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- [00:00]
Tracy Thomas
Hi, everyone. I just wanted to pop on and say hello and touch base. I did not feel comfortable dropping a new episode of the Stacks this week without acknowledging the terrible wildfires that are taking place in Los Angeles right now. The city in which I live, my family and I, we are okay. Thank you so much for reaching out to us. Unfortunately, so many people that I know and love lost their homes, including a few people who work here with me at the Stacks. I have to say, of course, I'm beyond grateful to the amazing work of the firefighters and first responders. And I hope that they can continue to protect the citizens of Los Angeles. I wanted to quickly highlight an organization that is in need of your financial contributions. I know there are so many places you could donate your money and I wanted to highlight Inclusive Action for the city. They have a fund going on right now for outdoor workers that have been impacted by the fires. Many gardeners, street vendors, recyclers and other outdoor workers who are an integral part of the LA communities touched by the fire have lost their livelihoods. Inclusive Action is giving out $500 grants directly to these workers. Also this week in my newsletter, I shared a list of places and in need of your support. And I have included links to both Inclusive Action and my newsletter in the show notes. So please check those things out and thank you so much for helping us rebuild Los Angeles.
- [01:16]
Michael Waters
I really would love for Kobe, the main athlete in this book, to read it because I do think, like, I am quite a cynical person and I do think there's like, there's a bit of like that sort of like light hearted hater mentality that I think he and I share. What I'm gleaning, you know, like before he, before he played sports, he was really mean about athletes. He was like, what's the point of this? You know? And I thought, and he's really funny about it too, in his book, so I could see us having some fun banter. I would like to think we'd be friends, but it's kind of crazy to think about.
- [01:56]
Tracy Thomas
Welcome to the Stacks, the podcast about books and the people who read them. I'm your host, Tracy Thomas, and today I am very excited to welcome to the podcast Michael Waters. Michael is a journalist and author whose work examines the relationship between sports identity and history. His latest book, the Other Olympians, Fascism, Queerness and the Making of Modern Sports, uncovers the untold stories of early trans and intersex athletes, highlighting how they navigated the complexities of gender and competitive sports during the 20th century, including the very controversial 1936 Olympic Games in Berlin. Don't forget our January book club pick is the Ministry of Time by Kellyanne Bradley. We will be discussing that book on Wednesday, January 29th with Jay Wortham. Be sure to read along and tune in. Quick reminder, everything we talk about on each episode of the Stacks can be found in the link in the show notes. If you love this podcast and you want inside access to it, now is the time to head to patreon.com the stacks when you join the Stacks Pack, you will get a bunch of perks every single month. Like bonus episodes, access to our Discord community, You get to be part of our mega reading challenge. And if you join before January 31st, you get access to my very, very cool, if I do say so myself, reading Tracker and you'll get a shout out on this podcast. I've been doing shout outs on this podcast for new members of the Sax Pack since we started Patreon in 2018. But you know what? All good things come to an end. That perk is going to be no longer starting January 31st. So if you want to hear me read your name in my dulcet tones, now is the time to join. Head to patreon.com the stacks and now I get to do a shout out to our newest members of the Stacks Pack. Thank you to Megan Gebhart, Anastasia Gorova, Hillary Huacker, Kathy F, Abs H, Deep D, Aloha, Lisa S, Tom Andada Cook, Lindsay Tamborello, Ashley Miller, Samantha Juan, Patty reads a lot, Adrian Wiley, Amy Kett and Kai Escobar, San Juesa. Thank you all so much. And thank you to every single member of the Stacks Pack. I could not make the show without you. Now it's time for my conversation with Michael Waters, the author of the Other Olympians. All right, Michael Waters, author of the Other Olympians. Welcome to the Stacks. I'm so excited you're here today.
- [04:19]
Michael Waters
Thank you so much. I'm so excited to be here, I.
- [04:21]
Tracy Thomas
Have to tell you. So normally I try to, like, stick with books in the year that they come out on the show for these kind of interviews, but I loved your book so much and I sort of up and didn't read it until after it came out and so I was like, I can't do it, blah, blah, blah. And then I was like, you know what? I love the book too much to just let it disappear into the 2024 ethos. So I'm thrilled to have you here in 2025. I'm assuming there'll be a paperback at some point this year, maybe. And so it'll still be relevant this year and beyond. But for people who don' about your book, can you tell us in about 30 seconds what you did here?
- [04:57]
Michael Waters
Yeah. Well, I appreciate you making an exception for this. So my book is a nonfiction queer history book, and it's essentially the story of this Czech sprinter named Jenyette Kobach, who was assigned female at birth, played in women's sports for most of his career, and then after stepping away from sports in 1935, he announced that he was transitioning gender and would begin living as a man.
- [05:22]
Tracy Thomas
Okay, I am sure that I am not unlike many people who read this book who are like, wait, there were trans athletes in the 1930s? Did you, like, how did you come to this story? How did you know that there was a story here to write about?
