Zoë & Theodora, Byzantine Empresses

Over almost 30 years in 11th-century Constantinople, sometimes Zoë ruled alongside one of her husbands, sometimes she and Theodora ruled together, and in the end, Theodora ruled alone. All against a backdrop of distrust and intrigue and possibly murder.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class, a production
of I Heart Radio. Hello, and welcome to the podcast.
I'm Tracy V. Wilson and I'm Holly Fry. So our
show has been skewing a little bit more for the
nineteen and twentieth centuries lately, uh, including something we just

(00:23):
recorded that's coming out after this one. So when I
picked today's topic, I wanted to just break a little
farther out of that. And I have had Byzantine empresses
Zoe and Theodora on my list for ages. They went
through a whole series of twists and turns in eleventh
century Constantinople, and over the course of almost thirty years,

(00:47):
sometimes Zoe ruled alongside one of her husband's, sometimes she
and Theodora ruled together, and then in the end Theodora
ruled alone. All of that happened against a backdrop of
a lot of distrust and intrigue and possibly some murder. Uh.
A note on the names before we get started. Pretty

(01:08):
much all the English language sources on this use Anglicized
rather than Greek names. That's what folks will probably find
if they go looking for more information in English on this,
including in scholarly work, so for the sake of clarity,
even though that's a little weird to me, we're gonna
stick with that convention rather than trying to translate all

(01:31):
the names back into Greek. Right, And we are also
going to give a little bit of context first, both
about the available sources for this episode and the imperial
dynasty that Zoe and Theodora were part of. There are
always challenges when it comes to researching historical figures from
this long ago. Documentation obviously is pretty scarce. We have

(01:52):
had so many conversations on the show about the oldest
surviving records of a person, or even uh records about
them having been written decades or even centuries after the fact,
or the oldest surviving written record being a copy of
something that was written much earlier, but we don't have
the original for comparison because it hasn't survived, so we

(02:14):
don't know if that copy is accurate, or how many
iterations it may have gone through, or even just editorial
flare or interpretation. Uh. And in some cultures we do
have a sense of how history was preserved through an
oral tradition, but often there are just a lot of
unanswered questions about how later accounts reflects something that happened

(02:36):
way before, so Zoe and Theodora come with a slightly
different challenge than the one that we are usually talking
about with things from this long ago. The most detailed
record of their lives and their rule is the Chronographia
of Mikhail Slosh. Slosh lived from about ten eighteen to
ten eighty two, and he was a writer, a political advisor,

(03:00):
and a government official before eventually becoming a monk. His
chronicle documents events that he actually lived through and in
some cases witnessed, Although it does start with things that
happened when he was a baby and did not have
a personal memory. Of Slash met Zoe and Theodora multiple times,

(03:21):
Theodora frequently invited him to leave his monastery and come
visit her in the palace. Although it was written shortly
after the things that documents, the Chronographia is not really
a straightforward presentation of people and events. Its writing style
is often very poetic and dramatic. In places it reads
like a novel or a memoir. Sometimes Salas describes things

(03:45):
that happened behind closed doors, with no one there to
witness and report on them. His personal opinions are often
very apparent, and in places entire paragraphs are about himself
instead of his purported subjects. Sometimes he also gives ages
and dates that contradict official records of the time. He

(04:06):
really has some parts that are just like I'm going
to talk about myself for a minute, about and that's
about you. How about how I feel about you? So
the Chronographia also follows literary tropes that were common during
the Byzantine era. The emperors and empresses are usually described
as physically flawlessly beautiful, which was pretty much the standard

(04:30):
way to describe royalty, and the depictions of women are
often stereotypes. So, for example, here is how he describes
Zoe after one of her husband's confined her to the
women's quarters in the palace under guard. Quote anyway, she
avoided the despicable feminine trait of talkativeness and there were

(04:51):
no emotional outbursts. So it is not entirely clear whether
his criticisms of Zoe and Theodora reflect their actual behavior
or if they are more drawn from the sexist stereotypes
of the day. As we noted at the top of
the show, Zoe and Theodora were empresses during the eleventh
century in the Byzantine Empire. The Byzantine Empire, also known

(05:14):
as the Eastern Roman Empire, was established in the fourth
century after Diocletian divided the Roman Empire into Eastern and
Western portions, each with its own rulers. Constantine the First
became the emperor of the Eastern portion and established Constantinople
as its capital. Today it is Istanbul, Turkey, and it
was built on the site of the ancient city of Byzantium.

