Deep Dive
Shownotes Transcript
This is Sound School from PRX and Transom. I'm Rob Rosenthal. Today on the show, the backstory to a podcast produced by Nicole Hill that's about to hit the streets in a little over a week. Nicole got the idea for the podcast. Actually, you know what? Gut is the wrong verb. Seems more like she was struck, struck hard with the idea about four years ago while she was poking around some newspaper archives.
Black-owned newspapers from decades ago. Of course, the front pages had a lot of what I expected, which is about the fight for civil rights and racial equality, all of these amazing things. But in the back of the newspaper, the society pages and the gossip columns,
she found a whole different thing. It was really juicy and fascinating, and I couldn't look away. So I just, I've been working and working and working at it. With her amateur historian hat on, Nicole took a deep dive looking for stories in papers like The Washington Afro-American. Then she tried out her idea in a podcast she was already making, The Secret Adventures of Black People. In fact, she made four episodes centered around stories she was finding in these old newspapers.
Listeners liked them, and that was encouraging, evidence that maybe this idea should be its own podcast. So she played around making more episodes, hoping to discover the exact right format and the best way to tell these stories. She says she didn't quite nail it, but she wrote up a pitch anyway, and using the episodes from The Secret Adventures of Black People as a sample, she shopped the idea around to podcast companies. They all said, eh, cool idea, but no.
Well, Nicole said, rejection schmaction. Actually, I don't know what she said, but she did keep pushing ahead. She even managed to produce a piece based on an old newspaper story for NPR's Code Switch. Then she used that to pitch more podcast companies. You know, everyone was like, this is special. This is wonderful. You are definitely on to something, but it's too much of a risk.
Too much of a risk because podcasting was imploding. The money had dried up, especially for narrative podcasts. What she envisioned was too ambitious and too costly. According to Nicole, the companies recommended she cut back on the scoring and sound design and just interview some guests.
42 of them, actually. You know, like, just basically, how can you make this a weekly show? Nicole was like, nope. Because this is my dream and I'm only doing it for love, I was like, well, I don't want it made so bad that I would compromise it to that degree. Something else maybe, but not this.
After four years of fiddling around, trying this and trying that and shaping her idea into a pilot, she finally felt like she nailed the format for the show, and so she produced a full-fledged pilot episode. Risking more rejection, she submitted it to the Tribeca Festival, hoping they'll debut the show there. If they take it, that would help Nicole spread the word about the show. She'd also get feedback from the audience, and that feedback will help her to figure out what to do next with the show, if anything.
Here's the opening to the pilot. The Secret Adventures of Black People and Coco Hill Productions present Our Ancestors Were Messy.
Percy Julian danced, drank wine, and dot, dot, dot with professor's daughter. Today, a scandal is percolating in Howard University's chemistry lab between a couple whose brilliance made history. Go down in black history. And whose messiness made headlines. Drama. This episode stars Nige Turner. Nah, that was wild.
He said, give my tenderest regards to your wife. And your host, Nicole Hill. What are you thinking at this point? That's kind of wild. This is Our Ancestors Were Messy, a podcast about our ancestors and all their drama. Ooh, like, this is juicy. Juicy, juicy, juicy, juicy, juicy.
The plan for each episode of Our Ancestors Were Messy is this. Report a story from the society pages of historic black newspapers, write it up, and then tell it to someone. In this case, as they said in the intro, Nige Turner, who you may recognize from Adultish, the podcast from Radiotopia. How much does Nige know in advance? Nothing. So he's coming at this cold. Totally cold. I don't tell him a thing. Does he know what the premise of the show is and what his role is?
I think I told him, like, I'm going to tell you a story and I want you to react. So I'm going to be telling you a story. And it's a true story. So we're going to start in Washington, D.C. We're in 1932. National, international headlines. World War I ended. Then everybody went into the roaring 20s. They partied, they drank, they had so much fun. But then the Great Depression. One in every four workers is unemployed. Everyone's so sad.
