The History Fangirl Podcast

Latest Episodes:

Roskilde: The Vikings Go to Denmark May 08, 2018

Show notes

On today’s episode of the History Fangirl Podcast, we talk with Noah Tetzner, host of the fantastic The History of Vikings Podcast. Vikings have come up a few times on this show, including their time in Iceland’s Thingvellir and their sacking of Lindisfarne. So this time we turn to another sliver of lesser-known Viking history and talk about their time in Denmark. As Noah tells me in this episode, while the Vikings may have a reputation for violence and pillaging, they were actually a simple, agrarian people. On this episode we talk about Norse mythology, Viking raids and a man named Bluetooth.

The Vikings of Denmark

As Noah told me on this week’s show, if you were to encounter the Vikings of any Scandinavian country, their lifestyles would look similar to you. But while the Vikings of Sweden explored, and the Vikings of Norway colonized, the Vikings of Sweden perhaps had the largest impact on history, or at least the largest footprint. They were the ones that raided and settled in York in the north of England and really changed English history. But the Vikings also established Danish history. Before the Vikings came, there was no recorded history, and the Roman and Greek armies didn’t bother exploring that far north. So once we hit 700 A.D., the Vikings land in Denmark and the history of Denmark begins.

Raiders of the Lost York

When Vikings settle in Denmark, they’re really set up as a series of farming communities. But they do gain notoriety when they show up on the shores of England and raid Lindisfarne. Denmark becomes one of the most powerful nations in the world, and the Viking structure transitions from a loose collection of farming towns to more of a traditional monarchy. The nation of Denmark really begins with the second king, King Harald Bluetooth, who came to power in 958. And he’s significant for a number of reasons, but in particular history will remember him for making Christianity the state religion of Denmark, and setting the country on a similar course to other world powers.

The founding of Roskilde

King Harald Bluetooth, aside from inspiring the name of everyone’s favorite local wireless technology, also founded the city of Roskilde. If you’re ever traveling to Denmark, Roskilde is a must-visit, particularly the Viking Ship Museum, where you can actually crew a Viking ship. Also worth visiting in Roskilde is the cathedral, built in the 12th and 13th centuries, which is also known as the royal burial cathedral. Danish monarchs since the 15th century have been buried here, making it an amazing place to connect with history.

Outline of This Episode

[1:48] How Noah got interested in Vikings
[3:22] Who are the Vikings in Denmark?
[7:24] Viking life in Denmark
[11:06] King Harald Bluetooth
[14:25] Christianity in Viking life
[21:13] The founding of Roskilde
[40:00] How to connect with Noah

Resources Mentioned

Connect With Stephanie

Featuring the song “Places Unseen” by Lee Rosevere. More info and photographs for this episode at:

https://historyfangirl.com/roskilde-the-vikings-go-to-denmark/

An Irreverent History of Disney World Apr 30, 2018

Show notes

On today’s very special episode of the History Fangirl Podcast, I, a Disney Skeptic, try to figure out why anyone over the age of nine would ever want to go to Disney World. And luckily, for this task I have Maggie Garvin on the show. Maggie is not only the hilarious blogger behind Mags on the Move, she’s also a huge Disneyphile, a former Disney employee, and the perfect person to convince me to head to Orlando, Florida. On this episode we talk about the origins of Walt Disney World, how Maggie was born a Disney kid, and her best tips for drinking around the world.

Disgusting hellholes are the mother of invention

Today we think of Disney as this enormous entertainment company, but back when Disneyland opened in Anaheim, it was still run by Walt himself. And Walt decided to build his theme park because he had taken his kids to carnivals and amusement parks and discovered what everyone already knew: Carnivals, in Maggie’s words, are “disgusting hellholes.” So he wanted to build something that would be clean, fun, and would make you forget the outside world while you’re there. And after the California Disneyland took off, Walt looked east because people weren’t traveling from coast to coast that much in those days, and he picked Orlando as the home of Disney World.