(05:38):
The term Byzantine Empire comes from this ancient city, although
that term was not coined until around the sixteenth century.
People living in this empire did not typically describe it
as Byzantine. They only even use the word Byzantium pretty rarely.
They generally referred to themselves as Romans, while people in

(06:01):
the Western Roman Empire were more likely to refer to
them as Greek and to call the empire the Empire
of Constantinople or New Rome. So within the field of
Byzantine history, there is starting to be some discussion about
whether to move away from this terminology and into something
that is more accurate still in motion, still in motion,

(06:26):
like pretty New conversation from I mean, I'm not I'm
not a Byzantine historian, but as I understand that this
is a pretty new conversation just about the whole field
and how to approach it and how to kind of
unload some of the Westernized baggage, which like the naming
convention of of Anglicized names, is also part of So

(06:47):
this empire had started to decline by the ninth century,
when Emperor Basil the First came to power. This started
a new imperial dynasty known as the Macedonian Dynasty, because
Basil had been born to a peasant family in Macedonia.
The Byzantine Empire, at least in theory, was an elective monarchy,
but Basil took steps to establish a dynastic line that

(07:09):
would be passed down through his descendants for generations. Although
this line of succession was interrupted by various usurpations and rifts,
the Macedonian dynasty ruled the Empire for almost two hundred years.
The Macedonian dynasty is described as ushering in the Byzantine
Golden Age, marked by a period of literary and artistic flourishing,

(07:31):
as well as an expansion of the empire's territory, and
this expansion wasn't just about extending the empire's political influence.
It was also about spreading Christianity. The Bulgarians, Serbs, and
Roosts all converted to Christianity during this phase of the
Byzantine Empire. Zoe and Theodora came to power five generations

(07:53):
after Basil the First at the end of this imperial dynasty.
They were the daughters of Constantine the eighth and his
wife Elena, and nieces of Constantine's brother, Basil the second.
Basil and Constantine were sons of the emperor Romanus the second.
They were named co emperors in the year nine sixty
They were both still children then, depending on which account

(08:16):
you are looking at, Basil was either three or five,
and his younger brother, Constantine was either a baby or
a toddler. Their father was still living when they were
named as his successors, but then when Romanus died in
nine sixty three, it kicked off a period of instability.
At first, Basil and Constantine's mother, Theofano, acted as their regent,

(08:37):
but then she married a general named Nicophorus Focus. This
was one of many apparently unhappy marriages in this story.
He was an accomplished general, but deeply unpopular as a ruler.
He was ultimately assassinated in nine sixty nine, and Theofano
was implicated in his death, along with another general, John Samiskis.

(08:58):
John Samiskis took the throne and banished the Afano to
a monastery. He then reigned until his death in nine
Although Basil the Second and Constantine the eighth technically came
into power as co emperors, at that point, Basil was
seen as the far better choice to lead. He was
described as thoughtful and intelligent, while his brother was more

(09:20):
interested in maintaining a life of luxury than actually ruling. Also,
as we said earlier, Basil was the older of the two,
and even so he was just barely considered to be
an adult. So all the parties involved generally agreed that
Basil would take the lead and his brother Constantine would
be co emperor pretty much in name only. As emperor,

(09:41):
Basil faced a series of revolts launched by other claimants
to the throne, some of whom were close enough to
the Macedonian dynastic line that they might have been able
to gain some acceptance if they actually succeeded it. Wasn't
until nine thirteen years after coming to power that Basil's
forces defeated the last of them. This Byzantine victory came

