Based Camp - Wild West Dating & Mail Order Brides： Tinder of the Old West

00:00:00.000 Hello, Simone! Today we are going to go into an interesting deep dive to learn more about

00:00:06.740 dating in the Old West. We are going to look at the widely practiced concept of

00:00:13.200 male order brides in the Old West, talk about why people opted into it, why they did it, 0.98

00:00:19.420 review a lot of firsthand accounts of what men were looking for back then and what women were

00:00:23.700 looking for to understand what they valued in a partner and how that has changed in society.

00:00:27.760 Because I think that's something to go back to, like different cultural periods, to one,

00:00:31.340 better understand our own ancestry, because I think a lot of Americans have forgotten what

00:00:34.980 their great-grandparents valued, what they were looking for in partners, etc. And we, through

00:00:41.360 seeing different cultures, we can be like, oh, this is a different way to relate to marriage and

00:00:45.720 sexuality. And a lot of people would ask if you're like, really? Like women would do this. They would 0.96

00:00:50.260 like get in a carriage and like drive out to meet with someone in the middle of nowhere in like the

00:00:57.000 Old West. Like, weren't they afraid of like being turned into like a sex slave and like chained up 0.73

00:01:01.340 in the basement or something? And it's like, well, actually, there wasn't that much risk of that 0.58

00:01:06.160 because that was sort of like a strictly like worse value proposition for a guy than a wife.

00:01:11.940 Sex slaves are very high maintenance, especially if you're living on the frontier.

00:01:15.580 Yeah, they're not doing that much work, which is, I mean, I guess you could force them to work.

00:01:19.980 There was like that tragic story recently of the, well, now man, but who had been trapped in his

00:01:25.800 house for a long period of time? And he was occasionally let out to clean the house. So

00:01:30.120 he did do some housework, but then otherwise, that's strictly less, like even if they were

00:01:34.440 just cleaning the house, that's strictly less than you can get out of a dedicated wife 1.00

00:01:37.980 who like you, you dedicated part of your time to, right? You know, like you get a lot more labor

00:01:43.680 out of her just by being nice. So we'll get to like the dynamics of this. Although there was an

00:01:48.920 instance where a woman did get married to a nice guy only to realize shortly after her wedding,

00:01:53.880 and we'll go into this case in a bit, that he had robbed her stagecoach on the way over,

00:01:57.820 not knowing it was his future wife. And he was just on the lowdown, also a stagecoach robber.

00:02:03.980 Oh, oops.

00:02:06.200 Well, he was nice about it too. He didn't know it was going to be his future wife and he let

00:02:09.400 her keep her wedding outfit and everything. 1.00

00:02:11.160 Oh, that's sweet.

00:02:12.040 She was like, oh, I'm going to get married.

00:02:13.620 And then he's like, oh.

00:02:14.580 He's like, I can just imagine his face when she arrives. Like, oh.

00:02:17.360 Oh, wow. What a start, huh? That's, that's.

00:02:24.260 But before we get into all of that, I want to go into some other crazy stuff I learned about

00:02:29.780 marriage in the Old West.

00:02:31.380 Okay.

00:02:31.680 So we're going to start with Arbuckle's Coffee Coupons and Rings. In late 1800s,

00:02:37.800 Arbuckle's Coffee was a dominant brand across the American frontier, especially among cowboys,

00:02:42.300 homesteaders, and minors. Coffee was a staple and Arbuckle stood out by including redeemable

00:02:46.860 coupons or premiums in their three-pound bags. These weren't just throwaways. Think of them

00:02:51.340 as loyalty points. Customers collected them to train for goods like kitchenware, razors,

00:02:55.720 and notably finger rings. The rings, often simple bands or modestly adorned, were marketed as

00:03:01.480 keepsakes or engagement symbols. The claim of 80,000 weddings a year was, was one of their,

00:03:08.400 their things. So the Old West, there was a common practice of you would buy. Now the reason this

00:03:15.060 brand of coffee became popular in the Old West first is they built a way to seal it so it stayed

00:03:20.580 fresh longer so they could ship it further. And so then the next thing they did is they built a system

00:03:25.580 where you would get like this coupon book that you could use to buy things. But one of the most

00:03:29.960 popular items in the coupon book was wedding rings. And so people would save up for various

00:03:36.260 wedding rings that they would buy with coupons.

00:03:39.360 That is, that is, I mean, that makes sense. It sounds honestly like buying a wedding ring with

00:03:46.620 your credit card points today, which a lot of people do. I bet if I log on to our credit card

00:03:52.460 rewards, I will find ways to buy a ring.

00:03:56.880 Yeah, maybe. Yeah.

00:03:58.880 This year, never one to rest on his laurels, Arbuckle next came up with a voucher plan.

00:04:03.060 He printed a coupon bearing his signature on each package. A given number of coupons would

00:04:08.100 earn the bearer one of a hundred items available in Arbuckle's catalog, the wishlist book of its

00:04:13.420 day. Items included everything from a toothbrush to a double action revolver. A young man could even

00:04:19.240 order a golden wedding ring for his lady love. His lady love.

00:04:23.480 I love that you could be killed by a gun that somebody got with coupons in the Old West.

00:04:27.780 Not only was the coffee a lifesaver to those early Westerners, so was the packaging.

00:04:31.520 Coffee was shipped with sturdy Maine fur crates, 100-pound bags to the lot. The crates were used

00:04:39.320 to make furniture, coffins, and cradles. The Navajo Indians even used the wood to make

00:04:43.900 a Hogan's, and trademark flying angel that embezzled each package of coffee adorned many

00:04:50.300 a Western Christmas tree.

00:04:52.300 Oh my gosh. That is so cool. I love that.

00:04:57.640 I thought you'd get excited about this. I was like, that's a cool little anecdote.

00:05:01.240 I'm moving that right to the beginning.

00:05:02.860 Yeah, hold on. I want to see if I can find pictures of these books.

00:05:06.360 I could find pictures of the books, but not the rings.

00:05:08.880 Well, I mean, I imagine the rings looked pretty, you know.

00:05:11.160 Nondescript.

00:05:11.800 Yeah.

00:05:12.040 Like just a gold band. Yeah, that's my guess.

00:05:14.280 So a common courting custom in the Old West was something called courting mirrors.

00:05:18.860 Courting mirrors were another quirky tradition more common in rural America, including the Old

00:05:23.620 West during the 1800s. They were small handheld mirrors, often four to eight inches long,

00:05:28.400 with wooden or metal frames, sometimes carved or painted with simple designs like hearts

00:05:33.820 or flowers. A sooner gifted one to a woman he was courting. And it wasn't just about vanity.

