teeth. It's already so expensive.
Speaker 1: Now not far from the Chehennay Apache. Around eighteen sixty,
Speaker 1: Tadaste was born into the choke, a un band of Apaches,
Speaker 1: and List has written about her life growing up, but
Speaker 1: she was also a warrior since youth. New Mexico. Nomad
Speaker 1: dot com says that her people remember her as a
Speaker 1: great hunter and fighter. Her chief was a guy named Coaches,
Speaker 1: and he was one of the most noted Apache leaders
Speaker 1: to resist Western intrusions in the eighteen hundred's. His name
Speaker 1: meant having the quality or strength of an oak, because
Speaker 1: he was like a big, solid, strong as hell do
Speaker 1: and now Coaches is slang for the ultimate badass and
Speaker 1: a biker gang. I had never heard this before. I
Speaker 1: had heard where it was like you heard it as
Speaker 1: like a California like yeah, something like that. Okay, coachese
Speaker 1: something like that, And I didn't know what it meant really,
Speaker 1: but I mean pretty amazing to be a slang word
Speaker 1: for the ultimate badass. Yeah, when people say, like, you're
Speaker 1: a real Diana in the future, they're just gonna mean
Speaker 1: you've got bad teeth. Wow, rude future folk. I disagree
Speaker 1: how I disapprove how you're using my name, but I
Speaker 1: guess you don't get to choose. They remember you anyway.
Speaker 1: So Coaches was dope, and Todas Stay rode with him,
Speaker 1: helping to push back settlers and soldiers who were coming
Speaker 1: over from the East. Now, Unlike Lowsen, Todas Stay put
Speaker 1: effort into her feminine appearance. She was well groomed, she
Speaker 1: dressed in feminine attire, despite her also being a great fighter.
Speaker 1: She just she liked to look good. It's like Commander Leiwaway, Remember,
Speaker 1: she was always like, let me look good? Right, did
Speaker 1: I stay like? It said that She always wore her hair,
Speaker 1: her hair down, but it was always brushed. She always
Speaker 1: just like wanted to present herself. Is very feminine, and
Speaker 1: why not right now, Losen never married or had any children,
Speaker 1: but todas Stay married young to a warrior named Ann
Speaker 1: and they had several children together. She and her husband
Speaker 1: rode together during battles, and it was said that she
Speaker 1: was a better writer than most of the men in
Speaker 1: her tribe. Tadaste was also fluent in English, and she
Speaker 1: was a skilled translator and an effective mediator with the U.
Speaker 1: S Cavalry. So we've got these two badass women out
Speaker 1: here kicking ass, taking names. But Lowsen and her brother
Speaker 1: had to deal with the US government setting up reservations
Speaker 1: and shockingly, spoiler alert, it did not go in their favor. Na,
Speaker 1: But our history with that is so cool and chill.
Speaker 1: But it did give Mosen the chance to be a
Speaker 1: bad s and eventually it led to her and Tada
Speaker 1: Stay meeting and we will hear about that right after this.
Speaker 1: Welcome back to the show, everybody. So in the US
Speaker 1: government offered Victorio and coaches both reservation land at Warm Springs,
Speaker 1: New Mexico, and Victoria was like, okay, hold up, let
Speaker 1: me just go check with my sister. My right hand
Speaker 1: and I need to confer. We don't do nothing without
Speaker 1: asking Lowson. That's right, and he went back to Lowes
Speaker 1: and he's like, hey, you know, do you think it's
Speaker 1: a good idea to take this prop you know, take
Speaker 1: this land from the government or whatever. She's basically like,
Speaker 1: I mean, no stress, but what are other choices? You know,
Speaker 1: it's kind of we're kind of David and Goliath over here, right,
Speaker 1: and we don't need to go into the whole history here.
Speaker 1: But of course the US was moving in, they were
Speaker 1: colonizing the western plains. They all saw this happening, and
Speaker 1: they were like, there, it might be best if we
Speaker 1: kind of take a deal early on rather than getting
Speaker 1: into fighting later getting killed and then getting nothing left over. Yea.