(10:02):
with the aid of Vladimir, the Great Grand Prince of Kiev,
so it counts very somewhat in their details on this,
but it was all connected to a political and religious
agreement in which Vladimir married Basil and Constantine sister Anna,
and as part of the marriage negotiations, also agreed to
convert to Christianity. We also have an episode of this

(10:24):
in the archive, but if you go check it out,
be aware that most of this region was described at
the time as Russia, but today it's Ukraine. During his
fifty year reign, Basil implemented land reforms, forcing wealthy families
to return land that had been seized from the peasantry.
Of the course of decades, he expanded the Byzantine Empire's

(10:44):
territory and consolidated its influence in territory that had already held.
He was nicknamed Basil the Bulgar Slayer after his conquest
of Bulgaria. Basil also hoped to form an alliance with
the Holy Roman Empire, which at the time encompassed a
lot of central Europe and what's now northern Italy, and
that is where we finally get back to Zoe, so

(11:07):
we will turn our attention to her after a quick
sponsor break. We have only mentioned two of them so far,
but Byzantine Emperor Constantine the eighth and his wife Helena
had three daughters. The oldest, Eudokia, had become a nun.

(11:28):
According to Psilosh, this was because she had been scarred
by an illness. That illness was probably smallpox. The middle daughter, Zoe,
was born around and the youngest, Theodora, was born around one.
Zoe and Theodora were both known by the honorific Porphyro Genita,
or born in the Purple, which was used for the

(11:50):
daughters of emperors born during their reign. Emperor's sons had
the corresponding title of Porphio genitos. Basil the seconds land
to create an alliance between the Eastern Roman Empire and
the Holy Roman Empire involved a marriage between his niece
Zoe and Holy Roman Emperor Otto the third. This arrangement

(12:11):
was made in the year one thousand one, so Zoe
would have been about twenty three. She was described as
being exceptionally beautiful, although, as we noted earlier, Byzantine royalty
were generally always described this way. This alliance would have
brought together two massive political powers, But when Zoey arrived
in Bari in southern Italy to be married, having sailed

(12:34):
there from Constantinople, it turned out that Otto had died
suddenly of a fever at the age of only twenty one.
Had he survived, though this probably would have been a
tumultuous marriage, Otto actually died after fleeing a rebellion and
losing control of the imperial city. Zoe returned to Constantinople,
and she largely disappeared from the historical record until Basil

(12:58):
the Second's death in ten twenty five. Over the course
of his reign, Basil had become more and more sober
and reserved, and in his last years he was described
as having an almost monk like austerity. He had never married,
so his brother Zoe and Theodora's father, Constantine the eighth,
followed him on the throne. Although Constantine had the three

(13:20):
daughters that we already mentioned, he also had no male heir.
He became ill in ten twenty eight at the age
of seventy, and on his deathbed, he appointed his relative
Romanos are Gyris, who was the eparch of the city
of Constantinople, to be his successor, and he also arranged
a marriage between Romanos and Zoe. Although Romanos was a relative,

(13:42):
he wasn't within the Macedonian line of succession, So according
to Selash, in romanos mind this was the start of
a new ruling dynasty. He would be its founder and
it would carry on through his descendants. If that was
the case, though, there was a big flaw in his plan.
Zoe was fifty, making it sort of unlikely that he

(14:03):
was going to be able to father any children with her.
Slash describes the couple trying all kinds of fertility treatments
and charms in an attempt to conceive an air. This
really seems to have driven a wedge between Zoe and
her husband. Each of them took lovers. Romanus also cut
Zoe off from the royal treasury and put her on

(14:24):
a strict allowance, which infuriated her. In some accounts, so
he also became really jealous of her sister, who had
at one point been considered as Romanus's bride, and other
accounts her advisers were the ones who suggested that her
sister might be a threat to her. Either way, Theodora
was confined to the women's quarters in the palace and

(14:46):
then eventually sent to a monastery, and some accounts Zoe
also cut her sister's hair into a tonsure. Slash also
describes Romanos as an ineffective ruler, overconfident in his knowledge
of both letters and military tactics, and this led him
to make all kinds of strategic blenders that he tried
to pay for by raising taxes. But then he also

