Tony and I were at a conference in Las Vegas a year or so ago and had a few hours to kill before our flights home. The Mob Museum was on the way to the airport, so we decided to check it out. It’s a cool place – especially if you’re as into gangsters and true crime as we are.
The museum has a lot of info and artifacts about the role organized crime played during Prohibition. Part of that exhibit was one very small plaque hanging below a photograph of a stunning woman. Just 47 words to tell the story of the ‘Lady Hooch Hunter’, Daisy Simpson. One of only 12 women to serve as Prohibition agents.
I flew home – but I couldn’t stop thinking about Daisy. Who was she? Why had I never heard her name? It became something I fixated on, one of my little micro obsessions.
I began hunting for Daisy’s history and was blown away by what I found. I ended up writing her story for an episode of our TRUE WEIRD STUFF podcast. Which, if you’ve not checked it out, covers a whole lot of cool, weird tales. Aliens, of course, because hello? You know how obsessed I am with space. But other things too – freaky science and history and the epic stories about the lives of forgotten people. People like Daisy Simpson. And that real Wild West bad girl, Pearl Hart. And the actress who dumped an aristocrat for love – and now maybe haunts a hotel in Pennsylvania. The heiress who flatly refused to be bullied by her husband, and the two women in Colorado who ghoulishly stole and sold body parts from the dead. Or how about the young Irish woman who paid with her life for because her neighbors were in the grip of superstition and fear and thought she was a fairy changeling? Kindly grandmothers who were hiding their murderous deeds behind rosy-cheeked smiles? The grieving mother who just could not bear to bury her dead son – for 13 years…one amazing story after the other and yet no one knows their names?
March is Women’s History Month, and there are so many incredible stories to tell. I’m a woman’s woman, and nothing makes me happier than whipping up an episode about a forgotten woman who deserves to be remembered. Max and I love telling their stories – even if those stories are sometimes bloody, diabolical, or just a little bit insane.
If that’s not your thing, we also cover cannibalism, reincarnation, and giant sharks. Truly something for everyone lol
Happy Women’s History Month! Keep making that good noise, my sisters! Live loud and proud.
Sheri< I'm a Social Worker like you. I have been doing this for 42 years. My Agency(Which I love) doesn't recognize Social Workers during this milestone. Kind of strange isn't it? have a good day. I'm one of your listener's from your day one. A Bob listener as a child.