- [05:41]
Michael Waters
Yeah, so my background is in queer history, and I spend a lot of my time, like, just reading sort of random news articles from the early 1900s about queer folks generally. So I think. I think, to me, I wasn't quite as shocked as probably the average person is. I subscribe to this database called newspapers.com, which, literally, they just digitize many of the major newspapers. It's an incredible resource. And so I have spent a lot of time just literally typing in different keywords and phrases related to queer people in different eras, because every era would have their own kind of buzzwords to describe, like gay people, for instance. And if you kind of know the ways that these things were described, you can really find a lot. And so in the 1930s, we didn't have this concept of being trans. And so the way that, like, people who were moving between these gender categories were described, it would be as undergoing a kind of quote, unquote, sexual metamorphosis and sort of other similar phrases. And so I was, like, looking up stuff related to that in the 1930s when I stumbled on this newspaper story that mentioned Kobach, who is this athlete who transitioned gender, who's really at the center of my book. And, you know, I think what struck me is I had read a lot of, you know, like, local news stories about people cross dressing, people transitioning in some way, maybe after, like, it would be discovered on their deathbed or something, or they'd even apply to have, like, their name changed on formal documents. You know, like, there are plenty of local news stories throughout the early 1900s about transition and about this sort of expansiveness of what we would call gender today. What struck me about Kobach's story right away is just that he was quite famous, you know.
- [07:26]
Tracy Thomas
Yes, yes, that struck me too. When I was reading the book. I was like, wait a second.
- [07:31]
Michael Waters
Yeah, well, and it's because usually, like, this is mostly relegated to local news and the fact that Kobek was an athlete who was prominent in Czechoslovakia at the time, but, like, maybe not world famous until he transitioned, and then his sort of gender transition just became like global news for a year from 1935 to 1936. And that was really striking because he sort of became a way in which just like the world public, and I'm focusing especially on the American public in this case, were talking about and receiving gender in sort of like, were breaking down, like, well, what does it mean to move between these categories? And perhaps like, are these ideas of male and female, like, you know, are they perhaps more permeable than the public would have thought? And so he really became a vehicle for the public in the 1930s to just like, think about gender, which I found really fascinating.
- [08:24]
Tracy Thomas
Do you feel like, as far as his fame goes relative to the media, I guess, then versus now, was it similar to a like, Caitlyn Jenner situation? Was it that kind of like, holy cow, this is this huge thing that's happening, or was it, was it different? Was, was it received in different ways?
- [08:45]
Michael Waters
Yeah, I don't think it was quite the same full court press as like a Caitlyn Jenner situation, I think. I mean, honestly, like, I think there was an element of like sensationalism to the way that he was covered. I think it was more of like, here is this odd story out of Czechoslovakia, more so than like, here is this athlete that everyone knows and. Yeah, and so that was kind of the original tenor of the coverage. I mean, and then there's this moment in 1936 actually during the Berlin Olympics. So Kobach doesn't play in the Berlin Olympics, but he is invited to perform on Broadway in New York City. And so he comes to New York and there's like tons of tabloid reporters all over him. People are trying to take his picture and interview him. The New York Daily News is covering him left and right. And so he definitely was more than just sort of a one off news item for even the American press. I think just his story was so perplexing. But I wouldn't say that kind of everyone in America had heard of him as of that year. I think if you read the New York Daily News or the New York Post, for sure. But there was this element of sort of like What a wild thing that is happening. More so than, like, here. Is this a list athlete?
- [10:00]
Tracy Thomas
Yeah, I. I'm curious a little bit about. Since you have your background in queer history, why did you want to write this book? Why did you want to spend time with Kobe and the other. And Mark Weston and other athletes and sort of this story. Because it's not just a story about the athletes. It also is a story about the Nazis and my personal enemy, Avery Brundage, who I've hated for my whole adult life. I don't. I just. I discovered what a monster he was years ago through Dave Zirin, the sports writer, because he's, like, very anti ioc. And I'm just, like, sort of curious what it was about. About these athletes. And then also sort of the broader story where you said, you know what, Michael, sit down. We're gonna write this as a book.
- [10:42]
Michael Waters
Yes, Avery Brundage, for sure. Recurring bad guy. Which actually was sort of helpful for. For the book, too, which is, I think, like. I think the reason that I wanted to do this in the first place is I really am interested in queer and sort of, like, scrambling people's timelines of queer history and perhaps just history generally, which is. I think it's really easy to assume that, like, queer history from, like, 1969, when the Stonewall riots happened, up until, like, maybe we'll just say 2016, is this, like, story of, like, linear, clean progress. And, you know, before 1969, it was all kind of darkness and closeted people. And then after, it's like, we slowly got better and better, and that's just so far from the truth. Like, I think when you look through the 20th century, you see these, like, pockets of queer possibilities and these ways in which the public is grappling with, like, gender and sexuality, and I think, really sort of fascinating in fascinating ways that we just kind of forget about now. And I really think there are just so many lessons in understanding all of these different. All these different moments in the queer past, and the fact that someone like Kobe could exist and be written about in this way in the 1930s. So that's just a general framing where it's like, when I'm discovering these stories that I feel like, challenge people's notion of how the queer movement has unfolded and how queer people sort of have existed in America, that's always really gonna get my. Sort of pique my interest. And then in this case of this particular story, Quebec is at the center of the story. And you also mentioned that there's a couple Other athletes who transition gender who are part of this as well. One of them is a British field athlete named Mark Weston, who transitioned in the summer of 1936, shortly after Quebec, and actually married a woman a few months later, which was a bit of a scandal in the uk and honestly, there was just so much structuring narrative behind just, like, the actual story that happened, which you often don't get in queer history. You know, the fact that there was, like, kind of a villain in the form of Avery Brundage, who is this, like, Olympics official who kind of used Kobe's story to create these early, like, gender surveillance policies at the Olympics. Also, I think most key to this is Kobach wrote basically, like, this long series of personal essays about his life in 1936. And so it's like 40,000 words. It's basically a short memoir. And it's him narrating his life from birth. Like, he actually does have a birth scene, which I'm sort of like, you weren't there for that. So, you know, there's elements of. Exactly. There's some elements of it that are a little sensational. But he explains, like, his whole life and his whole thinking, sort of his relationship to gender and his body, his relationship to sports. He, like, lays it all out there. And, you know, when you are doing, like, any kind of marginalized history, especially, you know, Pre World War II, that is so rare to get a document like that from someone that was really, like, preserved by, you know, like, there is so little sort of, like, archival memory of a lot of different marginalized folks, including queer folks. And so when I saw that, and I was like, this man literally wrote out his life story. And, like, that is just, like, such an incredible document to really structure a book.
