Thou Shalt Not Suffer: The Witch Trial Podcast, Anniversary Special. This episode was recorded live and unscripted at the Podcast Movement Conference in Denver, CO. With the anniversary of their first episode fast approaching, cohosts Josh Hutchinson and Sarah Jack take this rare opportunity to discuss their favorite things and reflect upon the past year and the experience of producing a podcast. This is the story of how Thou Shalt Not Suffer became what it is after 12 months.
Links
Mrs. Krieger, Vermont’s Only Witch, The Looking Glass
Pownal Historical Society Facebook Page
Support Us! Shop Our Book Shop
Resolution Concerning Certain Witchcraft Convictions in Colonial Connecticut
Purchase a Witch Trial White Rose Memorial Button
Support Us! Sign up as a Super Listener!
Support Us! Buy Witch Trial Merch!
Support Us! Buy Podcast Merch!
Join us on Discord to share your ideas and feedback.
Fact Sheet for Connecticut Witch Trial History
Thou Shalt Not Suffer: The Witch Trial Podcast, Anniversary Special. This episode was recorded live and unscripted at the Podcast Movement Conference in Denver, CO. With the anniversary of their first episode fast approaching, cohosts Josh Hutchinson and Sarah Jack take this rare opportunity to discuss their favorite things and reflect upon the past year and the experience of producing a podcast. This is the story of how Thou Shalt Not Suffer became what it is after 12 months.
Links
Mrs. Krieger, Vermont’s Only Witch, The Looking Glass
Pownal Historical Society Facebook Page
Support Us! Shop Our Book Shop
Resolution Concerning Certain Witchcraft Convictions in Colonial Connecticut
Purchase a Witch Trial White Rose Memorial Button
Support Us! Sign up as a Super Listener!
Support Us! Buy Witch Trial Merch!
Support Us! Buy Podcast Merch!
Join us on Discord to share your ideas and feedback.
Fact Sheet for Connecticut Witch Trial History
Hello and welcome to Thou Shalt Not Suffer: The Witch Trial Podcast. I'm Josh Hutchinson.
Sarah Jack:And I'm Sarah Jack.
Josh Hutchinson:Hello, Sarah Jack.
Sarah Jack:I'm good.
Josh Hutchinson:We're actually together for the first time recording in person with each other. We're at Podcast Movement in Denver, and we're having a great time, aren't we?
Sarah Jack:We are.
Josh Hutchinson:Yeah. Learning a lot.
Sarah Jack:Yeah.
Josh Hutchinson:So far. Off to a good start. In a change of pace, I'm going to start by getting to know Sarah a little better.
Sarah Jack:Oh, dear.
Josh Hutchinson:Oh, Sarah. What's your favorite movie?
Sarah Jack:Jaws.
Josh Hutchinson:Jaws? Why is that?
Sarah Jack:Jaws.
Josh Hutchinson:Why?
Sarah Jack:I love anything with a chase and an attack. And the book.
Josh Hutchinson:Oh, and you love the book also.
Sarah Jack:I did. Yeah.
Josh Hutchinson:Yeah. Okay.
Sarah Jack:The characters.
Josh Hutchinson:Characters. Yeah.
Sarah Jack:I've watched it hundreds of times.
Josh Hutchinson:I love the sheriff guy. What's his name? Brody? Yeah. Yeah, Brody. He's pretty cool. And the Richard Dreyfuss guy.
Sarah Jack:Yeah, it's, as many times as I've seen it, I can't think of the name.
Josh Hutchinson:Yeah. That other guy.
Sarah Jack:This is a very different feel than the normal.
Josh Hutchinson:Yeah, doing a podcast together in person. We're recording in a booth with a glass wall and people are walking by and we're just not used to the distractions. I know I'm not, but
Sarah Jack:What's your favorite movie, Josh?
Josh Hutchinson:Oh, my favorite movie is Dumb and Dumber and that's just because it's hilarious. And it stands the test of time. It's just a classic. Came out when I was in high school, so it was one of those movies that I went to attend without my parents that was a little bit raunchy at times but just mostly the slapstick humor, and that really is something I'm a fan of, I'd say. How about a TV show?
Sarah Jack:The Walking Dead.
Josh Hutchinson:Yeah?
