Typhoid Mary and The Movie Titanic

Joanna cries to the score of Titanic. Hannah continues her crusade to clear Typhoid Mary's name. 

Follow the show on Instagram @mywholepersonalitypod
Produced and edited by Joanna Clark
Theme music by Rebecca Jaffe
Podcast art by Michelle Hong (michelleyhong.com)

Transcript

SPEAKER_03 0:00

I love Typhoid Mary. I love Mary Mallon. I should not call her Typ-I should call her Mary Mallon. Because like she the way that he talks about her, he literally called quote I wrote this on quote a menace to public health. Um he also he was so shitty to her. He said she was, quote, more like a man than a woman. Oh no, we didn't need to say that. He basically, like, him and all the media were like, did she was Irish, lots of like anti-Irish sentiment at the time, very like this brassy Irish woman, too loud, swore, hated that she swore. Like, basically, like she's this loud, brash, mean woman who's more like a man, and I hate her, is basically like it's not only does she have typhoid, she's ugly. Kill her! Yeah, like might as well burn her out of stake.

SPEAKER_00 0:44

I like this one thing. So I made it my whole thing. Now no one wants to talk to me at parties. Please listen to my spiel, because I made it my whole deal. I made it my whole personality.

SPEAKER_04 1:02

Yeah. Hey everyone, welcome back to my whole personality. Uh first, I just want to say thanks to everyone who reached out about James, my cat. He I think he's doing better. He uh we went to the vet again, and um they still don't totally know what's going on, but we're gonna switch over to steroids and potentially um they're gonna put him on an inhaler. So both of us have asthma, apparently. And if you're wondering how to give a cat an asthma inhaler, um look it up. It's kind of crazy. I'm gonna have to train him to um learn how to use this inhaler. So that's what I'm gonna be doing for these next couple weeks. I had all of these goals and resolutions and things that I wanted to work on in the new year, and all of that has just been thrown to the wayside. And instead, I'll be spending my time teaching my cat to use an inhaler. So my dreams aren't coming true in 2026, that's that's for sure. Anyways, I had so much fun with Hannah on this episode. She truly, I mean, this is if you want an example of a hyperfixation, this is it. Hannah is so funny, and honestly, like a true comedian, she really stuck to the bit because she told me she was gonna be doing typhoid Mary for her topic, and then she invited me for dinner afterwards. She invited me to stay so she could cook um something in a large pot for us to share. And I thought, huh. Seems a little suspicious, a little on the nose uh after talking for hours about how this woman was cooking and infected many people with her poo pants. So she's committed to the bit. So I hope you all enjoy this episode. And I I think Hannah does a fantastic job of clearing Typhoid Mary's name as best she could. So shout out to Hannah, and I'll see you all next week. One of my first real big interactions with you was when Meredith started the book club, and you were like, I'd like to put forth a book, and it's about the Donner Party. And so now when I think about the Donner Party, I think about you.

SPEAKER_03 3:21

Oh, that's an honor. I did consider it as the Donner party for my like the thing that I'm obsessed with. But I was like too expected.

unknown 3:28

I need to lie.

SPEAKER_04 3:30

Well, Meredith wants to come on and talk about that, so maybe you guys can do it.

SPEAKER_03 3:33

Oh, we could we can both come on and just talk over each other with how excited we are.

SPEAKER_04 3:36

Yeah, talk about snow blindness, which I'm terrified of now.

SPEAKER_03 3:39

Oh yeah. And also cannibalism.

SPEAKER_04 3:41

Yes, cannibalism. Yeah, which is the real killer.

unknown 3:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 3:44

That's the silent killer.

unknown 3:46

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 3:47

I have notes in 40 different places.

SPEAKER_03 3:50

Okay. I'm glad because I wrote a bunch of notes, but I was like, oh, she's gonna think I'm a dweeb. Oh god, no. But I wrote like dates. Because, like I said, it's like it's it's history. I'm like, I should like, I should know.

SPEAKER_04 4:00

Well, I was gonna say, I don't know when the Ditanic's on. Well, you know, who can say? April 14th.

SPEAKER_03 4:05

Oh god, I don't know. It's early 1907? It's before World War I. Typhoid Mary. Oh, then it's before 1906. Oh no, then it's not before Typhoid Mary.

unknown 4:16

Right.

SPEAKER_03 4:17

Okay, never mind. Let's compare notes.

SPEAKER_04 4:19

Well that there's no way to know. Um, but so um the thing that I'm gonna talk about first is um something that I've made my whole personality and honestly, I think shaped a great deal of my personality is the movie Titanic. Are you familiar with the movie Titanic?

SPEAKER_03 4:33

I've heard of it. I have. I have heard of it once or twice.

SPEAKER_04 4:36

Was it like for me, it was the movie of my childhood that's like when I watch it, the lines just fall out of my mouth. Even the sounds, like the fully like sound design, whatever, I have them just like imprinted in my brain. So it wasn't that for you, or was it?

SPEAKER_03 4:56

It I mean, I think partially because my older sister loved it, was so obsessed with it. I think I took it as like that's a big girl thing. Like that's a teen girl thing. Like one day, one day I'll be cool like them. When you're ready I'll know. Yeah, then I'll be ready and then I'll watch it. So, like, I do also know quotes, but it's quotes that I remember her and her friends saying to each other. So I would just imitate it back and they'd be like, shut up, Hannah. And like her in the back is like mouthing it. And so no, I I have seen it plenty. It was yeah, it perhaps was not such a cultural touchstone in my childhood, but I saw it plenty.