- [14:06]
Tracy Thomas
Yeah. So I. So let me. Let me give you some context of my life. So I read this book kind of during the 2024 Olympics right after I returned from a trip to Germany. So it was, like, exactly where my brain was. And it feels like right now, sports is sort of the frontier for conversations around transness and trans. Yes, trans athletes, but also just, like, trans kids who want to play soccer, which, like, you know, like, maybe they're. Maybe they consider themselves athletes. But, like, my kids are 5, and their soccer is, like, not really a sport. So I'm wondering if that's sort of the sense that you get that, like, the. That the framing of the Olympic, like, the great athletes is somehow being shaped in order to do the work of, like, fudgeing with kids and, like, fudgeing like, if that. I don't, I don't know how to frame the question exactly. But like, if this big Earth, if these elite athletes are sort of being used as a way to teach everyday people how to be transphobic and destroy children's lives.
- [15:19]
Michael Waters
Yeah, I mean, that's a good question. I don't know that I have a great answer to that. I think on some level, I almost am hesitant to ascribe so much logic or forethought to a lot of these right wing legislators who are really just trying to demonize trans kids. And I think what they've realized is that sports is an issue where they feel like they just have some kind of talking point that resonates more broadly. And I also think that's just because people are sort of unwilling to have real conversations about how complicated, like, you know, just like. And just like how complicated this is and then also about, like, how like, access to sports is just a human rights issue, in my opinion. So I think I don't want to ascribe too much logic to connecting these things. But I mean, I think you saw over the summer, you know, like, people like J.K. rowling and Elon Musk were behind a lot of this, like, sort of hatred and this hatred directed towards Amani Khalif, the Algerian boxer. And I mean, for sure those are the same people who are pushing for anti trans policies sort of at all levels. And so I think that probably they are seeing some way of like, if we can sort of conflate these discussions altogether, perhaps they see some kind of advantage. I don't really know. But I do think the way that we talk about these things is often bundled up together. And I think for sure it's the same. I think the sort of backlash and the transphobia is the same across all levels of sports and government.
- [17:01]
Tracy Thomas
Yeah, you said that you feel like access to sports is a human rights issue. Can you talk a little bit more about that?
- [17:07]
Michael Waters
Yeah, well, so when I say that, I especially mean, like, I think the way that this discussion is often framed is, you know, when we're talking about trans women and women on the intersex spectrum playing in women's sports, it's often framed as like, well, is it fair for them to play? And I think that what we need to be doing is we need to frame this as well. Is it fair to exclude them? I just think that, like, rhetorically, we kind of are having these conversations from the wrong place. And to me, like, I don't think it is fair to have These sort of exclusionary policies. So that's what I mean when I say that.
- [17:42]
Tracy Thomas
I see. As far as language goes, as you were mentioning at the beginning of this conversation, you know, you knew what words to search for when you were looking into sort of the history in the 1930s and in different eras, you know, with your expertise, you know, what you're looking for. Were there challenges with language that came up for you as you're writing a book in 2024, given the language that was used in the 1930s? And how did you navigate that?
- [18:08]
Michael Waters
For sure, endless challenges. I'm still navigating it. Yeah. I mean, so I think that there are a bunch of different layers to this. I think even describing Kobe has been really tough for me, because Kobek was transitioning in this era before the public had this sense of gender, this sort of socialized psychological identity as distinct from biological sex, which is assigned to you at birth. And so when Kobach was talking about himself, and even when he was being written about, it would often be through talking about the body. So he would talk about how, you know, like, over time, he just, like, felt his body becoming more and more like a man's, which is something was kind of a trope that you see among a lot of trans people in the 1930s, which is they would sort of frame it as like, you know, I woke up one day and then suddenly, like, I had a beard, or, you know, you know, just like your body had kind of changed. And that was just because that was the easiest way to articulate to the public what was happening, I guess, or just a way to. When it was hard to describe transness as an identity, you could just sort of describe the physical body. And so Kobeck, at different points, does reference, including in his memoir, about how he always felt more like a man. He does sort of articulate this. A psychological desire to be a man, really, from a young age. But, you know, it's, like, very possible that he would have fit on an intersex spectrum as well. It's just really hard to know, especially because. And it's hard to know how he would have identified, because these words of, like, trans and intersex as distinct potentially. Well, I guess there's overlap between those communities too. But the false sort of words that we use were not available to him. And so I've really struggled because I want to sort of, as a historian, I don't want to sort of impose too much language onto him. And then also as like, sort of a person who wants these stories to Connect to the present and sort of resonate in the present. I. You know, it's like, I do kind of want to add a label so that people. So the right people know about it. And, Yeah, I mean, it's kind of unresolved, ultimately.