Second-rate Vegas

Disneyland had become such a success, that Walt Disney knew he wanted to expand eastward. And once he’d decided on Orlando, he set up a number of fake companies to buy up a bunch of land, because he knew if he tried to buy it as Disney, hot on the heels of Disneyland’s success, the price of the land would skyrocket. But Walt had other ideas for Orlando, as well. He said he felt like Disneyland had become a “second-rate Vegas,” and he wanted to build something different in Florida. So much of a tourist industry had sprouted up around Disneyland that Walt Disney really wanted to ensure that Disney World was wholly contained. Unfortunately, Disney wasn’t alive to see his second creation. He bought up the land in 1965, died in 1969, and Disney World opened in 1971.

Jungle Cruise confessions

It’s a testament to Maggie’s abiding love for Disney that she still loves it despite her years working as a jungle cruise tour guide. (She refers to the people who work at Disney, including herself, as a “higher grade carnie.”) She told me about the time a friend of hers let a kid steer the boat, and the kid returned the favor by defecating on her shoe. But that doesn’t top Maggie’s favorite jungle cruise story. It involves a rope, a cleat on the back of the boat, and a passenger who was putting his hand where he shouldn’t have. As she says, it’s actually not her favorite story, but it is a memorable one, and you’ll have to listen to the show to hear it.

Disney for the childless adult

Maggies is full of great advice for visiting Disney, and what to see in Disney World and around the area. As she says, she’s a big advocate for the “childless adult weirdo” to come visit Disney, even if that’s not the demographic they’re going for. Maggie makes great recommendations for restaurants and for, of course, drinking around the world. What country does she recommend beginning your Epcot crawl in? You’ll have to listen to find out.

Outline of This Episode

[2:01] Why Disney opened a park in Florida
[8:03] How Disney World overtook Disneyland
[14:58] Disney World’s impact on family vacations
[18:19] What it was like working at Disney
[28:36] Tips for families visiting
[31:55] Tips for traveling without kids
[42:30] How to save money on a Disney trip

Resources Mentioned

Mags on the Move

Connect With Stephanie

Featuring the song “Places Unseen” by Lee Rosevere. More info and photographs for this episode at:

https://historyfangirl.com/an-irreverent-hi…-of-disney-world/

Space Tourism in Houston, Texas Apr 23, 2018

Show notes

While the History Fangirl Podcast has typically gone around the world to find the most fascinating stories, today we’re taking our eyes off the Earth and casting our gaze starward. Today’s guest is Valerie Stimac, an accomplished travel writer in her own right, who has started a unique site at spacetravelguide.com. While she isn’t quite making recommendations for the burgeoning field of travel into space, Valerie does specialize in covering travel destinations that are of interest to space geeks around the world. In this week’s episode we talk about the history of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, how Houston became such an important part of its mission, and what happened on the ground during the most dramatic moments in American space exploration.

We have liftoff

Valerie provides the Cliffs Notes version of NASA history in this week’s episode of the History Fangirl Podcast, starting with its founding in 1958, following President Dwight D. Eisenhower’s signing of the National Aeronautics and Space Act. NASA started with a budget of about $100 million and three large facilities and two small research facilities. But in 1963, it was clear those facilities would not be able to handle all of the development that needed to happen (Langley Aeronautical Laboratory in Virginia you may remember from the movie Hidden Figures), which led to the establishment of what was eventually called Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas.

Houston, we have a space center

When the U.S. federal government was looking for a city where they could build a mission-critical space center, it wasn’t too unlike the way corporations now search for their headquarters. They had various cities wooing them, and NASA factored in several different facets when conducting their search: it had to be near a big city, it had to be near a large university with resources for research, etc. And it had to be away from other NASA centers around D.C. and Florida. We couldn’t have all of our brain trust in one place for, well, safety reasons.

Phoning home

If you quote or paraphrase any astronaut (as I did above), you’re likely quoting mission control in Houston, or something an astronaut said to them. “Houston, the eagle has landed,” “Houston, we have a problem”; those are quotes from two different Apollo missions. As Valerie tells me in this episode, with all manned spacecraft being operated from Houston, some of the most iconic moments in space have filtered through Johnson Space Center. Of course Johnson is much more than mission control, there are numerous buildings in the complex that includes engineering and simulation and more, all of which can be called upon to help solve problems in space.

