Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class, a production of iHeartRadio. Hello, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Holly Frye and I'm Tracy V. Wilson. So this is part two of our two parter on Sofia Jex Blake, and in part one we talked about her work in education and how traveling to Boston led her to meet doctor Lucy Sewell and thus become interested in medicine, and then after trying to get into Harvard and meeting rejection after rejection, she went to New York to study medicine with doctor Elizabeth Blackwell. But then her father, Thomas's death prompted her to leave the United States after several years and move home to be close to her mother. Transitioning back to life in Brighton in East Sussex was naturally difficult for Sofia Jax Blake. Her grief was on a delay compared to the rest of her families. She had learned of her father's death several weeks after it had actually happened, so while they were all figuring out how to return to something like a normal life, she was in the very early stages of feeling like there would never be anything like a normal life again. She also started to realize that her quick decision to leave New York and her friends in Boston had once again totally changed the course of her life. There was also a little bit of culture shock in the mix. I mean, she had grown up in the UK, but now for several years she had been living in two of the busiest cities in the United States, and now she was back in the seaside resort town, which was a much different place and a very different way of life. She missed Lucy sewell, and she felt out of place at home, writing to Lucy quote, it's hard for me to fit in anywhere, and of course everybody's feeling more or less sad and pained doesn't make matters smoother, Oh Lucy, Dear, I do think it's too bad to be expected to go on with medicine and not have you to help and interest me in it. If I didn't believe you would, after all come and start me in practice. When I do get through, I don't think I should have any heart to go on at all. But we will be together again someday, old lady, won't we, Oh Dear, I am getting so tired of living and fighting and hoping. As soon as one hopes one got a little foothold, it is all knocked away from under me. The first few weeks were especially rough, but then she went to the local hospital and asked one of the doctors to read medical texts with her as a study, which he agreed to do. It wasn't medical school, but at a time when she worried she might not ever be able to return to a true medical education, it was at least something. Then she got an introduction to activist Josephine Butler, who was working on a book of essays about women's professions that was published in eighteen sixty nine under the title Work in Women's Culture. Sepia contributed one of the essays to this book, called Medicine as a Profession for Women. Despite the doldrums of her first weeks back home, jex Blake had no intention of actually leaving behind her medical studies. She ran into difficulties finding an opportunity in England to continue, though both Josephine Butler and Sepia's brother, Thomas William jex Blake supported her in this. In the case of her brother, who they called tw this was a little bit of a turnaround, because he had not always believed in her plan to go into medicine. There's a lot of writing in a particular biography of her that makes it sound like he was a little embarrassed by his rambunctious younger sister, even once they were both adults, and so for him to suddenly be supported was a big deal. Through Butler and her brother, queries were sent to very educators about Sophia's plans. The responses were often sympathetic, but not all that encouraging. Cambridge was called out as unlikely to bend at all and admit her, but the University of London, it was suggested, might offer a little more hope, but also was going to be difficult. A professor from the University of Edinburgh wrote to Josephine Butler that some of the staff there would be happy to meet miss jex Blake, but that they weren't confident the school would admit her or any woman. But several of these responses did suggest that she try anyway at just about any of the institutions. And there's a subtext when you're reading these letters that make it seem like these professionals feel like having women applicants might at least open a pretty worthy and interesting discussion, even if she doesn't benefit directly. Henry Sidgwick, who was a professor of philosophy at Cambridge, wrote to Sophia, quote, my instinct is to tell you to come, but that is because I like a fight. My soberer judgment is the other way. Ultimately, Sophia applied to the University of London and was denied entry. It was explained to her that the charter of the school clearly excluded giving women medical degrees and that it simply could not be changed. She next turned her sites to the University of Edinburgh, hoping for a better reception there. Some of the school's faculty seemed open to the idea, but others, unsurprisingly were not. One professor flat out told her that he could not envision quote any decent woman trying to do what she was doing. In every letter she wrote, Jex Blake made it clear that she was ready to abide by whatever terms or conditions had to be set in place to make a school accept women as students. She was so polite in all of her dealings with all of these people, even the ones that were really kind of curt and unkind to her. I admire and cannot identify with that. But despite all of this condescending pushback from a few professors, the odds were still better in Edinburgh than they had been in London, and Sofia persisted until the university took action in her favor. David Masson, who was a historian and academic who was then teaching at the University of Edinburgh, wrote letters on her behalf to the medical faculty of the university. We mentioned in Part one the work of Elizabeth Garrett, who had gotten around the obstacles to a medical license by first becoming an apothecary. She eventually got her MD after passing an exam in Paris for it. And while she and Sepia were at odds regarding how to advance the position of women in education for medical careers, jax Blake did not hesitate to use Garrett as an example in her arguments to the school of a woman who had become a very successful practicing physician, noting that among her patients were very happy European royals. It's worth noting in the midst of all this that Jack's Blake was well known at the various medical colleges and medical schools in Paris and Zurich had started admitting women. So as these efforts were playing out, there was a real awareness that whatever any school did would probably garner press. Saphire wrote in her journal quote, if I can be the first woman to open a British university, then Shirley I, like Charlotte Bronte, shall have served my heart and eye, even if I die straight away. There was a vote at the University of Edinburgh's leadership and the outcome was that women would be allowed to study medicine there. This came with the stipulation that such classes would only include women, though there would be no co ed medical education. Then another stumbling block. The university decided it couldn't make all of these arrangements just for one woman. It wasn't reasonable, and professors bulked at having to double their teaching load when half of the time they would be lecturing to a single person. At least one of the professors threatened to resign, a mister Christison, who became a little bit of a villain in her story. Sophia found this out because mister Christensen's wife told her and also conveyed that she thought that Sophia was not being treated fairly. Additionally, male students complained at the possibility of a woman getting personalized instruction. This entire back and forth had been covered in the press, especially the Scotsman, and Sephia had told the Scotsman that if there were more women interested in pursuing a medical degree, things might be different. Several days later she got a letter. Part of it reads quote, I should be glad if you renew your application to join you in doing so, and I believe I know two or three other ladies who would be willing to do the same. This was signed by Isabel Thorne. Soon there was another letter, this one from Edith Petchi, who wrote quote, before deciding finally to enter the medical profession, I should like to feel sure of success, not on my own account, but I feel that failure now would do harm to the cause. Petty thought that if they stood a chance, they had to be not equal to their male peers, but better. Four more women soon made themselves known to Jex Blake as willing to join her in applying once again to the University of Edinburgh. They were Matilda Chaplain, Helen Evans, Mary Anderson, and Emily Buvell. On October twenty ninth, eighteen