Madam Fan Jones of Bangor, Maine
Madam Fan Jones successfully ran Bangor, Maine’s most popular and longest running brothel called the Sky Blue House of Pleasure.
Who was Jezebel?
Who was Jezebel? How did her legacy become synonymous with loose, misfit, morally depraved, wicked women?
The Everleigh Sisters’ Best Brothel in Chicago
The Everleigh Sisters successfully ran the best brothel Chicago had ever seen from 1900 to 1911. Why did the mayor force them to shut down?
Stella Darby: Beloved Madam of Pendelton, Oregon
Stella Darby, beloved madam of Pendelton, Oregon, had a heart of gold. She is now remembered with a bronze statue and Underground Pendleton Tours.
The Age-Old Stigma of Mary Magdalene
The stigma of Mary Magdalene has endured throughout biblical times into the current era. How did she become aligned with sex workers?
Brothel Owner Mrs. Lake’s Secrets Revealed in Boston’s “Big Dig”
Thanks to Boston’s “Big Dig,” artifacts from a 19th century brothel were unearthed, shedding light on the life of brothel owner Mrs. Lake.
Ella “Cattle Kate” Watson: Trailblazer of the Wild West
Ella “Cattle Kate” Watson was a Western trailblazer. An independent and industrious woman, she sought to challenge gender norms to live life her own way.
Lycoris the Mime was the Most Influential Courtesan in Ancient Rome
Evidence of the oldest profession can be traced back to ancient Greece and Rome. Lycoris the Mime is among the oldest and most influential pros in history.
The Legend of Punk Rockstar & Hustler Dee Dee Ramone
Hustler Dee Dee Ramone, bassist and founding member of the Ramones, pioneered punk rock and side hustled as a sex worker to pay for his heroin addiction.
Belle Brezing Was Lexington, Kentucky’s Most Successful Madam
With razor sharp wit and dogged determination, Belle Brezing claimed her space as Lexington, Kentucky’s most successful Madam.
Maya Angelou: Sex Worker History is Part of Her Esteemed Legacy
The Oldest Profession Podcast: Maya Angelou – sex worker past matters, and to ignore her experience does a disservice to her legacy.
Nevada Brothels and the Truth About Legalized Prostitution
The Oldest Profession Podcast: Nevada brothels house the only legal prostitution in the US; then why the highest arrest rate per capita? Nevada brothels model doesn’t work.
Sex Work Coming Out Stories
Sharing sex work coming out stories; some are funny, some are sad, and they all remind us this holiday season that we are never alone.
thotscholar & The Scarlot Harlot: Perspectives on Language
thotscholar & The Scarlot Harlot: Perspectives on Language iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify What is gained or lost by the language we use to define ourselves and our community? Where does this language come from and who gets to use it? In this thought-provoking...
International Whores’ Day: In Conversation with Ceyenne Doroshow
This episode of The Oldest Profession Podcast about International Whores’ Day (June 2) is hosted by Kaytlin Bailey and Ceyenne Doroshow.
A Special Tribute to Margo St. James
A Special Tribute to Margo St. James iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify Margo St. James, who founded the prostitutes’ rights organization COYOTE (Call Off Your Old Tired Ethics) and later the St. James Infirmary, passed away on January 11, 2021. As a tribute to Margo, we...
Tina Horn on SfSx & We Too
Tina Horn on SfSx & We Too iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify Tina Horn is a writer, teacher, and media-maker. She hosts and produces the long-running kink podcast Why Are People Into That?!. Her reporting on sexual subcultures and politics has appeared in Rolling...
Jack the Ripper’s Victims
Jack the Ripper’s Victims iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify Late in the summer of 1888, a serial killer murdered at least five women in London’s East End. The press at the time was quick to paint his victims as prostitutes, punished for their promiscuity. This...
Annie Sprinkle & Beth Stephens: Remembering Margo St. James
Annie Sprinkle & Beth Stephens: Remembering Margo St. James iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify Margo St. James, who sparked the sex worker rights movement in the 1970’s, passed on January 11, 2021. James was a visionary who brought global advocates together to...
#OldProProject & Why January 25th Matters
#OldProProject & Why January 25th Matters iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify On January 25th, 1917, 300 sex workers in San Francisco marched to protest the imminent closure of their brothels. #OldProProject is an annual event that builds towards this anniversary, and...