It's going to be facing off in the November elections against Herbert Hoover. He says he's got a new deal. He says it will fix all the problems. We don't know yet. We're hopeful. When it comes to pop culture and entertainment headlines, the biggest criminal, Al Capone, the biggest true crime, the kidnapping of the Lindbergh baby, most popular book,
brave new world and the biggest black stars, Josephine Baker, Duke Ellington, Louis Armstrong. Everybody's talking about them. But the day we're going to specifically is July 30th, 1932. Okay, so you get home, you open your copy of the Washington Afro-American, one of the most popular black newspapers of the day, and you read the following. Can you please read that first page? Oh my gosh, I feel like I'm in school. It's popcorn reading. Okay.
Julian tells of hot date with German sweetie. Danced, drank wine, and dot dot dot with professor's daughter. Percy Julian, head of the Department of Chemistry at Howard University. What was that? Oh, supped. Supped? What is supped? Like suppered?
Oh, okay. "Supped and dined with pretty Viennese girls in his apartment in Austria, according to this week's letter to Robert Thompson, his assistant, who is now suing him."
Man, this is wild. Like back in the day, like stuff was just so sneaky. Like, you know, now this would be like a picture, like a video or something like that. But this is like word of mouth. It is. And it's in the paper. And today we're covering the love story of one of America's first black power couples, Percy and Anna Julian. Hmm.
I think it will help if I play another two-minute clip from the show before I ask Nicole about some of her production choices. It will help set the table a bit more on the life of Percy Julian, one of the main characters in the story.
So Percy Julian was born in Montgomery, Alabama in April of 1899. He is one of six kids and his family is just scraping by. He's got two parents, Elizabeth and James. They used to be teachers. So they started a library at their home and they want their kids reading all the time. They believe that education will be their kid's ticket to a good life. Percy's grandparents, so that's Elizabeth and James's parents, were enslaved.
Then you have Elizabeth and James, they're first generation free. Percy, second generation free. You and I are fifth. Fifth generation. It's really weird. I was like, it's not that long ago. My grandparents are third generation free. That's crazy. Yeah. And I knew my great grandparents on both sides of my family and their second generation. Wild.
So it's still kind of a new thing. Everybody's trying to figure out, like, what will freedom for Black people look like? And I think a lot of Black people at this time are thinking if they act like white people, they will be left alone, which I was going to say works. I don't know if it works. Who knows? I don't think it works. I don't think we'll ever be left alone. Yeah. No.
But I mean, understandable for the time. Exactly. Exactly. So Percy's reading all the time. He's very drawn to chemistry. At one point as a little boy, he climbs a fence so that he can watch the little white kids do chemistry stuff in their labs at their white school. But unfortunately, someone spots him and they call the cops and the cops scare him away. He is in Montgomery, Alabama, after all. So it's obviously very racist.
I want to talk about Nige Turner. Why is he there? Why do you need him to tell this story? Yes, that's a great question because that was a big point of contention in pitching. What I decided is that I wanted to bring people into the papers and I wanted them to feel like they were there. And I wanted them to not just sit back, because I think you typically just listen to black history and revere it,
but there's a little less interacting with it. And so I decided I needed a guest to interact with the history. So I needed to both tell them the story, but then I needed them to react to it so that the audience knows you're allowed to react to this.
I want to parse out a word with you. You call him a guest. Guest. And when I think of a guest, you know, I think of someone who's brought in for a conversation, for an interview, who has some level of expertise. So you're going to ask them questions. But he's more of a, he's not a co-host. He's not telling the story with you. Like, I just can't figure out how to place him. He is...
I mean, I just think of him as an audience stand-in. In my dream world, I would be telling the story to my audience directly. Mark Pagan, who is a fantastic producer and a good friend of mine, told me when I was starting my first podcast, The Secret Adventures of Black People, that when you're creating something like a show like this, you should have an image in your mind that you can keep coming back to as like, this is what the show is about.
And so for me, the image of Our Ancestors Were Messy that I always come back to is two people on a couch in their grandparents' basement with a photo album, flipping through and looking for some kind of resemblance, being like, oh my gosh, you look exactly like Uncle So-and-So. And oh my gosh, I can't believe that's mom doing that. That is, I just have that image so clear. So he is a guest in a sense, but really it's like,
We're supposed to be two cousins, like finding this, finding out this history together. What were your biggest fears when you were like elementary school aged? I don't know. The dark. Probably the dark. My closet. My brother. Those are good ones. Those are the big ones. Yeah.
