Rescue Annie

Frank Turner's Tales From No Man's Land

Somethin' Else

History

4.8 • 674 Ratings

🗓️ 4 September 2019

⏱️ 38 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Frank tells the tale of a young woman who drowned in the river Seine in Paris in the 1800's. As was common in this period a cast of her face, known as a 'death mask', was displayed in the morgue for her family to claim. Sadly she was never identified, but her story doesn't end there. Her peaceful expression captivated so many that very quickly moulds were made and her likeness was hung on the walls of homes across Paris. She became known as L'Inconnue de la Seine, or The Unknown Woman of the Seine. Years later, a toy maker discovered her death mask and used it as the face of the first CPR doll, which he named Rescue Annie. Frank meets Art Historian and Curator Katy Hessel to discuss the woman behind the mask.

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

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	Hello, I'm Frank Turner. Welcome to Tales from No Man's Land, a podcast that accompanies my album, No Man's Land. It's about 13 women from history who you probably haven't heard of, but definitely should have. Their stories are fascinating, moving, funny,
0:22.7	and most importantly, worth celebrating and sharing.
0:32.6	Welcome back, everybody, to Tales from No Man's Land with me, Frank Turner.
0:37.0	Today's episode focuses on one of the more
0:38.6	mysterious and possibly apocryphal women that I've written about on my album, No Man's Land. It's the
0:43.2	story of an anonymous young woman who drowned in the River Sane in Paris in the 1880s. One of the
0:49.2	things that's unique about her tragic death and the reason that people have come to know about her
0:52.8	in her story is her peaceful expression. The story goes, the doctor who attended her body in the morgue
0:58.1	was so taken with her beauty that he made a death mask of her, partly for identification purposes,
1:02.7	but partly because he thought that she was so serene and beautiful that he wanted to capture
1:05.8	that expression. And many people agreed she became something of an artistic sensation.
1:10.7	Her death mask was famous in Paris in the Fandesieckler art world.
1:14.0	It captivated so many people that very quickly moulds were made
1:17.0	and her likeness was hung on the walls of people's homes across Paris.
1:20.7	She became known as Lankon du Seine, the unknown woman of the same.
1:25.1	Years later, a toymaker discovered her death mask and used it as the face for the first
1:29.1	CPR doll, thus Rescue Annie was born. But what do we actually know about the real woman behind this
1:35.1	myth? Who is the real Annie, in quote marks? Today I'm going to meet and chat with art historian and
1:40.3	curator Katie Hassel to discuss the woman behind the mask.
1:54.0	Welcome back to Tales from No Man's Land and today I am sat in a studio in a basement in Old Street in London and across the table for me is my new friend Katie Hassel. Hi Katie. Hi,
1:59.0	Frank. How are you? I'm very well, thank you. How are you?
2:01.2	I'm good. I'm very excited for us to have this conversation. Thank you so much for coming in.
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Somethin' Else, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Somethin' Else and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.