A Special Collaboration With Peepshow Media: Coming Out As A Sex Worker
COMING OUT AS A SEX WORKER IN COLLABORATION WITH PEEPSHOW MEDIA iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify A collection of coming out stories from sex workers, in celebration of the International Day to End Violence Against Sex Workers on December 17th, and in solidarity with all...
Lilith
Lilith iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify Lilith: The First Woman and First Feminist The story of Eve tempting Adam in the Garden of Eden is a patriarchal fairy tale that most of us learn at an early age. But Eve wasn’t the first wife or the first woman. Her predecessor,...
Marsha P. Johnson and Sylvia Rivera
Marsha P. Johnson & Sylvia Rivera iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify The category is… revolutionary love. Revolutionary women, civil rights pioneers, drag queens, freedom fighters. Marsha P. Johnson and Sylvia Rivera were the vanguard of the modern LGBTQ Rights...
Melania Trump
Melania Trump iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify Melania Trump (1970 – ) is the 45th First Lady of the United States, model, and old pro. Born to tax evaders in Slovenia, Melania is the second First Lady born outside of the United States (the first, born in England,...
Victoria Woodhull
Victoria Woodhull iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify Soothsayer, suffragette, stockbroker, sex worker, candidate for President of the United States, and even “Mrs. Satan,” Victoria Clafin Woodhull has been called many names and lived a vibrant, controversial life....
Lou Graham
Lou Graham iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify At a time where full service sex workers in Seattle euphemistically called themselves seamstresses, Madam Lou Graham was so rich that she served as an alternative to banks, giving loans to business propositions deemed too risky...
Cardi B
Cardi B iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify The most famous sex worker of today’s music industry, Cardi B unabashedly flaunts and celebrates her past as a stripper in her songs, music videos, and social...
Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec
Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify Best known for is commercial paintings of the moulin rouge, French artist Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec was also a john who (literally) lived in brothels. As a tenant and client, Toulouse-Lautrec created compelling...
Ching Shih
Ching Shih iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify Ching Shih went from working as a full service sex worker on a floating brothel in Canton to becoming the one of the most successful pirate captains in the history of the...
Marilyn Monroe
Marilyn Monroe iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify In 1949, Marilyn Monroe, struggling to make ends meet as an actress, got paid $50 to pose nude for a calendar. She worked as a pinup and — according to some — as a prostitute before becoming an internationally recognized sex...
Anais Nin
Anais Nin iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify Anaïs Nin was one of the first prominent modern western women known to explore and take part in erotic...
Tlazōlteōtl
Tlazōlteōtl iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify This Mesoamerican Goddess was the deity of vice, filth, purification, steam baths, lust, fertility, adulterers and — you guessed it — sex workers. Tlazōlteōtl symbolically castrated priests in elaborate rituals, and pardoned her...
Aileen Wuornos
Aileen Wuornos iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify Infamous misandrist and queer icon Aileen Wuornos killed seven men while working as a hitch hiking sex worker in Florida. To say that her life was defined by hardship would be an understatement. She started exchanging sex for...
Holiday Special: Sex Worker Coming Out Stories
Holiday Special: Coming Out Stories iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify A very special episode of compiled heartbreaking and heartwarming coming out stories from Coyote Fawn, Allie Oops, and many...
International Day To End Violence Against Sex Workers
International Day To End Violence Against Sex Workers Guest Hosted by Ceyenne Doroshow iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify In this special episode to commemorate the International Day to End Violence Against Sex Workers on December 17th, Ceyenne Doroshow interviews long time...
Stormy Daniels
Stormy Daniels iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify Stormy Daniels is a self made woman and sex worker who had the audacity to tell her own story. The uneventful sex she had with Donald Trump might be the least interesting part of this incredible woman’s...
Big Nosed Kate
Big Nosed Kate iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify Mary Katherine Horony-Cummings, also known as “Big Nosed Kate,” worked as a full service sex worker and eventually became the wife and companion of Old West gunfighter Doc...