sixty nine, the university drew up a list of regulations regarding women's students which had to be tipped into the eighteen sixty nine eighteen seventy school year calendar. Were paraphrasing for brevity, but these rules stated that one women would be admitted into the university medical program. Two women would be in women only classes. Three professors would be allowed to teach separate classes for women. For women who didn't want to pursue medicine as a career could still take these classes if the university approved them. Five classes would cost four guineas unless the class was too small, and then students could pay more to make up the gap. That was something they were going to have to arrange with each individual professor. Six, All women taking classes were subject to school regulations current and future, and seven. These new regulations were in effect beginning in the eighteen sixty nine autumn session. There was also yet another hurdle in view. To be accepted to the program perspective, students had to pass a matriculation exam To qualify. This exam had three mandatory subjects which were math, English and Latin, and two subjects of the applicants choosing, which had to be selected from a pool of foreign languages, Advanced math, Logic, natural philosophy or moral philosophy. They took this exam on October nineteenth and all of them past, and there were four of them who placed in the top seven students overall of all of the applicants. Notes of congratulations from Sophia as many supporters rolled in, including from Elizabeth Blackwell, who wrote, quote, it seems to me the grandest success that women have yet achieved in England. In the fall of eighteen sixty nine, Sepia jex Blake began her schooling at the University of Edinburgh along with the other six women. She and Edith Petchy rented a place together and that sort of became the hub for the group to meet and study. But though they had gotten over the hurdle of admittance and were generally thriving academically and really succeeding in their studies, there were a lot more obstacles to come. For example, the students who had the strongest academic performance in chemistry at the end of the winter session were given small scholarships. Edith Petchy ranked third in the school. She was only behind two male upperclassmen who had already taken the class before, but she did not get the scholarship which would have entitled her free use of the school's laboratory. That scholarship went instead to a man who had not done as well as her. This was in contradiction to the fact that she was awarded a bronze medal recognizing that she had placed third, and the logic of this decision was that the women's students were not truly considered members of the chemistry class, even though they were doing the exact same coursework. This incident got a lot of press and attention, including a write up in the British Medical Journal that right up is interesting because the British Medical Journal is like, okay, whether or not we think that women should even be in medical school, we can't see that these numbers are screwy. It's kind of a like out of both sides of their mouth kind of write up, and a lot of supporters were encouraging the Edinburgh Seven to fight the decision, but Petchy, who felt that the award situation was more of a blunder than a wilful insult wanted to just drop the whole thing. The other problem was that although the university's governing body had voted to create medical courses for women, that didn't mean there were instructors who were willing to teach those courses, and even if they did, the women had to pay a higher course fee to get them to accommodate their small class. On occasions where this happened, Safaia often paid about a third of the group's total cost because she knew she had more than many of her colleagues did, and she also felt this was a good investment of her resources. Anatomy was particularly problematic in this regard. Eventually, a teacher from outside the school ended up agreeing to let the women attend his regular class, and then the school accepted that as its coursework. Yeah, they were in this unique position where they were one having to handle their tuition on their own through side deals with professors, but then two having to set up their own curriculum in some cases where other teachers who weren't affiliated with the university were the only ones willing to take that money. Yet another problem was about to arise for the women of the University of Edinburgh. Several more problems actually, and we will talk about those after a sponsor break. The next issue for the Edinburgh Seven was access to the Royal Infirmary. The Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh was and still is a teaching hospital. To acquire a medical degree, any student had to study there, essentially doing clinical rotations to work hands on with actual patients instead of just learning from books and in the lab. This was the kind of work that Sophia was already accustomed to. It was that kind of stuff that made her fall in love with the medical profession during her time in Boston. But the Royal Infirmary would not allow women in, as they had done every other time such an issue had come up. Seven women students tried to get the policy changed, but this round got really incendiary for some reason. In particular, male students at the university got really mad at the prospect that women who had been doing the same coursework as them might actually get medical degrees. They started being openly hostile to Sophia and her classmates. According to rex Blake's account quote, a certain proportion of the students with whom we worked became markedly offensive and insolent, and took every opportunity of practicing the petty annoyances that occur to thoroughly ill bred lads, such as shutting doors in our faces, ostentatiously crowding into the seats we usually occupied, bursting into horse laughs and howls when we approached, as if a conspiracy had been formed to make our position as uncomfortable as might be. In addition to just being jerks in every interaction with their women classmates, some of the men of the school also started a petition to get them banned from the Royal Infirmary. Five hundred students signed it. The agitation of the male students continued to build, and then one day it reached its apex. There had been several days of male students trying to block women students from entering classrooms, but there weren't a lot of them, and the women were able to basically brush right past them. But then there was a day when things escalated. An estimated two hundred students stood outside the gate leading to Surgeons Hall, which is the building where the classes were held. This was a raucous crowd and noisy, including singing. Protest songs. When Jex Blake and the other women approached a little before four pm, this crowd started yelling, but the women continued forward as though they didn't see or hear their detractors. But as they got to the gate, somebody slammed it before they could enter. A janitor opened the gate partially so the women could still pass through. They had been shoved around and hit with mud, and they still wanted to go to class. But when they got to their classroom, which was for an anatomy lecture, the room was full full beyond capacity, and packed with students who were not part of the class. The professor, doctor Handyside, ordered the people that were not there for class to leave, but once he had gotten them out and class had started, someone led a sheep into the room, creating a whole new wave of chaos, and according to Sefaia's journal, when the women went home at the end of the class, they were quote escorted by a gallant cavaliers, b police, c general mob d all boys and girls of the town. They made it home safe that day, which was a Friday. On Monday, the women were warned that a more serious demonstration was planned The Irish brigade was called. This is a group of students who formed kind of an ad hoc security group, but the day was rainy, nobody really showed up to protest. Tuesday the twenty second, there were enough agitated protesters that the brigade, which is about thirty men, had to walk the women to the lecture hall and then home after class. This Surgeon's Hall riot, as it came to be called, makes it clear that had the women not had the support of some of their peers, things could have really escalated. In any case, it was made very clear to them that a lot of people did not think they should be studying medicine. Yeah, there were definitely some of their classmates that were supportive of them. That is how they got warned that things might get worse, and that is those are the people that actually were like, hey, let's get the Irish brigate involved. But had those people not stood up, there could have been violence. This riot had significant fallout, and