(15:09):
spent a lot of money trying to build churches and monasteries.
Unlike Basil the Second, he didn't get in the way
of big landowners, once again trying to take over land
from the peasantry, which pushed the empire toward a more
feudal existence. The Byzantine army, commanded by Romanos himself, suffered
a humiliating and expensive defeat at the Battle of azaz

(15:31):
Inten thirty. Zoe's lover during all of this was Michael,
brother of John the Orfanotrophists, who had been a prominent
eunuch in the court of Basilis Second. Michael was in
his twenties and Zoe was in our fifties, and Romano
seems to have known about this relationship but pretty much
ignored it, possibly because he thought that trying to put

(15:51):
a stop to it would just lead Zoe to take
other lovers instead. Michael also had epilepsy, and the Chronographia
describes Romano is feeling sorry for him. Ignoring. This relationship
did not work out for Romanos, though multiple accounts either
suggest or flat out state that Zoe and Michael conspired

(16:11):
to slowly poison him. Then inten thirty four, he either
drowned or was drowned in his bath while preparing for
the next day's Good Friday observances. Uh Silash has a
riveting account of his body servants holding him under the water.
Nice that we don't know actually happened. Yeah, Zoe put

(16:33):
her influence as empress to work to marry her lover
Michael and place him on the imperial throne. But just
like her late husband's decision to ignore that affair had
not really worked out for him, Zoe's efforts to establish
Michael as Emperor Michael the Fourth did not work out
for her. He seems to have concluded that a woman
who would allegedly conspire with her lover to poison her

(16:56):
husband might get a new lover and do that again.
So he confined Zoe to the women's quarters and dismissed
all of her loyal eunuchs and ladies in waiting, and
then replaced them all with people of his own, Choosing
Michael the Fourth was not particularly popular as an emperor.
He raised taxes and required that they paid in currency,

(17:16):
which was a change and a hardship for people who
add access to goods but not money. This led to
an uprising in ten forty, and that fed into a
revolt by the Bulgar people against Byzantine rule in general,
with the rebels taking over multiple cities in laying siege
to Thessalonika. During all of this, Michael had recurring and
sometimes serious illnesses. It's not clear whether this was a

(17:41):
complication of his epilepsy or something else. His brother, John
the Orfino Trophos, convinced him to name their sister son,
who was also named Michael, just to confuse things as
caesar or co emperor, to help take some of the
pressure off of him. So two Michael's at this point

(18:02):
ruling at least in name. Yes one of the things
that was a little frustrating about this episode is how
many of the same names were used by different people,
not just spread apart, but like within a couple of generations,
So like there's a lot of having to cross check.
Was this the same theo Fellow, Yes, different Michael No, no, no.
But there were some barriers to the younger Michael getting

(18:24):
any kind of support in this plan. Although his mother
was the sister of both the Emperor Michael the fourth
and John the Orphana Trophos, he was of common birth,
his father was a cocker. To try to give the
younger Michael a clearer connection to the imperial throne, John
suggested that Zoe adopt him as her son. This would

(18:45):
bolster his legitimacy as caesar, both because of his adopted
mother being the Empress and because at this point she
was pretty popular. She was an emperor's daughter born in
the Purple and the niece of another emperor, and she
was also generous with the royal treasury, at least when
the Emperor let her have access to it. The elder
Michael became seriously ill in ten forty one, and between

(19:08):
that illness and his military failures, he rapidly lost support,
but he tried to hang onto the throne for as
long as he could, including planning military expeditions to Bulgaria.
That was something that his physicians and advisers suspected that
he just would not survive. Ultimately, he was either forced
off the throne or chose to retire to a monastery.

