Behind the Scenes Minis: Maggie Lena Walker and Pepper's Ghost

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Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class, A production of I Heart Radio. Hello and Happy Friday. I'm Tracy P. Wilson and I'm Holly Fry. We talked about Maggie Lena Walker on the show this week, and Wow, I was not fully aware of how much she accomplished in her lifetime. I knew about chartering the bank, I knew about becoming president of the bank. I knew that in the process of all of her work, she became one of the wealthiest black women in the United States living at the time that she lived. Um, I didn't know about the emporium, or the newspaper or the many many, many, many, many many organizations that she played a leadership role in. Uh, that just went way beyond my basic understanding of her from having her on my episode shortlist for so long. She is is inspiring as all get out, and also, um, makes you want to take a nap. I'm like, Oh, that's a lot of work. That's an overwhelming amount of work to consider. Yeah. One thing that came up in the research that I just could not find a good place to fit into the episode was some speculation about how she may have been named for Mary Magdalen. The Maggie part of her name may have been named after a grandmother whose name is Margaret. The Lena part is a little not as clearly documented, and so the biographer whose ac count I was reading was like could have been named after Mary Magdalen, and also noted that there was one of the organizations that she was involved in or one of the departments. I don't remember the details that did not get mentioned in the show. Um was also named for Mary Magdalen, which I thought was an interesting speculation. Huh. I have questions for you about the listener mail. Okay, one, you mentioned that your family has like a family fudge recipe that does not involve a marble slab. I'm going to ask you the question, mhm, does it involve the inclusion of nuts in the fudge? Yes? Why? Okay, I don't know. Um. Starting before I was born, my mom, every year, uh, primarily my mom my dad had some involvement too, would make these things she called goody boxes. She would make them at Christmas every year. Um that she would make a whole bunch of chocolate chip cookies, a whole bunch of fudge. My dad usually would be the one who made peanut brittle, and then as my mom. My mom is disabled, and as her disability made her less able to do some of this, my dad has picked up a lot of the like goody box preparation. And two things in the Goodey boxes are chocolate chip cookies and fudge, both of which contain nuts, uh, both of which my spouse has some very strong opinions about how those should not be in there. He does. He and I have never discussed this, but now I feel bonded to him in any way. Yeah, so I have never tried to make the fudge recipe myself. I have though, made my mom's chocolate chip cookie recipe a whole bunch, and I usually, instead of putting nuts in there, put some extra chocolate chips so that they like cookie too solid peace ratio will still be pleasing and it won't be too much cookie and not enough other bits. Yeah. I'm not a fan of nuts in baked goods, just I like my texture a little more consistent than that. I will say, have you ever done a thing where the additional chocolate chips you put in your the chip cookies you used a different chip, like a butter Scotch do no highly recommend my other questions. Um, that tombstone got me to thinking what recipe you might want on your gravestone if you did such a thing. Oh, that's a good question. So another another recipe that was a big part of my uh family gathering life as a child was a potato casserole recipe made from as I remember it when I was a child. They were made with hash browns, but not the shredded hash browns that came in a bag. They were made with the patties and we would have to put the patties through the vegetable grad And I have modified that somewhat from the way that my mom made it when I was a kid, to instead use the shredded potatoes. Um. I could also be conflating that with something else. I just remember the experience when I was a child of putting cold frozen hash browns. Uh to like break up the break them up to Knoby salad pieces. Huh. I'm fascinated. It's very good. It's full of potato and cheese. I mean that's salt done. Yeah yeah. Cream a chicken soup unless we're having some vegetarians over and then we have cream mushroom soup instead. Yum. I it made me think of what I would want, and I think it would probably be a cocktail recipe, but I don't know which one yet. Yeah, I mean it might be the classic vodka Collins, which is one of my things that I think a lot of. And it's a very old twice It's a very seventies drink, but I love it. Yeah, But or maybe something more original, who knows. Yeah, just a good food for thought. Things I would like to be remembered me. I feel like today is behind the scenes has said the least about the subject of the episode and the most about the subject of the listener mail. Um. Yeah, I do love Maggieleena Walker though. Oh she's great. Glad I was able to take the opportunity to learn more than my limited knowledge was about previously. Also glad that she's gotten I mean, recognition beyond what we talked about in the in the in the show, and in addition to the statue, they are also schools named for her, and streets named for her, and all kinds of stuff named for her. Um. An increasing body of discussion about specifically economic work among black communities after the Civil War during reconstruction, which has not been discussed as much compared to like how much discussion there has spent of more education and social service conversation. So interesting thread of research there. We talked about John hen this week. Yeah, I think this episode had more instances of the letter P than any other episode we have ever ever ever done. It's definitely a plosive party going on a we we kind of hinted at it in the