it was probably not the kind that the instigators had hoped for. It did not magically fix anything for Sofia or the other women's students, but it did bring to light the ways that they had been treated. The withheld scholarship. The anatomy classes problems the impossibility of completing their degrees due to being barred from the physical places that they needed to go to complete those studies. All of this was reported in the press along with news of the riot, and the public reaction was largely in favor of the women's students, who had done all of the same coursework as the men in far more challenging circumstances. Additionally, all of the women started receiving hate mail. Friends and families started asking very seriously if these women were really going to be okay if they continued in an environment of such hostility. One of the high notes during this time was a petition signed by nine hundred and fifty six women of Edinburgh urging that all medical facilities be opened to the women for their studies as needed. This was not the only show of support from the women of the city. A well respected woman named missus Nickel appeared at a meeting of school leaders and noted that the women of Scotland were watching the events at the school to consider what the next generation of doctors would be, asking how they could be trusted to work with female patients. Zaphia jax Blake was booed and pelted with peas, yes, peas at that same meeting when she rose to speak. She continued to get supportive letters though from women throughout the UK. Sofia had noticed during the riot that an assistant to one of the professors, the doctor Christisen that we mentioned earlier, was one of the main instigators the day that the women had gotten the gate slammed on them. She believed that Christensen's assistant had been an instigator of the entire riot, and she said so publicly. In response that assistant sued her for libel because he said that she claimed he was drunk at the riot. She had not to be clear done that she had said that someone had told her that he was drunk. This case went to court and it took two days there and it was crowded with spectators throughout. The outcome was not a judgment in her favor. It was that she had to pay one farthing quote for her rash and libelous statements. Though everyone also noted that mister c the man who brought the suit, had refused to ever deny that he had been part of the riot. Sofia was also deemed responsible for the cost of the case. Those costs were more than nine hundred pounds. Her brother very quickly stepped into pay half of that, but Sofia's supporters raised more than enough and his contribution was returned. Jury members were later quoted in the press as saying that they thought no monetary expense should have been awarded to the pursuer, even though it was just a farthing. Lucy Sewell and Sophia, of course, had been living on two different continents, but they were still emotionally closed through all of this, and Suwell did make a visit in eighteen seventy one. This holiday was a good one, and it made both of them consider whether they might be able to practice medicine together one day. But there was about to be yet another obstacle. Even though the public had grown relatively sympathetic to the difficulties that the women medical students were dealing with, the university did not make anything easier for them. Some lecturers had started allowing the women to attend their regular classes i e. Not women's specific classes, in an effort to get them ready to graduate, but the university found out and put an end to that. Additionally, the women were not going to be allowed to sit for their final exam, which would have conferred upon them their MD if they had passed. In January eighteen seventy two, the university made it abundantly clear that it just didn't think there was a way to credential the women's students with medical degrees. Safaia wrote of their determination quote On January eighth, the university court declared that they could not make any arrangements to enable us to pursue our studies with a view to a degree, but that if we would altogether give up the question of graduation and be content with certificates of proficiency, they would try to meet our views. Certificates of proficiency were not an acceptable compromise. The women sued the school for a breach of contract. As this legal battle was playing out, so Fi appenned Medical Women, which contained two essays. The first, Medicine as a Profession for Women, was what she had written for Josephine Butler's Anthology. The other was Medical Education for Women. That writing, which is dedicated to doctor Lucy Sewell, examines why exactly women hadn't been admitted to the medical community, and it includes an opening argument quote in the first place, let us take the testimony of nature in the matter. If we go back to primeval times and try to imagine the first sickness or the first injury suffered by humanity, does one instinctively feel that it must have been the man's business to seek the means of healing, to try the virtues of various herbs, or to apply such rude remedies as might occur to one unused to the strange spectacle of human suffering. I think that few would maintain that such ministry would come most naturally to the man, and be instinctively avoided by the woman. Indeed, I fancy that the presumption would be rather in the other direction. And what is such ministration but the germ of the future profession of medicine. There were also, at this time some women who were going really hard in the opposite direction of the status quo, and suggesting that men were the ones who should not be allowed to become doctors, because they were not as inherently nurturing as women. But Sophia stated plainly that she thought this was not a good position either, writing quote in my own experience as a medical student, I have had far too much reason to acknowledge the honor and delicacy of feeling habitually shown by the general of the medical profession, not to protest warmly against any such injurious imputation. I am very sure that in the vast majority of cases, the motives and conduct of medical men in this respect are altogether above question, and that every physician who is also a gentleman is thoroughly able, when consulted by a patient in any case whatever, to remember only the human suffering brought before him, and the scientific bearing of its details. But she does also kind of throw women under the bus a little bit later in that paragraph, writing quote, the medical man is only one of the parties concerned, and that it is possible that a difficulty which may be of no importance from his scientific perspective, may yet be very formidable, indeed to the far more sensitive and delicately organized feelings of his patient, who has no such armor of proof as his own, and whose very condition of suffering may entail an even exaggerated condition of nervous susceptibility on such points. This issue ended up in Scotland's Court of Session, and things did not go well there. For Sofia and her women colleagues. Not only was the school deemed able to refuse medical degrees to women if it so chose, it was also ruled that the school should never have started taking women as medical students at all. Jax Blake and her fellow litigants appealed the decision to Parliament. We're going to talk about how things played out there after we hear from the sponsors who keep the show going. When the issue of women's university education moved to London, so did Sofia, so that she could continue to work for educational equity there. As the legal babble over women in medical schools was waged in eighteen seventy four, jax Blake made a path around the problem for the women who followed her. She helped found the London's School of Medicine for women. The professors, though, were still men. Jex Blake worked on this project with Elizabeth Garrett Anderson, and the two women were so very different. As you'll recall, Elizabeth Garrett had found the way around getting her practicing license by becoming an apothecary, and though these two women were very close friends and collaborators, according to reports, there were a lot of arguments between them about how to go about things setting up the school. Though they didn't succeed in getting their medical degrees from Edinburgh, the battle had gained a lot of attention and sympathizers, and as a result, in eighteen seventy six, the Medical Act was passed, also known as the Russell Gurney Enabling Act. This didn't open the doors of medical schools to women. It just created a law that said that universities could do that if they wanted to. More importantly, the Act established that women doctors who had trained in other countries could become registered to practice medicine in Britain. Yeah, for clarity, the reason why there had to be a law