SPEAKER_04 5:32

I had some very visceral like memories, like the two-part VHS was like a big like I can picture it so like getting that from Blockbuster that it came with two VHS tapes, and it was like the the whole second VHS is the ship sinking, which is crazy that like a whole half of the movie is the ship sinking, but I guess that is the story. My friend Megan and I, when we were on the swim team, we took ourselves like really, really seriously, and so we'd be like, we can't be out in the sun, like we can't exert ourselves, we need to like absolutely crush this swimming. And also, like probably like two races. Yeah, but so we would spend all day, we would find the longest movies we could watch, and so we would do a lot of times we'd we eat spaghetti and watch uh Lord of the Rings Director's Cut, or like with the commentary, and then we'd do Titanic because it just kept us inside for like four hours, and then we still were bad at swimming.

SPEAKER_03 6:22

I was just about to ask if you did like the Alfredo carbo load.

SPEAKER_04 6:26

Because I remember Yes, we would pasta party.

SPEAKER_03 6:28

Yeah, friends who took themselves too seriously in high school and during sports. Bless them, we're all like, we got a carbo load. I was like, okay.

SPEAKER_04 6:36

Made absolutely no difference. Yeah. But yeah, the Titan, I honestly, my childhood my childhood, I feel like that was so important to me that it's almost like my childhood is divided into before Titanic and then after Titanic.

SPEAKER_03 6:48

What like, okay, so what age would you say that was your discovery?

SPEAKER_04 6:52

Third or fourth grade. Probably fourth grade.

SPEAKER_03 6:54

Okay. And that's right in the middle. No, it's not. What am I talking about? Well, I kind of like what are you, like nine? Yeah. If you're talking between before like if you split 18 in half, yeah, that's about fourth grade. It really is. Your life was truly.

SPEAKER_04 7:05

It was like that VHS.

SPEAKER_03 7:08

That okay, that VHS. I also remember, weren't the boobs in the second VHS?

SPEAKER_04 7:14

I don't know, because that happened. They might, because that might be the cut. That happens right before the ship sinks. Okay.

SPEAKER_03 7:20

Because I only says, like, I feel like I remember uh a friend's mom being like, you can rent it, but you can only watch movie like the first one, because that was before the sex and the boobs. I I believe you then. That's my memory. But they're like, and they all lived happily ever after. And that was it. And the movie ended perfectly. Like, I don't get what the big deal is. Or the UK. Oh no, I don't know what it is. Oh, New York. Great.

SPEAKER_04 7:44

Yeah. So I put it on to watch uh this week just to like refresh my memory and prepare for it. Opening song starts, cry. Like, I don't cry at things ever, and so I don't know like what's happening to me, but the music seriously brings out something so emotional in me. It's so beautiful.

SPEAKER_03 8:06

How long had it been since you've seen it?

SPEAKER_04 8:08

Well, I hadn't really seen it as an adult, and so that was also a really different experience because when I was little, I would watch it and be like, this is a movie, these are fake people, and then watching it as an adult, I thought I shouldn't have jokes about the Titanic in my stand-up set, like I do. Like I was I sat and I felt pretty bad.

SPEAKER_03 8:28

Yeah, those are real people, it's it really happened. Awful. It's just that never clicked for me. Well, I mean, that said, you gotta be able to make fun of some things. Sure.

SPEAKER_04 8:39

I just have such like specific memories of certain weird little scenes in there. Do you remember when like they pull out that this is so specific, but when they pull out the safe from the bottom of the ocean in the beginning and they crack it open and it's all that red mud?

SPEAKER_03 8:51

Yes, actually, yes, I do. I absolutely do.

SPEAKER_04 8:54

It's like weird stuff like that just stuck with me in a way that's so strange. But it's also the so it's the first time that I ever saw like, I think like an adult romance story. Sure. And then it was the first time I realized that I have um megalophobia.

unknown 9:08

What is that?

SPEAKER_04 9:09

It's being afraid of large things. Oh, any large things. I think. Okay. No one's formally diagnosed me with this, but I I always bring these to my therapist and I'm like, do I have this? And she's like, I don't know. But I I think I do. But it's like that scene, that first scene, one of the first scenes where the ship is going and there's this like a little tiny boat next to it, and it just like absolutely looms large over it. Yeah, it feels are you afraid are you afraid of heights at all? No, not really.

SPEAKER_03 9:38

I'm afraid of flying. But not but the heights themselves are not what scares me.

SPEAKER_04 9:41

Do you get that feeling though? It's like if you're standing too close to a ledge or maybe flying, it's like my stomach drops out, sure, adrenaline spiking, and I never really understood why. And then like so many when they show the ship like sinking and its butt comes up in the air, I was like, ship's butt. And that's what it's called. It makes me so scared. Yeah. And icebergs, I'm afraid of big icebergs, whales.

SPEAKER_03 10:03

This I was gonna say, this fascinates me that Kiko the Whale was one of your topics. I know clearly you should be afraid of them.

SPEAKER_04 10:09

I should I feel like orcas are typically like if I were to see a blue whale, even looking at a picture of a blue whale, they're so big.

SPEAKER_03 10:16

They're quite big. See, now when we were in Iceland, we did we were like up close and personal with both icebergs and whales, actually. So I think perhaps you would not enjoy your time in Iceland.

SPEAKER_04 10:27

Well, and I've been thinking about going to Iceland.

SPEAKER_03 10:29

You don't have to go and do those things. Okay.

unknown 10:31

Right.

SPEAKER_03 10:32

I mean, I guess some of the icebergs are hard to avoid because they are just sort of out there. But why are they? But I mean back to Titanic. They can sure be hard to avoid, you know what I mean?

SPEAKER_04 10:46

If Titanic wasn't the movie of your childhood, what was?

SPEAKER_03 10:50

I had uh a big thing with uh these are two very different movies, but Muppet Treasure Island.

SPEAKER_04 10:58

Oh, I've Muppet Treasure Island, the black spot. The black spot, the black spot. I still I was like afraid to even draw a period on a piece of paper for years.