Mission control

The Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas is an amazing place that for the last 60 years has launched some of the most incredible feats of human ingenuity, and helped those feats stay on track once they’re out of our atmosphere. As Valerie tells me in this episode, you can actually visit the historic mission control center where NASA staffers on the ground kept Apollo astronauts in the heavens alive. But that’s just the beginning of what you can see there. It’s a truly rare historic site, and even if you don’t think of Houston as a historic city, the space center is a must-see.

Outline of This Episode

[1:07] Why Valerie founded SpaceTourismGuide.com
[5:39] Brief history of NASA
[10:09] How Houston got a space center
[16:03] Important historic events at Johnson
[22:06] How Houston helped Apollo 13
[27:16] How it became a tourist attraction
[28:48]] What to see at the space center

Resources Mentioned

Connect With Stephanie

Featuring the song “Places Unseen” by Lee Rosevere. More info and photographs for this episode at:

https://historyfangirl.com/space-tourism-in-houston-texas/

The Storied History of the Guinness Storehouse Apr 16, 2018

Show notes

On today’s episode of the History Fangirl Podcast, we’re talking with someone who has arguably the coolest job in the field of history, and one you may not have even known about. My guest today is Fergus Brady, the archives manager at the Guinness Storehouse. The archives contain everything about one of the most famous beer companies in the world, including the founding documents of Guinness signed in 1759. As Fergus tells us, there’s a great tradition of record keeping within the Guinness company, and this episode we take a look at one of the most beloved companies in the world, and its place in Irish history.

A historic brewery needs a brewery historian

In case you needed any more evidence that Guinness is a cool company, Fergus told me that when the company decided to open the storehouse to visitors, it should also create historical exhibits about the company and its place in the country. So its staff of archivists creates and manage the exhibits. And in fact, Fergus told me that Guinness is opening a brewery with an exhibit in Baltimore, Maryland, the first time Guinness has had a brewery in the States since 1954. So I had to ask him why Baltimore and not the famously Irish cities of Boston and New York.

The #1 tourist destination in Ireland

The Storehouse was built at the turn of the 20th century, and as Fergus tells me in this interview, it wasn’t actually built for storing anything. Its first use was as a fermentation house (“store” in brewing lingo means to add yeast), and it was the first building erected in Ireland in the Chicago style, with steel girders rather than the walls holding the building up. The Storehouse is actually the number one tourist attraction in Ireland, with 1.7 million people visiting in 2017. If you’re headed to Ireland and it’s not on your itinerary well, you might be the only one.

The founding father of Guinness

Arthur Guinness, the man who started the famed brewing company, was born in 1725. There are a lot of myths about Arthur, of course, but Fergus sets us straight on this episode. And while Guinness may be best known as the “black stuff” as Fergus calls it, when Arthur started the brewery in 1759 he was actually brewing red ale. And then in the 1770s, he started brewing porter. And the porter became so popular that in 1779 he stopped brewing red ale altogether and his “stout” became his signature brew.

Ireland through the Guinness Archives

It’s impossible not to view the modern history of Ireland without factoring Guinness into the story. Fergus told me about Guinness during World War I, when not only did Guinness workers fight in the war, but barrels of the stout may have saved sailors’ live. A steamship had been torpedoed and the ship was going down, but according to the sailors, the barrels of Guinness floated up and actually helped them survive the attack. If you’re interested in Irish history or the history of the darkest beer around, you have to listen to this week’s episode.

Outline of This Episode

[1:05] What is the Guinness Storehouse?
[7:25] When was the Storehouse erected?
[13:38] How Guinness was founded
[17:39] Ireland through the Guinness archives
[20:17] Lives of Guinness workers
[26:51] Ireland and Guinness’s relationship
[29:23] Visiting the Storehouse
[33:41] St. Patrick's Day at the Storehouse

Resources Mentioned

Guinness Storehouse

Connect With Stephanie

Featuring the song “Places Unseen” by Lee Rosevere. More info and photographs for this episode at:

https://historyfangirl.com/the-storied-history-of-the-guinness-storehouse

Penn Station: Sacrficial Lamb Apr 09, 2018

Show notes

If you’ve ever been to New York City, there’s a good chance you traveled through Penn Station at some point. And then you instantly regretted it. On today’s episode, my guest is Greg Young of the famous Bowery Boys podcast, and we talk about the sad history of Penn Station, and what it can mean for the rest of the country, not just New York City. And while the story of Penn Station is sad, Greg promises to wrap it up in an optimistic, or hopeful, package. Does he succeed? You’ll have to listen to this week’s episode to find out.