Speaker 1: And Victoria was like, okay, great point, and he goes
Speaker 1: back to the US governments, as we'll take it. Well,
Speaker 1: guess what. It did not work out so great, because
Speaker 1: soon after they moved to Warm Springs, they got moved
Speaker 1: again to a totally different reservation. In December of eighteen
Speaker 1: seventy two, President Ulysses S. Grant established the San Carlos
Speaker 1: Apache Reservation. And this place was notoriously horrible. First, the
Speaker 1: US government couldn't find anyone good to run it. They
Speaker 1: asked people and a bunch of people turned it down
Speaker 1: of over and over and over again. Also, the U.
Speaker 1: S Army there were incredibly cruel to the indigenous people
Speaker 1: that lived there. Sometimes they would torture or kill apaches
Speaker 1: just for sport. Now, politicians also in setting this reservation up,
Speaker 1: made no effort to learn the difference between the various
Speaker 1: tribes in the region and just lumped them all together.
Speaker 1: So you had some bands of Apaches that were enemies
Speaker 1: living right up against each other. And while Apaches were
Speaker 1: supposed to be fed and housed on the reservation shan,
Speaker 1: a lot of their caretakers were never even given the
Speaker 1: federal money that was set aside for them. So they're like, hey,
Speaker 1: too bad, So sad, I can't feed you. So everyone
Speaker 1: just suffered. There wasn't enough grass for livestock degrayes, there
Speaker 1: wasn't game to hunt. The water was bad, it was hot, overcrowded,
Speaker 1: and there were malaria outbreaks, which the Apache had barely
Speaker 1: experienced before that. Oh my god. So it was just
Speaker 1: an awful, terrible, horrible place. And this is where Victorio
Speaker 1: lows In and their band of Apaches were sent to
Speaker 1: live in the mid eighteen seventies. Now, without getting too
Speaker 1: deep into the history here. Victorio was a great leader
Speaker 1: and he negotiated a lot with the American and Mexican armies,
Speaker 1: so he knew this place was bullshit. He's like, this
Speaker 1: is not what we talked about. Not one time did
Speaker 1: I say malaria was yeah, you throw in some malaria,
Speaker 1: then we'll do it in the contract where I signed off.
Speaker 1: And in eight seventy six, he and lows In and
Speaker 1: their patches just got the funk out of there. They're like,
Speaker 1: you know what, We're not living here. So they packed
Speaker 1: up their ship and they just walked away, and army
Speaker 1: patrols were like, no, you can't leave, because actually you're
Speaker 1: a prisoner. So they kind of surrounded them as they
Speaker 1: moved west and forced them to another reservation near oh
Speaker 1: Kellyane in northern New Mexico. They were classified as prisoners
Speaker 1: of war, just sitting waiting for the usr ME to
Speaker 1: like decide what to do with them. Two years of
Speaker 1: uncertainty pass and rumors started circulating that they were going
Speaker 1: to be moved back to Stan Carlos, that worst reservation
Speaker 1: ever that they had left in the first place. So Victoria,
Speaker 1: of course was pissed about that. He's like, no, bitch,
Speaker 1: I said, I would not accept this. So he probably
Speaker 1: looked looked over at lows In and what was like
Speaker 1: and she gave him like a solemn little nod like
Speaker 1: Robert redfor me, like yes, let's do it. And in
Speaker 1: the autumn of eighteen seventy nine he declared war. Victorio
Speaker 1: was facing the entire might of the U. S. Army,
Speaker 1: which obviously was a lot, but the Apaches still had
Speaker 1: a few major advantages. They knew the terrain, they were
Speaker 1: more accustomed to traveling long distances without rest or food,
Speaker 1: or water, and plus, the white settlers had plenty of
Speaker 1: horses for loads and to steal. The Apaches would just
Speaker 1: ride their horses hard until they were too tired, and
Speaker 1: then they would just trade them out. They just slip
Speaker 1: into somebody's camp, steal their horses, and they would keep going.
Speaker 1: And then you know, the U. S. Army only had
Speaker 1: their regular ass horses that were still tired and they
Speaker 1: couldn't keep up. But battles were difficult and the Apaches
Speaker 1: had to constantly stay moving. Victorio did sometimes raid ranches,
Speaker 1: and he killed ranchers and miners that had settled on
Speaker 1: Apache lands, and of course, the US government inflated this
Speaker 1: and made him seem like, you know, just the butcher
Speaker 1: of the West, Like he's out there just trying to
Speaker 1: kill everyone he can get his hands right, right. But
Speaker 1: history net dot com says that while at the time
Speaker 1: the New York Times claimed that Victorio killed four hundred civilians,
Speaker 1: the real number is likely far smaller. Again, just propaganda
Speaker 1: trying to make these people look like we need, we
Speaker 1: need to go in and civilize them, you know, that
Speaker 1: was the message they were always trying to push. But
Speaker 1: between battles Lows and was out there saving everyone's asses constantly.