Sarah Jack:Or any of its spinoffs.
Josh Hutchinson:Many spinoffs of that show now.
Sarah Jack:There's even a new one starting next month. Can't wait.
Josh Hutchinson:Yeah, what's that new one?
Sarah Jack:It's got Daryl. I don't remember what it's called, but I just finished watching the first season of Dead City, which was a spinoff on two of the characters.
Josh Hutchinson:Oh, Dead City. Okay.
Sarah Jack:It was great.
Josh Hutchinson:Yeah.
Sarah Jack:One of my favorite zombie situations of the whole series was in this season.
Josh Hutchinson:Yeah. What attracts you to the Walking Dead universe?
Sarah Jack:The survival and relationships and making choices and the survival.
Josh Hutchinson:Okay, great. My favorite TV show is Psych. And if you're not familiar with it, it's a detective comedy about a man posing as a psychic and starting a psychic detective agency with his best friend, who's a pharmaceutical sales representative, and it's just a lot of comic hijinks, and, I'm about the same age as the lead actors in that, so they were, I was at the same stage of life when the show aired, and I really saw myself in Sean, the lead character.
Sarah Jack:That's great. Today we're learning how to do this on the spot, in person, but what have we learned this past year about podcasting?
Josh Hutchinson:Oh, we have learned so much, it's been a full year. This is the end of that, and we're contemplating what we've learned and how far we've come since then. So much has blown my mind about the experience. It's, we do the full production ourselves. So end to end, getting a podcast made every week is challenging and doing all the edits and stuff, but it's been opportunity for growth, getting new skills, new technical skills, and just the people that we've met. Been amazing.
Sarah Jack:Yeah. Yeah. There's the pace has been fast, putting one out every week, but that those deadlines keep us moving even when we weren't exactly sure, throwing ourselves out there and trying the next thing.
Josh Hutchinson:And we have tried different things. We do usually an interview, but we've also done our own 101 episodes. And we've interviewed such a variety of guests, the academics, the artists, the advocates, it's been quite an array. And just wonderful meeting people from all these different walks of life.
Sarah Jack:It has been amazing. And so we've got that learning curve going on, while at the same time, we're starting to learn more about witch hunts past, witch hunts present.
Josh Hutchinson:The witch hunts present, that I would say has been the most impactful lesson of this whole thing for us. It prompted us to start a nonprofit called End Witch Hunts. We learned the reality, the sad reality that many hundreds, if not thousands of people are being tortured, banished, and or killed each year in occurring in at least 60 nations that there've been reports from. And it's just so prolific and widespread, when we learned about that, it just touched our hearts right away and we knew we wanted to amplify the message of those advocates who are doing the great work in these various countries struggling with this problem.
Sarah Jack:Yeah, we, I've looked at the work that we were doing as before educational, telling you the information, telling you what's happening, but there's another part of that and that is finding out what needs to be done. So we hope that you learn what's happening, but also hear what you need to be doing to help stop it.
Josh Hutchinson:Yeah. And our path to where we are now, that's been so enlightening and revelatory. We started off with that interview of Damon Leff about South African witch hunts. And then we had Leo Igwe talk to us about Nigeria, and those two interviews brought us along really far, but what we've done since then is maintain relationships with those guests, and we've had the opportunity to meet Leo in person and help him with a speaking tour in New England this past May. Just that relationship with him leads to continued growing, and now our colleague, Mary Bingham, has reached out to advocates worldwide, and we're meeting so many people from so many countries that, continuing us on this path to wherever we're going, trying to eliminate this violence.
Sarah Jack:The witch attacks are violent, and they're in more communities than you would imagine, and learning from the history, looking at the research from academics and those who've been out in the field where these attacks are happening, looking at all of it is really important to understanding the bigger picture. Sometimes we hear that people don't quite understand those historic witch hunts, and if we don't understand what was happening then and we don't understand what's happening now, we're not going to find solutions.