The early days of Penn Station

After sharing my Penn Station horror story (many New Yorkers and visitors have one or a dozen), Greg and I chatted about the early days of the transit hub, which didn’t always double as hell on Earth. These days, the station sits beneath Madison Square Garden, which opened in 1968. But that wasn’t always the case. Greg told me about the original design of the station, which opened in 1910 as the fourth-largest building in the world, with beautiful colonnades and shopping arcades and a beautiful concourse for catching a train. And what’s more, it had tons of natural light, something that the modern-day, underground Penn Station eschews like a vampire. But one fascinating bit of information Greg shared: How impressionist painter Mary Cassatt influenced Penn Station’s design.

Why New Yorkers stopped caring about Penn Station

What’s fascinating about this time is that Penn Station was sort of the crown jewel of the Pennsylvania Railroad, the largest rail line in the country. But just a couple years later, the Vanderbilt family, which owned the New York Central Railroad, built Grand Central Station. And the ownership of these enormously important landmarks by private companies may have paved while the way for their construction, as we see with Penn Station, it also contributed to its downfall. Greg told me about how both the automobile industry and the airline industry forced rail to take a nosedive, and dragged down the grandeur of rail stations with it. And as the stations fell into disrepair, New Yorkers used them less and less, and cared about them less and less.

Madison Square Garden and Penn Station

As you may know, in the middle of the 20th century, New York City hit financial hard times, and the railroads were no different. Penn Station, not being in the center of New York, Greg told me, really bore the brunt of the financial struggles of the city, whereas Grand Central benefited from being in the center of town. So in the 1950s, in an effort to revitalize the station and the area, the city announced it would tear down the station but keep the railroad infrastructure below it intact, and then build something above it that would benefit from the railway. That became Madison Square Garden, and Penn Station became the underground place no one wants to visit.

JPenn Station and the landmark movement

As Greg tells me, the movement to mark buildings as landmarks and preserve the city’s history was just getting started when the news that Penn Station would be torn down was released. There were no laws on the books to protect old buildings, no landmarks commission. There was a small but powerful group standing up to the city, but it wasn’t a fight they could win. In fact, Greg says Penn Station is often considered the sacrificial lamb to the cause of historic preservation, because after it was torn down, people saw what they had lost. that This was a really fun episode with a guest who helped further my love of history before I ever talked with him.

Outline of This Episode

[4:10] Penn Station’s early days
[8:53] Cassatt and Penn Station
[15:00] The decline of railroads
[21:17] Reaction to the station being torn down
[27:45] Sacrificial lamb
[30:50] Landmarking process

Resources Mentioned

Connect With Stephanie

Featuring the song “Places Unseen” by Lee Rosevere. More info and photographs for this episode at:

https://historyfangirl.com/penn-station-sacrificial-lamb/

The Colorful History of Lindisfarne Apr 02, 2018

Show notes

Maybe you’ve heard of the Book of Kells or the Gospel of Lindisfarne: These illuminated manuscripts are not only high works of religious text, but doors that open history to current scholars. Today on the show we’re talking about Lindisfarne, the island on the northern edge of England, where the monks who wrote that book lived My guest today is Dr. Michael Drout. He’s a professor at Wheaton College in Massachusetts and the author of How Tradition Works and Tradition and Influence, and the author of some of my favorite “modern scholar” online courses. We talk about the founding and sacking of Lindisfarne, how the writing of the Gospel of Lindisfarne changed the English language, a saint who used otters as beach towels.

The fickle tides of Lindisfarne

Lindisfarne is an island in Northern England, near Newcastle, with an unusual geography. Lindisfarne is technically only an island for part of each day. When the tide goes out, there is a causeway that allows visitors to drive from the mainland to Lindisfarne. But when that tide comes in, it’s back to being an island. (And, as Michael tells me in this episode, people get stuck on the causeway fairly regularly.) But that semi-isolation actually proved attractive to monks, who wanted a place to be separate. And so as early as 635 A.D. they built a monastery there, and Lindisfarne immediately became the center of what we think of as the golden age of English monasticism. And that reigned until, of course, the Vikings sacked it in the late 700s.