00:05:38.480 Mirrors were pricey and were where on the frontier were glass was a luxury. Giving one signaled

00:05:43.840 thoughtfulness and investment, like gifting a high-end gadget today. The mirror had symbolic

00:05:49.020 weight too. It was intimate. A personal item tied to appearance and identity, suggesting trust

00:05:54.480 in admiration. Some stories claimed that women used them to quote-unquote reflect on their

00:05:58.880 suitor's intentions, although that likely was romanticized folklore. Practically, a mirror was

00:06:03.520 useful for a woman living in a sod house or cabin with few possessions. In some cases, couples exchanged

00:06:09.440 mirrors with the man keeping a smaller one as a memento, reinforcing mutual commitment.

00:06:14.480 That's sweet. They both would bring a mirror and the man would just keep whichever one happened to

00:06:17.660 be smaller. These mirrors weren't mass-produced like Arbuckle's rings. They were often handmade or

00:06:22.820 bought from peddlers, making each one unique. By the 1880s, catalog companies like Sears began offering

00:06:28.980 cheap versions, but earlier a mirror might cost a day's wages. Serious for a farmhand or cowboy.

00:06:35.220 Their popularity waned by the 1900s as manufactured goods flooded markets, but they left a mark in

00:06:40.980 diaries and family heirlooms, often passed down as quote, the mirror he gave her, end quote.

00:06:46.100 That's so also sweet. And yes, I checked in 100% we could buy a wedding ring with credit card

00:06:54.260 points. Even on Etsy, you can now like convert credit card points to an Etsy gift card.

00:07:00.100 So I love it. And I, and I love the, the, the, this, this mirror idea. It's actually really

00:07:06.100 sweet. And practical. I love this mixture of practicality and tied to your identity, symbolic.

00:07:16.420 I should also like, take care of yourself. Like girl, like a vacuum, like you look rough. 0.91

00:07:22.500 Here's the evidence of mirror. But, and it's important to understand how little people owned

00:07:27.100 back then when we were going back through my family diaries at that time. And it was like my great,

00:07:30.420 great grandfather talking about being raised in the episode. It's called people used to like their

00:07:34.680 parents. That's the, it's a really good episode. I think one of the best we've ever done because it

00:07:37.840 was going over his diaries. And at one point he catalogs everything he owns and everything he

00:07:43.220 owns was like a dirt roof shed that they slept in an outhouse and then a weaving loom, a loom

00:07:51.660 and, and apparently some pigs. And that was it. I mean, pigs are, looms are useful too.

00:07:56.840 That all sounds good. Yeah. Yeah. But I was, it's, it's interesting to me that today,

00:08:00.740 like, if you thought about making a catalog of everything that your family owns, it would not

00:08:05.840 be like a four thing catalog. It's not like, well, we've got some pigs and I've got a loom

00:08:12.500 and an outhouse. Well, and in just a few years, you'd buy a house on a catalog. So

00:08:17.700 I don't know. Catalogs really saw this amazing. Catalogs were the pre-internet internet.

00:08:22.300 Yeah. Like Sears, you know, you can, in my hometown of Dallas, you can drive around and some of the old

00:08:27.180 Sears houses that were bought from a catalog are still standing in, in neighborhoods that I lived

00:08:31.060 in. Yeah. And they're, they're nice houses too. Like I've seen YouTube tours of them. They're

00:08:35.700 well-built, classic design. They, they look a lot better than modern, modern builds in

00:08:41.980 McMansions on average. Yeah. So for, if people are wondering, well, like, okay, I'll go into the

00:08:49.260 story now of mail order brides. Yes. The story of the famous mail order brides of the old west began

00:08:54.360 when the gold rush brought men over the Rocky mountains to new mining communities.

00:08:58.120 Ooh. Only a few prospectors struck it rich, but many young men stayed in the west. Mining,

00:09:03.080 ranching, farming, hunting, or opening businesses. As towns began to grow, these men wanted wise to

00:09:07.960 create families and to build more stable, lasting communities in the western territories. Men

00:09:12.840 outnumbered women drastically, sometimes by as many as nine to one. Not good odds. The obvious answer 0.95

00:09:20.040 was single women from the east willing to start new lives. And this wasn't just a phenomenon in

00:09:25.240 the old west. It was also a phenomenon in Australia. So here are some Australian ones,

00:09:30.280 because you know, you had the men in the outback farming and stuff trying to bring women out. 0.90

00:09:33.960 And, and they're really interesting to analyze. So you get an idea of what a man valued in a partner

00:09:39.320 back then. Like when he's out and he's like, I want a woman that meet these criteria, this, 0.95

00:09:43.560 this is what he's thinking. And, and keep in mind how this would work. He would like go to the

00:09:46.280 Telegraph office and you'd be like, I want to contact one of these, these magazines or newspapers

00:09:51.080 out east or in, you know, one of the major cities in Australia. And I, I want to write,

00:09:56.440 you know, to them like descriptions of what I'd want in a wife. And, and, and, and, and,

00:10:02.200 okay. So, and he also, it was more like singles ads. I mean, it was kind of male,

00:10:06.840 it was long distance singles ads. And you've also got to think when you're hearing this,

00:10:10.520 what it says about like how they're trying to sell themselves to the woman as well.

00:10:15.160 Like their understanding of what the woman values. Okay. So this one matrimonial, 0.99

00:10:20.120 two young men aged 31 and 25 wish to correspond with young ladies was a view to matrimony photos

00:10:26.680 exchanged. If necessary, ladies must be able to read and write and capable of conducting a store 1.00

00:10:32.440 on gold fields if required. So what's really interesting in this is first, like they don't

00:10:38.600 care that much what they look like. It's like, okay.

00:10:40.840 Oh, photo's optional. I'm a little confused by two men together looking.

00:10:46.520 No, they're, they're, they're okay. So they both want basically the same thing,

00:10:49.800 a competent woman. Right. And so they're like, well, let's just pull on the ad, you know,

00:10:54.040 because we both want a woman who's like good at accounting and business. 0.98

00:10:56.920 I'm just picturing this really cute gay couple. That's like, we just need wives. 1.00

00:11:01.480 Beards. No, no, no. You see that pretty frequently in these is that people will pull in together.

00:11:07.240 Yeah. They're like, well, let's just go in together and we'll, we'll look at the, the,

00:11:10.600 you know, the correspondence and see which ones we like. And then what's also really interesting

00:11:14.120 here. And we've noted this before. And like, people don't believe us. We're like women historically

00:11:19.560 were expected to work and work in the family business. This is what a corporate family was.

