Blackbeard and Jack Sparrow can’t hold a candle to Cheng I Sao. Ferocious and ambitious, the most successful pirate in the South China Sea innovated the piracy business model, and inspired fear around the world even as she established strict rules about the treatment of women on her ships. The Chinese government enlisted foreign powers to take Cheng I Sao, a former prostitute, down,, but she had other plans.

Afterwards, we'll be talking to Tracy Edwards, a sailor who fought her way into the man's world of racing to skipper the first all-female crew to race around the world.

Main Sources:

1. Pirate Women: The Princesses, Prostitutes, and Privateers who Ruled the Seven Seas by Laura Sook Duncombe
2. And the article, ‘One Woman's Rise to Power: Cheng I's Wife and the Pirates’ by Dian Murray, published by Berghahn Books in the academic journal ‘Historical Reflections’ in 1981

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Meet Clementine Paddleford, the forgotten food journalist who elevated food writing from dull and mundane to a delicious art form. The way we write about food today is largely due to Clementine, the roving reporter who taught herself to fly a plane so she could report on every aspect of food across the country and around the world.

Afterwards, hear Jo’s conversation with Yasmin Khan, the best-selling food writer whose books on middle eastern cooking, The Saffron Tales and Zaitoun, expertly carry on Clementine’s legacy.  

Main Sources:

1. Hometown Appetites: The Story of Clementine Paddleford, the Forgotten Food Writer who Chronicled How America Ate, by Kelly Alexander and Cynthia Harris
2. How to Cook for a Whole Crew by Clementine Paddleford, from the NY Herald Tribune, July 1960
3. Vast Drive And Courage Spark Career of Famed Food Editor – By Susan Delight, for the San Diego Union, February 1959
4. A Life in the Culinary Front Lines, by R.W. Apple for the NY Times, Nov, 2005
5. The Great American Cookbook: 500 Time-Tested Recipes: Favorite Food from Every State, by Clementine Paddleford - a reprint of the original ‘How America Eats’ edited by Kelly Alexander
6. A panel sponsored by the Food Studies Program at the New School in New York City titled ‘Clementine Paddleford: America's First Food Journalist’ which took place in June of 2010 (some panelists and guests knew Clementine Paddleford personally and shared anecdotes about her life.)
7. Clementine Paddleford’s obituary in the NY Times from November of 1967 titled ‘Clementine Paddleford is Dead; Food Editor of Herald Tribune

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Introducing Fierce, a new podcast from iHeartRadio and Tribeca Studios about the extraordinary women who never made it into our history books and the modern women carrying on their legacies today. 

Listen to these cinematic stories paired with invaluable conversations that will ensure these women’s names are on the tips of our tongues as we look towards the future—from the first woman who used poetry to escape slavery, to the greatest pirate in all of history, to the reporter who turned food writing into an artform, and so many more. 

Tune in May 6 for this storytelling adventure. 

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