100 Objects #12: "Negro Cloth"
7 August - 37 minsIn 1821, two Rhode Island brothers went looking for buyers for their woolen fabric, and stumbled into a lucrative, captive market: Southern slave plantations. Roman Mars and historian Seth Rockman trace the strange life of so-called "Negro cloth" — a textile category defined by nothing but who it was worn by. Along the way, they uncover how enslaved people shaped the very cloth used to control them, and how New England manufacturers convinced themselves they were the good guys.
A History of the United States in 100 Objects is a production of 99% Invisible and BBC Studios.
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Series Episodes
100 Objects #19: Western Electric 500 Series
Former MythBuster Adam Savage joins Roman Mars to explore the history of the 500 Series Telephone and what we lost when we eventually decided to leave it behind.
38 mins
25 September Finished
The Rocky Statue
How a movie prop became one of Philadelphia’s most beloved monuments, and sparked a decades-long fight over where it belonged.
32 mins
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100 Objects #18: Hair Relaxer
How a single product—the hair relaxer—became a mirror for all of America's contradictions.
35 mins
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Doves Type
A legendary typeface, a spectacular friendship breakup, and one extremely committed act of revenge.
37 mins
15 September Finished
100 Objects #17: M43 Field Jacket
How should the military outfit its soldiers to make them as safe and effective as possible?
41 mins
11 September Finished
Kobuk the Destroyer
Every product has to be tested somehow, and sometimes that means finding increasingly creative ways to break it.
38 mins
8 September Finished