SPEAKER_03 11:06

Haunted. Yeah. I was like, why wanna get the plague? I straight up in like third grade, word for word, lifted Kermit the Frog's speech and like pretended like I that was a short story that I wrote, and then the teacher like praised me in front of the class, and I was just like, yeah. It was just a speech from Kermit the Frog. Clearly, none of them had seen Robert Treasure Island, which is on them, frankly. I wonder like what the monologue could have been about. I think it was one at the end. Like, I think it was like at the point where he's taken off his captain's coat and he's in like the white long sleeve, like flowing piratey coat. This is what I'm imagining. It was it was around that era, I would that era, that like point in the movie I would need to revisit. Happy to do an episode on that.

SPEAKER_04 11:44

I love Treasure Island?

SPEAKER_03 11:46

I could. I and that I would happily rewatch. I mean, I watched it 2,000 times in my childhood, but have also watched it in my adulthood. I own it. Four or five times, I would say. Like it's so good. What was your other movie? Look who's talking. I've never seen that. Oh my god, you don't need to. It's not good. Is Alan Baldwin in that? No, John Travolta, Kirsty Alley. Um, and then the voice of Bruce Willis is the baby. Is the voice inside of Bruce Willis's nope, I'm sorry. Is the voice the voice inside of the baby's head is Bruce Willis. So, like, that's like the premise of the movie is like, what do you think babies are really thinking? So it's like, how do they turn that into a whole movie? Oh, I don't know. It I think it was just one that like was recorded on VHS. Like my parents, we did not have an extensive library, and I do not know why my parents recorded that movie in particular. We had HBO for like one month, and while they had HBO, my parents recorded every movie that we're from the 20th century. The most important one being Look Who's Talking. Um I would watch it, I would take it out, I would rewind it, I would watch it again. Like, wow. Endlessly funny. I thought it was so funny. That is one I have not watched as an adult. There's no way it holds up. It's not possible.

SPEAKER_04 12:57

Was there one with Alec Baldwin or no? Like babies, looking yeah, baby going to work. Yeah, baby in the brief.

SPEAKER_03 13:04

When I was a nanny, boss baby was big. So that was eight years ago, something like that. Like, because I remember I went and saw Boss Baby. Boss Baby was a big part of my life at that time.

SPEAKER_04 13:13

You're like, you know what, you know what kills every time is a baby that's got some things to say.

SPEAKER_03 13:18

What are they thinking? Yeah. Like, what if he had a meeting to go to? Wouldn't it be funny?

SPEAKER_04 13:29

Mr. Andrews, you're not gonna know, but so hot. He's the shipmaker.

SPEAKER_01 13:33

Oh, I think.

SPEAKER_04 13:33

He's the one who at the end when he's like, he's like, go on, Rose, and he's like standing there with the clock and he just lets the ship collapse on him. Oh, wait, the captain? No. No, but he also does that. He also, um, yeah, but Mr. Andrews, um, he was yeah, he built the ship and he was um, I think just like feeling bad for how it went. Oh. I don't know.

SPEAKER_03 13:51

So he went down with the ship?

SPEAKER_04 13:52

He went down with the titan.

SPEAKER_03 13:53

If he's hot, I'll look him up.

SPEAKER_04 13:54

He's hot. I'm scared. If you don't look at him up now, you're gonna be like, No, I need to.

SPEAKER_03 13:57

Mr. Andrew's titanic. Mr. Andrews Titanic. Alright, is this allowed? Am I allowed to look up his as me? Okay.

SPEAKER_04 14:02

He's not a young guy. Okay.

SPEAKER_03 14:04

It all I had to do was Mr. Andrews. Oh, this guy. He's famous, right? What's he in? Is he in Harry Poppins? Hold on. I mean, he's in everything. He's a character actor that appears he's in um legally blonde, first of all. Bad guy in Legally Blonde. Oh my god. Victor Garber, Victor, alias, The Flash, DC's Legends of Tomorrow. He was so good in Titanic, I'll tell you. He's he pops up from time to time. I listen, I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna begrudge you Victor Garber. Like, I would he have been on my top, perhaps no. But like, yeah, you know.

SPEAKER_04 14:34

And it's the personality too. Like he's it's like he's remorseful. He he doesn't want to turn on the he doesn't want to light the whatever boiler that like pushes them right into the iceberg. Because did you know that in real life there were several ships that were ahead of them that were like, hey, just you know, there's ice ahead, and they were like, we're good, we're so big, it doesn't matter. Oh, so they were warned. They were warned several times. Okay, and then because in the movie they kind of like turn and like hit scrape the iceberg on their side, and then I was thinking, what would have happened if they ran straight into it? Would they have stayed afloat? That's true. There are so there's deep articles on it, and yeah, they probably would. A lot of people down below would have died. Yeah, but not great.

SPEAKER_03 15:11

But it would have stayed afloat at least long enough for someone to come get them.

SPEAKER_04 15:14

Yes, they kept saying she would have come in. Right. So I guess I mean she would have come into port.

SPEAKER_03 15:18

Oh, okay. Like limping, but it would have made it.

SPEAKER_04 15:21

Right.

SPEAKER_03 15:22

Okay. Cause how far well now I'm now I'm asking facts about the Titanic, like the actual sinking, which maybe you can't dance. Anything about that. Okay, got it.

SPEAKER_04 15:29

Um let me be clear. Okay, the act scene, that's crazy. Um opening scene, tears, let's see. Oh, okay. Um has anybody ever drawn you naked?

SPEAKER_03 15:44

Drawn me naked? No, I don't think so. I would love it. I mean, like, I did, I did not get this done, but I did look into like before our wedding, like what they would call like boudoir photos, which are not like nude, but they're just like like cute little like sexy lingerie. Like, yeah, because it was like truly the quote from um uh Moira from Shits Creek stuck with me where she was basically like, you may be looking at yourself now and thinking you look terrible, but one day you'll be looking back with much kinder eyes and you will wish you could like bask in the world.

