This podcast is brought to you in part by POTATXFest coming to the UT Austin campus August 16th through 19th.

The conference is open to people with all levels of podcasting experience including professionals, journalists, hobbyists, educators and students.

Sessions will feature industry leaders like Laura Beale of Dr. Death, Dallas Taylor of 20,000 Hertz, Kate Dawson of 10 Fold More Wicked and Wicked Words, and Stephanie Quote and the PRX Training Team.

Early bird and student registration is available now at POTATXFest.com. POTATXFest is a production of the drag audio at UT Austin's Moody College of Communication, Texas Student Media and KUT and KUTX Studios.

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You're listening to The Drag.

It's May 23rd, 1885. It's a busy week in Austin, Texas. There's a carnival at the Scottish Right, Masonic Temple formerly known as Turner Hall.

There's a small fire in someone's kitchen and a local woman dies of the quote, fearful disease, smallpox in the citizens of Austin fear and outbreak.

According to the city of a physician, the woman's husband unknowingly spread smallpox while he was mourning her death.

The man and a handful of other people who came into contact with are ordered to quarantine.

This is all fairly typical for the developing city of Austin, Texas. Construction continues on the new Texas Capitol building in the heart of the city.

Just a few blocks north of where the Capitol was soon stand, Irene Cross is fast asleep after a long day of work.

She's 33 years old in a widow, but she lives with her son Washington and her nephew Douglas.

She's a black woman who works as a domestic servant and lives in a small outbuilding on her employer's property.

Austin has been terrorized by a series of brutal attacks on primarily black and immigrant domestic servants for the past five months.

Two women are dead, but it's been three weeks since the last attack.

Irene wakes in the middle of the night. Her nephew sleeps in a joining room, but there's a stranger in the room she serves with her son Washington.

...