Josh Hutchinson:Yes. That's why we got into the podcast, I think, in the first place, was to educate people primarily about historic witch hunts in Connecticut and elsewhere. We've launched the podcast with that education in mind because when we started the Connecticut Witch Trial Exoneration Project, we were just getting weird looks from people anytime we mentioned that Connecticut had witch trials in the first place. People just weren't aware of that, and we thought we'll use every form of media that we can, and podcasting just seemed a natural outgrowth of that. And I'd say that's why we got involved was just to educate, but what we're learning is there are so many connections between the past witch trials and the modern witchcraft persecutions that learning about one helps you learn about the other, because if you can understand what happened in, say, 1692 in Salem, you can understand what's happening in 2023 in any of these nations that are affected by this and vice versa, if you understand what's going on right now, you understand the same suffering that happened before. So I think continuing to educate about both of those aspects is what lies ahead of us in the future. Yeah.
Sarah Jack:One of the things that I didn't expect when I started was how much Research I was going to be doing to be prepared for our episodes, for the guests that were coming, and that we're continually being informed by our preparation. Were you surprised at how much preparation we do for each episode?
Josh Hutchinson:I was, yeah. The research is constant, continuous, every day, seven days of the week. Research It basically fills in every hour that we're not doing the production tasks, we're doing the research tasks. So these are full days and doing a 101, especially, it's really takes nearly a week to do the, just the research and write out what we're going to talk about and how we're going to present it. So yeah, the research. It's, it's been so beneficial, that's probably what surprised me more is just the amount, the number of different topics that we're reading about. Because we can be reading in the same week, as we were recently. We're reading a novel, we're reading a screenplay, we're reading research and learning about witch hunts in India. At the same time, we're learning about witch hunts in Scotland. And we're learning about witch hunting at Salem. Just that variety of what we're learning has been, I just, I adore it, really. I like the research, because I'm that history nerd. And I'm just so curious about the current situation and what's going on and how do we solve that? So constantly reading is a great benefit.
Sarah Jack:One of the things that I love the most is as I'm reading and thinking about talking to our guests, I know that I'm going to get to have some questions clarified. Even though the podcast episode is literally a set of questions and conversation that comes from that, I know that I don't have to read something, look at something that I'm reading and wonder. If I need something answered, I'm going to get a moment to ask the question, even if it's not part of the script. So I've really loved that direct access to the people who've created the information. And the other thing that has come out of the variety of the topics is we, when we hear from our listeners, and we do, which we love it, we hear all sorts of different ways the show's impacting them. Sometimes they share research that they've done to update us on something. Sometimes they ask questions. A lot of the times it's just,"Hey, we're so glad you're doing this." And one of the, one of the things that came out of our week with Leo Igwe this May, if you listen to his episode that we did directly after that, he talked about that he hopes that next time he comes through the United States, there's more,"hey, what can I do to help?" and less"you're kidding me. I had no idea." And I really feel like people are understanding that they need to inform themselves more on the modern crisis, and there's a lot of information out there to do so. I'm feeling really hopeful about that goal.
Josh Hutchinson:Yes. I'm really excited about the advocates that we're meeting and getting more of them on the podcast is something I look forward to, but you also made a good point about that direct access to ask questions. It's quite a privilege to be able to speak with these esteemed professors and other guests who've written about the witch trials. Many of our guests are people whose books I've been reading for years. And so it's been really something to now be talking with them in, I say in person, but it's, we do our recording remotely because Sarah and I are in different states and our guests are all around the world. But having that access you talk about to directly to the brains that have all the information, whatever questions arise in our research, we're able just to ask the experts. And so that's really something.
Sarah Jack:Yeah, it's really great and another thing that's exceptional that has come out of this is our community is there and has grown. When we've reached out to our previous guests, all, they've all been so willing to answer other questions or help with new ideas. Yeah, I guess I'd like to thank our guests directly, each of you, because so many of you have communicated with us on the side afterwards. We're starting to bring back some of our guests. That's really exciting, but that's a huge component, the ongo the conversation is ongoing with our guests after their episode is complete.
Josh Hutchinson:Yes, and we do thank all of you guests. We appreciate you very much all of your help and just giving us your time and allowing us to pick your brain. We really appreciate that and hope that this message is starting to get out to people around the world and yeah, I look forward to continuing to grow. One of the big moments in the podcast for me was landing our first, all of our first guests, and talking the first time to a university professor was a really big moment. When we had Scott Culpepper on, that was big. And Danny Buck was the first international guest we interviewed, plus the first thesis we read. Talking to Malcolm Gaskill was incredible, because I'd read so many of his books. Several, can't number the books, but, once that happened, guests just kept wanting to come on and the positive response that we've had from the academic community is something that surprised me.