00:11:24.840 The idea of a nuclear family where a woman stayed at home and did nothing does not represent what 0.83

00:11:29.320 your ancestors were doing. You were getting a business partner. These were more ads for

00:11:33.640 business partners, for sure. Except for a very short time from the 1910s to like the 1970s. So

00:11:39.240 if you go back to the old west, you know, listen to what the, the one qualification they want in a

00:11:44.760 woman. Ladies must be able to read and write and be capable of conducting a store on a gold field if 1.00

00:11:51.480 necessary, i.e. you need to be able to run a business. That's what I need you for. I'll do like the

00:11:57.560 gold panning and stuff like that. And you run the store. Like that's the way it often worked,

00:12:01.720 which is really interesting and understanding what was expected from gender dynamics in a relationship.

00:12:06.600 And also what you'll see in a lot of these is women were expected to manage the finances. 1.00

00:12:11.000 So here's another one. Matrimony, a young man, about 24 years of age of respectable connections,

00:12:16.680 having an income of about 120 pounds per annum, wishes to obtain an introduction to a lady about 19 or 20,

00:12:23.320 agreeable in person and capable of looking after domestic affairs, property, no object.

00:12:28.920 Okay. So again, what he's saying here is he's not asking about looks. He's saying,

00:12:34.040 I need a woman who can look after my financial affairs, which is really fascinating. But I think 0.99

00:12:39.640 it's also signaling to the woman, like what type of guys these are as well. Like this is part of a

00:12:44.360 two part signaling. This is, look, I'm a respectable guy. And you know, you come, you meet with me and

00:12:49.960 we'll, we'll start a business together and we'll build something that matters together. Right.

00:12:53.720 You know, it's not like, Hey, I'm looking for a hoochie mama, you know, any, any thoughts on that 1.00

00:12:57.800 before I go further? We need to get back to this, this, but this does, what I'm thinking already,

00:13:04.200 when I hear this is there's this phenomenon within the rationalist or EA community online,

00:13:11.160 whereby some people will post marriage bounties and they're just like way too wordy versions of this.

00:13:16.760 And I, when I compare these succinct ads with the marriage bounty descriptions,

00:13:22.760 I'm really seeing the difference between why people were able to get married back then

00:13:28.600 when being practical and why practical, logical people today can.

00:13:32.440 I mean, keep in mind, they were paying for the letter on these, but I know, but no,

00:13:36.600 my point though is like these people worked out to like, what do I really need? You know, someone

00:13:43.560 who owns property and can, you know, or like someone who's practical and not crazy and can

00:13:49.160 help out domestically around the house doesn't have to be a supermodel. Whereas when I, when I go

00:13:55.000 through some of these, these marriage bounties that people describe, it's like long documents

00:13:59.800 and like, I'm an INTJ and I'm looking for someone with like, they're being completely unreasonable

00:14:06.520 about what they want. And, and they, they also are being way too, but I think it's, I think it's

00:14:11.720 unfair to just point this out with the EA community. It was in our own fan base. We'll talk to people

00:14:15.560 and they're like, I want like a hot woman and I'll get a hotter woman. And like, you know, 0.93

00:14:19.160 I'll go to Latin America and find a hot wife, you know? And it's like, no, you, you shouldn't even 0.99

00:14:23.720 be caring about that. Like, you know, like you, you should be focused on their, like when I met you,

00:14:29.720 your attractiveness was of, I think a very obvious to me of little concern. I was much more

00:14:35.880 interested in your industriousness and your breadth of knowledge and curiosity to learn new things.

00:14:42.200 That was like my criteria. Like it was, it was not big, but I was, I wanted people who, someone who's

00:14:48.280 world-class at those things, which I think, you know, why our relationship has gone so well.

00:14:51.720 But there's, there's other, like when I look at other ads and this is from later periods,

00:14:56.680 so you're talking around the gold rush around 1849 to 1856, I imagine all the way up until like

00:15:02.360 the 1920s people were still that practical. Like I'm there's, there's a Pittsburgh press 1921 ad that

00:15:11.160 just reads I'm 27 employed by the government, have a small, but reasonable salary. We'll make some poor

00:15:17.160 working girl from 18 to 25, a good husband and a happy home. Must be Protestant, no dancers, 1.00

00:15:23.080 flirts, or street walkers need answer. I had that one. I was going to do this one. I thought this was

00:15:27.320 a good one. No dancers or flirts. No, but it's always, I want a woman of strong moral character. 1.00

00:15:33.720 And not even, no, he doesn't, he's not even here like, oh, you know, you can't have never slept with

00:15:39.240 someone before. You can't have never. Yeah. Just like, don't like your character be someone

00:15:42.840 who's addicted to that. That's it. He's being reasonable. Yeah. He cares about like religious,

00:15:47.320 ideological compatibility. That makes perfect sense. I actually really don't understand how

00:15:50.760 interfaith marriages work. Yeah. And that's the thing is, is it, and you, you don't have to say

00:15:55.320 this in so many words. And I think when you say it in too many words, then

00:15:58.120 you're losing people. And you see his aspiration here is to be a good husband to somebody.

00:16:05.240 Yeah. He, he, he, he, he's explaining right up front. I'm a man of modest means, right? Like

00:16:10.440 I'm not making, I'm not a sugar daddy. I'm not a wealthy man, but if you're poor and you want a

00:16:16.280 decent, stable life, I'm your guy. Yeah. You know, that's great. Here's one. The respectable man

00:16:23.240 desirous of forming a matrimonial alliance with a young and respectable female, but I love that line 1.00

00:16:30.260 instead of a wedding, a matrimonial alliance. That's what I. That sounds prestigious. Sign me up

00:16:35.480 for that. People, maybe people go for it more if it's a matrimonial alliance and not a marriage. 1.00

00:16:41.860 Oh, hello. Sorry. It's somebody from the New York times. Yeah. I'm happy to take your call.