SPEAKER_04 16:18

I think Samantha Jones has a similar speech too in Sex in the City.

SPEAKER_03 16:21

Is that see? Exactly. Which like, which is not to say I don't think like everyone who's 60 is like, I look terrible. I wish I were 20. I don't think that's true. But it is, it's like, I don't know, it might be nice to like have some proof.

SPEAKER_04 16:32

Nobody somebody's drawn me before horribly, horrifically. Well, two people. One at Kate Caitlin's wedding. Oh, yes. I had that caricature done. Was it bad? No, but it was um he gave me quite a quite a rack. And I was like, huh. Uh it just felt a little uncomfortable. But then also my friend Evan, one time on a trip, he was like being really quiet and like kind of like laughing to himself, and I was like, what are you doing? And then he just turned around a piece of paper, and it was the worst picture I've ever seen of me, and it highlighted everything I hated about myself.

SPEAKER_03 17:06

I do remember at that wedding, at the our friend Caitlin's wedding, that the caricature artist, like, I wanted to get it one because I was like, I'm ready, like I I can take it. I want to see like what they're gonna highlight and what they're gonna lowlight. You hardly don't see. Right. This is true, but yeah, Meredith, our friend Meredith who was on the other pocket. Uh she basically said she was like, I'm not strong enough. I don't want to, I don't want to know. Like, I don't I was like, you know what, it's a good point. Maybe I don't want to know.

SPEAKER_04 17:30

That it would be it would be hard um to come back from that. Speaking as someone who had a very good friend, draw a horrible picture of all my flaws. Um but the rack? How was the rack? Evan didn't give me a rack. Evan gave me um I looked like um I looked like Gollum. Oh, sure. Yeah. And no rack. No rack. No, no, no. If anything, yeah, the opposite of a rack. They were sure. Con gave the city. They stuck out the back. Have you ever been on a cruise?

unknown 18:01

No. Okay.

SPEAKER_03 18:03

I I don't want to. I don't love to be around people, like lots of people. I also don't love when my like toileting situation is not like clear and available and like always going to like work.

SPEAKER_04 18:16

I didn't realize that the toilets on cruise ships were so notoriously. It like.

SPEAKER_03 18:20

If the power goes out, which can happen, the toilets don't work. Well, did you watch poop cruise? I did watch poop cruise. Yeah, yeah. And that's where I'm getting all my info. No, I would have said that before. The shared food, and yeah, like the close quarters and the people everywhere that like you don't know who like it's their first day on earth, clearly, by the way they're behaving. I can't, I can't, I simply.

SPEAKER_04 18:37

And I think um a lot of murders happen on cruises. What? Well, I don't know if they're murders, but a lot of crimes happen on cruises. Like it's really easy to disappear somewhat. I bet. Right, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 18:47

Oh, you were talking bodies that was like theft.

SPEAKER_04 18:49

No, I mean, but that also. But it's like it's kind of like a lawless land.

SPEAKER_03 18:53

I mean, I suppose fall off the side and then and that's it. I mean, that's the other thing. I'm not a great swimmer. I'm not a terrible swimmer, but like you clearly swim.

SPEAKER_04 19:00

Well, if give me some, give me a give me a what is it called? Chicken tetrazzini, and I'll be I'll swam all the way back to shore. Then this is the last thing. I'm sure everybody's heard about this. Sure. Have you heard about the PCP in the clam chowder? No. Oh my god. What? Oh my god, okay. So it's unsolved to this day. They don't know who did it. They were doing like the scenes that were in Nova Scotia or whatever, so it was Bill Paxton and um James Cameron. They were shooting, and someone spiked the craft service's clam chowder, all of it with PCP. And so they're in the shoot, and all of a sudden they're like, some of the crew is being so weird. And so then they divided them between like good crew and bad crew, because they're like, some people are just like losing their minds. One poor man had four bowls of clam chowder. Oh god. She was in the hospital until 10 a.m. They all went to the hospital, it was like 80 people. Um, and apparently Bill Paxton was pretty cool about it. He's like, I'm just gonna sit back and enjoy the ride. Um, but people were like losing their minds and they didn't know what it was. Uh and I think James Cameron thought it was like, I guess there's some like toxin you can get from shellfish or something. Uh-huh. So he thought it was that, but then like the forensics came back and they're like, no, you all are just absolutely tripping. People were doing conga lines in the hospital. Can you believe that?

SPEAKER_03 20:16

So what like did they find out who did it? No. Who spiked it? They still don't know. I feel like that would have to be a lot of PCP to have such an effect on so many people. I don't know anything about it. And then to have four bowls of clam chowder.

SPEAKER_04 20:28

And when I hear PCP, I think of um, what are those pipes called? Is it a PCP pipe? Like a crack pipe? Oh no, I'm thinking of like a structural, like so I I I don't know. PVC? Yes. So I'm like, it had to have been so obvious, like a bone floating, like a PVC pipe.

unknown 20:43

Right.

SPEAKER_03 20:43

Um They should have known immediately.

SPEAKER_04 20:45

I know. There's what's this floating in here? Um, but yeah, isn't that crazy? They still don't know who did it. Some people were saying that they thought it was somebody trying to like sabotage the catering company, but I don't know.

SPEAKER_03 20:55

It's crazy. I know. Also, I love that you stated that as if like, surely you know about the PCP clam chowder. I'm so happy you didn't, because I was like, I thought for sure you might have. No. I I like I said, I Titanic was in my my zeitgeist, but it was not top tier. I don't have all the ins and outs, unfortunately. I wish I knew.

SPEAKER_04 21:15

I mean, yeah, that was just like, I feel like one of the biggest, one of the one, but but I didn't realize that until like years later. But also, I can't imagine anything more disgusting than angel dust and clam chowder.