(19:30):
John the Orfino Trophos was imprisoned and then later blinded,
so Michael's nephew Michael, followed him as emperor, becoming Michael five.
And if you're thinking right about now, hey, it seems
like there's a pattern here, and he's probably not going
to act very grateful for Zoe's help and getting him
on the throne. Spoiler alert, You're exactly right, and we're

(19:50):
going to talk about that after a sponsor break. Even
though Michael the fifth acceptance as emperor was really only
possible thanks to Zoe agreeing to adopt him and publicly
supporting him. Once he was on the throne, he banished

(20:14):
her to a monastery and started spreading rumors that she
had been plotting to kill him. And although there are
some sources that conclude that Zoe really was involved in
the poisoning of her first husband, Romanos, or at least
that it was possible that she had been. They also
generally agree that this whole accusation by you know, the

(20:35):
younger Michael, now Michael the fifth, like that, was just baseless.
As word spread about Zoe's treatment, the people of Constantinople
were outraged. In the words of quote, the indignation, in fact,
was universal, and all were ready to lay down their
lives for Zoe. Michael's father, being of common birth, made
the whole thing particularly insulting. Quote How was it this

(20:58):
low born fellow dear to raise a hand against a
woman of such lineage. When people learned that Zoe had
been banished to a monastery, an armed mob attacked the
palace and started tearing down royal buildings. Zoe was retrieved
from the monastery to give a public appearance alongside Michael
the Fifth, still dressed in her nun's habit, But this

(21:21):
really did not appease the mob. They did not want
Zoe the nun. They wanted Zoe the Empress. Also, the
people of Constantinople had not forgotten about Zoe's sister, Theodora,
who had spent at least the previous ten years in
a monastery. When they couldn't restore Zoe to the throne,
they went to Theodora's monastery, brought her out of it,

(21:42):
and proclaimed her to be the empress. This did not
settle all the unrest, though, and in April of ten
forty two, Emperor Michael the five fled the palace. According
to the Chronographia, his relationship with his uncle's had become
increasingly contentious, and he had had all of them astrated,
with the exception of his uncle Constantine, who he had

(22:03):
promoted to noblissimus. And in the wake of the mobs
attack on the palace, both Michael the fifth and his
uncle Constantine were exiled and blinded, and with that there
were two empresses, Zoe and Theodora, both of whom had
popular support, even though a lot of people didn't think
it was quite proper for a woman to be empress

(22:24):
without a husband. The empresses dismissed everyone who had been
involved with Zoe's banishment, and they kept the people they
thought were loyal, but otherwise they did not appoint new
counselors for a while. Here's how the Chronographia describes them.
Quote the elder Zoe was the quicker to understand ideas,
but slower to give them utterance. With Theodora, on the

(22:46):
other hand, it was just the reverse in both respects,
for she did not readily show her innermost thoughts, but
once she had embarked on a conversation, she would chatter
away with an expert and lively tongue. Zoe was a
woman of passionate interests, prepared with equal enthusiasm for both
alternatives death or life. I mean and that she reminded

(23:08):
me of sea waves now lifting a ship high and
then plunging it down to the depths. Such characteristics were
certainly not found in Theodora. In fact, she had a
calm disposition, and in one way, if I may put
it so, a dull one. Zoe was open handed, the
sort of woman who could exhaust a sea teeming with
gold dust in one day. The other counted her staters

(23:31):
when she gave away money, partly, no doubt, because her
limited resources forbade any reckless spending, and partly because inherently
she was more self controlled in this manner. I can't
help but think about Zoe and her perfumes also being
associated with poisons. Um he also describes Zoe as very

(23:52):
pious and not enjoying the typically feminine tasks like spinning
and working on a loom, but really enjoying a and
that thing that I just referenced, making perfumes and having
a laboratory set up in her rooms for that purpose.
When it comes to talking about their leadership, though the
last is not quite as flattering. I mean, I would
call that earlier thing that I read kind of flattering,

(24:15):
but also sometimes a little tempered. But when it came
to talking about the rule he wrote quote to put
it quite candidly, for my present purpose is not to
compose a eulogy, but to write an accurate history. Neither
of them was fitted by temperament to govern. They neither
knew how to administer, nor were they capable of serious
argument on the subject of politics. For the most part,

(24:37):
they confused the trifles of the harem with important matters
of state. Even the very trait of the elder Sister,
which is commended among many folks today, namely her ungrudging liberality,
dispensed very widely over a long period of time. Even
this trait, although it was no doubt satisfactory to those
who enjoyed it because of the benefits they received from her,

