Lady Cryptoid's Spook Show Lady Cryptoid's Spook Show

How can the dead speak when we’ve deemed them too unimportant to listen? On this episode, we’ll explore what Lena Johamesson calls the “significant insignificances” of history through the lens of two Wisconsin fires: The Great Peshtigo Fire, and the fire and murders at Frank Lloyd Wright’s Taliesin.

This week’s questions are:

How and why do historical events and figures become significant?
Is there a way to reframe the way we think about or approach history to elevate what Johamesson calls “the significant insignificances”?
What tiny but crucial details do you care about in your historical subject of interest?

Please be sure to get in touch with your answers! Find me on Twitter and Instagram @ladycryptoid and by email at ladycryptoid@gmail.com.

Many, many thanks this week to Matt Spireng for permission to read his poem, “The Peshtigo Fire Cemetery,” and for his time and insight. You can find his poetry all over the place, but go ahead and buy his collections What Focus Is and Out of Body.


REFERENCES AND FURTHER READING

Brown, H. (2004). “The Air Was Fire”: Fire Behavior at Peshtigo in 1871. Fire Management Today, 64 (4), p. 20.

Friedman, A.T. (2002). Frank Lloyd Wright and Feminism: Mamah Borthwick’s Letters to Ellen Key. Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians, 61 (2), p. 140-151.

Holbrook, S. (1944). The Peshtigo Fire. The American Scholar, 13 (2), p. 201-209.

Lyons, C. (2011). Hell on Earth: The Peshtigo Fire. History Magazine (Februrary/March), p. 38-40.

Pernin, P. (1971). The Great Peshtigo Fire: An Eyewitness Account. The Wisconsin Magazine of History, 54 (4), p. 246-272.

Peters, A. (2012). The House on the Ledge. Southwest Review, 97 (1), p. 89-112.

Rosenwald, M.S. (2017). “The night America burned”: The deadliest -- and most overlooked -- fire in U.S. history. The Washington Post, 6 Dec 2017.

Schwarz, F. D. (1996). 1871: One hundred and twenty-five years ago -- Two fires. American Heritage, 47 (6), p. 118-120

Spireng, M. J. (1998). The Peshtigo Fire Cemetery. College English, 60 (1), p. 67.

Tarshis, L. (2015). The Blood-Red Night. Storyworks, 22 (4), p. 4.


MUSIC CREDITS
Intro:
Ferera and Paaluhi, “The Saint Louis Blues” (W.C. Handy, composer)

The Sky Ablaze:
Moriz Rosenthal, Etude Nouvelle in A Flat and Etude in C Major, Op. 10, No. 1 (Frederic Chopin, composer)
Bellini Ensemble Unique, Piano Sonata No. 14 in C sharp minor, “Moonlight” (Ludwig van Beethoven, composer)

Mamah:
National Parks Service, “Dawn Soundscape from the Sun Valley Trail”

Conclusion:
American Quartet, “Moonlight Bay” (Percy Wenrich, composer)

This week we're learning about how we learn. Under the principles of constructivism, educational psychologists believe that we learn by making connections between new information and our past experiences. You'll hear some examples of people "connecting the dots" over the course of the last century, including:

- Patricia Resick, creator of Cognitive Processing Therapy
- Carl Sandburg, poet
- The inventors of the electrostatic detection apparatus (ESDA) and those forensic professionals who use it in their work
- Felix Gonzalez-Torres, artist

Please be sure to get in touch with your own examples of connecting the dots! Write to ladycryptoid@gmail.com.

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REFERENCE LIST & FURTHER READING

Curtis, K. (1996). “Double Murderer Executed in Electric Chair; Called Himself Son of God.” Associated Press. Retrieved from https://www.apnews.com/04ff253e076acd1275b48da94d6bb418.

Davis, T. (1994). ESDA and the analysis of contested interview notes. Forensic Linguistics, 1, 71-89.

Driscoll, M. (2014). Psychology of Learning for Instruction. Essex: Pearson.

Eco, U. (1984). Semiotics and the Philosophy of Language. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press.

Gonzalez-Torres, F. (1993). Public and Private: Spheres of Influence. Art & Design, 9, 87-91.

Jordan, M. (Director). (2003). Last Will [Television series episode]. In P. Bourdett, Forensic Files. Allentown, Pennsylvania: Medstar Television.

Larry Gene Bell. (2017). Retrieved from http://murderpedia.org/male.B/b1/bell-larry-gene.htm.

Moore, D. (2014). “Question the Queen City: The Disappearance of Denise Porch.” Creative Loafing Charlotte. Retrieved from https://clclt.com/theclog/archives/2014/08/15/question-the-queen-city-the-disappearance-of-denise-porch.

“Officers scour counties for victims of convicted killer: Informant says murderer dumped women in well.” (1992). GoUpstate.com. Retrieved from https://www.goupstate.com/news/19920625/officers-scour-counties-for-victims-of-convicted-killer-informant-says-murderer-dumped-women-in-well.

Resick, P., Monson, C., & Chard, K. (2017). Cognitive Processing Therapy for PTSD: A Comprehensive Manual. New York: Guilford.

Sandburg, C. (1918). Cornhuskers. New York: Henry Holt & Company.


CREDITS
Intro music: Vladimir Hirsch, “Ultima”
Other music:
Chris Zabriskie, “Cylinder Nine”
Beethoven’s “Sonata 15 in D Major,” performed by Karine Gilanyan
National Parks Service/Gavia Immer, “Oregon Trail”