Footnoting History

(Kristin) Ever wondered about the origins of Valentine’s Day and whether it was purely the invention of the greeting card industry? Join Kristin this week on Footnoting History to explore the development of our modern celebration of St. Valentine’s Day.  

(Kristin) Think you know how the Salem Witch Trials started? You may be surprised. Join Kristin on this week’s episode of Footnoting History to explore the origins of the 1692 trials and find out what historians know … and what we only wish we knew. 

(Christine) Winnie-the-Pooh has lived in the the hearts of people of all ages since the 1920s. Here, Christine traces the life of the famous bear (and his friends) from his origins in the family of author A.A. Milne and his acquisition by the Disney Company, all the way to his current place of residence. For more information, please visit FootnotingHistory.com

(Christine, Josh, Kristin) Join us as we say goodbye to 2021 with a series of historical anecdotes related to holidays, from Hanukkah to Christmas to New Year's.   Click here for tips for Teaching with Podcasts! Or here to buy some FH Merch! We are now on Youtube with accessible captions checked by members of our team! And you can find out how to support us through our FH Patreon to help keep our content open access!

(Elizabeth) How did Joel Chandler Harris's stories on Br'er Rabbit, Br'er Bear, and Br'er Fox go from beloved to problematic in the mid-twentieth century? In this episode, Elizabeth traces the story of how Joel Chandler Harris's work became Song of the South.     Click here for tips for Teaching with Podcasts! Or here to buy some FH Merch! We are now on Youtube with accessible captions checked by members of our team! And you can find out how to support us through our FH Patreon to help keep our content open access!

(Elizabeth) By the end of the nineteenth century, Joel Chandler Harris's Uncle Remus folktales were famous not only in the South, but throughout the United States. For much of the last century, however, they have been sharply critiqued for their presentation of antebellum plantation life. But who was Joel Chandler Harris? In this episode, Elizabeth dives into his story and the people from whom he learned these tales. Click here for tips for Teaching with Podcasts! Or here to buy some FH Merch! We are now on Youtube with accessible captions checked by members of our team! And you can find out how to support us through our FH Patreon to help keep our content open access!

Oh my gosh, we're back again! Our annual tradition continues as this year we bring you yet another round of creepy and fantastic history for the scariest holiday of the year.   Click here for tips for Teaching with Podcasts! Or here to buy some FH Merch! We are now on Youtube with accessible captions checked by members of our team! And you can find out how to support us through our FH Patreon to help keep our content open access!

(Lucy) How did Ivanhoe become a wildly popular school text? And what happened to the interpretation of the text when it did? Across the Anglophone world, Scott’s medieval England became reified as a time and place of chivalric adventure, despite the novel’s often ironic tone and often pointed social criticisms. This episode examines how Sir Walter Scott’s imagined past became something very different as it was reinterpreted in popular culture, in sometimes sinister ways.    Click here for tips for Teaching with Podcasts! Or here to buy some FH Merch! We are now on Youtube with accessible captions checked by members of our team! And you can find out how to support us through our FH Patreon to help keep our content open access!

(Lucy) There are some things that almost any Hollywood film set in the Middle Ages can count on. It will be set in England. There will be a lot of forests. The Norman nobility will oppress the Saxon peasantry. Other things are optional but frequent. There may be a tournament or a siege. There may be a reference to the Crusades. Robin Hood may turn up. There may be a trial for witchcraft. Sir Walter Scott’s Ivanhoe contains all of these things, and since its publication in 1819, this runaway bestseller has helped to shape Anglophone ideas of the Middle Ages.    Click here for tips for Teaching with Podcasts! Or here to buy some FH Merch! We are now on Youtube with accessible captions checked by members of our team! And you can find out how to support us through our FH Patreon to help keep our content open access!

(Josh) Manfred of House Hohenstaufen is dead; Charles of Anjou, in the name of the papacy, has claimed Sicily and awaits coronation. Across the Ionian and Aegean Seas, Michael Palaeologus looks to the Latin West and waits. In Germany, Conradin, son of the last "rightful" king of Sicily, desires to seize his own claim to the throne. And the House of Aragon begins to stir and look towards Sicily with its own ambitions. This week on Footnoting History, the thrilling conclusion to our saga of the Sicilian Vespers which sees 4000 Frenchmen dead.    Click here for tips for Teaching with Podcasts! Or here to buy some FH Merch! We are now on Youtube with accessible captions checked by members of our team! And you can find out how to support us through our FH Patreon to help keep our content open access!

In the middle of the 13th Century, a violent uprising began on the island of Sicily in an attempt to oust the French King, Charles I of Anjou, that left approximately 13,000 people dead over the course of six weeks. This violent uprising also sparked a wider pan-Mediterranean war between the Spanish crown of Aragon, the Angevin Kingdom of Naples, the Byzantine Empire, and the Kingdom of France. In part one of this two-part series, Josh explores the causes of the uprising and the immediate aftermath. (Josh)   Click here for tips for Teaching with Podcasts! Or here to buy some FH Merch! We are now on Youtube with accessible captions checked by members of our team! And you can find out how to support us through our FH Patreon to help keep our content open access!

(Elizabeth) Starting in the early 1600s, the Ottoman sultans switched from practicing fraticide to confinement as a means to preserve their rule from their grasping brothers. In this episode, Elizabeth examines how this treatment led a number of eventual sultans to have less than stellar qualifications and less than stellar legacies.    Click here for tips for Teaching with Podcasts! Or here to buy some FH Merch! We are now on Youtube with accessible captions checked by members of our team! And you can find out how to support us through our FH Patreon to help keep our content open access!

(Lucy) Mohenjo Daro was a vast metropolis, with elaborate urban infrastructure… and largely mysterious urban organization. It was a center of the Indus Valley civilization. Located in what is now Pakistan and northwestern India, the cities of this civilization covered territory roughly the size of western Europe. Because its language still hasn’t been deciphered by modern scholars, there’s still a lot we don’t know about it. But this hasn’t stopped modern scholars, writers, politicians, and artists from engaging with and fantasizing about it. This episode looks at what history can tell us about the art and culture — and water management — of this ancient civilization.   We are now on Youtube with accessible captions checked by members of our team! And you can find out how to support us through our FH Patreon to help keep our content open access!

(Kristin) One of the most iconic Indian curries has its origins in British colonial India. But was this dish created by South Asian cooks, working in Britain, or was it created in India and then eagerly adopted by the West? Explore the history of this delicious dish with Kristin this week on Footnoting History!    Click here for tips for Teaching with Podcasts! Or here to buy some FH Merch! We are now on Youtube with accessible captions checked by members of our team! And you can find out how to support us through our FH Patreon to help keep our content open access!

(Christine) Morris "Moe" Berg played for multiple Major League Baseball teams in the late 1920s and 1930s. Then, during World War II, he worked as a spy. In this episode, Christine discusses Berg's unusual life and career trajectory.   Click here for tips for Teaching with Podcasts! Or here to buy some FH Merch! We are now on Youtube with accessible captions checked by members of our team! And you can find out how to support us through our FH Patreon to help keep our content open access!