00:16:46.880 It's just a fact checker from the New York times. Okay. So she's going to call back. She's got

00:16:51.180 something else going on, but you know, I, I mean, I think that we should view marriages that way as

00:16:55.260 matrimonial alliances. That's like a really powerful way, much more so than like a matrimonial 0.90

00:17:00.380 submission. And this is when people are like, Oh, in the old days, woman submitted to their husbands. 0.68

00:17:05.000 Does this sound like you want somebody to submit to her? Like, no, a matrimonial alliance with a 1.00

00:17:10.860 young and respectable female is informed of a person ready and willing to change the state of the 1.00

00:17:17.560 single blessedness for the hazardous chains of wedlock life exclamation mark. So he's saying

00:17:25.340 willing to change the state of single blessedness for the, the hazardous chains of wedlock life

00:17:30.640 saying, I know that a marriage is a risk for, for both of us, but, but I want somebody who is willing

00:17:35.700 to take that risk. Now here's the, here's the first thing we've got her appearance, very attractive,

00:17:39.960 a temper, excitable, and a mind capable, uh, to enlighten the dark shadows of his earthly

00:17:47.300 pilgrimage. Wow. He's looking for a muse. Yeah. He's looking for somebody. No, he's, you know,

00:17:53.060 he's like, I want somebody who's attractive, excitable. I like excitable women too. Yeah. Yeah. 0.97

00:17:57.740 I guess. Yeah. Someone who gets jazzed about your ideas. Yeah. You're right. I mean, not, not all of

00:18:02.640 these are agnostic to appearance. Like the one that, that says desires to meet a single or widow lady of

00:18:10.880 some means and of refinement and Christian age 33 to 43, weight 125 to 145 pounds, height 5, 4 to 5,

00:18:18.860 7 stylish and of neat appearance, but plain, which is really interesting. So you had, you had read

00:18:24.780 another one or. Well, that, yeah, I mean, they're not agnostic to appearance. Not all of them are,

00:18:31.420 but like weight ranges, like 125 to 145 pounds, height 5, 4 to 5, 7. Stylish and of neat appearance,

00:18:39.560 but plain. Plain. I love it. Okay. So I asked like, why, why did women do this? Right? Like 1.00

00:18:44.180 women who answered the ads for wives in the West were those who weren't finding men or men of quality

00:18:50.000 at home or those who wanted to get away from home for some reason. Reasons included having strict

00:18:54.660 parents being subject of a scandal that was ruining their reputation or simply wanting adventure or a

00:19:00.860 new start after something bad had happened at home. These women needed to find husbands elsewhere 1.00

00:19:05.600 far from where they lived. Surprisingly, no shortage of women answered these mail order bride ads. Many 0.98

00:19:11.940 old Western marriages were made this way. In most cases, the marriages went smoothly as both parties

00:19:17.120 represented themselves accurately. No one wanted to travel a thousand miles or more across a continent

00:19:21.860 or wait for someone to travel that far to get to them only to find out there were lies involved that

00:19:28.680 would make the marriage unpleasant for one or both of them. However, the occasional stories of

00:19:33.100 mail order bride ventures went awry. And I think this is the core thing is the, you know, the reason

00:19:37.380 why this didn't end up poorly that frequently is just because you got to live the rest of your life

00:19:43.280 with this person. Right. You know? Yeah. Yeah. You're not gonna. Lying works on a one-off. I'm never

00:19:49.520 going to see you again basis. It doesn't work if you need to depend on that person, the rest of your life

00:19:54.360 and your spouse, whether you're antagonistic toward them or not, they can really make your

00:20:01.040 life miserable. Your life is in their hands. Your food is in their hands. Your safety is in their

00:20:05.080 hands. If you are sick and vulnerable, they decide whether you live. As a husband, like that's

00:20:09.680 absolutely true. If you piss off your wife, she can just dab you at any time in the night. Yeah. Or if

00:20:14.780 you're, if you're deadly ill, she could just not give you water. You know, like there are ways,

00:20:21.280 you know, even without actively. Actually, there was one serial killer woman who just like killed

00:20:26.600 tons of husbands. Yes. Yes. I think there's, there's been multiple of them in history because

00:20:31.040 it's, it's a pretty easy game to play. One notable example, though, by all means, not the only one

00:20:36.680 is that of 22 year old school mistress, Elizabeth Berry and bachelor minor, Louise Dribelvis.

00:20:44.080 Dribelvis. I know how to pronounce that name.

00:20:45.800 Yes. Not Dribelvis. No, no. But we always called her Dribelvis. I pretended I couldn't

00:20:52.280 pronounce it. Lewis described himself as a lonely minor in his ad. Elizabeth was concerned about

00:20:57.860 becoming a spinster since she was still unmarried at 22. I wonder if this is related to Brittany,

00:21:02.600 which was approaching old age in the old Western marriage market. That is hilarious. 22 was considered 0.99

00:21:09.200 approaching old age back then. Oh dear. So Elizabeth packed up her things after a short

00:21:14.000 correspondence with Lewis and married him in California. On the way, her stagecoach was Rob,

00:21:19.300 but one of the three robbers allowed her to keep her luggage, which had her wedding dress and other

00:21:25.020 belongings for her new life in it. She noticed the man had a ragged scar on his hand. Later that day,

00:21:30.540 she reached Lewis's house and they went to the justice of the peace to get married after she got

00:21:35.400 dressed for the ceremony. After the exchange, vows were pronounced man and wife. Elizabeth thought she

00:21:40.940 recognized Lewis's voice and saw the same ragged scar on his hand she had seen in the robber when

00:21:45.740 he signed the marriage license. Realizing he was one of the robbers, she fled and history does not

00:21:50.940 record what became of her. It turns out Lewis was indeed a minor, but he neglected to say in his ad

00:21:56.040 that he had supplemented his income by robbing stagecoaches with a couple of his friends.

00:22:00.540 Um, okay. So didn't necessarily have their happily for after she just ran off, just ran away. That's 0.92

00:22:09.180 really dangerous because high status did too, too high, you know, women just expect you to have money 1.00

00:22:15.780 without working for it. So that's the thing. And also, but like, she's out there and she's vulnerable.

00:22:20.540 I would, I mean, ran away. You know, I don't know if she like ran, you know, if the ratio was nine to

00:22:29.340 one, she could probably take a pick of the litter. Okay. On June 4th, 1871, Sarah Baines hopped down 0.97

00:22:37.900 from a wagon in Fort Bridger, a remote military and trading outpost at the crossroads of several pioneer

00:22:43.020 trails in what would one day become Wyoming. Baines, a 24 year old seamstress from Louisiana had just 0.99

00:22:49.660 spent several months traveling 1,500 miles through roadless territory alone, but she wouldn't be alone

00:22:56.460 for long. She'd come to Fort Bridger to get married. The groom was Jay Hensley. Imagine that months

00:23:03.020 traveling alone as a woman in the old west and a company that is terrifying because you know, 1.00

00:23:11.820 while that your husband wouldn't grape you, a bandit might, a native American might help you.

00:23:16.540 They don't have any interest in maintaining your, yeah, man, unaccompanied. That is Native 1.00

00:23:21.180 Americans during this period. Some tribes, not all tribes were genuinely terrifying and monstrous.

00:23:25.820 They would, they would do really horrible things. The, the one that you always use that, you know,

00:23:30.700 you know, off the top of your head, it was the, the one that Pocahontas came from that, which,

00:23:34.140 which is not one of the tribes. They had some torture involving burning and pulling your skin.