- [20:22]
Tracy Thomas
How did you think about it? Like, what was your approach? Were there questions that you were asking yourself as you were working through the lens? Like, if it was written like this, I could do that. Or, you know, like, how. How did you tackle it? Because, I mean, you. You use words in the book. So, like, you definitely made some decisions.
- [20:39]
Michael Waters
Yes. We'll see if they were right decisions. Well, I think on this very simple level, like, Kobach actually refer. So when. When Kobach is writing about his past self, which he does at certain points in the third person, kind of randomly, he refers his past self using she, her pronouns. I pretty quickly was just like, I don't want to do that because of just sort of, like, contemporary context. And so that was a moment when it's like, okay, he's talking about himself this way. I don't really want to do that, because that doesn't sort of fit with the way that we write today, essentially. And so there's, like, some moments of departure. And then when it comes to identity labels, I tried to be pretty sparing, actually, in adding too many, you know, so I use words like queer, which didn't have the same meanings in the 1930s as they did now. I also just think queer is nice because it's pretty expansive. And I think there are moments when I refer to Kobe as approaching, like, a trans identity of different of some sort. And that was just a choice that I made just because, to me, that felt like the clearest articulation of what he was saying that, you know, like, I think readers could really get. But, yeah, I don't know. I mean, I struggle with that choice. I also think it's like you are kind of just taking a shot in the dark to some extent, and being like, this feels like the right choice for this book. But perhaps there's a better way to describe transness in the 1930s or sort of different sort of forms of being on a gender spectrum in the 1930s that, you know, in a future edition, I can change that.
- [22:12]
Tracy Thomas
Yeah, yeah. No, I love that you're, like, so open to the changing, you know, the ways that language and identity change over time. And I think that's probably the right approach given, you know, how much we see the changes even just within your book from how certain things are talked about in the 1930s versus how we would talk about them now. Let's take a quick break and we'll be right back. Hey, y'all. Happy New Year. Same bookish you, I hope. I wanted to quickly tell you about what's going on and how you can support the work of this show. As you may know, I have a Patreon. It's called the stacks pack@patreon.com the stacks. And it's a bookish community complete with a very active discord where you get monthly bonus episodes of virtual Book club meetup. And right now we have some special offers going on all month through the end of January. When you join the Stacks Pack, you get our reading tracker, you get to vote in the Stacky Awards, and you get a shout out on this show. That perk is going to be no longer starting February 1st. So now's the time you get all of that for just $5 a month at patreon.com the stacks. If that doesn't sound like you, I also have a newsletter called Unstacked over at Tracy Thomas substack.com where I tell you about all the books I'm reading. I give you personal hot takes about pop culture. I even rank every book I read each month. And In December of 2024, I actually ranked every single book I read from least to most favorites. You can find so much more over @tracy thomas substack.com if you love this show and you want to make sure that you hear it every single week, those are two incredible ways to support my work and I really appreciate it. Okay, we're back. And I would like to talk a little bit about the Nazis, if that's okay, because you as I mentioned, I was in Germany and I have had a pretty much lifelong fascination with them because my parents decided it was a great idea to take me to the Holocaust Museum when I was 8. So for the last 30 years, it's been something that I, I thought about. And so then for people who don't know, the 1936 Olympics were famously held in Berlin at, you know, Pre World War II, but Hitler was in charge. It was sort of the, the kind of ascension of the Nazi party. It was the boots, it was the marching. It was all of those things. And this Olympics has a big impact on gender surveillance. I won't get into the whole, like, Avery Brundage of it all, but he's one of the reasons that it even happened there. And he's a big Nazi sympathizer. My favorite Sports enemy. Some might even say he's a Nazi. I don't know. I don't want to define him for him, but I wouldn't say he's not. Okay. So I would love for you to sort of explain why and how the Nazis became such a huge part of this kind of piece of history.