(25:00):
was after all the sole cause, in the first place,
of the universal corruption and of the reduction of Roman
fortunes to their lowest ebb. Zoe and Theodora ruled together
from April to June of ten forty two, and as
we said earlier, while they both seemed to have been beloved,
there wasn't ever present since that it was simply wrong

(25:22):
for them to be on the throne without a man.
So to solidify their positions, Zoe married again, this time
to Constantine Monomacos. He was a wealthy aristocrat who had
a reputation for being a womanizer, but he also had
experiencing government. He also had his own connection to the dynasty,
although it was a somewhat distant one. He was related

(25:43):
to Zoe's late first husband, romanos Uh, and he in
this marriage became Emperor Constantine the ninth. Zoe, Theodora, and
Constantine all ruled together, but getting married did not really
do much to avert scandal as it had been in
ten did. Constantine had a lover named Sclarina, and that

(26:03):
by itself would not have raised too many eyebrows, especially
if he had kept her in his own house without
being too showy about it and without being too you know,
extract extravagant and public and any gifts that he might
give to her. He did not do that, though he
moved her into the palace and essentially treated her as
though she were his wife, giving her the title of

(26:24):
Augusta and having the staff refer to her as Empress.
That's not problematic at all. According to the Chronographia, Zoe,
who at this point was in her sixties, actually didn't
really object to this. Sclarina seems to have wanted to
stay in the empress's good graces, gifting them things that
they particularly loved. For Zoe that was sweet herbs, and

(26:45):
for Theodora it was Persian coins, which she collected. But
in ten forty four, Sclarina, who had asthma and had
been experiencing chest pains, died suddenly. Constantine, who it seems
Zoe chose as a husband in part because of his
administrative experience, turned out to be pretty lavish in his
spending and also delegated most of the actual work of

(27:07):
governing to other people. Just spent money really freely from
the royal treasury and did not do a lot of
the management work himself. He also ordered the execution of
John the Orphano Trophos, who had already been exiled. He
fought off a revolt led by a soldier named Maniacs,
and the empire also had to defend itself against a

(27:29):
Russian fleet which attacked in retaliation for the death of
a city and noble who was killed in a brawl
in Constantinople. Then there was another attempted usurpation, complete with
the false rumor that Constantine was actually dead. That rumor
was helped along by the fact that he did have
some kind of recurring serious illness. Towards the end of

(27:50):
her life, Zoe put more and more of the day
to day administration of the empire in Constantine's hands, which he,
of course then delegated. Then, after a short and intense illness,
she died in ten fifty at the age estimated to
be about seventy two. Constantine was described as being heartbroken

(28:11):
after her passing, and he died five years later. That
left Theodora as the last of the Macedonian dynasty, and
Slash's words quote, she herself appointed her officials dispensed justice
from her throne with due solemnity, exercised her vote in
the courts of law, issued decrees, sometimes in writing, sometimes
by word of mouth. She gave orders, and her manner

(28:34):
did not always show consideration for the feelings of her subjects,
for she was sometimes more than a little abrupt. But
Slash also says that she didn't trust her own judgment,
relying too much on the opinions of other people and
appointing a man who was quote completely lacking in political
temperament as the head of her administration. And this doesn't

(28:56):
come up in the accounts of Zoe and Theodora personally,
but it was a big enough historical moment that it
seems weird not to mention it. In ten fifty four,
the Pope Leo the Ninth excommunicated the Patriarch of Constantinople,
Michael Serrellarius, from the Roman Catholic Church, and the patriarch
excommunicated the pope in turn. This became known as the

(29:17):
Schism of ten fifty four or the East West Schism,
which was the final split between the Roman Catholic and
Eastern Orthodox Churches after years of growing tension. So that
was towards the end of Theodora's life. She never married.
She died on August thirty one, ten fifty six, at
the age of about seventy five. She named a civil
servant as her successor, and he became Michael the sixth Stratioticos.