00:23:38.780 They would pull your skin off with a clam. Um, yeah, clamshells, but they weren't even like the

00:23:44.140 most violent Indians were generally the Plains Indians. Like this is where you had the big war 1.00

00:23:48.780 like cultures that developed during this period. And so really a scary, brave thing to do.

00:23:53.500 The groom was Jay Hensley, a 48 year old farmer who'd left Ohio some years before to seek his fortune

00:24:00.460 out west. The two met after Hensley responded to an ad placed in the matrimonial pages of the October 12th,

00:24:07.500 1869 edition of Frank Leslie's illustrated weekly. They corresponded via letter for more than a year

00:24:13.340 before Hensley proposed the day after Brian's arrived at Fort Bridger, and they were married by the

00:24:18.460 fort's minister in a small ceremony on the banks of Gorosh Creek. The next day they left to open a general

00:24:25.900 store in Plackville, California. Platterville. Platterville. Platterville. I don't know how to say it.

00:24:32.780 In the foothills of the Sierra Nevada, the Hensleys were married for 51 years.

00:24:37.580 So here you see a few things, you know, one, it's not like the husband is the breadwinner.

00:24:40.860 They went to open a store together as soon as they, and they like started their life. It wasn't

00:24:46.700 like he had a store operational and then he got a wife. It was like, hey, what do you want to spend

00:24:51.580 your life doing? Cause we're going to be doing it together. And they go open a store together. 0.55

00:24:54.860 Right. You know, and they end up married for 51 years. It seems like a pretty, you know,

00:24:59.500 harmonious. And I will say it always gets to me. We, we should actually do an episode that's like

00:25:03.660 a realistic take on native American pioneer interactions, because the, I mean, I think

00:25:10.300 you have two periods. You have the one period where, you know, in 1950s Americana, where,

00:25:15.100 you know, people naively understood it as like cowboys versus Indians. And the Indians were

00:25:20.220 generally the bad guys, like just like, you know, except for like the, the wise friend Indian. 0.95

00:25:25.740 Yes. Who would, who would be a guide or whatever. But then in, in like Wokeville,

00:25:29.980 it became, you know, settlers always bad, like Indians always good. Like, but I think that that's 1.00

00:25:35.100 also really a twisted understanding of history. And there's actually this great one where they were

00:25:39.980 like, they were interviewing some like ultra progressive and, and they were talking about

00:25:44.380 how, you know, before the settlers came, like the native Americans all got along. There was never any 0.95

00:25:49.180 war. There was never any torture. There was never any slavery. I mean, first off, there is plenty of,

00:25:54.140 of history of native American tribes doing terrible things to each other independently.

00:25:58.940 No, no, no. They didn't believe that. They believed this narrative of like,

00:26:02.780 they were like these wise, like mystic people who like, didn't do that. And it's like, no,

00:26:07.820 there, there were some tribes that were like unusually nice. Like the Cherokee would be an example of

00:26:12.780 this, but you know, there were others like the Apache and the Comanche and the Seminoles.

00:26:17.820 No, they were pretty, they were proper scary.

00:26:20.700 Yeah, proper scary. The Seminoles don't even mind this today. You know, they've done pretty well.

00:26:24.380 They ended up buying the Hard Rock Cafe chain at the tribe.

00:26:27.420 Good for them!

00:26:28.300 That's nice.

00:26:29.180 For people who don't know, the Seminoles were the ones who lived in the Florida,

00:26:31.580 like Everglades and Swamp areas, and nobody really conquered them ever. And nobody wanted the land.

00:26:36.860 That's an advantage.

00:26:37.580 No one wanted the other. Yeah, that is.

00:26:39.820 But it keeps you strong, you know, when you live in-

00:26:42.460 That's why we're so busy on city-states in undesirable areas. That's actually a really great example

00:26:47.580 of like, people are like, why do you want to build in the far north? Well,

00:26:50.380 for the same reason, the Seminoles were okay, relatively speaking, because they were in 0.66

00:26:56.140 Floridian Swamp Zone of death.

00:26:59.580 Yeah. So here is a story that was put in a newspaper.

00:27:05.260 Mofat County ranch man secures charming housekeeper, married four hours after they first met. 0.83

00:27:11.500 And this is a very old write-up. This is like a modern write-up.

00:27:14.140 The young lady came in on the belated train something after four o'clock, was met by her intended

00:27:21.500 husband, and before nine, the deed was done. Now, it must not be imagined that the two were

00:27:25.980 altogether strangers before taking this step. Miss Bette is a sister of Miss Frank LeClaire,

00:27:33.020 who lived near Cal's place on the South Fork. They had been courted by mail for a couple years,

00:27:38.460 and recognized each other instantly when the young lady alighted from the train. R.H. Green was one of

00:27:43.900 the guests of honor at the wedding, and being a mutual friend of the interested parties, aided

00:27:48.540 greatly in their acquaintanceship. The bride is a charming lady who has made her home in Denver for 0.95

00:27:53.420 several years. Mr. Cal is one of the enterprising young ranchmen of eastern Mofat County, and has a host of

00:28:00.780 friends who will be enjoying in wishing both much happiness. So there's a few things to note from

00:28:05.820 this story. The first is that the way that this wedding was structured is they had mutual acquaintances

00:28:11.980 who helped source them, which was really common. Yeah, this really seems like a community endeavor.

00:28:16.140 Yeah, another is, which were common, they weren't always, you know, you had some like genuine

00:28:20.220 mail-in brides. But then in other instances, you had, you know, the people being matched by their

00:28:27.740 family members. But here I'd also note where she came from, right? I've mentioned that you have sort

00:28:32.860 of genetic selection events when you're dealing with the West. And a lot of people think of the

00:28:37.420 West as being like a single wave, when actually what it was is multiple waves, and then the most

00:28:44.220 adventurous people from the last wave settling the new wave. So you have, you know, the first wave

00:28:47.660 settling in the Appalachian region, then the next wave settling out in like Texas, and then in the West.

00:28:52.300 And here, this woman who is going out to this really rural region was already settled and living 1.00

00:28:56.780 in Denver. Yeah, she was a daughter of risk takers who took an even bigger risk. Yeah,

00:29:03.500 magnifying effect, which is many why many people argue that San Francisco has this sort of collective

00:29:10.540 genetic inheritance of startup risk takers. That's what you got there.