Sarah Jack:Yeah. And we couldn't, we could not have done this without them.
Josh Hutchinson:That's very true.
Sarah Jack:Yeah. And then I think back to our very first episode, it was our exoneration project team members, Tony Griego, Beth Caruso, Josh, and I, and then we did a piece of the conversation with Mary Bingham. We just kicked it off with ourselves, but Scott came next, because he had been working on, he was giving, he was teaching on Connecticut witch trials and Governor Winthrop, Jr., and that was like a really great second springboard for us.
Josh Hutchinson:Yeah. And then since then we've interviewed so many people who have literally written the book on the subject that we're talking about, like the book. So many of our guests, you look at early authors that we had on the show, Marion Gibson, Mary Craig, they literally wrote the book on the subject that we talked to them about. And people like Emerson Baker and Margo Burns and so many others have written these excellent books that I highly recommend, and one way that listeners can support us is by buying those books through our bookshop.org, bookshop.org/endwitchhunts. Thank you very much.
Sarah Jack:Yeah. It's really fun to look through those books in there. And it, when you look through all of the titles from the guests that we've had, it's amazing to know that that much information and research has been a part of what has come together. And when you listen to these episodes with these authors who have written the book, you're getting to hear more straight from the author. I love that part.
Josh Hutchinson:Yes. And most of the time our show is serious in nature. But we've been able to record some fun episodes. We've got a really fun one coming up with Katherine Howe That's actually about pirates, so for one week, we will be the Witch Trials and Pirates Podcast. And that was just such a blast, because that book is such a fun ride.
Sarah Jack:Yeah. A year ago, we were so excited about Ruin of All Witches. That book is so important and also a fun ride. And I think it's so great that here we are a year later, we're looking at another exceptional story, so what's next year? I'm thinking about that. Which of our guests or who are we going to find that has something like this exciting coming out?
Josh Hutchinson:Yes. And Katherine Howe is somebody that I've followed for many years who now we talk to, and it's just an amazing privilege, perk of the job, that I've got to pinch myself sometimes and say, yeah, we're talking to these people. We're talking to people who are heroes in their own countries doing the advocacy that is dangerous because if you advocate against witch hunting, people might interpret that as advocating for witches and they, there can be serious consequences when, if you yourself get labeled that way.
Sarah Jack:Yeah. And we've really learned too about the definition of witches and, how does all of this affect people who are practicing Wiccans or Pagans and their discrimination that they face and how it's different. Yeah, we're just learning all these different layers of the witch and I remember when we, early on, I'm just thinking, man, it's like peeling an onion, it's like peeling an onion, and then there's just the, all these layers and there's been all these different ways of referring to the layers and the complexities and...
Josh Hutchinson:Yes. So many layers to learn about. And one thing that I like about our podcast, in particular, is we're able to take these deep dives. When we did our Connecticut 101, it ended up being a six part series, so we're able to explore the details of the events that transpired. We're able to review an entire witch hunt from start to finish, because we're taking that time to do that, where a lot of shows, especially that are interview only, you're not able to explore that far, you're able to explore things at a high level, which is really important also, but to be able to do both and do a mix like we've done. And then to do follow up interviews and interview other people about similar, maybe this, we've talked to multiple people about Salem. We've talked to multiple people about Connecticut. We've drilled into those pretty extensively, but we've also approached those from the high level to see what caused those witch hunting events and what helped to end those witch hunt events, which is, both are key to our understanding what's going on now and how does it end? It ended for Europe and North America to the most part, for the most part. Organized witch trials aren't happening any longer. So what was it about that point in time when those witch trials ended in those regions? What was it about that point in time that they were able to overcome centuries of persecutions. And how do we apply that to the modern day? So I love getting the high level, but I also love being able to drill into, and we've got some more 101s coming up, and we've also got some really exciting Halloween content, don't we?
Sarah Jack:We do. Yeah. We got to bring Scott Culpepper back. And we talked about the origins of Halloween, and I'm really excited for that episode.