Okay, so Percy's are rattlesnakes and white people. So... Wait, what? No, I just... Yeah. Those are good ones. Nicole enlisted the help of a few people to make this pilot. Naj, of course. There's also the voice of Chioke Ionson from NPR. There's Martina Abraham-Zalunga, Kiyomiya Keinatis, and Aselika Smith. They helped with the story editing. And John Delors scored and sound designed the pilot.
Throughout, John mixes in the sound of newspapers rustling and champagne corks popping, people walking, the sound of doors, and of course, music. Do you have a favorite moment of sound design in the pilot? There is a moment where the central character, Percy Julian, has achieved his big goal of
And we bring in hip hop. The story is based in the 30s, but we bring in hip hop. And that was so exactly what I wanted because it's I want to score the scenes. I want people to feel that they're in the scenes. But then the characters are meant to have modern personalities. And I'm highlighting the things that they do that we will recognize. And having music that underlines that is incredible.
exactly it just it signals exactly what i want it to signal like you you know this you recognize this behavior this is not ancient i know they're your ancestors but this is you you know bravado and attitude and stuff like that so that's my favorite so percy works really hard he synthesizes all the plant alkaloids you know about this synthesis yes exactly taking photos photos photos taking photos and synthesizing them
wow, how lucky am I to have a chemist on this episode? We do what we can, you know? So then he does it. He successfully makes a pain medicine from plants.
or leaves or whatever. I'm not the chemist here. And then finally, after having to go to Missouri, Memphis, Boston, there was like a short stint in West Virginia I didn't even tell you about because he hated it so much. Then D.C. and then finally Vienna in 1931. He has finally earned his Ph.D. in chemistry. He's done it. We're so happy for him. Second one.
I don't even know if he was the second one. Somebody might have beat him. I don't know. Man, that would be whack. But let's believe that he was. He was. You did it, Percy. Second in our hearts. Yes. So now he is Dr. Percy Julian. He returns to Howard University. He says, thank you, Dr. Jacob Shoham, for your service. You may leave. Then he tells his assistant, Robert Thompson, and the rest of his staff...
He will be turning the school into a nationally recognized center for research. Him and all his genius friends start writing all these research papers. And Percy becomes America's preeminent black chemist and a superstar at Howard University and the toast of D.C. But he hasn't heard the last from Dr. Jacob Shohan. Hmm.
This is the point in the episode where the gossip begins. It's complicated. To simplify, I'm going to cut out a lot, hopefully not too much. Here's what you need to know for the purpose of my discussion with Nicole. Percy fires one of his colleagues at Howard, his lab assistant, Robert Thompson.
And the way Nicole tells the story, we're not sure why this happens. In fact, it's a bit surprising. Wait, what? So Percy, my bad. No, no, no. Yeah, go ahead. Go ahead. Percy is Robert's boss and Robert is married to Anna. So, and then there's Anna. Anna is brilliant. As in she skipped from third to eighth grade brilliant. As an adult at the time of this incident, she was in a graduate program and would likely be the first black woman with a PhD in sociology.
And to reiterate, she's married to Robert, who was just fired by Percy. What are you thinking at this point? That's kind of wild. It is kind of wild because of what happened next. Robert Thompson fought back in court.
Then on May 14th, so just a few weeks after the first headline, the following story appears in the papers. Robert B. Thompson filed suit against Dr. Percy Julian, Howard Chemistry Head, in District Supreme Court Monday. He set forth that he discovered his wife and Dr. Julian together in the apartment of the latter.
On October 25th, 1931, he swore that after having observed his wife's car in front of the address, he later heard her voice in Dr. Julian's apartment. Thompson went home, packed his things and left, he stated. On the following morning, Thompson took the case to Dr. Mordecai Johnson, president of Howard University, but was told to go to the university physician and get some pills to make him sleep.