00:29:15.820 Yeah. And it's also important to understand like how bad things were for women in these cities in terms 0.99

00:29:21.020 of like, what led them to go out and do this, which was that, you know, often jobs, if you didn't have

00:29:27.980 a husband were hard to get as a woman, you know, you could end up in one of the like sewing factories, 1.00

00:29:33.180 which is like a nightmare existence. Yeah. God, that'd be a fun one to do an episode on or a depressing

00:29:39.580 one to do episode on the old workhouses. Basically, they kept you like a slave, you know, you'd rather

00:29:45.580 be a sex slave, but then at one of these workhouses where they keep you working, you know, extremely 0.90

00:29:51.500 long shifts every day of the week. In very unsafe conditions. Yeah. On these giant looms, 0.99

00:29:57.100 you can still go tour them and stuff like that. And, and that was, you know, if you, if you weren't from

00:30:00.940 a wealthy family or you weren't like the oldest kid from a wealthy family, you know, this is, this is

00:30:04.700 what was waiting for you if you didn't secure a husband. And well, that or like dying on the streets

00:30:09.260 or becoming a pickpocket or a beggar or thief or, you know, so for a lot of these women, 1.00

00:30:14.460 this was actually a very good option. Also keep in mind that many of them were coming from like

00:30:19.340 Puritan strict households or something like that. And we're having the rebellious phase and we're

00:30:23.660 like, you know what, I'd really like to, you know, live a bit more free. And the, the West was

00:30:28.620 significantly more gender equality than the East, like women in these states and territories,

00:30:34.140 you know, in the East, sometimes they weren't allowed to own property. They weren't allowed to,

00:30:36.780 et cetera, et cetera. That wasn't true when they got to the West and the arrangements that they were

00:30:41.020 able to form were, were generally significantly more gender equal. So if you're a young woman

00:30:45.580 who had a sense of adventure and wanted a degree of equality, you could find that.

00:30:50.380 But people, people also like, you know, made a little fun of this. Like it was a little negative,

00:30:55.580 like the early days of dating online. Like I remember when we were dating.

00:30:58.300 Oh yeah. You would get the side eye for dating online. Yes. Yeah. Well, I think the important

00:31:05.180 thing to note is that not dating IRL, like not meeting your partner at church or in school or

00:31:12.940 having them be your neighbor is, is a risky endeavor and is viewed with derision and suspicion by non-risk

00:31:21.100 takers, by conformist non-risk takers. And that's why online dating is seen this way. This is why

00:31:26.700 these mail order brides were seen this way. And yet this behavior has been actually quite common

00:31:33.020 for a long time. That's how, I mean, essentially that's how my grandmother married my grandfather.

00:31:38.620 They corresponded via mail for some time after meeting in person just a few times after the war.

00:31:45.980 Yeah. So, so the Hartford Courant remarked in 1910, the Wichita Eagle reported with sardonic glee

00:31:53.820 that Miss Effie Newland, one of the wealthy young women of Hoaxie, Kansas, married a Mr. Lopez,

00:32:00.060 a sailor of Key West, Florida, after she jokingly responded to his ad for a wife.

00:32:05.740 But Lopez was a splendid writer and the girl soon became infatuated with his lovemaking.

00:32:10.380 I love it today. Lovemaking means something totally else, but they meant like being sweet in letters.

00:32:15.420 Yes, I get this. The paper claimed Lopez traveled to Hoaxie and the couple were married while the

00:32:21.020 parents protested. Other stories fueled the panic that marriages made outside society bounds were

00:32:25.980 dangerous. The Los Angeles Herald reported on October 31st, 1897, that a 32 year old man shot

00:32:32.700 and killed his heavily insured 19 year old wife, who he met through an advertisement in a matrimonial

00:32:38.300 paper. Of course, some stories had happy endings, marriages that they didn't well. So like one

00:32:43.900 headline from 1907 declared, girl writes in secret and wins rich planter. The story of an Indiana woman

00:32:49.260 who met her husband through an ad in matrimonial paper. This fair spent years writing to each other

00:32:53.420 in secret and they married in person. This is, this is a story from an old newspaper or something that it's

00:32:58.860 poorly. Red hair, box Cupid's plans. Mail order bride forgot to ask perspective husband about it. 1.00

00:33:05.980 Trip here in vain, Kentucky. She shows up, but she's a ginge. 1.00

00:33:10.700 No, he's a ginge. And, and, and she immediately renounced their marriage possibility because he 1.00

00:33:15.500 was redhead because she said, quote, I just couldn't live with a redheaded man. I couldn't. 0.84

00:33:20.140 They are always so cross.

00:33:24.380 Is that actually just like literally her, her stereotype against people with red hair?

00:33:29.100 That was a redheaded man. 0.98

00:33:31.820 Oh, okay. This is a crazy stay off from an old newspaper. Like who knows how many of these old

00:33:37.020 stories are true. A brother and sister drawn together through matrimonial ad. Council Bluffs

00:33:41.740 October 18th. The most remarkable romance ever brought to light in southwestern Iowa has befallen

00:33:47.820 James Coopington, a prosperous farmer residing in the Nishawa Bota Bottom, 20 miles east of here.

00:33:55.580 However, Coopington advertised for a wife and received a response from a widow in Georgia.

00:34:00.300 They exchanged a number of letters and he sent the woman money with which to come to him.

00:34:06.140 They were married on the day of her arrival. He met her at the depot and they were mutually

00:34:11.020 dumbfounded when it was discovered that the intended bride was none other than Coopington's

00:34:16.460 sister from whom he had been separated at youth. He heard she was killed in a railway wreck

00:34:21.500 and mourned her as dead. Each married and other, and their respective spouses died.

00:34:27.100 The sister's name being changed by marriage, Coopington did not recognize her in correspondence.

00:34:33.820 Did they get married? Do I, did I hear that right?

00:34:36.620 No, no, they didn't. Okay.

00:34:37.820 They were previously married and they had, that's why they didn't, you know, the name.

00:34:42.060 Um, who knows if it's real, but it's a sweet story if it is like, I want it. I mean, yeah,

00:34:46.860 at least you discovered your sibling is still out there. Okay. So to go through some original texts,

00:34:54.060 because I love reading these, this is from 1865 in the Chicago Tribune. Correspondence desired for

00:34:59.580 the love of the thing, fun or matrimony, any young ladies between 16 and 21. This, this is,

00:35:05.340 this was like a more flirty one, like either for marriage or just for fun.

00:35:08.620 Oh dear. Ooh. And, and then this is an ad for people to join like a service for doing this.

00:35:14.780 Either rich, handsome, pretty, stylish, accomplished, refined, Italian, or brillianted

00:35:19.180 by two gentlemen, a wrong, a young, a rich young widower, S.H. Layard. Oh, so this is for two men.