that said you can take women if you want is that a lot of these schools had charters that specified men, and if they had changed their admission policies, that charter would then come into question and could be litigated. That was why that was such a weird and strange but necessary step. As a consequence of all of this, Safia, Jex Blake and Edith Pecchi were able to get their graduations from a medical school in Switzerland and then they sat for their exams in Dublin at the College of Physicians there to get their mds and their license. Starting in eighteen seventy eight, she was finally able to practice medicine in a practice that she set up in Edinburgh. That practice was active until eighteen ninety nine, and during her time in that practice she also founded the Edinburgh Women's Hospital in eighteen eighty five in the Edinburgh School of Medicine for Women in eighteen eighty six. Sephia also experienced two significant losses in the middle of her triumphant career in Scotland. First, her mother died in July of eighteen eighty one. This is one of the few events in her life which she wrote very little about in her journal. The other is that while Sepia and Lucy Sewell had often fantasized about starting a practice together and living together, probably as a couple, each of them was so strongly tied to their own communities that this never happened. Lucy Sewell died in February of eighteen ninety which was a huge blow to Sephia. It is a little bit unclear precisely when Sefiah met Margaret Todd. Todd was born in eighteen fifty nine, so she was nineteen years younger than Sefaia jex Blake, and she had enrolled in the Edinburgh School of Medicine for Women almost as soon as it was founded. She was one of its first students, so presumably the two of them met around that time. Margaret was also a writer. She wrote several novels under the name Graham Travers, and her work in literature meant that she took a longer time than usual to complete her medical degree took her eight years. After sitting for a medical examine Brussels in eighteen ninety four, she became assistant medical officer at Edinburgh Hospital and Dispensary for Women and Children, but her medical career lasted just five years, most likely because of her relationship with Sophia. When Sophia retired in eighteen ninety nine, in part because she had developed issues with her heart, Margaret retired too and left Edinburgh with her. Sofia had decided she wanted to try farming in retirement on an estate named Wendadeine in East Sussex, and she did. She planted figs, peaches, apricots and other fruits and had a small dairy. She threw big dinners full of fresh food. Her door was always open to any of the women she knew through her work in medicine and education, and some that she didn't know but were students of the school that she would just let come and visit, which I love. Sophia died at Wendeddine on January seventh, nineteen twelve. Following her death, Margaret Todd wrote a biography of her titled The Life of Doctor Sephia jax Blake. This was published in nineteen eighteen. Todd seemed to have access to pretty much all of jax Blake's personal papers, right down to drawings she had made as a child and poetry she'd written in her early years. The portrait of jax Blake in the biography is a very loving one, although Margaret did not mention herself in it even once. Nope. It's it's very sweet because she does acknowledge various faults in her character, but it's always like yes, but she was also amazing. It's really a sweet biography. One of Sephia's favorite sayings, according to Todd's biography, was not me but us, meaning that she believed in people working together for each other and the other women of the Edinburgh Seven went on, like Sophia, to practice medicine, although all in very different ways. Edith pet She worked in England before leaving for Bombay, where she worked at the Kamma Hospital for Women and Children. Isabel Thorne did not pursue her MD, but became the Honorary Secretary for the London School of Medicine for Women. Emily Bubble worked in London's New Hospital for Women before moving to Nice and working on tuberculosis research. Matilda Chaplin founded a school for midwiffery in Tokyo, then returned to Britain and had a private practice. Helen Evans took time away for medicine to raise a family, then joined the Edinburgh School of Medicine for Women's executive committee. And Mary Anderson worked with Emily Bubble at the New Hospital for Women until eighteen ninety five, when she retired for health reasons. In twenty nineteen, the Edinburgh Seven finally received their posthumous degrees from the University of Edinburgh. Yeah. That's Safia Jex Blake, who I adore. Yeah, she's one of my favorites that I have research to the time. I have two pieces of listener mail, in fact cool one is very short, which is about something that I said on the podcast in a behind the scenes MANI. It is from our listener Chad, who writes y'all suggested that instead of the brutal capitalism of monopoly, it would be nice to play a game where the person who adopts the most cats wins. There is such a game. I played it with my niece once. It's called Here Kitty Kitty, and it comes with a bunch of cute little black, gray, white, and orange cat figurines. Chad, Thank you, Chad. I'm gonna be looking for that one. There's another that someone else mentioned. Yeah, I couldn't find that one. I'm absolutely willing to bet that there are many game And the reason I've come to this conclusion is that a friend of mine recently asked my spouse what was that game we were playing where we were trying to grab little sushies out of a bowl with chopsticks? And I went to try to find the answer and found at least six different games by different publishers that were all about grabbing little sushi bits out of a bowl with I love it. Listen many people can have the same great idea. Yes. My next one is from our listener rose Mary, who writes, Hi, Holly and Tracy. I'm a longtime listener and I love to play your podcast while working on my cosplays, sewing for craft fares and crocheting. I've always wanted to write in and finally I have something. I was listening to the Spring twenty twenty four on Earthed episodes and you mentioned ancient lipstick from Iran. Recently, I saw instagrammer Aaron Parsons recreate this very lipstick on her page and it was such a pretty reddish brown. Here's the link if you want to check it out. I wanted to read this because I also follow Aaron Parsons, who does a lot of historical makeup deep dives like she does. Do you follow her? No, but a friend of mine sent me the same video. She does like stuff where she will. At one point she kind of cold called the person who used to do Marilyn Monroe's makeup to get information on what exact products she used on some of her classic looks like she very respectfully she had a contact that gave her that info. She didn't just like call out of the Blue and she does things like this. She's a really really interesting makeup artist who also is just obsessed with the history of makeups. Going back to this email, Rosemary writes, I also was listening to Behind the Scenes and Holly was talking about how she cried during the bobs Burgers episode of Louise doing a shadow puppet presentation on Amelia Earhart. I just want to let you know you were not alone. I cried too. I'm so glad it was such a moving episode. I tear up just writing about it. Just talking about this brings me to tears. It's such a good show. I attached the mandatory pet tax. These are my three cats, Fry who is black, doctor Pants a tuxi, and Tina, Gray forever Kitten. Yes, they are named after my favorite shows. Fry is our oldest and most stoic, Doctor Pants is the friendliest an FIP survivor, and Tina is the silliest epitome of a gray cat. Here's what I want to know, Rosemary, is doctor Pants named after mister Pants from Home Movies, which is all so created by the same person that does Bob's Burgers. So I feel like the DNA of your taste is all in here. His name is mister Pants. He's a kitty catman. I had a cat I used to call mister Pants. That was not his actual name, but I called him that anyway. These cats are adorable and she caught them all in one picture where they look like a gang that's coming to get you in the best way possible. They are so cute, little cuddle monkeys. The sweetest, sweetest, sweetest Rosemary, thank you for this email. It was so sweet. You feel like a kindred spirit. If you would like to write to us and maybe make me cry by mentioning Bob's Burger's episodes that are very moving, you can do that at History Podcast at iHeartRadio dot com. If you have not yet subscribed to the show, it is so easy. You can do that on the iHeartRadio app, or anywhere you listen to your favorite shows. Stuff you Missed in History Class is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.

Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class, a production of iHeartRadio. Hello, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Holly Frye and I'm Tracy V. Wilson. So this is part two of our two parter on Sofia Jex Blake, and in part one we talked about her work in education and how traveling to Boston led her to meet doctor Lucy Sewell and thus become interested in medicine, and then after trying to get into Harvard and meeting rejection after rejection, she went to New York to study medicine with doctor Elizabeth Blackwell. But then her father, Thomas's death prompted her to leave the United States after several years and move home to be close to her mother. Transitioning back to life in Brighton in East Sussex was naturally difficult for Sofia Jax Blake. Her grief was on a delay compared to the rest of her families. She had learned of her father's death several weeks after it had actually happened, so while they were all figuring out how to return to something like a normal life, she was in the very early stages of feeling like there would never be anything like a normal life again. She also started to realize that her quick decision to leave New York and her friends in Boston had once again totally changed the course of her life. There was also a little bit of culture shock in the mix. I mean, she had grown up in the UK, but now for several years she had been living in two of the busiest cities in the United States, and now she was back in the seaside resort town, which was a much different place and a very different way of life. She missed Lucy sewell, and she felt out of place at home, writing to Lucy quote, it's hard for me to fit in anywhere, and of course everybody's feeling more or less sad and pained doesn't make matters smoother, Oh Lucy, Dear, I do think it's too bad to be expected to go on with medicine and not have you to help and interest me in it. If I didn't believe you would, after all come and start me in practice. When I do get through, I don't think I should have any heart to go on at all. But we will be together again someday, old lady, won't we, Oh Dear, I am getting so tired of living and fighting and hoping. As soon as one hopes one got a little foothold, it is all knocked away from under me. The first few weeks were especially rough, but then she went to the local hospital and asked one of the doctors to read medical texts with her as a study, which he agreed to do. It wasn't medical school, but at a time when she worried she might not ever be able to return to a true medical education, it was at least something. Then she got an introduction to activist Josephine Butler, who was working on a book of essays about women's professions that was published in eighteen sixty nine under the title Work in Women's Culture. Sepia contributed one of the essays to this book, called Medicine as a Profession for Women. Despite the doldrums of her first weeks back home, jex Blake had no intention of actually leaving behind her medical studies. She ran into difficulties finding an opportunity in England to continue, though both Josephine Butler and Sepia's brother, Thomas William jex Blake supported her in this. In the case of her brother, who they called tw this was a little bit of a turnaround, because he had not always believed in her plan to go into medicine. There's a lot of writing in a particular biography of her that makes it sound like he was a little embarrassed by his rambunctious younger sister, even once they were both adults, and so for him to suddenly be supported was a big deal. Through Butler and her brother, queries were sent to very educators about Sophia's plans. The responses were often sympathetic, but not all that encouraging. Cambridge was called out as unlikely to bend at all and admit her, but the University of London, it was suggested, might offer a little more hope, but also was going to be difficult. A professor from the University of Edinburgh wrote to Josephine Butler that some of the staff there would be happy to meet miss jex Blake, but that they weren't confident the school would admit her or any woman. But several of these responses did suggest that she try anyway at just about any of the institutions. And there's a subtext when you're reading these letters that make it seem like these professionals feel like having women applicants might at least open a pretty worthy and interesting discussion, even if she doesn't benefit directly. Henry Sidgwick, who was a professor of philosophy at Cambridge, wrote to Sophia, quote, my instinct is to tell you to come, but that is because I like a fight. My soberer judgment is the other way. Ultimately, Sophia applied to the University of London and was denied entry. It was explained to her that the charter of the school clearly excluded giving women medical degrees and that it simply could not be changed. She next turned her sites to the University of Edinburgh, hoping for a better reception there. Some of the school's faculty seemed open to the idea, but others, unsurprisingly were not. One professor flat out told her that he could not envision quote any decent woman trying to do what she was doing. In every letter she wrote, Jex Blake made it clear that she was ready to abide by whatever terms or conditions had to be set in place to make a school accept women as students. She was so polite in all of her dealings with all of these people, even the ones that were really kind of curt and unkind to her. I admire and cannot identify with that. But despite all of this condescending pushback from a few professors, the odds were still better in Edinburgh than they had been in London, and Sofia persisted until the university took action in her favor. David Masson, who was a historian and academic who was then teaching at the University of Edinburgh, wrote letters on her behalf to the medical faculty of the university. We mentioned in Part one the work of Elizabeth Garrett, who had gotten around the obstacles to a medical license by first becoming an apothecary. She eventually got her MD after passing an exam in Paris for it. And while she and Sepia were at odds regarding how to advance the position of women in education for medical careers, jax Blake did not hesitate to use Garrett as an example in her arguments to the school of a woman who had become a very successful practicing physician, noting that among her patients were very happy European royals. It's worth noting in the midst of all this that Jack's Blake was well known at the various medical colleges and medical schools in Paris and Zurich had started admitting women. So as these efforts were playing out, there was a real awareness that whatever any school did would probably garner press. Saphire wrote in her journal quote, if I can be the first woman to open a British university, then Shirley I, like Charlotte Bronte, shall have served my heart and eye, even if I die straight away. There was a vote at the University of Edinburgh's leadership and the outcome was that women would be allowed to study medicine there. This came with the stipulation that such classes would only include women, though there would be no co ed medical education. Then another stumbling block. The university decided it couldn't make all of these arrangements just for one woman. It wasn't reasonable, and professors bulked at having to double their teaching load when half of the time they would be lecturing to a single person. At least one of the professors threatened to resign, a mister Christison, who became a little bit of a villain in her story. Sophia found this out because mister Christensen's wife told her and also conveyed that she thought that Sophia was not being treated fairly. Additionally, male students complained at the possibility of a woman getting personalized instruction. This entire back and forth had been covered in the press, especially the Scotsman, and Sephia had told the Scotsman that if there were more women interested in pursuing a medical degree, things might be different. Several days later she got a letter. Part of it reads quote, I should be glad if you renew your application to join you in doing so, and I believe I know two or three other ladies who would be willing to do the same. This was signed by Isabel Thorne. Soon there was another letter, this one from Edith Petchi, who wrote quote, before deciding finally to enter the medical profession, I should like to feel sure of success, not on my own account, but I feel that failure now would do harm to the cause. Petty thought that if they stood a chance, they had to be not equal to their male peers, but better. Four more women soon made themselves known to Jex Blake as willing to join her in applying once again to the University of Edinburgh. They were Matilda Chaplain, Helen Evans, Mary Anderson, and Emily Buvell. On October twenty ninth, eighteen