You're hosting. You sound very conversational, but you're also just very sure-handed. Do you have a script? I have a script. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Is it word for word? Word for word. Before I got into podcasting, I was, I love storytelling. I love live storytelling. And so I got trained that way and then was helping other people to tell stories that way. And I've learned a lot of different styles for how you get on stage and perform a story in a way that feels natural. And for me, the style that works best is I want to write down every single word,
be able to visualize it, then it's the most frustrating creative process. But then I don't use the script at all. It's just like a guide and I don't read anything. Well, I read some things, but for the most part, it's just a guide. But as long as I have every single word written out, I can improvise and like freestyle. I could just have an outline, but I think if I did, I just need to know that if I get overwhelmed, there's something I could read and then retract later to sound more natural.
Robert Thompson not only fought back against Percy in court, he fought back in the black newspapers.
It just so happens that years earlier, Percy was studying for his Ph.D. in Vienna. And while he was there, he wrote letters to Robert, his research assistant. Well, Robert held on to those letters and he sent them to the Washington Afro-American. And for the rest of the summer of 1932, the papers released Percy's letters one by one. And everyone is super scandalized.
In the letters, Percy was very frank. He dissed other chemists. He wrote about his love affairs. And then there was this letter. At the end of one of his letters to Robert Thompson, this is what he writes. This really hurts him. Ah, nah, that was wild. Percy was, yo, he was tweaking. He said, give my tenderest regards to your wife, Anna.
I shall drop her a letter soon. Wow. How are you feeling? Percy is cold. That's a cold dude. I like he don't even rock with it though. Like it's not even like, it's not even cool. Like he's not even doing it in a cool way. What do you mean? I don't know. Percy was just like, just wilding. He was just out, out in the open. Like, yo, tell your wife I said what's up. Like, what was he on? Like,
We don't know. We'll never know. I said he was looking for a relaxing plant. He was looking for it. Maybe this wouldn't have happened if he had found a different kind of plant. Right. He should have chilled out. It's alleged that when he opened the papers and he saw his private correspondence in print for everyone to see, he cried. Do you feel like there's any problem with giving weight to the salacious nature
like the gossipy side of stories, given what you're looking to achieve with the podcast? Right. That is still an area where I'm wondering how gossipy and salacious they are. So there is a limit for me. A lot of people have sent me stories about people who have killed people or...
a lot of like madams and drug kingpins and things like that, but they're unexpected. You know, they're like oftentimes women. And it's hard because when you say gossip and you say the ancestors, you think it's going to be like the biggest gossip. But I'm actually looking for the most relatable, small g, you and I would do it because the thing underneath gossip
all of this, this entire show for me is the understanding that all of us are ancestors in training and that someday, you know, hundreds of years from now, people will say, they'll look to us and they'll be like, well, if they could do it, then I can and I'll get strength from them. But we're just people. And so what I'm trying to convey is that we're just people. And the easiest way to do that is to say this person messed up, this person failed, this person made a mistake. And I
The stories, the inciting incident, kind of the climactic moment is them confronting this mistake that they've made. But actually the inciting incidents are usually a goal that they're trying to achieve and the gossip gets in the way.
But I have been very reticent to put too much of the salacious in the story. I know that's very entertaining, but I think it allows people to take a step back and feel more removed than I want them to feel. I definitely want people to feel like, oh, I would do something like that. That's very important to me.
In terms of minutes, in the pilot, you don't give much weight to the affair between the two main characters. Right. But it's the center of how the episode opens. And it's the premise of the whole series, that we're going to look for these stories in the gossip pages. And so in that way, it's given more weight. It's the way to draw people in, I think, right?
This is a little bit of an experiment here, but when I say our ancestors were messy in front of a room of people, there's like this little titter and people laugh and they kind of lean in. And then when I say, you know, this is a person who had this dream of becoming, you know, earning their PhD and becoming this famous chemist, but then something got in the way. And the thing has to lead to the eventual success. That is sort of my...
in my effort to stay honest and true to what I'm doing and for my audience to not feel tricked. I don't ever want people to feel like it was a bait and switch. So once we hit that climax and they've had this incident happen, it will lead to whatever thing that they're known for. So that climax and the gossip always contribute to what happens in the end.
So Percy, he's totally disgraced. He has to resign from his position at Howard. No other Negro college will have him. Everybody's whispering about him. While Percy is reeling from the humiliation, Robert divorced Anna, which is scandalous in the 1930s. And so both Percy and Anna are outcasts, and they stay together as a couple. In time, Percy builds his career back, and Anna goes on to earn her Ph.D. They get married and move to Chicago.
Nicole says it's at this moment their story usually starts, the moment when they enter into Black history. They get to Chicago, a bunch of really racist things happen to them. But also, Percy gets a job working for Glidden, the paint company, and he patents all of these little inventions. And they let him run a lab, which is his first lab since Howard. And Anna gets really involved in the civil rights struggle in Chicago.
They decide they want to start a family, but it's not easy. Anna suffers a couple miscarriages, which inspires Percy to study the hormone progesterone and learn more about its role in facilitating healthy pregnancies. They eventually have their daughter, Faith, and their son, Percy Jr., and they take in their nephew, Leon. Percy starts his own lab called Julian Laboratories, and Anna becomes the company's VP, treasurer, and bookkeeper. And then Percy figures out this way...
Oh, wow. They've done it. Can you believe it? Dr. and Dr. Julians. Mm-hmm. That's dope. So they become the toast of the town of Chicago.
They're major donors to civil rights related causes for the rest of their lives. Everyone remembers them for being prestigious, an honorable, and an exemplary family. Percy passes away in 1975 at the age of 70 with 18 honorary degrees. And Anna passes away in 1994 at the age of 90, having won dozens and dozens of service awards and honors. There's no mention of whatever happened to Robert Thompson, but I hope we
hope we wish him well. Man, I'm sorry, Rob. Sorry, Rob. Obviously, there's a whole lot more that happened, but for now, that is the story of one of America's first Black power couples, Percy and Anna Julian. So, Nicole submitted this pilot to the Tribeca Festival in 2024. They listened, and they gave a thumbs up.
Our Ancestors Were Messy debuted at Tribeca last summer. So I was pretty nervous, a lot of fear. I'm so afraid I'm not being reverential enough. But after it played, Nicole says she was energized by all the positive feedback. I had been on the fence of if I would make it on my own and if I would put my own money into it. And after Tribeca, I decided, yeah, I'm going to.
You know, something I like that's been a thread throughout this entire conversation is hearing you talk about how you're pushing yourself. When I realized I was going to make the show myself and I was going to be my funder, I was like, if I'm going to do that, I only have enough money to do this one time. So there'll only ever be one season unless I find some funding. And I want it to be something that I really enjoy doing.
that I'm really proud of. A lot of times, you know, I can be a little bit hard on myself as a creative. And I've had to grow a lot to write the series, to make the series. I couldn't have made it four years ago when I started. I've had to become a better writer, a better storyteller, a better listener, a better researcher. And I'm enjoying that. Like, I just, I look at what this, making the show has done for me and to me, and I think it's really beautiful. Great.
And now I need to ask you about some gossip. Uh-oh. What do you mean? What gossip? I don't know what you're talking about, Rob. What? I don't have any gossip.
The first episode of the new series of Our Ancestors Were Messy drops on February 5th, right around the corner. My thanks to Nicole Hill for putting up with all of my questions, including the incessant ones I kept asking in follow-up emails. Thank you, Nicole.
Nicole told me that she was influenced by several other podcasts, including This American Life, My Favorite Murder, and Too Scary Didn't Watch, podcasts that don't really fit together in terms of tone and format. So at the post for this episode at Transom, Nicole shares how those shows shaped the production of Our Ancestors Were Messy. Genevieve Sponsler and Jay Allison keep me honest. Jennifer Jarrett works all the magic at transom.org.
WCAI, where I track my narration, is still located in Woods Hole, the radio center of the universe. This is Sound School, the backstory to great audio storytelling from PRX and Transom. I'm Rob Rosenthal. Thank you very much for listening.