Religious feats of strength at Lindisfarne

After winning what you could call a come-from-behind victory at the Battle of Heavenfield, Oswald, King of Northumbria, credited his placement of a cross on the battlefield with the win. So Oswalt invited monks, many of them Irish, to Northumbria to build a monastery. Oswald had also seen the monks of Iona perform religious “feats of strength,” like reciting scripture while waist deep in freezing water, and had been impressed by that. So he brought monks to Lindisfarne to not only deepen his relationship to God, but to help convert his people to Christianity.

The Lindisfarne Gospel

When the monks weren’t busy praying, or singing, or singing in prayer, they did make the famous Lindisfarne Gospel, a beautiful, illuminated text. Along with the Book of Kells, it’s considered one of the most beautiful books of the Western monastic tradition. And the writing of those books by different groups was not without its rivalries. But one of the most fascinating things that Michael said to me in a very fascinating conversation was how those rivalries, the argument over which Christian traditions should be followed, actually had a huge impact on how English is written.

St. Cuthbert's coffin

The history of Lindisfarne is incredible, and Michael spins so many great stories of what happened there, what life was like for the monks, how and why the Vikings raided. There’s even a personal favorite anecdote, about St. Cuthbert, who—legend has it—would swim in the waters, and otters would follow him onto land to dry his legs with their fur. And we won’t spoil it here, but you have to hear the unusual story of St. Cuthbert’s coffin. This was a really fun episode with a guest who helped further my love of history before I ever talked with him.

Outline of This Episode

[1:17] What is Lindisfarne?
[5:21] Oswald King of Northumbria
[7:24] What was life was like for the monks
[11:20] Monastic rivalries
[16:36] How the writing of books showed a blending of cultures
[20:25] St. Cuthbert
[24:03] Why the Vikings sacked Lindisfarne
[28:13] How Michael began studying this period

Resources Mentioned

Connect With Stephanie

Featuring the song “Places Unseen” by Lee Rosevere. More info and photographs for this episode at:

https://historyfangirl.com/the-colorful-history-of-lindisfarne/ ‎

The Lost History of Angkor Mar 26, 2018

Show notes

Angkor, along with its most famous temple Angkor Wat, is one of the most unique places in the world. The French claim to have discovered it when Cambodia was part of French Indochina, but like so many “lost” places the locals always knew about it. However, much of what we know about the ancient city comes from inscriptions and other artwork on the temple. And because the jungle climate much of the other information we have about the city may be lost forever, but we do know that it was the largest pre-industrial city in the history of the world. My guest today is Drew Vahrenkamp of the Wonders of the World podcast. We chat about the ancient history of Angkor, how tourism in the city has changed dramatically over the last two decades, and how history lovers grapple with the ancient past of Cambodia, and the more recent reign of the Khmer Rouge.

The Difference Between Angkor and Angkor Wat

Drew told me that “Angkor” is actually Khmer for capital, and so Angkor Wat translates to capital temple. The city of Angkor was so massive, so populated, that at its peak (from about the ninth century to the 14th century) one out of every thousand people on Earth lived in the city. Angkor Wat, of course, is the prominent temple and landmark of Angkor, and a depiction of it actually sits in the center of the Cambodian flag. It’s literally at the center of Cambodian identity, and it’s the main tourism site in the country, with approximately 2 million people a year visiting. That’s a good and a bad thing of course. Great for Cambodia, but bad for someone trying to experience the site and not a thousand people trying to take the perfect Instagram photo.

Jayavarman II and the Rise of Angkor

Taking in the sheer size of Angkor is mind-blowing. It was about 400 square miles, making it 30% larger than the five boroughs of New York City, and nearly double the size of the city of Chicago. Drew told me that we don’t have an exact time for when the city was founded because often cities would be settled, then they would be abandoned or changed or another city would arise on top of it. But the first major ruler that we know of, who really started the Khmer Empire was Jayavarman II in about 802. Jayavarman oversaw the building of what we understand as Angkor, with the houses and palaces being built of wood, but the temples being built out of stone. In fact, the Khmer people used more stone for the temples of Angkor than the Egyptians used for the pyramids. So historians are now left with only the temples surviving the humid jungle climate.

