Episode 245: Jessie Tarbox Beals

We recently traveled across our home state of Missouri from Kansas City to St. Louis to visit the Missouri History Museum. While it’s a fine museum, we were there for a specific reason: to do a live show about pioneering photojournalist, Jessie Tarbox Beals. We know that a lot of you would have loved to have been there to learn about this extraordinary woman, so we re-recorded the show in an audio-only format for you.

Jessie Richmond Tarbox was born on December 23, 1870, in Ontario, Canada. She was the fourth child of John Nathanial Tarbox and Marie Antoinette Bassett Tarbox. Jessie was born into wealth but grew up far differently after her father lost all his money and her mother asked him to leave. Jessie’s first career was as a teacher in Massachusetts, where she met and married Alfred Tennyson Beals when Jessie was 26.

While teaching, Jessie began to photograph on increasingly better equipment and, when she realized she was making more money during her summer, side hustle of photography, she and Alfred hit the road as itinerant photographers. During this phase of her life, she became the first woman photojournalist and the first woman staff photographer for a media outlet.

Similar to Jessie’s very first camera, nothing fancy at all, but it opened a whole world to her.
On the streets of Buffalo, the Bookcase Climbing era.

While Jessie would have a long career of photographing everything that she thought she could sell (and she sold a lot) from street photography to political commentary, to famous people and the homes of the wealthy- her big break into large circulation publications came when she worked and talked her way into being the official photographer for the publicity department at the 1904 St. Louis World’s Fair AND 1904 Summer Olympics.

Jessie and her assistant, Punkin at the fair

Her photography secrets at the fair included walking confidently…
…and carrying a big ladder.

Did she sneak on the balloon or is this a reenactment for publicity purposes?

Cue a montage of some of Jessie’s World’s Fair photographs!

Yes, that’s THE Alice Roosevelt!

Yes, that’s THE Alice Roosevelt’s father, TR….okay, fine, President Theodore Roosevelt

While Jessie’s dream of photographing the world was limited to the countries and people represented at the fair, she was a professional photographer based out of New York City for most of the rest of her life. Jessie Tarbox Beals died on May 30, 1942, she was 71 years old.

It’s time for a final photo montage from her life after the fair:

Beckett’s favorite cat picture

Susan’s favorite dog picture

Biography with a lot of photos by Alexander Alland,Sr.
Compilation by Maria Ausherman
Photos from the fair by Eric Breitbart

An online souvenir book that was digitized by the Library of Congress: The Complete Portfolio of Photographs of the World’s Fair, St. Louis, 1904

Jessie’s photographs are online at the Museum of the City of New York, the Missouri Historical Society, Schlesinger Library, and the Library of Congress.

The National Parks at Night website has a piece about Jessie’s nighttime photography.

A history of…

Greenwich Village on Stuytown.com, Wanzer Sewing Machine Company, rural schoolhouses, the camera (those last two are fun because they are also a list of links…see? Cockamamie Rabbit Holey at its finest!) and MOSS at the American Bryological and Lichenological Society!

The Forgotten History of Racism at the 1904 World’s Fair in St. Louis.

The Missouri History Museum’s new 1904 World’s Fair exhibit opens April 27th, if you can get to St. Louis, it’s worth the visit alone (and the rest of the museum is fantastic, too!)

The World’s Greatest Fair documentary is on Amazon Prime.

Meet Me in St. Louis is all over the place on many streaming services.

Break music: Rise and Shine, by Icicle; end music: Magic by LehtMoJo

Episode 244: Althea Gibson, Part One

There are quite a few lines on a tennis court; sideline, baseline, service line – all of which have their functions. But beginning in 1950, a powerful and charismatic African American athlete named Althea Gibson began to smash tennis’ color lines, one after another. Althea Gibson broke new ground and changed the world’s perception of what was possible in the world of sports.

All media recommendations will be on the shownotes for Part Two.

Episode 242: Alice Roosevelt Longworth, Part Two

Mrs. L in 1953 at nearly 70, via Library of Congress

On paper, Alice Roosevelt’s life reads like a typical young society woman: Debut at 17, travel, friends, parties, marriage to a wealthy and important man, and eventually, motherhood. But Alice’s life was far from typical. For starters, her travel was for official United States goodwill missions, her friends were some of the wealthiest in the world, and the parties were expensive balls where “Be Naughty” seemed to be her rule of the day. She smoked, she bet on horses, she flirted and rode around in cars with men…and America, and soon the world, LOVED her!

Alice circa 1902, Library of Congress

When it came to marriage, Alice chose Representative Nicholas Longworth from Ohio, a wealthy respected, and charming man who loved his drink and women–including ones that were not his wife. They did have a very public, Power Couple life hobbing and nobbing with influential politicians, and Alice- with her quick wit and intelligence became so important to the government- without ever holding an office- that she earned the nickname, Washington’s Other Monument.