Josh Hutchinson:I'm so excited for that one. It was a bit of a fun episode. We talked about some fun things while also tying everything back to the portrayals of witches, things like that. I'm also really looking forward to talking with Maya Rook about witches in pop culture.
Sarah Jack:Yeah, I'm looking forward to that again. It coming, through a year and getting to speak with some of our first guests a second time is exciting. And I'm excited to discuss the pop culture aspect of witches with Maya. It's something, throughout the year, I think that topic comes up as a layer, but we haven't really got to spend much time really discussing that, its impact on women, on culture, on society, on the arts. So it should be really enjoyable.
Josh Hutchinson:Yeah. And we have another episode coming up that's going to be a real blast talking Halloween history with Sean and Carrie from Ain't It Scary with Sean and Carrie. That's one of our first real crossover kind of episode that we're doing with another podcast and they're just so much fun on their show. I know we're just going to have a ball doing that. And then what else do we have coming up for Halloween, Sarah?
Sarah Jack:The Ordinary Extraordinary Cemetery. They travel and they talk about cemeteries, and one of the topics that we're going to discuss with them is omen, signs.
Josh Hutchinson:Yes. That's going to be very interesting. And again, that speaks to the variety of content that we've had on the show. I wouldn't have expected to be doing an episode like that when we began. We began with a relatively narrow focus and have broadened into so many different areas. One thing that I'd like to touch on is, Sarah, we talk about a lot of really heavy stuff, a lot of deep topics and our guests give us so much information that sometimes it's a little hard to process everything that's going on and to deal with really challenging subject matter at times. So how do you, would you say you get through those challenging moments?
Sarah Jack:I really try to go ahead and, put myself in the shoes of those people that were in those stories. Even though it's really hard to look at some of the horror, if you humanize it and really think about what was that personal journey like for that person? Who wasn't that much different, if they are at all, from us? So I think that's one way that I do.
Josh Hutchinson:Yeah, I like to repeat, we have this little mantra in our organization that is just"mellow vibes" and so when things get heavy, I just remember to keep mellow vibes and be chill about stuff, basically. But at times it's challenging because the subjects are so ponderous, the talking about the modern witch hunts, especially, learning what's actually happening to the victims, which we don't always share all the details, because they're really gruesome. But we're seeing videos and images of victims and that can really weigh on you. But I just find a lot of motivation in that and turn it around to just use those images to inspire me to push harder and keep doing what we're doing with the show and with the nonprofit, End Witch Hunts. By the way, visit endwitchhunts.org.
Sarah Jack:Yeah.
Josh Hutchinson:Learn about our organization. We started as a continuation of the Connecticut Witch Trial Exoneration Project. The board consists of four of the founders of the Connecticut Witch Trial Exoneration Project, plus the wonderful Jen Stevenson as secretary. We have multiple projects running. We're excited that we get to probably talk to you about more of our projects coming up very soon, but we're working on memorialization in Connecticut right now. That's one thing that we're working on, and we're working on this world advocacy now, as well, largely amplifying other voices from these countries that have these issues.
Sarah Jack:Yep. And there's still some exonerations that need to be looked at in the United States.
Josh Hutchinson:There are other exonerations and so our show and our nonprofit organization we're doing, basically trying to honor the memory of past victims, educate about the past trials and of the many lessons that we can learn from witch trials, and inform people about the modern crisis. And then our other kind of branch or activity that we get into is advocacy, which is trying to inform world leaders about the situation and the options on how it can be resolved.
Sarah Jack:Yeah, we've learned through the Connecticut Witch Trial Exoneration Project that community leaders are a critical part of moving forward with education and change around witch hunts. We are so grateful to Jane Garibay, House Representative Jane Garibay in Connecticut and Senator Saud Anwar. They worked so hard to get support from the other legislators, and when I say work hard, they were doing, navigating through their jobs and how they see bills through the process, but there, there was a lot of, some of it new information to them, and they were so attentive as we gave them more layers and more layers, and by the time the bill was on the last vote at the Senate floor, the modern witch hunt crisis was being mentioned. We'd had so many yes votes from the House from all political parties, and so when that final vote happened in the Senate and everyone voted yes but one politician, that, that really was a testament to the work that had been done into the project.