The Preservation of Angkor

Drew is full of good stories about the early days of Angkor (including one about a young prince leading a battle atop the head of a war elephant). But what’s perhaps so fascinating about Angkor in the broad picture is that it was, culturally, as advanced and beautiful as any of the “great cultures” we study and celebrate every day. The only difference is that it was in the jungle. So while we may become invested in the Anglo-Saxons, or know so much about the desert cultures of the Middle East, really what it comes down to is that they had different weather, and the jungles of Cambodia were not conducive to preservation. But luckily, Angkor Wat, built by the elephant-riding king, Suryavarman I, has been preserved.

Jayavarman VII and the Rise and Fall of the Khmer Empire

While Jayavarman II may have founded Angkor, it was Jayavarman VII who really helped build many of the beautiful temples and structures of the city. Many of these included depictions of his face, 216 according to Drew, but that doesn’t diminish the beauty of the temples. But soon after Jayavarman VII, as Drew put it, “the whole thing collapses.” War with Thailand decimates the city, Buddhism rises leading to less deference to authority, and climate change alters the environment of Angkor drastically. From there, it’s a more modern history of colonization, and of course the troubled rule of the Khmer Rouge. Angkor is a fascinating, beautiful place, and one whose history, even with so much of it lost, connects with our current times, as this conversation shows.

Outline of This Episode

[2:10] The difference between Angkor and Angkor Wat
[3:30] Drew’s first trip to Angkor
[8:30] Instagram and traveling
[18:01] Jayavarman II
[22:57] Khmer religions
[31:23] Suryavarman I and Angkor Wat
[35:00] Jayavarman VII
[43:45] War with Thailand and the collapse of Angkor
[48:57] French colonization of Cambodia
[52:03] Angkor Wat during the reign of the Khmer Rouge
[58:04] How Angkor’s history is connected to today
[1:01:03] Visiting Angkor Wat

Resources Mentioned

Connect With Stephanie

Featuring the song “Places Unseen” by Lee Rosevere. More info and photographs for this episode at:

https://historyfangirl.com/the-lost-history-of-angkor/

Belfast and the Troubles Mar 19, 2018

Show notes

Belfast is many different things to many different people. It’s both the second-largest city on the island of Ireland and the capital of Northern Ireland. With Brexit looming, Belfast’s attachment to the United Kingdom grows ever more tenuous. But wasn’t that long ago that Belfast was wracked with sectarian violence rooted in class and religious divisions, known as the Troubles. April will mark the 20th anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement, which was the culmination of the peace process that ended the Troubles. My guest today is Fin Dwyer, the historian behind the Irish History Podcast. We discuss how Belfast and Northern Ireland became separated from the rest of the island, and the underlying tensions that sparked the violence.

The Early Days of Belfast

What’s interesting about Belfast is that despite its prominence in modern history, it was actually fairly late to come together. As Fin told me, a lot of Irish cities were founded in the Middle Ages, but because the Gaelic tribes were stronger in the area at the time. Dublin, for instance, was founded in 841, whereas it wasn’t until the 17th century that Belfast settled. The Gaelic families of Ulster began to falter, and the Scottish and the English began to settle there. And Belfast began to emerge as the leading industrial center in Ireland, particularly in the 19th century, before the Irish famine.

Class and Religious Conflict

It was also in the 18th century that Belfast began to see a true identification as a Protestant city. The Protestant ascendancy was marked by “Orange Parades,” celebrating the city’s Protestantism (and named in honor of William the Orange). And while certainly the sectarian divide between Catholicism and Protestantism separated the city, as Fin told me, that divide was inextricably tied up in class. Belfast was a roaring industrial city, where unions were banned but workers were looking to organize. And as we’ve seen in many parts of the world, that conflict is interwoven with a religious conflict. And as we’ve seen in many parts of the world, that conflict often turns violent.