Speaker 1: One account from a man named James Kawaikla, who was
Speaker 1: a child at the time, said that at one point
Speaker 1: their band was pressed up against the Rio Grand with
Speaker 1: U S forces closing in. Kawakla wrote, quote, I saw
Speaker 1: a magnificent woman on a beautiful horse, Lows and sister
Speaker 1: of Victorio, and she held her rifle high over her head,
Speaker 1: and a glint of lights sparkled against her boot, and
Speaker 1: she kicked her horse into action. The horse reared and
Speaker 1: charged into the river Lows and turned him upstream, and
Speaker 1: they swam across to the other side. The rest of
Speaker 1: the women and children followed her into the raging river,
Speaker 1: and soon all of them had made it safely to
Speaker 1: the other side. Lows And told kawakeless mother to take charge,
Speaker 1: and then returned across the river to join the other
Speaker 1: warriors in battle. Awesome, so cool, so cool. She was like, listen, ladies,
Speaker 1: let's go girls. I hope she didn't say that, just kidding,
Speaker 1: but she girls, get it done. Girls kidding, but she
Speaker 1: definitely inspired them, you know, to to brave this verifying river.
Speaker 1: There can you imagine standing there at the Rio Grand River.
Speaker 1: It's like raging and surging. It's a huge as river
Speaker 1: and you're like, easily they're gonna kill us if they
Speaker 1: catch up to us, or I can cross the water
Speaker 1: work and drown in this river. And Lowson was just like,
Speaker 1: follow me. I got this. Watch Sha, how it's done.
Speaker 1: We can do If I can do it, you can
Speaker 1: do yeah. And they're like, you're way cooler than me.
Speaker 1: But I guess a lot of them are like, there's
Speaker 1: a lot of you can do that I can. In
Speaker 1: eve Ball's book In the Days of Victorio, she describes
Speaker 1: los In helping a pregnant woman in their band who
Speaker 1: was about to give birth. As the apaches pressed forward,
Speaker 1: los And stayed back and helped this woman find a
Speaker 1: hidden place in enemy territory and helped her quietly deliver
Speaker 1: the baby without getting caught. It's like the scene in
Speaker 1: the Quiet Place, Yes, except the monsters are white people,
Speaker 1: if you can imagine that? What uh? The next morning
Speaker 1: they snuck out and made for the river, just her
Speaker 1: and this woman and her one day old baby. The
Speaker 1: woman had just given birth, like sneak out around to
Speaker 1: come on. All they had on them was a blanket,
Speaker 1: Losens rifle, and Losens night. So lows In goes down
Speaker 1: to the river, starts chopping off willow shoots, and builds
Speaker 1: a little cradle for the baby. Of course, of course,
Speaker 1: like that's exactly what I would do. It's the first
Speaker 1: thing I would think of. Then she told the mom, like,
Speaker 1: hang on, I gotta brb real quick. We're running out
Speaker 1: of food. There were enemies all around them, so she
Speaker 1: couldn't risk firing her rifle to hunt. So Lowsen did
Speaker 1: what eve Ball calls quote a feat that few men
Speaker 1: would undertake. And she went out and she wrestled and
Speaker 1: killed a longhorn bull with nothing but one empty hand
Speaker 1: and a knife in the other. I mean, do you
Speaker 1: think she jumped out of the bushes just like punched
Speaker 1: him in the face. I imagine she was probably like,
Speaker 1: I'm sorry I have to do this, but I'm gonna
Speaker 1: kill you and eat you. Uh. I mean, come on,
Speaker 1: that thing is huge. See the horns on that thing.