- [25:16]
Michael Waters
Yeah, for sure. I'll try not to go too far down the Avery Brundage rabbit hole. I think that's like, he's definitely part of this story. I think at a really high level. Like you said, the 1936 Olympics are held in Berlin, hosted by Hitler. And leading up to the 1936 Olympics, there's actually this big movement, especially in the U.S. but in a lot of countries, to boycott the games. And there is this movement, especially on the left, especially organized by Jewish activists and anti fascist activists, to say we're not going to send a team to the Olympics because this is just going to bolster sort of like Hitler's credentials. And basically that movement fails in large part because many members of the International Olympic Committee and then other just sort of like high up sports officials don't want that to happen. And they do want the Olympics to go on. And in fact they, some of them don't really see a problem with Hitler at all. And I think that's important context because, you know, in 1936, the Nazis are quite influential, you know, in sports, in the Olympics. They're not just hosting it, but they also have a lot of cachet and sway and are sort of like sending messages back and forth with all these officials from across the world, including Avery Brundage. And you know, there are a bunch of, there are a few different sort of characters involved in this. In particular, there's this sports doctor named Wilhelm null, who in January 1936, he writes this op ed actually in kind of direct response to Kobach, the Czech athlete who transitioned. He writes this op ed in a sports magazine, essentially accusing Kobach of being a fraud and seeming to assume that Kobe is either on an intersex spectrum or as maybe just like was always like a CIS man using our language. It's kind of unclear. I mean, again, you can't really ascribe too much logic to like a Nazi writing in a sports magazine. But he essentially like, he used this to call for medical exams of women athletes. So this, although Kobach did not want to play in women's sports, after he transitioned, this sports doctor took issue with the fact that Kobach had played in women's sports at all. And he was actually quite influential at the time. He headed this group of international sports doctors that advised the International Olympic Committee and some of these different sports federations on kind of, like, medical and scientific matters. And so he began agitating for these sports federations to pass policies essentially requiring physical exams of all the women athletes would participate, with the idea of weeding out, you know, certain people who he did not feel fit. And actually, so Noel writes these letters to all these sports federations. He doesn't get a lot of traction, as he complains in this, like, later op ed where he's like, everyone ignored me except for one, which was the Track and Field Federation. And basically, like, the International Olympic Committee is this kind of, like, overarching governing body of the Olympics. And then more specific policies are often set by federations that, like, govern a group of sports, so like track and field swimming. So basically everyone except for the Track and Field Federation ignored Knoll the sports doctor. This is also what I mean where it's like, none of this was inevitable in the 1936. You have the Track and Field Federation kind of takes up Noel's request and in August 1936, passes this really vaguely worded rule about doing physical exams of women athletes where there's, like, a question of gender, essentially. And that's really the origins of sex testing and gender surveillance policies. That's the first time that we see on this international level a policy dictating, like, which women would be allowed to play and actually calling for, like, a direct examination of certain women, notably, like, they never really wrestled with, like, the fact that, you know, the human body is a big spectrum, not to mention, like, sort of gender being a spectrum. We don't even need to go there. But just like, none of this was sort of discussed in the. In the policy that was passed in 1936. And I do think it really is, in large part because this was like a moment of sort of, like, fascism on the upswing. And it just seemed perfectly logical, I think, to a lot of these sports officials that of course, we would try to eliminate certain kinds of women just kind of wholesale from these sports. And also, like, we don't even have to get too much into this. But all these, like, the people passing these policies were all men, and they were all men who largely opposed women's sports itself. You know, like, in general.
- [29:45]
Tracy Thomas
Yes, yes.
- [29:46]
Michael Waters
Like, they did not want women to play. They were constantly limiting, especially, like, women track and field athletes. So it's like this group of men who, like, think there's no point in Women playing sports think that's actually dangerous for women to play sports. These are the same men who are then passing the policy that's saying only certain women are allowed to play.
- [30:03]
Tracy Thomas
Right. Just like, a personal question for you. How much into sports are you? Are you a sports person? Were you a sports person before the book? Did this change your relationship to sports?
- [30:14]
Michael Waters
Yeah, great question. I have to say that I'm not a huge sports person. That's okay. I've watched lots of footage now, sort of for the book, and I've always watched the Olympics. But yeah, I think that I'm always fascinated by the politics of a bureaucracy, and I think sports bureaucracies are extremely, extremely weird and wild and.
- [30:36]
Tracy Thomas
Especially Olympics.
- [30:37]
Michael Waters
Especially the Olympics, yeah.
- [30:39]
Tracy Thomas
Oh, my gosh.
- [30:40]
Michael Waters
And so, yeah. And just like, so, like, watching the Olympics, you know, I'm really just like, oh. I think I just, like, know too much about how all of this works. How messy the behind the scenes is. I just, like, kind of got obsessed with, like, sort of the sort of structural elements of sports and the bureaucratic elements of sports. I'm not, unfortunately, streaming sports on a weekly basis, but it's okay.
- [31:01]
Tracy Thomas
I was just curious. I was just curious, like, your relationship to. To the actual, like, athletics of it. I'm also curious what was. What were, if any sort of big surprises for you as you were researching and writing the book. Were there things where you were like, holy shit, like, did not see this coming.
- [31:21]
Michael Waters
Maybe I've kind of spoiled, like, some of the bigger surprises by sort of mentioning them earlier. I mean, honestly, like, this article about Kobe in the magazine Physical Culture, this big sports magazine, was really striking to me early in the research. Just because it's a sports magazine, talking about, like, hey, like, I mean, they didn't say gender is a spectrum, but, like, there was talking about how, like, male and female, like, categories are imperfect. You know, a sports magazine in the 1930s that was quite striking. There was also this magazine called sexology in the 1930s that I read a lot of issues of. It was basically this, like, general interest publication about sex in the body and talking about everything from, you know, like, like masturbation to, like, marital problems to sexual problems, whatever, kind of the whole gamut. And it was really one of the only places because it had this lens of science. Although sometimes they publish pseudoscience, but, like, it had this lens of science. And so it was one of the main places that, you know, like, like the American public could read about sex and ask questions about sex in a really honest way. In the 1930s. And they had this letters to the editor section, which, you know, separately, some really wild questions were being asked.
