Ye Olde Crime

Ye Olde Crime is history told by two sisters, Lindsay Valenti and Maddie Savage, who take crimes from long ago and talk them through, mixing research with running commentary. The range is wide. Titles include 'Mattie Blaylock: The Forgotten Wife of the Wild West', 'Johnny Ringo: Ruthless Outlaw or Misunderstood Drunk?', 'Peter Niers: The Monster of the Holy Roman Empire' and 'The Shot Heard ’Round the Pigpen: The Pig War of 1859'. Together they reach frontier Arizona, the sixteenth century and a quarrel over livestock. The details are what make it work. Mattie Blaylock's story comes with dates: a move to Tombstone on December 1st, 1879, the Earp surname taken as Wyatt's common-law wife, and an addiction to laudanum, a common painkiller of the time. The research also says what the record lacks, pointing out that no arrest records show her doing sex work in Tombstone. When sources split, the other version is laid out, not buried, as with reports that her relationship with Wyatt began in Dodge City in 1876. The Peter Niers material is darker. It reaches the end of a murder spree near Nuremberg in 1581. It covers an arrest at a bathhouse, townsfolk pushing an innkeeper to open the leather pouch left in his care, and a belief that the arrest came easily only because he was caught without his magical objects. Then there is the pig. After a man named Lyman shoots a boar, Charles puts its value at a hundred dollars, Lyman swears it was worth no more than ten, and both sums are converted into today's money. That leads to a detour on Berkshire boars, their size, and meat prized enough to be called the wagyu of pork. The tangents are part of the appeal. A report that Johnny Ringo quoted Shakespeare, despite the idea that he had only an elementary school education, has the sisters picturing traveling plays, fairs and tavern entertainment on the frontier. Reactions come quick and plain: 'Gross.' 'I hate that.' 'Allegedly.' Not every episode is a sister act, and in the interview episodes Lindsay hosts on her own. Gigi Berardi, introduced as a Fulbright scholar and a professor at Western Washington University, talks about Renaissance Florence in an episode built around the book Bianca's Cure. She covers Cosimo the arts patron, his bookish son Francesco, and Ferdinando, made a cardinal at 13, who became Francesco's nemesis. D. Paul Fleming, introduced as someone who has investigated and cleansed haunted properties, joins to discuss his own book. Away from the podcast feed, a YouTube playlist collects segments where guest podcasters try to guess the meanings of obscure Victorian slang. Supporters are thanked by name, and episodes sign off by promising another tale as old as crime. The archive is large, which suits anyone who takes to the pairing and wants plenty more of it.