Speaker 1: So lows In and this new mother and this newborn
Speaker 1: they had to leave the river, but neither of them
Speaker 1: had a water jug and it would be too far
Speaker 1: to go on foot without one, so Losin is probably
Speaker 1: like rolling her. I was like, okay, hang on, let
Speaker 1: me go handle this too, right, I'll go get us
Speaker 1: a horse, and she cut a bridle from the hide
Speaker 1: of the long horn, and then she gave the woman
Speaker 1: her rifle and then jumped into the river to go
Speaker 1: steal a horse from the Mexican army on the other side.
Speaker 1: Before long, she found a group of Mexican soldiers, and
Speaker 1: she waited until nightfall. She picked out a big, powerful,
Speaker 1: restless horse, snuck up to it. She tied the bridle
Speaker 1: to its snout, but when she cut the horse's hobbles,
Speaker 1: it reared up and made a loud noise, and the
Speaker 1: Mexican soldiers woke up and realized they were being robbed,
Speaker 1: but lows In jumped on the horse's back, turned its
Speaker 1: head towards the river and started riding bull It's whizzing
Speaker 1: past her. She rode the horse straight into the river,
Speaker 1: sing to safety and out of range of gunfire. By morning,
Speaker 1: the two women were miles away. Amazing, such an adventure,
Speaker 1: incredible ship. And I also feel like she's deserved some
Speaker 1: royalties from many films who have done this exact same scene.
Speaker 1: Like I was thinking immediately at the mask of Zoro
Speaker 1: when he goes and gets his the black horse that
Speaker 1: he becomes really well known for, he goes and steals
Speaker 1: it from all these like Mexican Yeah, they're not asleep,
Speaker 1: they're like partying or something, but it's the same. He's like,
Speaker 1: be quiet and he's like sneaking around. And then the
Speaker 1: horse was like they all get it. They all like
Speaker 1: the horse was like what now, he was like, okay,
Speaker 1: thank you a good horse sound effect. So Victorio is
Speaker 1: often credited as being one of the greatest apache military
Speaker 1: strategists of all time, and history net says that quote
Speaker 1: no Western American Indian chief received shabbier treatment from the U.
Speaker 1: S Government than Victorio, and no one demonstrated a greater
Speaker 1: mastery of guerilla warfare. He would hit him hard and
Speaker 1: keep moving that they had to keep when they really
Speaker 1: had no where they could stay. So if the if
Speaker 1: U S forces were ever catching up, they knew exactly
Speaker 1: where to hide. They would ambush them, or they would
Speaker 1: just position themselves in the mountains in certain ways where
Speaker 1: they were totally unreachable. Really really impressive strategic moves, but
Speaker 1: it wouldn't last forever. By eight eighty he and Losen
Speaker 1: had the US and Mexican armies both hunting them down.
Speaker 1: When Lowson dropped the mother and child off safely at
Speaker 1: a reservation, she learned then that Victorio and most of
Speaker 1: his warriors had been defeated by Mexican forces. James K.
Speaker 1: Wakeless says in eve Ball's book that he was the
Speaker 1: sole survivor of the massacre at Trace Castillos, which was
Speaker 1: Victorio's last stand. He said that after firing his last bullet,
Speaker 1: Victorio took his own life rather than surrender. History dot
Speaker 1: Com says that his death made him a martyr and
Speaker 1: the Apaches resolve was fortified. One of the great Apache
Speaker 1: leaders who stepped up afterwards was Geronimo, and Geronimo had
Speaker 1: a particular warrior running with him. Somebody was helping him
Speaker 1: fight and translating their negotiations into English. Really none other
Speaker 1: than to Daste. Oh hey girl, how you doing? Where
Speaker 1: you been? So lows and rushed back to help her
Speaker 1: surviving people escape, and soon was helping Geronimo escape from
Speaker 1: San Carlos. She was ready for vengeance for her brother's death,
Speaker 1: and she brought deadly aid to Geronimo's cause. But this
Speaker 1: is also I wish she met to Daste, and we're
Speaker 1: going to hear about their love for each other right
Speaker 1: after this. Welcome back to the show. So Geronimo and
Speaker 1: his people, including Tadaste, had been shipped off to San Carlos,
Speaker 1: the worst reservation that we talked about earlier. Losen followed
Speaker 1: her new chief, Nana, who was another renowned APACHE leader
Speaker 1: who was kicking ass well into his seventies, uh, and
Speaker 1: they went to regroup with Geronimo's forces to try and
Speaker 1: get some action going. Nana, there's a lot written about him.