- [32:39]
Tracy Thomas
You said letters to the editor.
- [32:40]
Michael Waters
I was like, oh, my Gosh, I read 10 years of this and I was like, these people are crazy.
- [32:44]
Tracy Thomas
Some things never change. Some things never change is where the craziest of humanity likes to show up with paper.
- [32:52]
Michael Waters
Yes, well, but then. And then sometimes there's some beautiful things in there. And so one thing that really just struck me is that. So Sexology wrote a piece about Quebec and Weston transitioning, trying to sort of like explain to their audience, like, well, maybe you've heard this news story about these athletes, like, what does it actually mean scientifically? And in response, they got so many letters from people who wanted to know more about how a transition was possible. People who, you know, probably would identify as trans today, who are saying, you know, like, I seat myself in these athletes and like, is there a doctor I can go to? Like, how do I. Like, sort of, how do I find out more about this? They received so many letters from the editor that they wrote a follow up article where they were just sort of like, what's going on? Why is everyone trying to do this? And they quoted some of the letters they received. And so this piece, this follow up, I think was published in 1937. This is a bunch of people writing in, being like, I see myself in this athlete. And I too want to talk to a doctor about this, get access to some of this sort of medical care. And that really just struck me because it's so hard to find the voices of queer people in the archives sometimes, especially in newspapers and magazines, you really have to be creative. In the 1930s, we didn't have an openly gay publication of any kind. You know, and so it's like those little glimmers of what these stories, what these athletes might have meant to the wider queer community. And I thought that was really incredible to come across.
- [34:20]
Tracy Thomas
That's so cool. And how were the athletes transitioning? I know you write about it a little bit in the book, but if you want to just give us a little taste.
- [34:30]
Michael Waters
Yeah. I mean, it's honestly, like, kind of hard to untangle because it's. I mean, the way that especially for Kobe, he writes quite vaguely about it. Kobe had two different surgeries that he alluded to. And it's also possible and maybe likely that he was taking some kind of like, early hormone, although he didn't say that. So it's a little bit hard to know. I would say, yeah. All these athletes went to see doctors, which itself was quite fraught just because a lot of these doctors were also eugenicists and would only like give. You know, it's like you're really fighting against the system and would only give medical care often if you were white. Often if, you know, after you transition, you would be read as heterosexual. So yeah, it was, it was a hard system, but they didn't get into too much detail, I guess is just what I would say. But I would not be surprised. And I probably expect it's like an interplay of surgery and hormones.
- [35:25]
Tracy Thomas
Yeah. Okay. You mentioned earlier and I forgot to ask you this follow up, which I think is important though I also think I know the answer, but I just want to get it on the record. The record, because I'm a journalist, obviously, but with the Nazi doctor who was like writing the op ed and doing all the things that led to the gender surveillance of women athletes, it did not lead to gender surveillance of the male athletes. Correct.
- [35:56]
Michael Waters
Yeah. There's never been like any kind of sex testing policy for male athletes at the Olympics.
- [36:03]
Tracy Thomas
I mean, that's gotta just be like the most sexist shit ever, right? Like that's just based on the idea that like men are better than women at sports and like if a woman or a trans, A trans man wants to try, like good luck beating Jesse Owens or whatever.
- [36:19]
Michael Waters
Yeah, for sure. And it's also just tied to the fact that like, I mean, an extension of that misogyny, the fact that women's sports were incredibly scrutinized and still are throughout its whole history at the Olympics in a way that men's sports were not. The fact that like there has been like a hundred year battle for there to be enough women's sports at the Olympics, you know that like women's sports have always been under the microscope and women athletes sort of exponentially under the microscope at the Olympics. So. Yeah.
- [36:49]
Tracy Thomas
Okay, this is a. Well, actually, before we do the hard shift, can you talk a little bit about the title and the COVID of the book with us?
- [36:57]
Michael Waters
So the. Well, first of all, I really love the book cover and I had basically nothing to do with it.
- [37:02]
Tracy Thomas
It's so good though. I love it so much.
- [37:04]
Michael Waters
But it made me really happy to see. It's like kind of like in like a vintage 1930s like magazine style, which I really loved and thought was so genius, but again had nothing to do with that.
- [37:15]
Tracy Thomas
Who was your cover designer?
- [37:17]
Michael Waters
It was June Park.
- [37:18]
Tracy Thomas
Oh, amazing. Amazing. Well, it's so. It is so gorgeous.
- [37:21]
Michael Waters
And that's Kobe on the COVID And that is Kobe. Yes. Sort of in midair, which. Which was really cool.
- [37:29]
Tracy Thomas
And then what about the title? Was that always a title? Did it change? Where did it come from?
- [37:36]
Michael Waters
The title? To be honest, the main title, the Other Olympians, just sounded kind of good. Although a lot of people have pointed out to me that have asked if it's a reference to this really iconic book, the Other Victorians, which was not originally a reference, but I kind of want to retroactively make it a reference. The Other. The Other. Sorry, the Other Victorians is about, like, homosexuality in the Victorian era. I see. So I'm like. I would have. I'm gonna just sort of say that it would be cool if that were true, but it unfortunately wasn't.