SPEAKER_03 21:24

Seriously, that was my other thing. I was like, how did everyone eat clam chow? Like, I feel like in a group of 10, I feel like five people should be like, I'm okay. I actually don't want that.

SPEAKER_04 21:34

I'm not feeling clams today.

SPEAKER_03 21:35

Passing on that, actually.

SPEAKER_04 21:37

I am it was undeniable that clam chowder. Anything else on Titanic?

SPEAKER_03 21:42

No, I don't think so. I well, I will say, we talked briefly on the boobs, but I did think you were gonna bring up that like that was like I think a lot of people's first boobs. That was my first of our generation, which I hope Kate Winslit has taken that as like a, I don't know, like a good thing. Like I'm sure she I'm sure she was treated like absolute shit. In the 90s, there's no way she wasn't. I know she was because they basically the media was like, She's fat, she's a fat old cow. Oh yeah, like Kate Winslit, the most beautiful woman in the world. But I like truly, I feel like it's a lot of guys where they're like, Oh, Kate Winslit and Titanic.

SPEAKER_04 22:15

Yeah. I remember going into the basement and like taking the phone and calling my friend Megan and being like, I saw it. I saw it.

SPEAKER_03 22:22

Did you see it?

SPEAKER_04 22:23

I saw the boob.

SPEAKER_03 22:24

First, you saw that American Girl book that was like carekeeping review. First, those boobs. That was the very first. Then it was Kate Winslett's boobs. Then you saw them come to life. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 22:32

Yeah, that was huge. I can't believe we didn't talk about this. Um, but then also that was the first time that I'd ever seen like sex on film. And to this day, I don't know why they were so wet. Like they were so sweaty in a way that I'm like, am I doing them?

SPEAKER_03 22:46

Humid down there.

SPEAKER_04 22:47

I guess.

SPEAKER_03 22:47

Like they are still in the bowels of the. Where's that car? In the in the I guess, yeah, the bowels of the ship. In the bottom of the ship. Hot down there. Yeah. Boiler room, maybe.

SPEAKER_04 22:55

I I just remember thinking like my first time will be like this. This is this'll be it.

SPEAKER_03 22:59

So we went in a sinking ship. A sinking ship in a Model T. In a car. Yeah. And was it?

SPEAKER_04 23:06

Um, no, it was unfortunately. It was it was um I was in my boyfriend's basement at his family's house while his parents were at the polar plunge. Yeah. So not as remote, but polar plunge. Yeah. Iceberg. But I I did think that segueing from the PCP and the clam chowder would actually be quite a nice transition into your topic. First of all, why is Typhoid Mary your whole personality?

SPEAKER_03 23:36

I truly was having a hard time remembering what brought this to me specifically, but I think it was back when I was a nanny, we like got very into like children's podcasts, and one of them was about Typhoid Mary and all of them. Children's podcasts? Oh yes. And like all of us, we were like fascinated. Like we got so in. And I what I'm like, that may have been it. That may have been the start of my Typhoid Mary crusade. Um, and now it's become just like if it ever comes up, I'm like, and did you want to talk about it? Come over here. Like, please, I need to talk more.

SPEAKER_04 24:08

Anytime somebody well, I thought it was so weird because you're like, I'm gonna talk about this. And like, you know what, do you want to stay for dinner afterwards? And I was like, whoa.

SPEAKER_03 24:14

To talk more. Right.

SPEAKER_04 24:15

Also, like, yeah. So I can poison you? Yeah. So it's like any, I'm imagining like anytime somebody's cooking, you're like, by the way, have you heard about typhoid?

SPEAKER_03 24:26

They call me a real typhoid Mary. Uh let's all give each other nicknames. Okay, first. But yeah, okay, so I'll just like I'll take you through the life of Mary if that sounds good to you.

SPEAKER_04 24:38

Is her first name typhoid? Her first name's Mary.

SPEAKER_03 24:40

Yeah. But her name is Mary Mallon. She was an Irish immigrant. In the Titanic-y times, like the the year that we're gonna start with is 1906, but like obviously she was born before that, and it like spreads after that. So like she would have been aware of Titanic, certainly. Um but just to like set the background of like the era we're in, the concept of germ theory was new. So, like the concept that like germs cause you to be sick was a new thing. Also, not just new, but like not agreed on. There were like scientists and doctors who were like, I don't think so. Germs causing sickness.

SPEAKER_02 25:17

Ugh.

SPEAKER_03 25:17

To put Typhoid Mary into perspective, because she gets a bad rap, and I gotta tell you from the start, I'm on team Typhoid Mary. That was my question.

SPEAKER_04 25:24

Are you a are you a sympathizer or yeah?

SPEAKER_03 25:26

I am a sympathizer. I think it would be hard to not sympathize with her. There, she is not a perfect person. I'm not here to say she was, but she was treated appallingly by by the world, like by by New York, by the media, by like the health clinic, by the police. So that's back up. We're this is the era we're living in. Um but basically old old Mary Mallon, she was not actually little old, she was about, I think she was 36. Um, she like Oh no. At the time though, honestly, she was kind of old, I suppose, like in 1906, but she had been living in the US since she was a teenager, uh, was had a gig as a cook, which was like paid super, super well, really nice, really good gig for her. Um, and she was a cook for really, really rich people. And like she bopped around a lot, which was typical for cooks. They didn't often like, as much as Downton Abbey makes you think a cook stays for like a decade, like cooks bop bipped and bopped and whatever.

SPEAKER_04 26:14

That'll be my next uh Downton Abbey beyond rewatch. Yeah, I'm like beyond obsessed with it. To the fact that when I was like watching Titanic, I forgot that Downton Abbey is not real. And so I was like, oh, it's crazy that like the Crawley family, like, why Matthew? Because they I was like, Did you know that the Crawley family, like, whatever died on the Titan? And I was like, oh wait, no. You're like looking, you're looking for him on the manifest Nabbey fortune.