Speaker 1: He was kind of a protege under Victorio even though
Speaker 1: he was older than him, and after Victoria died, everyone
Speaker 1: was kind of like, hey, Nana, you're you're taken over, right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: And he was like, all right, I guess I will
Speaker 1: and her hand right. And he had like a bad leg,
Speaker 1: and so everyone's like, this guy with a with a
Speaker 1: bum leg over seventy years old was like outwitting and
Speaker 1: out maneuvering and out fighting the U. S. Army. That
Speaker 1: was pretty awesome. Yeah. In the book The Woman in
Speaker 1: the Shaman's Body, author Barbara Tedlock calls Taste and Losin
Speaker 1: friends and lovers who worked as messengers and warriors with
Speaker 1: Geronimo's band of Apaches. Did Asta was still married to
Speaker 1: an Andia, but Tedlock writes she was bisexual, and when
Speaker 1: she met Lows and Sparks started Lion, they just had
Speaker 1: so much in common. They were both skilled writers, fighters,
Speaker 1: and strategists. They probably bonded over like talked about the
Speaker 1: sharpness of their knives or what kind of horses they
Speaker 1: like to steal best. She's like, oh my god, So
Speaker 1: this one time I had this pregnant lady and I
Speaker 1: had to like go across the river and steal a
Speaker 1: Mexican horse and then right back over and get her
Speaker 1: the hell out of there. It was crazy. Wow, gir all,
Speaker 1: that is so cool. Meanwhile, I've just been negotiating with
Speaker 1: the US government this whole time. Sounds like even scarier,
Speaker 1: I know. Seriously. On May seventeenth of eighty five, the
Speaker 1: Apaches overpowered the reserve asitions commanding Officer Britton Davis and
Speaker 1: fled the reservation once again. The Apaches had a real
Speaker 1: advantage of knowing and surviving the southwestern terrain, but U
Speaker 1: s forces under General George Crook had employed around one
Speaker 1: hundred Apache scouts who knew how to find the mountain
Speaker 1: hideouts where Geronimo and his people were trying to rest.
Speaker 1: And Geronimo, of course, is heartbroken that Apaches were siding
Speaker 1: with US forces to root him right, right, That felt
Speaker 1: like a real betrayal, real betrayal. Right, But of course
Speaker 1: Geronimo had a few secret weapons of his own, notably
Speaker 1: to Das Stay and Lowson. Geronimo was able to stay
Speaker 1: a step ahead of US forces because Losin used her
Speaker 1: special powers to know exactly where the enemy was coming from.
Speaker 1: She stretched her hands out to the sky and said
Speaker 1: a prayer poem which was translated in eve Ball's book
Speaker 1: In the Days of Victoria. So let's go down to
Speaker 1: poetry corner, and here Lozen's prayer upon this earth on
Speaker 1: which we live, us in has power. This power is
Speaker 1: mine for locating the enemy. I searched for that enemy
Speaker 1: which only us in the Great can show to me.
Speaker 1: She would turn in a circle, her palms tingled, and
Speaker 1: she knew which way to look. You Pati say that
Speaker 1: this kept Geronimo and his forces alive. And some believe
Speaker 1: that if Lozen had been with Victoria at trace Castillo's,
Speaker 1: he would not have been ambushed and defeated. I mean,
Speaker 1: they really believed in this. Again, she she was. She
Speaker 1: was right often enough that they were like this, this
Speaker 1: is some real magic. This is legit. Yeah, even if
Speaker 1: you get it wrong. Sometimes if you're right seven times
Speaker 1: out of ten, I mean, l five times out of ten,
Speaker 1: I'm pretty good, even half, I think so. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: mean that's that's a lot better than the no times
Speaker 1: I got one. I guessed I didn't find a single
Speaker 1: one of Geronimo's enemies. Or you know, there's some magic happening,
Speaker 1: or there's some magic happening that might that could be true.
Speaker 1: I'm not I'm not here to say it is speculation.
