In September of 1907, the “tiny waist craze” swept up the women of London. They achieved the look by squeezing themselves into tightly laced corsets -- and deforming their bodies in the process. Women’s undergarments have evolved over the last century, but remain confining. Comedian Aparna Nancherla joins us as we trace this evolution and its surprising ties to American politics. This episode origi...

This week, we're dropping the premiere episode of the new time-traveling history trivia podcast, Past Perfect — brought to you by Simone Polanen and the team who brought you Not Past It. In this first episode, podcast superstars Emmanuel Dzotsi and Saidu Tejan-Thomas duke it out for trivia supremacy.

On September 13, 1963, Mary Kay Ash launched what would become a beauty empire. She wasn’t just selling makeup. She was selling a dream: Women could have a flexible career and still make time for a family. Mary Kay recruited hundreds of thousands of women from around the world to become sales reps. And her company grew into a multi-billion dollar, global phenomenon. Did Mary Kay give women the rein...