- [38:11]
Tracy Thomas
Okay, well, as I mentioned, I'm a serious journalist, and so this is on the record, so if you'd like to set the record straight right now, you can do that.
- [38:19]
Michael Waters
Yeah, I can't reverse quarterback. It. It just sounded good, ultimately.
- [38:22]
Tracy Thomas
Okay. Okay. Is there anything that's not in the book that you wish was or could have been?
- [38:30]
Michael Waters
Yeah, I mean, so, I mean, there was this whole sort of section about actually another Nazi, this really prominent woman athlete named Violette Morris, who was a French woman who was really one of the most famous, like, kind of, like, women athletes in the world in the early 1920s, who was this, like, big, kind of, like, butch woman who actually got a mastectomy in the 1920s and caused a lot of scandal in French society because of that. And so, you know, like, there was a section early in the book that I eventually just cut that talked about her and about how all of this kind of, like, gender panic around her, you know, like, getting different kinds of, like, cosmetic surgeries to her body sort of, like, in some ways, like, anticipated different sort of anti trans, anti, anti intersex rhetoric that was to come. And then she also, like, if you read the book Bad Gays, you might know that, like, she later becomes a Nazi and sort of collaborates with. With the Nazis during the Nazi occupation of France. So I thought, like, her arc was really interesting because I do think it kind of dovetails with this, like, rise of fascism. I don't know. It deals with a lot. Ultimately, it was just sort of too much to include her, too. There are a lot of characters in this book. There are a lot of people in this book. Yeah. But I think. And also, like, people have written about her story a fair bit, and a lot of these other athletes haven't really gotten much airtime at all. But I do think it would have been cool. But I made the choice to cut it. So, you know, I'm solely responsible for that, for better or for worse.
- [40:06]
Tracy Thomas
I love that you're owning this. You're like, I cut that Nazi out of this.
- [40:09]
Michael Waters
Yeah. Yeah. Ultimately, she wasn't that inspiring. You know, it's like someone had to go. It had to be her.
- [40:15]
Tracy Thomas
Had to be her. Okay, let's talk a little bit about your process. I always love to ask people this. How do you write? How many hours a day? How often? Where are you snacks and beverages? Rituals sort of set the scene, Tell us how the magic happens.
- [40:30]
Michael Waters
Yeah. Wow. I wish I was so consistent because I feel like a lot of authors are sort of like, I wake up at 6am and then I write for four hours, then I'm done for the day. I don't really have that.
- [40:39]
Tracy Thomas
It's okay. I've been doing the show for now, like, seven years, and a lot of people do that. And then a lot of people are like, I wish I did that, but actually.
- [40:47]
Michael Waters
So don't worry. Well, I also. I wrote a lot of this book while I was working a copywriting job, a remote copywriting job. I think they won't be listening to this, so I'll just say that, like, I would be working sort of when, you know, I'd have slack open and when I felt like no one needed anything from me, I would, you know, toggle over to the Word document. So it was more like kind of a bunch of stolen moments.
- [41:11]
Tracy Thomas
And why would you think that they wouldn't be listening to this podcast? It's like, probably, like, one of the biggest podcasts in the history. It's like me and then Joe Rogan's right under. So, like, they're probably listening.
- [41:21]
Michael Waters
It's so true. Well, I'm really sorry if so. But yeah. And so. And, you know, like, I mean, I really like to work. Like, I work listening to, like, almost always listening to music, which I think some people find crazy. Like, I will listen to club music. I don't really know why.
- [41:37]
Tracy Thomas
Okay.
- [41:38]
Michael Waters
I just do think that's, like, something, like, gets me a little animated and focused. I also love to be at a coffee shop and just there's something about, like, a lot of noise around you. Like, noise in my ears that, like, really lets me, like, lock in. Like, it really feels like I'm, like, in this space. Whereas sometimes when I'm home trying to write, it is kind of just like I'm, like, looking Around. I'm, like, looking for something going on, and I think in public, it's much more like I can lock in. It really is kind of just like, whenever I have the time and the inspiration. I also do a lot of writing on my phone, so I, like, will, like, write on the subway sometimes on my phone just because, you know, if I get. Sometimes the word document is stressful to look at, and then it's like, okay, let me just, you know, type this into the notes app, even into imessage, and just send to myself. And that's like a way of, like, I don't know, just, like, taking some of the stakes away from it and just, like, getting something out that has been hard to get out.
- [42:32]
Tracy Thomas
And when you go to a coffee shop to work, what snacks and beverages are you partaking in?
- [42:39]
Michael Waters
I am getting. Okay. I love a Danish. Often my order will be, like, some form of Danish and a large black coffee because, you know, I'm always a little sleepy, so.
- [42:50]
Tracy Thomas
And is there a favorite Danish kind? Like, if you go to the shop and they have X, Y, and Z Danish or, like, it is my lucky day.
- [42:57]
Michael Waters
There's one place near me that has a really good cherry Danish, which I think is kind of a curveball. I don't see many cherry Danishes anywhere else. Really am a fan of that. That's Mia's Bakery.
- [43:06]
Tracy Thomas
And where are you located? New York.