Josh Hutchinson:And now that the exoneration has been done, the work of memorialization has begun.
Sarah Jack:It has. We're excited about it. There's lots of community members and community organizations talking together, brainstorming, looking for that route, and you are welcome and should be a part of this.
Josh Hutchinson:Yes, you can join us. Go to ConnecticutWitchTrials.org. There is a volunteer form on there you can fill out, if you'd like to help out with planning and executing this project to get a memorial built. And I want to talk a little bit about why a memorial and what a memorial might be. We're looking into doing a two pronged memorial, where there'd be one state memorial to all of the victims. We'd name all of the indicted, as well as those who were executed and honor all, so that would be 34 individuals. And in addition to the statewide memorial or monument, there would be a state trail that called something like the Connecticut Witch Trials History Trail. And that would involve stops in each of the towns that either had witch trial action or were the hometowns of the victims, so you might start in Windsor, the hometown of the first victim, Alice Young, and travel through the state, you go through places like Farmington, Wethersfield, Hartford, Wallingford, Stratford, Fairfield, Bridgeport, New Haven, Old Saybrook, and there's even a stop in, on Long Island at East Hampton because that used to be part of Connecticut and while it was part of Connecticut, one woman was tried for witchcraft by a Connecticut court.
Sarah Jack:Yeah. And over the last decades or more, there have been people working and providing and researching their local witch trial in their town in Connecticut, and having this trail, having the memorial, it's an opportunity to bring all the work that's been done to, to connect it so that Connecticut has a clear picture and it's, each of the efforts won't be so siloed, there's just so much that has actually been done, but some of it isn't reaching the whole state. The whole picture isn't being told yet, and so I'm excited to see more of that shown, how the work has been done on the local level in many of the communities.
Josh Hutchinson:It's exciting how the local communities are embracing the history and they're willing to take it on. It's a challenging moment in history. A lot of people look at it and feel shame and guilt for that. So it's not the easiest subject to broach that hey, we hunted witches here. But we need to learn those lessons and you learn them very well by going to these locations where trials were held, where executions took place, where victims lived their lives and accusations arose. You get to go to physical locations now in some of these locations. There's the Goody Knapp Memorial in Bridgeport dedicated to a woman who was executed in that area. It's so great to see these communities, and we know of others that are working on getting memorial markers placed similar to what was done with the Goody Knapp stone with the plaque on it dedicated to her memory. You'll start to see those in these other locations, and we're starting to see historical societies and museums really take an interest in this part of the past, and so there will be lots of stops on the trail, but the basic premise is you go to a memorial and then for more information you go to historical societies, museums, and libraries in that community, and they'll have answers to your questions about what happened there. That's our vision for the trail, for the memorial. We've talked about our advocacy, we've talked about amplifying other advocates voices. What haven't we talked about?
Sarah Jack:And just like all of that came out in less than a year, but there's one other thing that I was thinking while we were sitting here talking is this wasn't our first podcast to have a conversation on. No.
Josh Hutchinson:What was that?
Sarah Jack:People Hidden in History.
Josh Hutchinson:Oh, that's right. We had a conversation on the People Hidden in History podcast with Kathleen Langone a month before we conducted our first interview for this podcast. And so that was an informative step and we really appreciate you, Kathleen.
Sarah Jack:We do. And if you haven't heard it, she did a followup conversation with us after the exoneration went through and that also a great episode.
Josh Hutchinson:Yeah. So a year apart, there's the two episodes of us, what we wanted to get out of the exoneration in the first episode, and then what it was like to experience the process of getting the resolution done.
Sarah Jack:And we also, we had our first invite as Thou Shalt Not Suffer to have a conversation on another podcast to talk about witches.
Josh Hutchinson:Witches, yes. That was a big one. And then you were invited to be on the NPR show 1A.
Sarah Jack:Yeah.
Josh Hutchinson:Yeah.
Sarah Jack:Having the opportunity on Extreme Genes with Scott Fisher and David Allen Lambert that, that's their podcast. That really helped me realize, hey, I can have some of these impromptu conversations. I can speak to what I've been learning.
Josh Hutchinson:Yes. And in addition to the podcast, going through the process on exoneration, we had so much interaction with traditional media. Everybody had questions about what are we doing? Why are we doing it? And learning, getting comfortable answering journalists questions, I think, really also benefited our podcasting.