sixty nine, the university drew up a list of regulations regarding women's students which had to be tipped into the eighteen sixty nine eighteen seventy school year calendar. Were paraphrasing for brevity, but these rules stated that one women would be admitted into the university medical program. Two women would be in women only classes. Three professors would be allowed to teach separate classes for women. For women who didn't want to pursue medicine as a career could still take these classes if the university approved them. Five classes would cost four guineas unless the class was too small, and then students could pay more to make up the gap. That was something they were going to have to arrange with each individual professor. Six, All women taking classes were subject to school regulations current and future, and seven. These new regulations were in effect beginning in the eighteen sixty nine autumn session. There was also yet another hurdle in view. To be accepted to the program perspective, students had to pass a matriculation exam To qualify. This exam had three mandatory subjects which were math, English and Latin, and two subjects of the applicants choosing, which had to be selected from a pool of foreign languages, Advanced math, Logic, natural philosophy or moral philosophy. They took this exam on October nineteenth and all of them past, and there were four of them who placed in the top seven students overall of all of the applicants. Notes of congratulations from Sophia as many supporters rolled in, including from Elizabeth Blackwell, who wrote, quote, it seems to me the grandest success that women have yet achieved in England. In the fall of eighteen sixty nine, Sepia jex Blake began her schooling at the University of Edinburgh along with the other six women. She and Edith Petchy rented a place together and that sort of became the hub for the group to meet and study. But though they had gotten over the hurdle of admittance and were generally thriving academically and really succeeding in their studies, there were a lot more obstacles to come. For example, the students who had the strongest academic performance in chemistry at the end of the winter session were given small scholarships. Edith Petchy ranked third in the school. She was only behind two male upperclassmen who had already taken the class before, but she did not get the scholarship which would have entitled her free use of the school's laboratory. That scholarship went instead to a man who had not done as well as her. This was in contradiction to the fact that she was awarded a bronze medal recognizing that she had placed third, and the logic of this decision was that the women's students were not truly considered members of the chemistry class, even though they were doing the exact same coursework. This incident got a lot of press and attention, including a write up in the British Medical Journal that right up is interesting because the British Medical Journal is like, okay, whether or not we think that women should even be in medical school, we can't see that these numbers are screwy. It's kind of a like out of both sides of their mouth kind of write up, and a lot of supporters were encouraging the Edinburgh Seven to fight the decision, but Petchy, who felt that the award situation was more of a blunder than a wilful insult wanted to just drop the whole thing. The other problem was that although the university's governing body had voted to create medical courses for women, that didn't mean there were instructors who were willing to teach those courses, and even if they did, the women had to pay a higher course fee to get them to accommodate their small class. On occasions where this happened, Safaia often paid about a third of the group's total cost because she knew she had more than many of her colleagues did, and she also felt this was a good investment of her resources. Anatomy was particularly problematic in this regard. Eventually, a teacher from outside the school ended up agreeing to let the women attend his regular class, and then the school accepted that as its coursework. Yeah, they were in this unique position where they were one having to handle their tuition on their own through side deals with professors, but then two having to set up their own curriculum in some cases where other teachers who weren't affiliated with the university were the only ones willing to take that money. Yet another problem was about to arise for the women of the University of Edinburgh. Several more problems actually, and we will talk about those after a sponsor break. The next issue for the Edinburgh Seven was access to the Royal Infirmary. The Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh was and still is a teaching hospital. To acquire a medical degree, any student had to study there, essentially doing clinical rotations to work hands on with actual patients instead of just learning from books and in the lab. This was the kind of work that Sophia was already accustomed to. It was that kind of stuff that made her fall in love with the medical profession during her time in Boston. But the Royal Infirmary would not allow women in, as they had done every other time such an issue had come up. Seven women students tried to get the policy changed, but this round got really incendiary for some reason. In particular, male students at the university got really mad at the prospect that women who had been doing the same coursework as them might actually get medical degrees. They started being openly hostile to Sophia and her classmates. According to rex Blake's account quote, a certain proportion of the students with whom we worked became markedly offensive and insolent, and took every opportunity of practicing the petty annoyances that occur to thoroughly ill bred lads, such as shutting doors in our faces, ostentatiously crowding into the seats we usually occupied, bursting into horse laughs and howls when we approached, as if a conspiracy had been formed to make our position as uncomfortable as might be. In addition to just being jerks in every interaction with their women classmates, some of the men of the school also started a petition to get them banned from the Royal Infirmary. Five hundred students signed it. The agitation of the male students continued to build, and then one day it reached its apex. There had been several days of male students trying to block women students from entering classrooms, but there weren't a lot of them, and the women were able to basically brush right past them. But then there was a day when things escalated. An estimated two hundred students stood outside the gate leading to Surgeons Hall, which is the building where the classes were held. This was a raucous crowd and noisy, including singing. Protest songs. When Jex Blake and the other women approached a little before four pm, this crowd started yelling, but the women continued forward as though they didn't see or hear their detractors. But as they got to the gate, somebody slammed it before they could enter. A janitor opened the gate partially so the women could still pass through. They had been shoved around and hit with mud, and they still wanted to go to class. But when they got to their classroom, which was for an anatomy lecture, the room was full full beyond capacity, and packed with students who were not part of the class. The professor, doctor Handyside, ordered the people that were not there for class to leave, but once he had gotten them out and class had started, someone led a sheep into the room, creating a whole new wave of chaos, and according to Sefaia's journal, when the women went home at the end of the class, they were quote escorted by a gallant cavaliers, b police, c general mob d all boys and girls of the town. They made it home safe that day, which was a Friday. On Monday, the women were warned that a more serious demonstration was planned The Irish brigade was called. This is a group of students who formed kind of an ad hoc security group, but the day was rainy, nobody really showed up to protest. Tuesday the twenty second, there were enough agitated protesters that the brigade, which is about thirty men, had to walk the women to the lecture hall and then home after class. This Surgeon's Hall riot, as it came to be called, makes it clear that had the women not had the support of some of their peers, things could have really escalated. In any case, it was made very clear to them that a lot of people did not think they should be studying medicine. Yeah, there were definitely some of their classmates that were supportive of them. That is how they got warned that things might get worse, and that is those are the people that actually were like, hey, let's get the Irish brigate involved. But had those people not stood up, there could have been violence. This riot had significant fallout, and