The Separation of Ireland and Northern Ireland

A historian’s hindsight is a valuable thing, and we can say now that the British Empire’s reaction to the potato famine, which ended in the middle of the 19th century, inevitably led to Ireland independence. But at the time not everyone was convinced. Through the late 19th century, the movement for independence gained momentum, but so did the “unionist” or “loyalist” movement, which argued for Ireland staying with the British Empire. By the time the 20th century came around, tensions came to a boil. World War I exacerbated the issue, with those seeking an independent Ireland arguing that the war was a British one, not an Irish one, while the loyalists arguing for Ireland’s involvement. And then in 1916, Irish Republicans launch a rebellion in Dublin, which leads to a vicious response from the British military, radicalizing both sides. This leads directly to the partition of Ireland in 1920.

Bloody Sunday and Beyond

People outside of Europe may know some of the more prominent terms to arise out of the violence: Bloody Sunday, the IRA, etc. But as Fin tells me in this episode, the conflict was actually deeply rooted in the history of the British Empire, and in both the religious and class divisions in the country. The violence may have been called “The Troubles,” but it was much worse than that: Death squads, massacres and hunger strikes. And Fin pulls back and looks at the larger picture, how the Troubles fit into a time of turmoil, including struggles in Latin America and Palestine. If you’re curious about recent European history, and history as it’s being lived today, you need to listen to this episode about Belfast and the Troubles.

Outline of This Episode

[2:45] The early days of Belfast
[7:30] The rise of Protestantism
[9:40] How Northern Ireland was carved out
[12:06] The 20th-century boiling point
[16:46] Loyalist makeup in Northern Ireland
[18:23] The partitioning of Northern Ireland
[25:45] The birth of the IRA
[29:56] Conflict across Ireland
[32:39] What each side wanted
[36:21] How the peace process started
[38:19] The signing of the Good Friday Agreement
[47:00] Belfast after the agreement

Resources Mentioned

The Irish History Podcast

Connect With Stephanie

Featuring the song “Places Unseen” by Lee Rosevere. More info and photographs for this episode at:

https://historyfangirl.com/belfast-and-the-troubles/

Birmingham and the Civil Rights Movement Mar 12, 2018

Show notes

With just a week left in office, President Barack Obama signed a proclamation declaring the Birmingham, Alabama Civil Rights District a national monument. Birmingham played a pivotal role in the civil rights movement in America in the 1950s and ‘60s. Prominent figures like Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. were both active in the community, and the city long ago captured the hearts and imaginations of the nation. On this week’s episode, I talk with Barry McNealy, education and programming consultant of the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. We talk about the events that took place in the city, and what led Obama to make his proclamation.

Birmingham and Civil Rights

Barry told me about how just by growing up in Birmingham, the civil rights struggle is a part of life. His aunt was a “foot soldier,” as he put it, and he had high school and college teachers who were involved in the movement. That’s how interwoven the civil rights fight was in Birmingham. And much of it centers on the Civil Rights Monument, where the 16th Street Baptist Church lies, as well as Kelly Ingram Park, infamous as the site where Birmingham public safety commissioner Bull Connor ordered demonstrators be cleared via firehose. And, of course, there’s the A.G. Gaston Motel, which Revs. Shuttlesworth and King used as a headquarters.

The 16th Street Baptist Church

The 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham was the site of the notorious bombing by the Ku Klux Klan in 1963, but the church’s roots go back to almost the time of the founding of the city. Birmingham was established in 1870, and the church’s congregation came together just a couple years after that. Luminaries flocked to the church: W.E.B. DuBois spoke there, opera singer Marian Anderson performed there. And this was before the civil rights movement took off. The church became known as “everybody’s church,” with both the first high school and the first bank open to African-Americans growing out of the church.

Shuttlesworth, King and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference

As Barry told me, the importance of Birmingham to the civil rights movement was both planned and the result of happenstance. The Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth was a key figure in the struggle. When the State of Alabama banned the NAACP from functioning in the state after the Montgomery bus boycott, the reverend created a new organization to stand in its place called the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights. The Movement took up both the NAACP’s legal challenges against the state and the nonviolent actions of the bus boycott in 1957. Then, Shuttlesworth and King would work together to create the famous Southern Christian Leadership Conference.