(29:42):
This was the start of another period of chaos. Michael
the six was overthrown in a military rebellion in ten
fifty seven, and then there was an abdication a general
who took the throne, only to be captured by the
Turks and replaced with a puppet ruler, and then yet
another military revolt. The Byzantine Empire was finally conquered by

(30:02):
the Ottoman Empire in fourteen fifties. Three yeah, like four
hundred more years passed between that sum up of things
that immediately followed this last Michael and the end of
the empire. There's a mosaic of Zoey and the Highest
Sophia in Istanbul. It bears the inscription Zoe the most
Pious Augusta. It's also possible that Zoe and Theodora are

(30:26):
depicted in medallions and the Kakooli triptych, which is a
cloison a depiction of the Virgin Mary. The figures in
that are not specifically named, but one of these medallions
depicts two empresses together with the Virgin Mary, possibly being
blessed or crowned, and it's actually the only known depiction
of two empresses together with the Virgin Mary. And all

(30:47):
of Byzantine art, that is the kind of roller coaster
of Zoe and Theodora with uh, with so question marks
about the the accounts in some cases yes, and the
who poisoned whom? And did? Uh? Did? Did anyone drown

(31:07):
accidentally or were they purposefully drowned? So many, so many
potential murders and assassinations in this story. Do you have
non murderous mail? Yeah? I have an email, a much
lighter in tone than the all the potential assassinations and whatnot. Um.
It is from Brianna, who says, Dear Holly and Tracy,
I've wanted to reach out to you, ladies for a
long time. When I heard the subject of this episode,

(31:29):
that episode being the Jim Thorpe episode, I ran to
my laptop to finally write to you. Jim Thorpe is
a subject near and dear to my heart, as he
is the namesake of my hometown. I'm all of two
minutes into the first part of part three on the subject,
so I'm sorry if I repeat some information or going
over in the podcast. I discovered your podcast when I
moved back to the area. Your voices have kept me

(31:50):
entertained and informed as I turned my house into a home. Now,
I take daily runs while listening to your podcast and
visit Jim Thorpe's grave and memorial often. While there are
different ring opinions on whether his remains belong in a
city he'd never been to in his lifetime, I can
say that the residents of this town treat him with
the utmost respect and honor. People who visit asked about
his history, and we're happy to share. My father also

(32:12):
grew up in this town, and he tells me stories
about how exciting it was to rename the town after him.
Even without the name change. Jim Thorpe, Pennsylvania is a
town rich in history and beauty, with tens of thousands
of visitors every year. Jim Thorpe was a center for
mining for anthracite coal and a founder of a coal
mining company. Created much of the town to house employees

(32:33):
of the minds, including his mansion. There's some deep history
about the Irish in this town, and they're also honored
and respected every year during St. Patrick's Day. There's a
canal system and a switchback railroad, and the people come
to visit from the cities to ride the train and
see the leaves. Every year. I'm including some photos highlighting
our town, and then I'm going to skip over the

(32:57):
to try and describe photographs themselves, and an audio podcast.
I am writing to show my appreciation of the show,
but if you want to read it on the podcast,
I don't mind. I know there are some personally identifying
details in this email. Keep up the great work, Brie.
I think I said Brianna at the beginning because I
was reading the email address, but it is signed Brie.
Thank you so much, Brie. I love seeing these pictures

(33:19):
because one of my favorite things to do when there
is not a pandemic happening, is going to some cute
little town and walking around and looking in all the
shops and galleries and eating in all the restaurants and
having drinks and all the bars. And I loved I
was like this. I had seen a few pictures of
the town of Jim Thorpe before, but these particular ones

(33:39):
maybe be like, Yep, this is a kind of place
that I would walk around, do a lot of window shopping,
eating lots of restaurants. Uh, hang out and relax, go
hiking a little, watch, watch some tree leaves. Yeah, I'm
nostalgic for that. We'll put it on the list these
pandemic days. Uh So, if you would like to write

(34:02):
to us about this or anither podcast or history podcasts
that I heart radio dot com and we're all over
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to our show on I heart radio app and Apple
podcasts and anywhere else to get your podcasts. Stuff you

(34:25):
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