it was probably not the kind that the instigators had hoped for. It did not magically fix anything for Sofia or the other women's students, but it did bring to light the ways that they had been treated. The withheld scholarship. The anatomy classes problems the impossibility of completing their degrees due to being barred from the physical places that they needed to go to complete those studies. All of this was reported in the press along with news of the riot, and the public reaction was largely in favor of the women's students, who had done all of the same coursework as the men in far more challenging circumstances. Additionally, all of the women started receiving hate mail. Friends and families started asking very seriously if these women were really going to be okay if they continued in an environment of such hostility. One of the high notes during this time was a petition signed by nine hundred and fifty six women of Edinburgh urging that all medical facilities be opened to the women for their studies as needed. This was not the only show of support from the women of the city. A well respected woman named missus Nickel appeared at a meeting of school leaders and noted that the women of Scotland were watching the events at the school to consider what the next generation of doctors would be, asking how they could be trusted to work with female patients. Zaphia jax Blake was booed and pelted with peas, yes, peas at that same meeting when she rose to speak. She continued to get supportive letters though from women throughout the UK. Sofia had noticed during the riot that an assistant to one of the professors, the doctor Christisen that we mentioned earlier, was one of the main instigators the day that the women had gotten the gate slammed on them. She believed that Christensen's assistant had been an instigator of the entire riot, and she said so publicly. In response that assistant sued her for libel because he said that she claimed he was drunk at the riot. She had not to be clear done that she had said that someone had told her that he was drunk. This case went to court and it took two days there and it was crowded with spectators throughout. The outcome was not a judgment in her favor. It was that she had to pay one farthing quote for her rash and libelous statements. Though everyone also noted that mister c the man who brought the suit, had refused to ever deny that he had been part of the riot. Sofia was also deemed responsible for the cost of the case. Those costs were more than nine hundred pounds. Her brother very quickly stepped into pay half of that, but Sofia's supporters raised more than enough and his contribution was returned. Jury members were later quoted in the press as saying that they thought no monetary expense should have been awarded to the pursuer, even though it was just a farthing. Lucy Sewell and Sophia, of course, had been living on two different continents, but they were still emotionally closed through all of this, and Suwell did make a visit in eighteen seventy one. This holiday was a good one, and it made both of them consider whether they might be able to practice medicine together one day. But there was about to be yet another obstacle. Even though the public had grown relatively sympathetic to the difficulties that the women medical students were dealing with, the university did not make anything easier for them. Some lecturers had started allowing the women to attend their regular classes i e. Not women's specific classes, in an effort to get them ready to graduate, but the university found out and put an end to that. Additionally, the women were not going to be allowed to sit for their final exam, which would have conferred upon them their MD if they had passed. In January eighteen seventy two, the university made it abundantly clear that it just didn't think there was a way to credential the women's students with medical degrees. Safaia wrote of their determination quote On January eighth, the university court declared that they could not make any arrangements to enable us to pursue our studies with a view to a degree, but that if we would altogether give up the question of graduation and be content with certificates of proficiency, they would try to meet our views. Certificates of proficiency were not an acceptable compromise. The women sued the school for a breach of contract. As this legal battle was playing out, so Fi appenned Medical Women, which contained two essays. The first, Medicine as a Profession for Women, was what she had written for Josephine Butler's Anthology. The other was Medical Education for Women. That writing, which is dedicated to doctor Lucy Sewell, examines why exactly women hadn't been admitted to the medical community, and it includes an opening argument quote in the first place, let us take the testimony of nature in the matter. If we go back to primeval times and try to imagine the first sickness or the first injury suffered by humanity, does one instinctively feel that it must have been the man's business to seek the means of healing, to try the virtues of various herbs, or to apply such rude remedies as might occur to one unused to the strange spectacle of human suffering. I think that few would maintain that such ministry would come most naturally to the man, and be instinctively avoided by the woman. Indeed, I fancy that the presumption would be rather in the other direction. And what is such ministration but the germ of the future profession of medicine. There were also, at this time some women who were going really hard in the opposite direction of the status quo, and suggesting that men were the ones who should not be allowed to become doctors, because they were not as inherently nurturing as women. But Sophia stated plainly that she thought this was not a good position either, writing quote in my own experience as a medical student, I have had far too much reason to acknowledge the honor and delicacy of feeling habitually shown by the general of the medical profession, not to protest warmly against any such injurious imputation. I am very sure that in the vast majority of cases, the motives and conduct of medical men in this respect are altogether above question, and that every physician who is also a gentleman is thoroughly able, when consulted by a patient in any case whatever, to remember only the human suffering brought before him, and the scientific bearing of its details. But she does also kind of throw women under the bus a little bit later in that paragraph, writing quote, the medical man is only one of the parties concerned, and that it is possible that a difficulty which may be of no importance from his scientific perspective, may yet be very formidable, indeed to the far more sensitive and delicately organized feelings of his patient, who has no such armor of proof as his own, and whose very condition of suffering may entail an even exaggerated condition of nervous susceptibility on such points. This issue ended up in Scotland's Court of Session, and things did not go well there. For Sofia and her women colleagues. Not only was the school deemed able to refuse medical degrees to women if it so chose, it was also ruled that the school should never have started taking women as medical students at all. Jax Blake and her fellow litigants appealed the decision to Parliament. We're going to talk about how things played out there after we hear from the sponsors who keep the show going. When the issue of women's university education moved to London, so did Sofia, so that she could continue to work for educational equity there. As the legal babble over women in medical schools was waged in eighteen seventy four, jax Blake made a path around the problem for the women who followed her. She helped found the London's School of Medicine for women. The professors, though, were still men. Jex Blake worked on this project with Elizabeth Garrett Anderson, and the two women were so very different. As you'll recall, Elizabeth Garrett had found the way around getting her practicing license by becoming an apothecary, and though these two women were very close friends and collaborators, according to reports, there were a lot of arguments between them about how to go about things setting up the school. Though they didn't succeed in getting their medical degrees from Edinburgh, the battle had gained a lot of attention and sympathizers, and as a result, in eighteen seventy six, the Medical Act was passed, also known as the Russell Gurney Enabling Act. This didn't open the doors of medical schools to women. It just created a law that said that universities could do that if they wanted to. More importantly, the Act established that women doctors who had trained in other countries could become registered to practice medicine in Britain. Yeah, for clarity, the reason why there had to be a