SPEAKER_03 26:38

Okay.

unknown 26:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 26:39

Where is he? But yeah, so she was she was caring for these for these Crowleys of of America, these real rich people. She was doing their like cooking and whatever. And eventually, this little girl in one of those family's called the Warrens got typhoid fever and she was really, really sick. Um, and it eventually went to her mom and it went to the gardener and it went to the maids because it was not a disease that like picked and chose. Like it it hit rich people and poor people. However, it hit poor people a lot more often. So, like, whenever it hit rich people like this, people were like, okay, sound the alarm, something's wrong. Like, whenever thousands of people got typhoid fever, but this time it happened to a rich family. So they were like, circle up the wagons, like let's find out the cause type of thing. They hired this guy, Dr. Soper, uh, to like find out what was wrong. He's like testing the water, testing the grounds. Um, they were testing like, because it was like 1906, you get like meat and eggs and dairy all from like the local butchery and like dairy. And so they were testing all that, nothing was showing up. And the uh uh the route that typhoid fever takes is the poo-poo-pee-pee route, uh, which is um it's not a coughing sputum surface thing. It's a like you gotta have it. Yeah, situation. Which, like, again, toileting, not so great in this era, not not great. The toileting and the hand washing, not so great. Um, but it starts through like those, like through those means, and then the human can get it, and then it's poops and peeps. Uh so he's like checking, he's not finding it a little bit later. Another rich family got sick, and they were like, What is like now it's happening to two rich people. This is a bridge too far. Like this, now we really have to figure out what's going on. Um, and he did eventually like figure out, like, boy oh boy, they were like, Yeah, he was like, Who's your cook? And then she's like, Oh, she just left, you know, she was this really nice Irish immigrant. Uh, she would make us uh ice cream, homemade ice cream with peaches, which means none of it is cooked. And if you cook, that's that's hot enough to kill the typhoid fever. But if it's raw peaches and raw ice cream that she got her little fingers in, that this typically was pointed to as the thing that got everybody sick was that was like her famous recipe was the like uh ice cream with peaches. Weird. Like, oh yeah, I and why that? I mean, probably it was a million thing. Like she cooked a lot of stuff, but that is handled everything, but yeah, through the annals of history, the peach ice cream has stuck through. So uh he figures out, he's like, oh my god, they're like, Yeah, this Irish like cook, and he's like, Oh my god, what's her fucking name? And they're like, Mary Mallon. He's like, I've been chasing this lady, and he like figures out of the last like eight families she's been with, seven cases of typhoid fever had broken out. And he was basically like, This is gonna prove what he had been like hypothesizing, which is an asymptomatic carrier. So someone or like a healthy carrier, someone who has a sickness but does not express it, which by the way, again, did not exist. She is the first case in America ever of any, not just typhoid, of any asymptomatic carrier.

SPEAKER_04 29:42

I think is that men with HPV?

SPEAKER_03 29:45

Honestly, yeah, maybe. I would think so. Because I think they don't have symptoms. Yeah, so yeah, basically. But wow. Like, but it was just not, it was not an extant thing. So again, people who like to throw a lot of shit on typhoid marriage, like she should have known better. It's like, no, no, she was the literal first. Like the things they were telling her had never been said to anyone ever in the history of time. Um, but so yeah, he, this Dr. Soper, uh, he's like, I'm gonna find her, I'm gonna get famous, I'm gonna like make my money off of this. Follows her around, finally finds her, comes up to her, and he is like, he has admitted that since that he did not handle this well. Oh god. Basically, like, you're dirty, you're not washing your hands, you have poop and pee on your hands. Um, you've gotten everybody sick, even though you've never been sick a day in your life, you have typhoid, and uh you need to come with me, and I'm gonna take your poop, and I'm gonna take your pee, and I'm gonna take your blood, and we're gonna test it. And she uh responded to that by chasing him out of the house with a carving fork. Stop! Which she I love Typhoid Mary. I love Mary Mallon. I should not call her, I should call her Mary Mallon. Because like she, the way that he talks about her, he literally called quote, I wrote this down, quote, a menace to public health. He also he was so shitty to her. He said she was, quote, more like a man than a woman.

SPEAKER_02 30:59

Oh no, we didn't need to say that.

SPEAKER_03 31:01

He basically, like, him and all the media were like, did she was Irish, lots of like anti-Irish sentiment at the time, very like this brassy Irish woman, too loud, swore, hated that she swore. Oh. Like, basically, like she's this loud, brash, mean woman who's more like a man, and I hate her, is basically like it's not only does she have typhoid, she's ugly. Yeah, you uh exactly kill her, yeah. Like, might as well burn her out of stake. Yeah, like that is truly like that is the best way to put it. Now, once you're typhoid, she's ugly and therefore a menace to public health. But again, like at this time, thousands of cases of typhoid fever in New York. Like it was not it was a very like common thing, but they were honing in on her. Um, and like basically the doctor, Soper, he tried to get her a bunch more times with the exact same result. And so he eventually was like, Looney Dunes. Yeah, like every time she was like, leave. And also, by the way, all of her like family she was working for and all the other like maids and everything were like, This need this dude needs to go. Cause they were like, You're a psychopath talking about asymptomatic carrier, which is not a thing. She's not sick. She was the one who because she never got sick because she always had it, they would like depend on her to like when everyone else got sick. Yeah, to show you. She was basically vaccinated. Yeah, she was she was vaccinated, you know, for her. And so she would change the sheets and she would like pitch in. They were like, Mary's so wonderful. What are you talking about? Like, yeah, I got poop all over them. Um, that by the way, I'll say that. They very, you know, this whole time where they're saying she's got poopy hands and blah blah blah. Hey, everyone did. There's like a quote that she admitted she never washed her hands. Like, that is not true. She many times was like, she tried very hard, like she considered herself a clean person, but to kill typhoid, you have to use 140 degree water, like boiling water, they did not have it, and wash for 30 seconds. They didn't do that to actually kill it. Of course, she didn't. Nobody did. Like, doctors probably didn't at that time. Like, so again, people are like, she was nasty and gross and had poopy hands. And I was like, listen, let's give Mary a little bit of grace.