Sylvester Stallone
Sylvester Stallone iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify Unbeknownst to most, six years before writing and starring in Rocky, Sylvester Stallone was the lead in a soft core porn film. In this episode, Kaytlin takes a deep dive into Stallone’s past and analyzes the...
Bettie Page
Bettie Page iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify Part two of our “Reformed Whores” series. Bettie Page, one of the most iconic pin-ups and bondage models of the twentieth century, had an on-and-off again relationship with Evangelical Christianity. While her...
Linda Lovelace and Andrea Dworkin
Linda Lovelace & Andrea Dworkin iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify Part one of our “Reformed Whores” series. This episode focuses on two powerhouses of the “Porn Wars.” Linda Lovelace starred in Deep Throat, the 1972 blockbuster success that...
Congressional Election Blues
Congressional Election Blues iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify In this special episode, Kaytlin talks about losing the NY12 Democratic Primary and next steps in the fight for sex worker...
Julie D’Aubigny
Julie D’Aubigny iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify Julie D’Aubigny fought, fucked and sang her way through 17th century France. Her list of accomplishments: she seduced aristocratic men and women, did some grave robbing, and burned a nunnery. A bisexual...
Gypsy Rose Lee
Gypsy Rose Lee with guest host Jacq The Stripper iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify Special guest Jacq the Stripper joins Kaytlin Bailey to talk about American icon and patron saint of strippers, Gypsy Rose Lee. Gypsy was born into a multi generational family of scrappy...
Valerie Solanas
Valerie Solonas iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify Best known for attempting to shoot Andy Warhol, Valerie Solanas’ SCUM manifesto became a rallying cry for a generation of feminist thinkers. Valerie was a vagrant working as a panhandler, full service sex worker and...
Maggie Meller
Maggie Meller iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify French courtesan Marguerite Marie Alibert, otherwise known as Maggie Meller, was the lover of Edward the VII. After her affair with the British prince, she married a rich, snotty and young Egyptian aristocrat, whom she killed...
Dorian Corey
Dorian Corey iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify Hosts Kaytlin Bailey and Wendi Starling are joined by the incomparably fabulous Ceyenne Doroshow to unwrap the tumultuously tantalizing life of Dorian Corey. As documented in the film Paris Is Burning, Dorian Corey was one of...
Elizabeth Moryng
Elizabeth Moryng iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify A 13th Century madame who tricked the system, Elizabeth Moryng serviced the religious clergy under the guise of operating an embroidery business. Elizabeth Moryng was a hustler who knew how to weave up a good cover...
Sharmus Outlaw
Sharmus Outlaw With guest host Melissa Sontag Broudo iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify Hosts Kaytlin Bailey and Wendi Starling are joined by Melissa Sontag Broudo, founder of The Sharmus Outlaw Advocacy and Rights Institute (SOAR Institute). They talk a little shop and...
Timarchus
Timarchus iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify Timarchus was a sex worker in his youth and was later shunned and outcast by his fellow politicians in ancient Greece. In this episode, Kaytlin Bailey and Wendi Starling also go over some updates on which companies have started...
Miss Major Griffin-Gracy
Miss Major Griffin-Gracy iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify After being mis-gendered and housed with male inmates, Miss Major Griffin-Gracy became one of the key negotiators in the Attica Prison Riots in 1971 and went on to work as an advocate for trans women’s rights within...
Flawless Sabrina
Flawless Sabrina iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify Flawless Sabrina mothered and mentored countless young trans women in the New York City ballroom scene and thrived as an inspirational beacon of light and love. Flawless Sabrina was arrested over a hundred times for simply...
Georgina Beyer
Georgina Beyer iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify Georgina Beyer went from survival sex worker to radio host, and ultimately took her place as the first trans politician in New Zealand as the Mayor of Carterton and Wairarapa MP. Prepare to be inspired by the life and barrier...
FOSTA / SESTA
FOSTA / SESTA iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify Both FOSTA and SESTA were introduced as bills to stop sex trafficking. Because sex workers know legislators fail to distinguish adult, consensual sex work from trafficking, they knew these laws would do just that and make sex...
Jenna Jameson
Jenna Jameson iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify An absolute legend in the adult film world, Jenna Jameson is one of the most well known porn stars who took her success in the sex industry and started an...