Speaker 1: Station it was magic fully. The Geronimo's forces were completely
Speaker 1: undefeated in battle, but they were tired and hungry and
Speaker 1: homesick after months of just running and fighting. Encyclopedia dot
Speaker 1: com says that apachees described Losen and Tadaste as quote
Speaker 1: regular companions at this time, and that in the nineteen thirties,
Speaker 1: Apache informants told anthropologist Morris Oppler about two unnamed women
Speaker 1: who had a sexual relationship. They are believed undoubtedly to
Speaker 1: be Lozen and Tadaste. Now. Tadaste was in her mid
Speaker 1: twenties at this time. Lowson was about twenty years older
Speaker 1: than her, but they were in separable both on and
Speaker 1: off the battlefield. They also continued their work as negotiators
Speaker 1: under Geronimo. In Marcia of eighteen eighties six, he decided
Speaker 1: it was time to negotiate a surrender. They were still undefeated,
Speaker 1: but they were exhausted. They couldn't keep running forever. He
Speaker 1: could tell the end was in sight. Better to have
Speaker 1: a say and how it will end. So let's go
Speaker 1: make a table and then get a seat at it
Speaker 1: right quick. So Lowsen and Tadaste arranged a conference with
Speaker 1: General Krook. They met in the Sierra Madre mountains just
Speaker 1: south of the US Mexico border, little neutral territory there,
Speaker 1: and they had negotiations for three days. Photographer CS Fly,
Speaker 1: who along with his wife Mary are some of the
Speaker 1: most prolific photographers of the Old West, got Geronimo to
Speaker 1: stand for about fifteen pictures during this time, and these
Speaker 1: are the only known pictures of an American Indian who
Speaker 1: was currently at war with the US. Losen and Tadaste
Speaker 1: kept negotiations going, and eventually they arranged some terms with
Speaker 1: Crook and brought those back to Geronimo. He was just
Speaker 1: south of the Mexican Board Order, and he agreed and
Speaker 1: said that he would cross the river and sign in
Speaker 1: the morning. But that night a U S soldier who
Speaker 1: sold Geronimo some whiskey told him, Hey, man, no, no, no, no,
Speaker 1: as soon as y'all crossed the US border, they're gonna
Speaker 1: kill al y'all. It's over now. Geronimo, Toda stay lows,
Speaker 1: and they all had plenty of reason to believe that
Speaker 1: the US government wouldn't keep their word, so the three
Speaker 1: of them, along with nearly forty of their followers slipped
Speaker 1: away during the night. Well that really piste off the
Speaker 1: US government Krook felt like he had failed, so he
Speaker 1: requested to be relieved of this mission to deal with
Speaker 1: Geronimo um and was eventually replaced with General Nelson Miles,
Speaker 1: who sent a huge expedition out to find them. History
Speaker 1: dot Com says they were pursued by five thousand US soldiers,
Speaker 1: which was nearly a quarter of the U. S. Standing
Speaker 1: army at the time. Can you imagine if a quarter
Speaker 1: of the U. S. Army was after you? No, I
Speaker 1: mean like you like, on one hand, I'm like, wow,
Speaker 1: I must be real special, you know. Well, and there's
Speaker 1: like forty of them. For five thousand people to catch
Speaker 1: forty of them, how badass they were though? They were
Speaker 1: like a real scary enemy army. Absolutely, Now me, I
Speaker 1: don't think I'd be a scary enemy to have to
Speaker 1: do a quarter of the U. S. Arm The teeth
Speaker 1: just go over the teeth. They sat it right here
Speaker 1: on their podcast now. For nearly five months, Losen and
Speaker 1: Tadaste helped Geronimo evade capture, but by August they were
Speaker 1: once again tired, hungry, and homesick. In September, US soldiers
Speaker 1: caught up with them in Mexico and to save the
Speaker 1: lives of his remaining people. Geronimo laid down his rifle,
Speaker 1: becoming the last American Indian leader to formally surrender to
Speaker 1: the U S military. Todaste and Lowsen once again headed
Speaker 1: up negotiations for this surrender, and they agreed that they
Speaker 1: would go into Eggsi for two years on a Florida
Speaker 1: reservation before being allowed to return to the West. But
Speaker 1: guess what this was, In the words of New Mexico
Speaker 1: nomad dot com quote a deliberate, calculated lie man. Lows
Speaker 1: And and Taaste were in the first group who was
Speaker 1: sent to Florida as a good faith gesture to the US,
Speaker 1: but there was no intention of letting them return home.