Sarah Jack:Yeah, and so many of them were able to get what we were saying through the editing and into the article. There's some really great articles and quotes out there this past year from those interactions.
Josh Hutchinson:The stories about the exoneration were picked up by literally hundreds of news networks and outlets. We got to see us in the Associated Press, Sarah was in the New York Times, there's been, we've been in The Economist. Some really big organizations have covered our story, CNN, the BBC, all of them, basically.
Sarah Jack:And I hope what you're hearing, we haven't spoken much of the descendants. There were lots of descendants involved wanting this exoneration. They want the memorial. We have a great episode where we talk to some of the descendants, but the, there was such a collaboration of descendants and authors and advocates and politicians and the local museums. It's really been great to see. It's not just one reason that the exoneration.
Josh Hutchinson:That's right. And just looking through, there were something like 34 written testimonies submitted to the General Assembly in support of this resolution, and 11 people gave in-person oral testimony.
Sarah Jack:I got to be one of those people.
Josh Hutchinson:Sarah got to be one of those people. And she ought to be asked some difficult questions, we'd say. And there were young people also involved in that with William and Catherine.
Sarah Jack:It was Catherine, 14, stood up, spoke to the history, answered some tough questions.
Josh Hutchinson:Brilliantly.
Sarah Jack:Yeah, and William.
Josh Hutchinson:And William.
Sarah Jack:Exceptional for 9, I believe. Yeah.
Josh Hutchinson:Nine years old at the time.
Sarah Jack:And you could hear he and his mother speak on one of our episodes. That's a really great episode, too. Jennifer Schloat was a great guest.
Josh Hutchinson:That was a really great episode to do with the two of them. And just to hear a 9 year old and a 14 year old speaking to these issues, and they both came from different perspectives on how they got interested in the topic. I think one was compelled for, by his interest in human rights issues and the other was really propelled by an interest in women's issues and you see all of those things coming together.
Sarah Jack:Look at the story we just told. It's a very layered podcast and podcast year, and we couldn't do it without our supporters.
Josh Hutchinson:Yeah, we thank you for listening. Couldn't do a podcast without having listeners, that would be awkward. We really appreciate you interacting with us, and subscribing to the show and getting involved in the ways that Sarah presents. We haven't talked about the news piece and Minute with Mary. Those are two important segments of the show and those will continue to be important going forward. The news, every week Sarah asked the audience to participate in the advocacy. You can do it just by telling somebody that you know about what's going on. Just get that started, post something on social media, share something that we post. Now, so thank you for your involvement. I hope you have a really great today and a very excellent, happy tomorrow.
Sarah Jack:I was going to say,"Hey, let's say your final tagline together."
Josh Hutchinson:Okay, let's try it.
Sarah Jack:All right. Have a great today
Josh Hutchinson:and a beautiful tomorrow. We said it together.
Sarah Jack:Yeah.
Josh Hutchinson:So that's a first too for us saying things and we're sitting on a couch and in this booth here and in person. This was fun. It took us like six months to meet each other.
Sarah Jack:And now our friend Mary Bingham is here with this week's Minute with Mary.
Mary Bingham:What does it mean to gaslight a person? As a verb, it means to manipulate someone so much that the person being manipulated questions their own reasoning. Most of us have been on the receiving end of this extremely cruel treatment. According to Aaron Mahnke and the podcast titled Unobscured, Hannah Stone certainly was a victim who paid with her life. Hannah was the daughter of Ann and Andrew Foster of Andover, Massachusetts, British America. She married Hugh Stone in 1667 and started to bear him children when their first son, Hugh, was born November 24th, 1668. According to author Richard Hite, Hannah bore six more children through 1686. Between 1680 and 1686, life must have been pretty tough for Hannah. Richard Hite says in his book, In the Shadow of Salem, that Hugh appeared before the quarterly courts three times for being drunk. The two times I found him listed, he seems to man up before the judges, saying that he is sorry. Even Nathaniel Saltonstall believed Hugh was repentant when Hugh voluntarily stepped before him. That Hugh turned himself in could be because some were ready to testify against him. Nathaniel determined that Hugh should pay an undisclosed fine. I wonder if this public displays of misbehaviors, though unsavory as they were probably masked the horror that was really going on in the Stone household. Hannah must have feared for her life. What could she do? How could she escape? How could her family help her? They couldn't. Hannah was pregnant when Hugh murdered her in broad daylight and in public. Ann Foster lost her daughter. Hannah's children lost their mother. The generational trauma would become evident in just a few short years. Hugh was sentenced to hang. His final words at the gallows were that Hannah's family caused him, at least in part, to murder his wife. He gaslighted his in-laws to the end. What a stab in the stomach that must have been to Hannah's mother and her children. Please listen to the episode in this podcast titled The Andover Witch-Hunt with Richard Hite. You won't be disappointed. Thank you.