From the 1950s to now

Barry shares so many fascinating stories of this tumultuous time in American history, from the work of civil rights heroes like Dr. King, to the racist actions taken by “mule” politicians like Bull Connor. If you’ve never been to Birmingham, Alabama, I highly recommend a visit to the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. Like so much of history, it’s wonderful to read about, but it’s on the streets where it happened where it really comes alive. The Civil Rights movement started in the 1950s, became a worldwide phenomenon in the 1960s, and in many ways continues to this day. Thanks so much to Barry McNealy of the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute for talking with me today.

Outline of This Episode

[2:47] How Barry became involved
[6:09] How the 16th Street Baptist Church rose to prominence
[8:49] How Birmingham became so important to the movement
[14:22] Bull Connor
[20:04] 1963
[24:57] The bombing of the 16th Street Baptist Church
[33:09] The problems with how Birmingham has been taught
[39:00] The aftermath of the bombing
[41:03] Birmingham and the continuing civil rights movement
[44:24] Doug Jones’s story
[54:32] Visiting Birmingham

Resources Mentioned

The Birmingham Civil Rights Institute

Connect With Stephanie

Featuring the song “Places Unseen” by Lee Rosevere. More info and photographs for this episode at:

https://historyfangirl.com/birmingham-civil-rights-movement/

Windsor Castle Mar 05, 2018

Show notes

England’s Windsor Castle has been home to 39 British monarchs, with its history stretching back nearly 1,000 years to William the Conqueror. My guest today is Deborah Cadbury, the author of Queen Victoria’s Matchmaking: The Royal Marriages That Shaped Europe, among many other books. We chat about the illustrious history of the castle, what historical events took place within its walls, and what it was like to do research in the Windsor Castle archives. British history buffs will not want to miss this episode.

Windsor and William the Conqueror

Windsor Castle is the oldest occupied castle in the world, but it’s even more than that. As Deborah tells me in this episode of History Fan Girl, the grounds of Windsor Castle are 13 acres, so it has the feel of a town. But it’s also a private residence and a window into 1,000 years of British history. It was originally picked by Saxon kings as a fortress, but in the 11th century, William the Conqueror chose it as one of nine castles to form a defensive ring outside of London. And it was chosen because of its elevation, its close proximity to the Thames, and just a day’s march from the Tower of London. It started out as a very simple design, with the round tower at the heart of the castle being one of the very first structures erected.

The Royal Archives of Windsor Castle

Anyone who loves history can appreciate the excitement in Deborah’s voice when she describes visiting the Windsor Archives. You have to, of course, first get permission to view the archives, and then you go right into the heart of the castle, climbing 200 stone steps to, as she said, “another world.” The first time she was granted permission, she was researching King George VI’s experience in World War II. And having those diaries from the king opened up the royal family to the historian in a whole new way. Deborah shares some fascinating insights into the monarchy, but also shares the enthralling process of the historian at work.

From William the Conqueror to King Edward

The stories Deborah has researched in Windsor Castle could fill a book (in fact, they’ve filled several of her books). When I ask her about events that have taken place in the castle, she speaks of King Edward abdicating the throne, Queen Victoria falling in love, and King Albert passing away. She told me about how William the Conqueror began building the castle, but his grandson made it into the stone structure it is now. But perhaps no event is more significant than the signing of the Magna Carta, which happened with Windsor Castle as the backdrop. And when you’re talking about 1,000 years of British history, you know there’s a lot more going on than that, and Deborah is an amazing storyteller to revel in that drama.

Windsor Castle: Where Britain unfolded

If you can’t climb the 200 steps to view the Royal Archives, the next best thing is listening to a wonderful historian like Deborah spin tales of Britain’s history. In addition to all of the stories that unfolded within Windsor’s walls, she gave us a sense of what architectural highlights to look for should you visit, like the dollhouse and St. George’s Chapel. We also discuss Queen Victoria’s legendary matchmaking skills, and Deborah’s beautiful book. If you love British history, or have binged your way through The Crown on Netflix and are suffering withdrawals, you need to listen to this episode.

Outline of This Episode