episode, but it does certainly all all of the information we have about Pepper and how he handled other people and things in his life make me wonder. As much as I certainly love Pepper's ghost in its place in in entertainment history, was he just an enormous pain in the neck to kind of seems like it? Um like he seems in some ways very fun and people spoke so lovingly of him and seeing him give lectures when they were kids. But then I think maybe on an interpersonal level, he had some challenges dealing with other people. As we said, we've both known that person. Yeah, exuberant and flamboyant person who doesn't like to be in any way heard it in a direction they don't want to go yep, or even just questioned his m His writing in that book that he wrote near the end of his life is very defensive. It's all very I did everything right. There were even like him being called professor Pepper he didn't actually have like credentials a teacher, which I don't think he ever claimed he did. That was sort of a nickname, but enough people had clearly mentioned it as something possibly shady. Then she basically like goes on a whole diatribe in that book about how he did not give himself that name, other people gave him that name. He never claimed to be something he was not, And part of me is like, are you just a pain in the neck. But I can also imagine that if you are a person in that position where someone is questioning you constantly for things that like we're not you're doing that, you might towards the end of your life be like I've had it. I gotta say, I also know this is not exactly the same thing, but I kind of like the idea that, like the guy given the lectures at the Science Museum had just becomes such a beloved celebrity. Oh yeah, for sure. Um, I mean it is one of those things that I think we have all probably I hope we have all known a person in our life that made learning really fun and took concepts that sometimes had been sort of characterized as though they were for higher minds and been like no, no, no, no, no, let me break it down and like it sort of makes you fall in love with learning. And I think he was that at a time when there was not a lot of that, right like in the mid eighteen sixties in terms of general lectures, probably not a lot of people trying to reach out to folks that did not have a whole lot of formal education and go, you know, you can learn this stuff, right, yeah, which is pretty great. That was, honestly one of the things that that frustrated me as a child about the transition from elementary school to middle school, because it felt like a lot of things in elementary school that we're supposed to be fun, including the library, we're not fun anymore. In middle school. They were work now, Like our elementary school library was this bright, welcoming open space with cozy places to read, and possibly influenced by the fact that our the middle school was older than the elementary school library was in terms of actual building, the middle school library was dingy with shelves and rows and hard tables to sit at, and the the shift in approach from teaching a lot of things went from here's a fun thing we're going to do, to sit down and shut your mouth and learn. Right, it was less about discovery and that's when it shifts to become more about memorization. Yeah, yeah, that's part of what kills it off. I know that's not the case with the way a lot of people are teaching now, but that was my experience growing up, right, And I mean when you think about right like that that right up in the Australian paper about like how many people learned practical stuff from him that we can't ever quantify his influence really since he was inviting people, you know, and so is the Royal Polytechnic people that were you know, laborers essentially in some cases to come and listen to a lecture and learn about this thing. Like how many of them gained a broader understanding of the world and we're able to tackle things. Um. That also is a theme that runs through his book For Boys and Science, which much of it is for Boys and Science, which is problematic, but also uh the blind spot of the times UM is that like no, No, if you learn all these things and you learn about how all of them work, like you will be able to handle anything. It's very much about like empowering people through learning, which I love. UM. The other thing I wanted to mention, which is silly, and I swear I don't mean to keep mentioning cocktails all the time, but I wanted to mention to anybody who might be going to Disney World. There's actually a cocktail you can get in Disney World called Pepper's Ghost Fun. They serve it at the Abrica Dab Bar, which is on the boardwalk, and it's a magic themed bar, and there's lots of references to illusionists in it. UH. And it's got like pineapple vodka and hobaniro lime and it's got a little uh I think it has a little black pepper on top. It's quite a tasty beverage. My husband sure likes it, so he is UM also memorialized in the form of a libation. In addition to all of the ways that his work is still being used today, which goes back to my my other Friday UH commentary on wanting to be remembered for cocktails. So now you go. Pepper and I clearly have not a thing necessarily in common, but a link in this way my aspirations. Uh. If this is your weekend coming up, we hope that it is filled with joy and delight and is smooth the silkin that you get so much rest and fun packed in without exhausting yourself. If you have obligations, like you maybe have to work, or do you just have a bunch of stuff you have to do, I hope it goes as well as it possibly can, it is not stressful, and that people are always nice to you. We will see you right back here tomorrow with a classic, and then we'll be back again on Monday with new shows. Stuff you missed in History Class is a production of I Heart Radio. For more podcasts from I heart Radio, visit the i heart Radio app, Apple Pie Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. H