Luck Be A Lady Governor

The Preamble

Sharon McMahon

Government, History, Storytelling, Education

4.9 • 15.1K Ratings

🗓️ 22 May 2023

⏱️ 39 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

In the middle of the 1920s, when Prohibition was at its peak, leaders and law enforcement could go one of two ways: they could crack down on Volstead Act violators… or they could look the other way. Today, we’ll meet the first two women governors in the nation’s history–and a couple of lawmen–and learn how they handled their duties during Prohibition.

Hosted by: Sharon McMahon

Executive Producer: Heather Jackson

Audio Producer: Jenny Snyder

Written and researched by: Heather Jackson, Valerie Hoback, Amy Watkin, and Mandy Reid

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hello friends, welcome to episode 10 of our series on Prohibition from Hatchets to Hoots.
0:13.4	On Christmas Eve 1926, a man burst through the doors of Bellevue Hospital in New York City
0:18.8	screaming hysterically that Santa Claus was chasing him through the streets with the baseball
0:23.5	bat.
0:25.2	More staff could make sense of the outlandish claim the delirious man died.
0:32.3	By the end of Christmas Day, 60 patients at Bellevue were gravely ill and ate were dead
0:38.2	by new years, another 41 people at Bellevue had died, the cause?
0:44.3	Alcohol poisoning.
0:46.3	Six years into Prohibition doctors were used to treating the symptoms of alcohol poisoning.
0:50.8	It was common for people to get sick from the questionable ingredients of bootleg
0:55.4	whiskeys and bathtub chins, but this was different.
1:00.4	This alcohol poisoning was killing people fast.
1:05.0	Charles Norris, the chief medical examiner of New York City, called it our national
1:09.0	experiment in extermination because he knew who was responsible for the lethal outbreak.
1:20.2	The United States government.
1:23.8	I'm Sharon McMahon, and here's where it gets interesting.
1:29.3	Our newly industrialized country in the 1920s couldn't run without industrial alcohol.
1:35.8	It was used for manufacturing detergents, cleaning, flavoring extracts, and perfumes, as well
1:41.4	as for gasoline, solvents, paints, medical supplies, and countless other things that kept
1:47.3	day-to-day life flowing smoothly.
1:50.8	But it was not fit for consumption.
1:55.8	During Prohibition when there was precious little drinkable alcohol commercially available,
	...

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