00:35:25.740 And a rather handsome, steady fellow, the only son of wealthy parents.

00:35:29.980 Oh, okay. Correspondence, honorable or secret?

00:35:33.180 Honorable or secret? This is a, what?

00:35:38.220 These men know what's up. That is a horny marriage ad. 1.00

00:35:43.100 They're ready for something raunchy, AKA secret. That is interesting. Wow. 0.77

00:35:48.780 A widow, this is from a widower merchant and stockman lives in Kansas, 56 years old,

00:35:54.140 height, six feet, weight, 210 pound brunette, black hair and eyes, wishes corresponding with ladies of 1.00

00:36:00.300 same age, without encumbrances and whiz means must move in the best socially and be fully qualified to

00:36:06.700 help make a happy home object matrimony. So he's like, I, you need to be, you know, upper, you need to,

00:36:13.420 you know, not classy. Yeah. Classy, right? There's a lad in Missouri with a flat foot, seeds in his pocket,

00:36:20.380 a brick in his hat, a blue eyes, size tin shoe called the bull of the woods and the boy for you.

00:36:27.260 Well, there's a lot of contemporary lingo in that one. My goodness.

00:36:30.940 A brick under his hat and seeds in his pocket. What on earth?

00:36:35.500 He's giving it a vibe with that one. That's what he is. Absolutely. No, he's slinging it.

00:36:41.420 Um, here's one. Once pretty girl, age 17 to 20. Advertiser is 29, five feet, nine inches tall, 1.00

00:36:49.260 blonde, can laugh for 15 minutes. Once a pretty girl. These are tall people. Are they overstating 0.95

00:36:54.860 just like people are on online dating ads now? I wonder. Because this is really tall. Five,

00:37:00.380 nine, six foot. Like these are very tall heights for that time period. We've seen what

00:37:05.340 beds look like from that time period. This is in clothing too. Yeah. Probably lying then.

00:37:10.780 Yeah. I doubt. I doubt. Yeah. Well, at least some things never change.

00:37:14.380 Respectable young man, 20 years old, good city position, desires acquaintance of modest young

00:37:19.980 lady, age 17 to 21, was home nearby, object to attend operas and church, perhaps more.

00:37:27.420 Perhaps more. He's showing off his wife. He's like, I go to operas and church and

00:37:32.300 that's what I want to do with you. He's really, really for signaling. No, but again, this is not,

00:37:37.340 you know, these are not guys who are like, I'm looking for a hot woman who can do, who can make 0.73

00:37:42.380 a good dinner. Like no one's been fed that. Right. Like no one's been like, you know, okay, here's one

00:37:46.700 from 1898. 30, wealthy, lost mother for whom I sacrificed youth. Dread a lonely future. Seek husband and

00:37:54.620 true companion. This woman is desperate. And 30 at that age was ancient. She's really

00:38:01.580 down for what she wanted. That's rough. This one was in 1899. Widow, 44 Southerner,

00:38:08.940 a stranger owned home. West end would like the hearthstone of a heart swept and the cobwebs

00:38:15.900 brushed away matrimony. Oh, sorry. Would like the hearthstone and heart swept. Getting poetic.

00:38:21.180 Okay. So he's being poetic. He's showing, you know, whatever. Okay. Here's one. Hold on. Here's

00:38:25.980 one. An older bachelor returning from the mines finds his old sweetheart married and old acquaintances

00:38:31.980 scattered. Desires lady acquaintance, object marriage. That's from 1904. I like that. Very

00:38:37.940 straight to the point. I was going to marry someone. Like I'm not like a flirt or whatever. She just got

00:38:42.340 married when I got back. This one here from 1921. Businessman, gentlemen, Christian, 33 to 43 age,

00:38:49.580 125. Oh yeah. So this is the one where you're talking about height and weight.

00:38:53.060 Very specific about weight. Yes.

00:38:54.540 And the skills he wants is music, stenography, typing, bookkeeping, good penmanship. That's

00:38:59.660 interesting. Okay. Here we've got here an ad for husband. I like this one. Okay. You got gold

00:39:06.140 diggers even in the past. 38 year old brunette seeks a husband with an automobile. This is from 1921.

00:39:13.500 Needs. Does she want to marry a man or a car? This is very interesting.

00:39:17.320 The cars would have been quite a new contraption back then. Like, Ooh, I want one of these men who

00:39:22.180 lives fast. Here's one from 1881. I think this one is interesting. Young person of noble birth,

00:39:27.720 beautiful as Helena, housewife like Penelope, et cetera, seeks a husband through press entirely 0.59

00:39:33.700 without acquaintances of the masculine sex. And so what she's saying here is, look at me. I'm so

00:39:40.200 educated. I'm a little, you know. Yeah. But is she describing herself to Helen of Troy? I mean,

00:39:46.280 good luck lady. Yes. And a wife like Penelope. No one wants to marry a woman who thinks she's 1.00

00:39:52.460 literally as beautiful as Helen of Troy. That is just trouble. I don't care how beautiful she is.

00:39:57.200 She doesn't have any male acquaintances. Maybe, maybe she'll be. Yeah. For a fucking reason. No one

00:40:01.980 can tolerate her. I can't, I can't even deal with one, one collection of sentences that she wrote

00:40:08.700 hundreds of years ago. Okay. Almost hundreds. So I found the first one that Mitch is cooking.

00:40:12.720 Gentleman 35, rancher in Montana, seeks lady under 30, adept at household duties and not afraid of 0.95

00:40:17.520 hard work. So he starts with the hard work saying, must know how to cook and mend. That's good. Yeah.

00:40:22.380 So rather than keep going, I collected some more, but this episode has run long and I think that we

00:40:26.300 get the idea of what people were looking for. Yeah. The question is, how can we bring this back?