SPEAKER_04 33:02

It's so hard. This is gonna be a horrible thing to say. It's so hard because that's how like norovirus spreads, and it's like, oh, you have poop on your hands, and it's like crazy that I can't see poop on my hands. You know what I mean? Like, it feels like a I was picturing her changing the sheets, and there's just like skin marks. Yeah, like hand marks across. But again, Titanic. Titanic, hand marked poop spread.

SPEAKER_03 33:23

Um, but yeah, so the doctor, he's like not getting anywhere with her, and did as I feel like many men at the time did. He was like, it's not working. I'm gonna go send a woman to do my job and not give her any credit. Uh so he did. He sent another doctor who, uh, a woman named Dr. Baker, um, who went with police to go get Mary. This time they like, they were like, Where is she? And they were like, she's gone. All the maids were like, I don't know where she is, and like put a chair up to a fence to make it look like she'd like escaped. Um, and then finally they found her because a little piece of her dress was sticking out of like the ash tray, like the ash buckets where they used to like collect all that stuff. But they took like pains to point out like she couldn't have hidden herself there. Like the people at the house were hiding her because they also were like, They love that peach ice cream. They had to have that typhoid ice cream. Like, but you know, like they were on her side, everyone was like they were like, What are these doctors talking about? They don't know anything. Mary is not the problem. But they did get her eventually, and they brought her to a island called North Brother Island in New York that's a quarantine island, and like it wasn't a prison, like she was, you know, it was but she was she was not allowed to leave by any means. Um, she just stayed in a little room with her little dog. She had a little dog there. Um, but they can dogs get typhoid? They must not have been able to, I don't know. Like that, or else I suppose he would he would have been a goner. But they like at the time, like at North Weather Island, like forcibly took from her, like would not let her go to the bathroom, like put a bucket in, and like she tried to hold out, but like eventually she had to go to the bathroom, they took it immediately. They forcibly took blood, they forcibly took spit, they forcibly took all kinds of things.

SPEAKER_04 34:59

Again, like And I'm just like the the the way that they took blood must have been just I'm picturing like a rusty needle.

SPEAKER_03 35:04

Right like a str like a straw. But yeah, so she it was again like she didn't trust it, she didn't understand it. She was worried because it we were not that far from like grave robbing happening for like for part people would rob graves to bring like cadavers for doctors to work on. So she was like worried that that what was they were like harvesting her, or she she was a guinea pig. She thought they were using her guinea pig, they were, right? To be clear. Um, and like did all these tests. Basically, all her stool samples came back typhoid fever. It was it was in her, they suspect in her gallbladder. Um can you you have to have that?

SPEAKER_04 35:38

Do you have to have a gallbladder?

SPEAKER_03 35:39

No.

SPEAKER_04 35:39

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 35:40

They could remove well, they offered to remove it. However, again, at this time, no antibiotics. Right, I was gonna say, but they were really cool about it too. Yeah, it was like 50-50 chance of. They came in with a knife. Yeah, like they were like, time to take the gallbladder. And she, I think rightly, was like back off. Like, I mean, she they have many people have admitted, they're like, she would have probably died in that surgery to get the gallbladder out. But basically, what happens is like the typhoid comes in, and in a very, very small percentage of people, the white blood cells come up and the typhoid cells go up, and they both just like reach this detente, and they're like, okay, like everyone just be cool and we'll all just live in the body together.

SPEAKER_04 36:15

I'm seeing the children's podcast come through.

SPEAKER_03 36:18

It's actually Miss Frizzle. Yeah, this is how I was explained by Miss Frizzle. Um, but yeah, but it and it just like in her case, like it's which is typical. It hangs in the gallbladder, it might hang in the appendix or like places or like in the intestinal tract where there's like little pockets where it can like hang out and chill.

SPEAKER_04 36:32

Anywhere the poop touches is definitely anywhere the poop touches.

SPEAKER_03 36:36

Okay, as they say. That's lying king, right? Anywhere the poop touches. Anywhere the poop touches, that's um, but yeah, so basically like they're like they're testing drugs on her because they're like, she is the first asymptomatic carrier ever. So they are they are experimenting on her with drugs. They keep taking stuff from her over and over and over.

SPEAKER_04 36:53

And like you say taking stuff from her, but I'm like, but taking her, it's taking her poop, right?

SPEAKER_03 36:57

Yeah, taking her poop. Pulling it off.

SPEAKER_04 37:00

But blood. I mean, blood and samples on skin of her.

SPEAKER_03 37:03

Skin. I mean, yeah, like little like skin samples, probably not like ripping it off, but yeah, little like and like hair samples, stuff like that. Um, it was like two years she's in there. Oh my god. And eventually, in my opinion, what happened was they ran out of stuff to test. Uh, and they were like, okay, we're done with her, and now she can go. Um, as long as she like pinky promises, signed this affidavit that she'll never cook again. Which sounds like doable. So you have to remember, like, right. But at the moment, like it was like that was a really good paying job. It was the best paying job she could have ever gotten, and she worked really hard for it. Like people obviously loved her cooking. And people loved her cooking, and so she was like, Yeah, cool, I'll go be a washerwoman. And like, she went and was a washerwoman for a while, and then she stopped like um uh checking in. They had like basically a parole officer. Oh my god. Like checking in with her equivalent of a parole officer, and like, here's where Mary's gonna lose you. She loses a lot of people here, and and I she loses me a little bit here. Okay. She becomes a cook again. Oh my god. A hospital. And a hospital for women and babies. So this one, this one's tough. This is a tough hit for Mare. I didn't say she was perfect. Oh no. Because ostensibly, she knew. She had been told. The question is, did she believe it? Certainly not. She did not believe it. But boy, what a place to test it out. Right. Yeah. Tough hit. Tough hit on Mary. Like, not at least. And was she making all those babies peach ice cream? This is just straight in. But that was when the media also turned on her. Like before she had been typhoid Mary. First of all, they doxed her. They said her name. They said she was a piece of shit and a dirty person and uh awful. Again, by this point, they had found many other asymptomatic carriers, and none of them had been quarantined except for Mary. Were they all hot? They were beautiful. Yeah. And that's why people get treated differently. They really do.