- [43:08]
Michael Waters
I'm in New York. I'm in Brooklyn. So the cherry Danish is from Mia's Bakery. If anyone is local. I love that spot.
- [43:14]
Tracy Thomas
Shout out Mia's M I. M I.
- [43:17]
Michael Waters
A. M I A. Yeah.
- [43:18]
Tracy Thomas
Shout out to Mia and her Danish. Very Danish. All right, what comes next for you? Do you have another book idea? Are you thinking in that world, is there another piece of queer history that scrambles the timeline that you're super excited about? Can you tell us anything?
- [43:36]
Michael Waters
Yes. Although it's not exactly queer history, so this is gonna sound like a curve ball, but I'm writing another history book about sort of the history of credit surveillance in America and sort of about, like, everything leading up until modern credit scoring. And so, you know, I think the connective tissue is. I've been saying to friends it's 10% gay. Like the gay activist movement. And also sort of like the black power movement, the feminist movement are all. The welfare rights movement were all sort of, like, big parts of trying to challenge the credit system in the 1960s and 70s. And I think sort of these efforts to unroll it failed in interesting ways. But, yeah, it's Basically, it's like a book that is looking at, like, how did we get to this place where we have three credit bureaus and this sort of private company that creates this algorithm that decides sort of our financial worth and value and our employability and whether or not we can rent an apartment? And it's a wild story that goes back to 1899. So the book is like a history of just how we got here and efforts to dismantle the system.
- [44:46]
Tracy Thomas
Oh, my gosh. Okay, wait. But the other connective tissue is the surveillance, for sure.
- [44:51]
Michael Waters
Okay, that's actually. Didn't think about that. Great framing.
- [44:54]
Tracy Thomas
Okay, thank you. Is it with Jackson? Is he your editor still?
- [44:57]
Michael Waters
Yes, yes, exactly.
- [44:58]
Tracy Thomas
Oh, my God, I'm such a fan. I didn't really know who he was, and then I started reading these books, and they all had him as the editor, and I was like, wait a second, are you a celebrity now? For me, Because I feel like that. And then I got to meet him at the National Book Awards, and I was like, I'm a big fan of yours.
- [45:13]
Michael Waters
Yeah.
- [45:13]
Tracy Thomas
Yeah. Jackson Howard, rising star at fsg or already a star. I don't know. Star in my heart. But that book sounds amazing, and I want to ask you questions about it, but I'm not going to. I'm going to stick to this one. Just a few more for you. Who was the coolest person, in your eyes, that was excited or expressed interest in the book?
- [45:33]
Michael Waters
Ooh. There are a lot of people that really excited me. Like, Susan Stryker, who's this really iconic historian of trans history, blurbed the book, which was so kind and was so thrilling early on, just because I read her book Transgender History, which is kind of like a classic in the field. When I was in high school, it was one of the books that really got me into doing queer history and sort of understanding how many stories are out there. So that was just, like, truly a thrill. And I also, you know, like, I sent the book to Chris Mosier, who's this Olympic athlete who really advocates for trans athletes at the Olympics and in general, and he was really kind about it, too. You know, there are a lot of little things like that. But I think that the moment early on, when Susan Stryker read it, I was like.
- [46:26]
Tracy Thomas
I love that. Okay, for people who love the other Olympians, what. What are some other books you might recommend to them that are in conversation with your work?
- [46:36]
Michael Waters
Good question. I would say there's maybe two different strands that I could answer this with, because I think there's certain queer history Books that at least I was thinking a lot about as I was writing. I don't know if I would deign to say I'm in conversation with them. I was reading a lot of the work of Jules Gill Peterson as I was writing this. She has multiple books about queer history and trans history and about sort of, like, the makings of this idea of gender. And I think she's just, like, such a brilliant historian. And so I was really thinking about her work as I was writing this. There's also this book called How Sex Changed that was published in the early 2000s. And, you know, like, just is a really full recounting of, like, how Americans thought about, like, gender and sex over time. And then I think the narrative history books, there's like, a lot of incredible narrative history books that I was reading and sort of, like, thinking over in my head as I was writing this. I really love this book, how to Hide an Empire, which is about, like, the. It's basically, like, about the history of American imperialism and colonialism. It's really. I mean, it like, does the incredible thing of like, rescuing all of these somewhat obscure stories about, like, you know, like, where, like, the word bikini comes from that, like, intersect in all these ways with American culture and are also rooted in different ways in, like, colonial oppression. It's just like one of those books where it's like, every page I was like, that's so crazy. I didn't know that. The first thing in that book that stood out to me is that in the introduction it talks about how during the bombings at Pearl harbor, there was also a bombing in the US Occupied Philippines at the time, which FDR intentionally erased from mentioning because Americans didn't realize that they had colonized the Philippines essentially, and he thought that would be inconvenient in his speech about the Pearl harbor bombing. So it's like. I mean, it's filled with stuff like that where I'm like, I had no idea. Oh, my gosh. So that's how to Hide an Empire. And yeah, there are a bunch more, but I could just kind of leave it there.
- [48:43]
Tracy Thomas
Okay, well, that sounds amazing. I'm definitely adding that to my list. But you're right, because your book is, like, a queer history, but also this, like, narrative history, just more broadly, which is aside from, like, investigative journalism, is probably my, like, second favorite kind of book. