BellingHistory with the Good Time Girls - The Podcast

In this episode we visit the White City resort built at Silver Beach, Lake Whatcom in Bellingham in the early 1900s, as part one of a two-part series exploring historical “bathing beaches” of Bellingham, Washington.  Show notes and more goodies at: https://bellinghistory.com/the-podcast

Since June is Pride month and it has an extra week, we made an extra special episode. Well it’s extra long that’s for sure!  We tried to cram in as much BellingQueerstory as we could into one hour plus a few. This is a big gay overview of queer Bellingham history as we know it. A companion to our new Queer History Tours.  Cheers and Happy Pride! 

Show Notes and More: https://bellinghistory.com/podcast

In Part 2 of “Sanitarium Insanity” our two-part series on sanitariums in Bellingham, Washington, we discuss the “Yoghurt Sanitarium” in Fairhaven, Bellingham's historic south side neighborhood.  More wacky electrical devices, dubious doctors and YOGURT, or as they spelled it, “yoghurt.”  Buckle up your bacilli, it’s a wild ride! Show notes and more at: https://bellinghistory.com/the-podcast

In part one of our two-part series on sanitariums in Bellingham, we introduce the local branch of the Kellogg’s Battle Creek Sanitarium, later known straightforwardly as the “Sanitarium Baths.” We get into the whys and wherefore of sanitariums and discuss many of the interesting treatments they offered. We trace the Sanitarium baths over forty years of business offering various treatments, including sweatin’ out the toxins in lightbulb-filled cabinets.

Show notes and bonus ephemera at: https://goodtimegirls.squarespace.com/blog/2023/5/30/the-podcast-sanitarium-insanity-part-1

This episode is about spring festivals in Bellingham, Washington. 2023 is the 50th anniversary of the annual Ski to Sea Race, which officially started in 1973 as part of Bellingham’s Blossomtime Festival. That festival traces its roots to Bellingham’s first spring fling - The Tulip Festival - born out of bulb cultivation in Whatcom County. Today we associate Tulips with our neighbors in Skagit, but Bellingham was the original “Tulip Town" of the PNW. Find out why the Tulip Festival died out, was resurrected as Blossomtime and then rebranded Ski to Sea. It’s a surprisingly wild ride.

It's another episode about exotic birds - this time it's pet parrots. Our chatty feathered friends appear frequently in Belling-History, and we thought we'd string a few stories together for your entertainment. You’ll meet a number of Pollys plus Mildred, and hear the stories of beer-guzzling bar birds and contenders for Whatcom County’s oldest psittacine. Squawk!

In this episode we tell the story of Hill’s Ostrich Farm, operated by William E. Hill in 1911 in Bellingham, Washington.  We delve into the history of ostrich farming and how there came to be such a feather-brained idea in the first place, the millinery ostrich plume craze, the fate of the farm and some more recent news from the world of ratite farming.  Ostrich burger anyone?  

This episode is a quick-and-dirty overview of the "Bellinghistory" background that might be useful to know while listening to the podcast. Our stories are largely based here in this Bellingham, Washington in the "fourth corner" of the U.S., aka the PNW.  If you don’t need a quick refresher on US/Washington/PNW and the basics of how the town of B-ham came to be here, feel free to skip this one!  If you just can't get enough we’ve got lots of resources and links for further exploring these topics in our show notes at bellinghistory.com/the-podcast!

This mini-sode, like all of our other episodes, is about history… only this is our history! The origin story of The Good Time Girls and this podcast. Where did we come from, what we do and who we are as business owners and guides. In this episode we give you the lowdown on what we are all about and why we decided to make this podcast.  If you are already familiar with the Good Time Girls, we won’t be offended if you skip this one - but if you are new to the Good Time Girls and want some more background on us, or just can’t get enough of listening to us babble, this is for you!