Speaker 1: After two years. They ended up in Fort Pickens in Pensacola, Florida,
Speaker 1: were Washington Post reports that quote the Apache died like
Speaker 1: flies at frost time. Meanwhile, white businessman used Geronimo as
Speaker 1: a tourist attraction, charging visitors to come see this blood
Speaker 1: thirsty Indian warrior, you know, while he's locked up in
Speaker 1: his cell. A lot of these Apaches still had children
Speaker 1: back in the reservations in Arizona, and the US government
Speaker 1: came in and was like, well, we'll go pick up
Speaker 1: your kids, and we'll send him to a school in Pennsylvania.
Speaker 1: Oh God, well, at that school, more than a third
Speaker 1: of those children died very quickly of tuberculosis. Man Yeah.
Speaker 1: Los And and Tadaste maintained their relationship while imprisoned, and
Speaker 1: during this time Tadasti divorced her husband and Nandia. But
Speaker 1: in many of the Apaches were relocated to the Mount
Speaker 1: Vernon Barracks in Alabama, and it seems this is where
Speaker 1: they were separated. Between eighteen seventy seven and eighteen eighty
Speaker 1: los And lost her brother, her homeland, most of her
Speaker 1: people while fighting with US and Mexico, and now in Alabama,
Speaker 1: she lost the woman she loved and thousands of miles
Speaker 1: from her home. She, like nearly a quarter of the
Speaker 1: Apaches at Mount Vernon, contracted tuberculosis and died in eighteen
Speaker 1: eighty nine. Didaste was moved to Fort Marion in St.
Speaker 1: Augustine and was confined as a pow there for eight
Speaker 1: more years. During this time, she survived pneumonia and tuberculosis.
Speaker 1: After these eight years, she was moved to Fort Sill, Oklahoma,
Speaker 1: along with Geronimo and many others, and she remained a
Speaker 1: prisoner there for another nineteen years. Although these prisoners, some
Speaker 1: of them were offered some land. Um that kind of
Speaker 1: it was more like the reservation where they like weren't
Speaker 1: allowed to leave, but they kind of lived a little
Speaker 1: with a little more freedom, if you can call that freedom. Um.
Speaker 1: After these nineteen years were up in nineteen nineteen, she
Speaker 1: was offered the choice to either stay in Fort Sill
Speaker 1: and be given land to live there, or returned to
Speaker 1: the West, and she chose the West at the Muscalero
Speaker 1: Apache Reservation in New Mexico. And there she remarried an
Speaker 1: Apache scout named Cooney. And it said that she never
Speaker 1: spoke English again understandable. I cannot blame her. Yeah, And
Speaker 1: though she did live well into the modern era, she
Speaker 1: wore only traditional Apache clothing. She passed away in nineteen
Speaker 1: fifty five, over ninety years old. She was interviewed by
Speaker 1: Eve Ball before her death, and Eve wrote quote Taste
Speaker 1: to the end of her life, mourned Losen. Mickey Weems
Speaker 1: says that biographies on Losin and Tadaste are sparse in
Speaker 1: their details and tend to downplay their affection for each other,
Speaker 1: not an unusual things. The best friends they were regular compaions.
Speaker 1: There's one remaining photograph of Losen and Tadaste sitting together,
Speaker 1: but biographical sources tend to even cut that picture in
Speaker 1: half and portray them separately. But the evidence is clear
Speaker 1: that these two loved each other very much. Mickey says
Speaker 1: that their resemblance, to a quote lesbian butch fem relationship
Speaker 1: has elevated the couple to iconic status in the two
Speaker 1: spirit community who have reintegrated. The visual and biographical image
Speaker 1: is of Losin and Todaste, so that they are once
Speaker 1: again reunited. It is nice. Yeah, it's really fascinating the
Speaker 1: way this, uh, their story has kind of been recaptured
Speaker 1: and being told again more seemingly more accurately now. And
Speaker 1: if you want more information about these two, Eve Ball's
Speaker 1: book In the Days of Victorio is really fascinating. Um.
Speaker 1: She talks to her and a lot of people from
Speaker 1: this era and there are just some really deep stories there. Um.