SPEAKER_04 38:54

You should write a dissertation on pretty privilege and typhoid Mary.

SPEAKER_03 39:00

They were a lot of them men, I will say that. Um, at least the ones that like at this point they kind of still talk about. Um, but yeah, all those people, like, they were all just kind of, they started finding more and more, and they were all like, okay, well, promise you won't be bad and we won't quarantine you. And they were all like, okay, and they just let them go and did none of the stuff that they did for Mary. And nobody, again, nobody's name has ever by now it has been, but at the time, nobody was like shit on in the media um like she was. And so maybe they brought her back and she uh died in like after a total of nearly 30 years of quarantine. 30 years of quarantine. She never left North Brother Island again. They brought her back and they never let her leave again. I almost said, did she have like a TV or anything? But not back then. Not back then. She had her dog and letters. She had a little friend. They let her be like a lab tech, actually, eventually. Okay. Like she like God though, with those poopans. With those poop pans. But I think by then it was more like, I mean, again, 30 years past. Like by then it was like they had like gloves, you know, like she was wearing gloves, and they could actually wash her hands and she could, you know, whatever. But yeah, she like she had a little life in North America. Clearly, I mean she had 30 years she lived there.

SPEAKER_02 40:08

Oh my god.

SPEAKER_03 40:09

But like by the time she died, or the time, 400 other healthy carriers of typhoid fever, just in New York, had been discovered. Just in New York, none of them were quarantined. And they have, among the 400, uh, they had cooks and restaurateurs, some of which were known to have gone back and cooked again, just like Mary, and again, never quarantined. Like they were all just sort of like let and allowed to go. But Mary was this, again, this like, well, not only does she have typhoid, but she's loud and mean, and we don't like her, and so she should be quarantined for that. Like, is kind of how how Mary's life like shook out in the end. So 30 years in quarantine. 30 years in quarantine. So then she died in her 60s? She, yeah, would have died at thir 60, 66. Okay. That's Mary.

SPEAKER_04 40:57

So I understand why you're a Mary sympathizer because it does seem like, um, it does seem like we really came after her with pitchforks and stuff.

SPEAKER_03 41:05

I would also point out, Mary never made any many people made money off of her. She never made any money off of anything. I mean, a anyone who sold a newspaper made money off of the typo Mary, but also Dr. Soper, the one who discovered her, discovered her. He became famous. He made m tons of money off of her.

SPEAKER_04 41:21

What did he even discover? Like, what did he even contribute from her findings? Well, the asymptotic.

SPEAKER_03 41:26

She was the first in the US, like, but also he sucked and whatever, and someone else would have discovered it. Uh, but like, he, yeah, he like would like headline speeches and he made money and wrote papers and dissertations and made like that was his whole career was on the back of Mary Mallon, and he never treated her well, and she died completely penniless, and he died rich. So God off of her. That's terrible. Yeah. So sorry. But that's that's Mary. So yeah, that's my I talk about her a lot.

SPEAKER_04 41:57

Because she gets a bad one. I can see. That's who I am with King Richard III. It's like I want to clear his name a little bit. Okay.

SPEAKER_03 42:02

You know what I mean? This is, and yeah, I'm like, she was not a perfect person by any means. Must have not gone to that hospital. Shouldn't have gone back, shouldn't have given those babies that peach ice cream. She's been given those babies those peach ice creams, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 42:14

Oh no. Is there anything else you wanted to add about Typhoid Mary or Titanic? Before we wrap.

SPEAKER_03 42:26

Can I do the one quote that I can remember that my sister, I think. Oh yes! I can't believe I didn't call up on this. No, but I forgot. I was gonna say it and I forgot, and I'm like, I'll do the quote. I feel like because maybe you'll remember it. I'm curious, because I think it's the guy, I think it's Victor Garber, who you think is high. I think it's him that says it. Okay. Because we'll see like ship rose. But no, no. It's some maybe it is that conversation though, because it's like one of the rich snooty guys, not um Billy Zane, says, like, but this ship can't sink. And then I think it's your guy. Goes, it's made of iron, sir. I sure you it can. And it will. It's a mathematical certainty. Yes! Thank you. Perfect. Thank you. Perfect. Thank you. My sister will be lit that I dared to do it. They decided to. They had many, but that's the one that they said the most, and it's the one that I can still remember. She would, if I started that quote, she would know immediately. She would one word, she would know it. That's funny.

SPEAKER_04 43:13

That's wow. That would be that's I mean, that's beautiful, and that is a beautiful note to end on because um I don't understand how boats float.

SPEAKER_03 43:19

So And that's for next week. Right. We'll follow up. Okay, well, thanks so much for coming on. Thank you. That's lovely.

SPEAKER_04 43:28

Thanks for listening to My Whole Personality. This podcast is edited and produced by me, Joanna Clark. Theme music by Rebecca Jaffe. If you like this podcast, please like, subscribe, read it, review it, wherever you listen to podcasts. Thanks for listening. Bye bye bye.