00:40:31.100 Because I like this. And I like this idea of like, of looking for a business partner. You know,

00:40:39.260 looking for someone who, you know, can, can move out here, knows how to do these things,

00:40:46.920 follows this religion. I have a great idea. What? Okay. So just like the old West,

00:40:53.060 our podcast is predominantly male watched. Yeah. So what women can do if you want, 1.00

00:40:58.520 and you want to reach out to us and have like a, a like short thing at the end of an episode where

00:41:03.420 we pitch you to the audience, right? Yeah. We forward you correspondence. If you're looking

00:41:09.020 for marriage and kids, you, you, you, you let us know and we'll make a pitch. Email us at

00:41:14.640 partners at pragmatistfoundation.com with a succinct, like these ads description of what you're looking

00:41:22.020 for. Also one more pitch also for the ladies watching this, there is a society of mothers who

00:41:30.740 have stepped back from, you know, rigorous full-time careers to do more parenting who

00:41:37.080 nevertheless want to be involved in business and start businesses and kind of work together,

00:41:42.020 kind of like in a, in a writer's club to keep each other honest and move forward and actually

00:41:45.700 get those businesses started. It's called undercurrent. If you're interested in joining

00:41:49.700 this also email us at partners at pragmatistfoundation.com. We're not running it. We're not the founders of it,

00:41:54.820 but we, we met the founder at natal con and she's a really cool woman. Also a mother of a bunch of

00:42:01.900 children who's she has a finance background, also very professional and it's a cool group. So email

00:42:06.900 us as well. If you're interested in that. Yes. But I, I, I like this idea of, of, of keep it short,

00:42:13.140 simple and what really matters to you, you know? Absolutely. And I think that that'll also help with,

00:42:17.800 with personal framing. Right. But, but I love that. I love you. You recognize that our podcast is the

00:42:22.380 Wild West. A lot of risk-taking, high-achieving, intelligent men. And here's the, here's a sweet

00:42:30.280 one from 1883. I want a wife to talk with at day's end. Someone gentle to make this lonesome place 0.98

00:42:37.520 home. Oh, I want to give him a hug, you know? It's okay, little man. It's probably not. He probably

00:42:47.580 died a very painful death. Yes. A lot of, that was actually a, a fun one from A Thousand Ways to

00:42:54.900 Die in the West. I thought that was actually a fairly funny movie with a interesting premise of,

00:43:00.580 of a, like, I think it sold pretty wrong. Like it sold like, oh, all the ways you could die in the

00:43:04.980 West is what makes it funny. But what makes it funny is taking somebody with modern sensibilities

00:43:10.280 and values and ideas of gender roles and putting them in an old West environment and just watching

00:43:15.700 them constantly, like, flabbergasted at how different things were back then and how much

00:43:20.420 nobody cared. I have only the finest healing tonics and elixirs procured from the farthest

00:43:25.080 corners of the globe. Ogden's celebrated stomach bitters. God, look at the ingredients. Cocaine,

00:43:31.440 alcohol, morphine, mercury with chalk. What the hell is mercury with chalk? Science. And red flannel.

00:43:39.280 Red flannel? There's shirt in here? Pieces of shirt. Here's one that I think you'll find from,

00:43:44.120 from 1889. Widower, 50, Texas. Owns 200 acres. Seeks a lady with some capital to join in matrimony

00:43:51.900 and improve the land. Just like, look. He wants an infusion of, this is, yeah, no, this is a growth

00:43:57.720 equity marriage. I, no, I'm not signing up for that. Nice try. I love you so much, Simone. I'm glad I got

00:44:05.800 you through the modern version of one of these. I reached out to you. I'll have you. You did. You did.

00:44:11.900 You were the trollop and I really appreciate that. Thanks. Sorry. You were an aggressive woman 1.00

00:44:18.040 in, in, in the, in the deed of, of, of, of matrimony. I, my first message to you was a

00:44:25.860 question about your startup. Okay. Oh, okay. You were being sly. And you were like, let's discuss it

00:44:33.400 over dinner. And it was like, okay. But no, it was always about business with us.

00:44:39.660 You were not interested in the startup at all. You, of course I wasn't. I was interested in your

00:44:44.980 stupid face. I love you too much. Oh my God. I love you too much. 1.00

00:44:50.560 I'm really lucky. I ended up with you. It's just letting you know that. Sorry. I did submit it

00:44:59.680 though. And it, it. You got it as an unlisted video. Can you send me the unlisted video just

00:45:05.420 so I can check it works? The link that you sent. I just checked that it works and I just submitted

00:45:09.060 it. So it's a little late, but sure. Here's the unlisted video. We are submitting to Andreessen

00:45:14.560 Horowitz. We got to round two applications. They liked our pitches of both of them,

00:45:21.020 both for the AI video game project and for the school. So that is so exciting. So exciting.

00:45:27.600 It is exciting. It is really exciting. You are just an absolute star, Simone.

00:45:36.620 And you know what else is on my unlisted YouTube videos? It's, it's insane. There's the gist of

00:45:41.480 Gigaverse. There's an original, and this is 2022 description of the Collins Institute,

00:45:47.300 which is crazy from our original fundraising for it. Um, and I have our Saberos con Andres spot.

00:45:55.420 Andres. We, we did that on Peruvian TV. The top, one of the top Peruvian TV shows had us on at one

00:46:02.080 point, but hold on. You were on NPR today and you were like, it was exactly like that scene from

00:46:06.720 Parks and Rec. Like they had this NPR accent and they were all like low energy. Leslie,

00:46:12.340 could one say that a book is nothing more than a painting of words, which are the notes on the

00:46:20.680 tapestry of the greatest film ever sculpted? One could say that, but should one join?

00:46:31.100 And the bioesthetist was like, well, of course no one would call you a Nazi, Simone, for what

00:46:35.520 you're doing. And you're like, no one would describe that as like what the Nazis did. And I'm

00:46:39.740 like, every day. Progressives don't know how crazy their own party is. Like just, just not even 0.99

00:46:46.780 close. I thought what we're going to do for the next episode. He had more eugenic views than I did

00:46:51.140 because he believed that there were some things that universally everyone could agree. We should

00:46:54.440 screen out this. And I'm like, no, that's no.

00:46:58.100 No, they wouldn't agree on that. They wouldn't agree with you. Yeah. And that's, that's crazy

00:47:02.340 that like progressives have more eugenic views than we do, but we're, we're the bad ones. We're

00:47:09.300 evil. We're the one. Oh, sorry. Not, not sorry, actually.

00:47:14.320 Yeah. No. And I've been, I've been getting boiled at something because I've been watching people angry

00:47:17.820 at, at a lot of our like friends, like the, the lady who was on our show, science lady,

00:47:22.100 Sabina Hofstetter, because she, you know, championed a book that was like, Hey, science is getting too

00:47:27.000 woke and it's causing issues. And the guy was like, Oh, how could you say that when Trump's

00:47:31.000 in office? And so we're going to rail on him. We're going to say, we won the war on science.

00:47:34.440 We defeated science.

00:47:35.860 Toasty, what did you learn about picking daffodils?

00:47:38.000 I just wanted, I just wanted, I just wanted, I was just, you, I just wanted to, you, I just

00:47:49.120 wanted to put, I just wanted to put your flowers in the house so, so we can go, uh, can go to

00:47:57.280 the store to get some blueberries. Oh, okay. Toasty wants blueberries. We gotta go.

Based Camp - April 16, 2025

Wild West Dating & Mail Order Brides： Tinder of the Old West

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