The uuuuh happy couple and Papa? Library of Congress

In this episode, we continue with the story not only of the life of Alice, or Mrs. L as she came to be called, but also continue to take a good look at the most influential man in her life, her father, President Theodore Roosevelt. It’s really a two-fer!

Alice and baby Paulina, 1925, Library of Congress

Alice Roosevelt Longsworth died after a very long, very influential, and very unconventional life at her home in Washington, DC on February 20, 1980. She is buried with her daughter, Paulina Sturm, at Rock Creek Cemetary in Washington, D.C.

Deepest dive, by Stacy A. Cordery
Book Beckett read first, by Carol Felsenthal
The newest biography, by Shelley Fraser Mickle
Charming with lots of photos by Michael Teague
For your Eleanor Roosevelt fix by Marc Peyser and Timothy Dwyer
A picture book for kids, we were charmed! By Barbara Kerley and Edwin Fotheringham

If you find yourself near Long Island, NY, head on over to the Roosevelt summer estate, Sagamore Hill (the one that should have been named Leeholm until Alice’s mother died.) Tours are limited and by reservation, so plan ahead.

Read all about it! Alice Roosevelt at the 1904 St Louis World’s Fair! St. Louis Post-Dispatch

White House History post with a lot of lovely photos from her wedding to Nick Longworth as part of an online exhibit about White House Weddings and also Memoirs from Edith Roosevelt’s social secretary, Isabella Hagner, is also at White House History, and the Reagan Library has a series on White House kids, here’s Alice’s!

Read her “voice” in this interview from the Washington Post in 1974Wondering who the real source of a quote is?

The Quote Investigator may have hunted it down already!

The two podcasts that Susan mentioned were: The conversational show about Philippine history, What’s AP: Araling Panlipunan Rebooted and the scripted comedy, Edith! about Edith Wilson.

The scripted, historical drama, Crowded Hours, is an Amazon Original starring Emma Roberts as Alice! Does HBO Max still have the television series based on Alice’s life in production? We don’t know, but we are hoping really hard that it’s true!

Episode 241: Alice Roosevelt Longworth, Part One

Alice Lee Roosevelt, circa 1902, Library of Congress

President Theodore Roosevelt had many challenges during his career… corruption in the New York police force, the creation of the Panama Canal, the Spanish-American war, protecting the Grand Canyon and other national monuments, and groundbreaking anti-trust legislation…but the greatest challenge he faced was a volcano in a blue dress, his eldest daughter – flouter of convention, spicy of demeanor, and perhaps the world’s first media superstar who admirers across the world came to call America’s “Princess Alice.”

The Roosevelt family, circa 1903, Library of Congress. L-R: Quentin, Theodore Sr., Theodore, Jr., Archie, Alice. Kermit, Edith, and Ethel
The kind of deep dive information you come to us for. You’re welcome.

Time Travel With The History Chicks

Sources and media recommendations will be on the shownotes for Part Two

Used with permission, iLicenseMusic

Episode 240: La Malinche

Malinche (this artist’s guess is as good as ours) and the volcano named after her in Mexico. (photo CC license: Alyse and Remi, Flickr)

In the early 1500s in Mesoamerica, modern-day Mexico, a very young child who would come to be known as La Malinche was sold into slavery by her own family. Through a series of curious circumstances, she began working as a translator and cultural interpreter for Hernán Cortés and became one of the most famous (or infamous) characters in the story of Spain’s conquest of Mexico. For the most part, we have to look at the details of her life through the lives of the people around her, then turn our heads sideways and squint because how she is seen, depends on the angle of your, or historians, view. Even her name is shrouded in mystery: was she Malintzin, Malina, Marina, Doña Marina, or La Malinche? She was called all of those, but her true, original name is lost to history.

Time Travel With The History Chicks

Books!

By Jason Porath…we love this book for so many reasons and open it often
Biography by Camilla Townsend

Best read, part biography, part travelogue by Anna Lanyon

By Rebecca Yegar

By Buddy Levy

By Hugh Thomas

By Matthew Restall

Cortes’ letters

Bernal Diaz…if you speak Spanish, let us know how it is. All our sources cited it so we figured it was worth mentioning even if we didn’t read this one.

KIDS:

By Francisco Serrano, Illustrated by Pablo Serrano

Web!

The Denver Art Museum had an exhibition of Malinche’s life through art back in 2022, but since nothing dies on the internet, we can all still cyber-visit it! Traitor, Survivor, Icon: The Legacy of La Malinche

The murals at Palacio National in Mexico City: Here’s some information about Malinche’s portion and here’s a good look to grasp the size of this art!

Moving or Audible Pictures!

The Rest is History Podcast has an (entertaining and conversational as well as educational) series on the Fall of the Aztecs that goes into depth on Cortes and his conquest of Mexico (and Malinche is in there, of course!)

Episode 239: Field Trip Travelogue, France

End music: Rabbit Hole, by Emma Wallace