Yoshiwara
Yoshiwara iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify Yoshiwara was the infamous red light district in 17th century Edo, current day Tokyo, Japan. The original hoe-topia, if you...
Der Pranger
Der Pranger iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify Der Pranger was a German communist publication written by whores for whores in an attempt to establish fair treatment and laws benefiting sex workers and their patrons. The original “Dickpedia,” if you...
Salon Kitty
Salon Kitty iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify Salon Kitty was minding her business running a brothel in Berlin when the Nazis came along and threatened to throw her into a concentration camp unless she cooperated with them as an undercover Nazi spy prostitute. In this...
Operation Midnight Climax
Operation Midnight Climax iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify Hear all about how the US government took full advantage of sex workers by forcefully enlisting handfuls them to aid in administering LSD tests on their unsuspecting clients, a.k.a. Operation Midnight...
Yu Husuan-Chi
Yu Husuan-Chi iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify Yu Husuan-Chi was one of the most famous poets of the late Tang Dynasty. Yu Husuan-Chi had a reputation of being sexually adventurous, and is thought to be China’s first openly bisexual historical...
Heidi Fleiss
Heidi Fleiss iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify Heidi Fleiss ran an upscale prostitution ring based in Los Angeles, California in the 1990s and was known as the “Hollywood...
Santa Claus (Nicholas of Myra)
Santa Claus (Nicholas of Myra) iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify You may know him as Santa Claus or Old Saint Nick, but Nicholas of Myra has an essentially untold history of relationships with sex workers that children’s books and churches decided to leave...
Wu Zeitan
Wu Zeitan iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify From an impoverished child to concubine of a powerful Emperor, to her ultimate destiny as a powerful Empress, Wu Zeitan really knew how to run...
Lulu White
Lulu White iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify Lulu White was the most famed madam in the Storyville district of New Orleans known as the “Diamond Queen” for her love of extravagant jewelry. Much of her early life remains a mystery, but she was born in Selma, Alabama in 1868,...
Sex Worker Witch Hunt
Sex Worker Witch Hunt iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify Sex Worker Witch Hunt: Accusing women of witchcraft and condemning them to death was just one of the sadistic methods in the systematic disempowerment of women. But have those seemingly archaic practices and patterns...
Joanna of Naples
Joanna of Naples iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify Queen of Naples, Countess of Provence, and Princess of Achaea… the epic story of Joanna of Naples lives up to the hype of all of her...
Anna Nicole Smith
Anna Nicole Smith iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify Anna Nicole Smith was labeled a white trash gold digger throughout her career, all for capitalizing on her sexuality and good looks. Some women can “have it all,” but that sure pisses some other people...
Phryne
Phryne iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify Phryne, a nickname meaning “little toad,” was a renowned courtesan in Athens at the height of the civilization’s power in ancient Greece, around the 4th century B.C.E. She rose to prominence during a period where priestesses and...
Lizzie Lape
Lizzie Lape Legendary Ohio Madam Lizzie Lape owned not one, but multiple brothels at the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th. iTunes | Stitcher |...
Mary Jones
Mary Jones iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify Mary Jones (1803 – Unknown) was a New York old pro and hustler who was given the name Peter Sewally at birth. Mary Jones was of African descent and much of her early life is lost to the archive, but newspaper records indicate...
Harriet Hicks & The Contagious Diseases Act
Harriet Hicks & The Contagious Diseases Act iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify Harriet Hicks is one of the few documented cases of harassment and abuse of women by the government. Harriet Hicks worked as a prostitute during inception of the Contagious Diseases Act (CDA)...
Ah Toy
Ah Toy iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify A historic whore who essentially ran the sex industry in San Francisco during the Gold Rush, Ah Toy was a sought after Chinese prostitute and madam who came to America and dominated the booming sex work industry at the...
Veronica Franco
Veronica Franco iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify Courtesan Veronica Franco endured public shaming that attempted to strip away her status as a prolific poet and author in the 16th Century in Venice,...
Ishtar
Ishtar iTunes | Stitcher | Spotify The goddess of romantic love and fertility, Ishtar was worshipped through the bodies of church-sanctioned prostitutes who were trained in the arts of sexual...