Sarah Jack:Thank you, Mary.
Josh Hutchinson:Sarah has another insightful edition of End Witch Hunts News.
Sarah Jack:End Witch Hunts, a non profit 501(c)(3), Weekly News Update. Witch hunt memorials and commemorations now take many forms and serve as enduring, tangible reminders. On September 16th, 2023, a historic and poignant event took place in North Pownal, Vermont, as the community came together to dedicate the Legends and Lore Witch Trial Marker. This significant occasion was made possible through the collaboration of the Vermont Folklife Center and the William C. Pomeroy Foundation, with the invaluable support of the Bennington Museum and the Pownal Historical Society. Attendees heard the captivating narrative of the widow with many names, a story that has been passed down through generations. While formal documents about the witch trial have yet to be found, the marker commemorates the Krieger family, who resided in North Pownal, and the remarkable woman who became known as Widow Krieger in 1785. The dedication ceremony featured a heartfelt reading by a Historical Society member who has dedicated years to researching Widow Krieger and her family. During the reading, they shared their personal reflections and wondered what it would have been like to live as Widow Krieger's neighbors in the 1700s. According to student staff writer Eva Dailey of Southern Vermont College Media, The Looking Glass, in the article, Vintage Vermont Lore 5: Mrs. Krieger, Vermont's Only Witch, quote,"though an exact year is not given, as only a brief record of the incident exists, clues are available to those who dig deep enough. According to town records, the Kriegers, a Dutch family, first settled in Pownal in the early 1700s and are mentioned in the original town charter of 1760. Her accusers asserted that she possessed extraordinary powers. According to Vermont's lore expert, Joe Citro, Mrs. Krieger was thrown into the Hoosic River, still iced over by winter, to see if the devil would hold her afloat or not. The story goes that her accusers dove in to rescue her when she sank." At the marker ceremony, it was shared that, unable to own land as a woman, the widow was ultimately forced to leave Pownal, Vermont, and return to her birthplace, Williamstown, Massachusetts. Margaret Schumacher Krieger rests in Westlawn Cemetery in Williamstown, Massachusetts, alongside her husband, John, her son, Peter, and her granddaughter, Elizabeth. To learn more about this memorial marker and the event, go to the Pownal Historical Society Facebook page. Pownal is spelled P O W N A L. Links to the Facebook page and the referred article are in the show notes. Thank you for being a part of Thou Shalt Not Suffer podcast community. We have enjoyed this last year with you. We appreciate your listening and support. Keep sharing our episodes with your friends. This podcast is a project of our nonprofit called End Witch Hunts. It is dedicated to global collaboration to end witch hunting in all forms. We collaborate and create projects that build awareness, education, exoneration, justice, memorialization, and research of the phenomenon of witch hunting behavior. End Witch Hunts employs a three pronged approach to the problem, focusing on knowledge, memory, and advocacy through our various projects. Get involved. Visit endwitchhunts.org to learn about the projects. To support us, make a tax deductible donation, purchase books from our bookshop, or merch from our Zazzle shop. Have you considered supporting the production of the podcast by joining us as a Super Listener? Your Super Listener donation is tax deductible. Thank you for being a part of our work.
Josh Hutchinson:Thank you, Sarah.
Sarah Jack:You're welcome.
Josh Hutchinson:And thank you for listening to Thou Shalt Not Suffer.
Sarah Jack:Join us again for another year.
Josh Hutchinson:Once again, have a great today and a beautiful tomorrow and a totally epic next year.