law that said you can take women if you want is that a lot of these schools had charters that specified men, and if they had changed their admission policies, that charter would then come into question and could be litigated. That was why that was such a weird and strange but necessary step. As a consequence of all of this, Safia, Jex Blake and Edith Pecchi were able to get their graduations from a medical school in Switzerland and then they sat for their exams in Dublin at the College of Physicians there to get their mds and their license. Starting in eighteen seventy eight, she was finally able to practice medicine in a practice that she set up in Edinburgh. That practice was active until eighteen ninety nine, and during her time in that practice she also founded the Edinburgh Women's Hospital in eighteen eighty five in the Edinburgh School of Medicine for Women in eighteen eighty six. Sephia also experienced two significant losses in the middle of her triumphant career in Scotland. First, her mother died in July of eighteen eighty one. This is one of the few events in her life which she wrote very little about in her journal. The other is that while Sepia and Lucy Sewell had often fantasized about starting a practice together and living together, probably as a couple, each of them was so strongly tied to their own communities that this never happened. Lucy Sewell died in February of eighteen ninety which was a huge blow to Sephia. It is a little bit unclear precisely when Sefiah met Margaret Todd. Todd was born in eighteen fifty nine, so she was nineteen years younger than Sefaia jex Blake, and she had enrolled in the Edinburgh School of Medicine for Women almost as soon as it was founded. She was one of its first students, so presumably the two of them met around that time. Margaret was also a writer. She wrote several novels under the name Graham Travers, and her work in literature meant that she took a longer time than usual to complete her medical degree took her eight years. After sitting for a medical examine Brussels in eighteen ninety four, she became assistant medical officer at Edinburgh Hospital and Dispensary for Women and Children, but her medical career lasted just five years, most likely because of her relationship with Sophia. When Sophia retired in eighteen ninety nine, in part because she had developed issues with her heart, Margaret retired too and left Edinburgh with her. Sofia had decided she wanted to try farming in retirement on an estate named Wendadeine in East Sussex, and she did. She planted figs, peaches, apricots and other fruits and had a small dairy. She threw big dinners full of fresh food. Her door was always open to any of the women she knew through her work in medicine and education, and some that she didn't know but were students of the school that she would just let come and visit, which I love. Sophia died at Wendeddine on January seventh, nineteen twelve. Following her death, Margaret Todd wrote a biography of her titled The Life of Doctor Sephia jax Blake. This was published in nineteen eighteen. Todd seemed to have access to pretty much all of jax Blake's personal papers, right down to drawings she had made as a child and poetry she'd written in her early years. The portrait of jax Blake in the biography is a very loving one, although Margaret did not mention herself in it even once. Nope. It's it's very sweet because she does acknowledge various faults in her character, but it's always like yes, but she was also amazing. It's really a sweet biography. One of Sephia's favorite sayings, according to Todd's biography, was not me but us, meaning that she believed in people working together for each other and the other women of the Edinburgh Seven went on, like Sophia, to practice medicine, although all in very different ways. Edith pet She worked in England before leaving for Bombay, where she worked at the Kamma Hospital for Women and Children. Isabel Thorne did not pursue her MD, but became the Honorary Secretary for the London School of Medicine for Women. Emily Bubble worked in London's New Hospital for Women before moving to Nice and working on tuberculosis research. Matilda Chaplin founded a school for midwiffery in Tokyo, then returned to Britain and had a private practice. Helen Evans took time away for medicine to raise a family, then joined the Edinburgh School of Medicine for Women's executive committee. And Mary Anderson worked with Emily Bubble at the New Hospital for Women until eighteen ninety five, when she retired for health reasons. In twenty nineteen, the Edinburgh Seven finally received their posthumous degrees from the University of Edinburgh. Yeah. That's Safia Jex Blake, who I adore. Yeah, she's one of my favorites that I have research to the time. I have two pieces of listener mail, in fact cool one is very short, which is about something that I said on the podcast in a behind the scenes MANI. It is from our listener Chad, who writes y'all suggested that instead of the brutal capitalism of monopoly, it would be nice to play a game where the person who adopts the most cats wins. There is such a game. I played it with my niece once. It's called Here Kitty Kitty, and it comes with a bunch of cute little black, gray, white, and orange cat figurines. Chad, Thank you, Chad. I'm gonna be looking for that one. There's another that someone else mentioned. Yeah, I couldn't find that one. I'm absolutely willing to bet that there are many game And the reason I've come to this conclusion is that a friend of mine recently asked my spouse what was that game we were playing where we were trying to grab little sushies out of a bowl with chopsticks? And I went to try to find the answer and found at least six different games by different publishers that were all about grabbing little sushi bits out of a bowl with I love it. Listen many people can have the same great idea. Yes. My next one is from our listener rose Mary, who writes, Hi, Holly and Tracy. I'm a longtime listener and I love to play your podcast while working on my cosplays, sewing for craft fares and crocheting. I've always wanted to write in and finally I have something. I was listening to the Spring twenty twenty four on Earthed episodes and you mentioned ancient lipstick from Iran. Recently, I saw instagrammer Aaron Parsons recreate this very lipstick on her page and it was such a pretty reddish brown. Here's the link if you want to check it out. I wanted to read this because I also follow Aaron Parsons, who does a lot of historical makeup deep dives like she does. Do you follow her? No, but a friend of mine sent me the same video. She does like stuff where she will. At one point she kind of cold called the person who used to do Marilyn Monroe's makeup to get information on what exact products she used on some of her classic looks like she very respectfully she had a contact that gave her that info. She didn't just like call out of the Blue and she does things like this. She's a really really interesting makeup artist who also is just obsessed with the history of makeups. Going back to this email, Rosemary writes, I also was listening to Behind the Scenes and Holly was talking about how she cried during the bobs Burgers episode of Louise doing a shadow puppet presentation on Amelia Earhart. I just want to let you know you were not alone. I cried too. I'm so glad it was such a moving episode. I tear up just writing about it. Just talking about this brings me to tears. It's such a good show. I attached the mandatory pet tax. These are my three cats, Fry who is black, doctor Pants a tuxi, and Tina, Gray forever Kitten. Yes, they are named after my favorite shows. Fry is our oldest and most stoic, Doctor Pants is the friendliest an FIP survivor, and Tina is the silliest epitome of a gray cat. Here's what I want to know, Rosemary, is doctor Pants named after mister Pants from Home Movies, which is all so created by the same person that does Bob's Burgers. So I feel like the DNA of your taste is all in here. His name is mister Pants. He's a kitty catman. I had a cat I used to call mister Pants. That was not his actual name, but I called him that anyway. These cats are adorable and she caught them all in one picture where they look like a gang that's coming to get you in the best way possible. They are so cute, little cuddle monkeys. The sweetest, sweetest, sweetest Rosemary, thank you for this email. It was so sweet. You feel like a kindred spirit. If you would like to write to us and maybe make me cry by mentioning Bob's Burger's episodes that are very moving, you can do that at History Podcast at iHeartRadio dot com. If you have not yet subscribed to the show, it is so easy. You can do that on the iHeartRadio app, or anywhere you listen to your favorite shows. Stuff you Missed in History Class is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.