Speaker 1: And then Aaron Wise says on that Bustle article that
Speaker 1: you can check out Seating Sovereignty dot org to learn
Speaker 1: more about two spirit warriors from history and support the
Speaker 1: work that they're doing. So I thought those are really
Speaker 1: really interesting sources. Um, you know, haven't spoken to these people,
Speaker 1: but but I love their work, um, and there's some
Speaker 1: really fascinating history here. It took some effort to try
Speaker 1: and just stick to toda stay in Losin story because
Speaker 1: if you get into what was Victorio's war is what
Speaker 1: it was called after they left the reservation, and he
Speaker 1: was just like, I've had it, look into it because
Speaker 1: it's a really fascinating history. UM. A lot about Geronimo
Speaker 1: as well, who of course was his own sort of
Speaker 1: figure in history. Geronimo, I read, was really popularized by
Speaker 1: uh Us propagandists as a figure, and that's kind of
Speaker 1: why we know him so well. But I was reading that,
Speaker 1: you know, Victorio and Nana were actually better generals um,
Speaker 1: and kind of had more of an impact on the
Speaker 1: Apache back in the day than even Geronimo did. Um.
Speaker 1: Geronimo was just kind of the last one, um, but
Speaker 1: still just fascinating history. Funny who they pick to decide
Speaker 1: to put into the zeit guys sometimes, well they had him,
Speaker 1: you know, he was a prisoner because you could go
Speaker 1: see him, so they held a big story around him
Speaker 1: so that you would want to go see him and
Speaker 1: pay a little quarter or whatever, and he, you know,
Speaker 1: he continued to negotiate and work with the US. He
Speaker 1: marched in, uh, Theodore Roosevelt's inauguration. Geronimo was there kind
Speaker 1: of you know, he tried to be the symbol of like,
Speaker 1: can we just stop killing each other and get along
Speaker 1: a little bit here? Um, you know, to an arguable
Speaker 1: degree of success. But but he was out there trying.
Speaker 1: I mean, there are still Native Americans today, so I
Speaker 1: suppose that is a good thing that he managed to
Speaker 1: not have a total genocide of free tribe, which could
Speaker 1: be easily could have been the outcome. And it is
Speaker 1: really upsetting that it's like the only concessions were ever
Speaker 1: made by them in the US government to make any
Speaker 1: concession about ship. Every time they said they did, it
Speaker 1: was a blatant lie. And they were just like, let
Speaker 1: me put you on this free range prison or a
Speaker 1: real prison. Yeah, that's just really galling. Hey, we need
Speaker 1: the land you got, but there's a way better one
Speaker 1: over here we're going to send you to and they
Speaker 1: get there and there's like no grass. Yeah, because that's
Speaker 1: why the US government didn't want it. I mean, it's
Speaker 1: just crazy to be and we had talked in past
Speaker 1: episodes about how the killing of Buffalo was such a
Speaker 1: concerted effort to be like, we don't want you to
Speaker 1: have food to eat, and you're really trying to like
Speaker 1: starve you out. Um, it's just really just a sad blight,
Speaker 1: I guess on our on us. Yeah, yeah, it's it's
Speaker 1: not a fun part of history. No, nope. But but
Speaker 1: I do love these two badass ladies. These two are awesome.
Speaker 1: They're very cool people and a beautiful little love story.
Speaker 1: I wish there was a little bit more about them,
Speaker 1: But just knowing that they were out there and cared
Speaker 1: so much for each other in the face of all
Speaker 1: this chaos, has some some inspirational quality to it, doesn't
Speaker 1: it sweet. I hope you all enjoy the story. Yeah,
Speaker 1: let us know what you thought. Yeah, please do go
Speaker 1: look more into this kind of part of history, because
Speaker 1: there's there's only so much we have time for here,
Speaker 1: but there's so much to know and it is valuable,
Speaker 1: I think. So, Yeah, let us know what you thought.
Speaker 1: Our email is with Dick Romance at gmail dot com.
Speaker 1: You can find us on social media on Twitter and Instagra.
Speaker 1: Am I'm at Oh great, it's Eli. I'm at dynamite
Speaker 1: boom and the show is at ridict romance. Yes, and
Speaker 1: we really appreciate you spending your time with us today.
Speaker 1: We love you, guys. We'll see you next time. So long,
Speaker 1: So long friends, it's time to go. Thanks for listening
Speaker 1: to our show. Tell your friends neighbor's uncle s indance
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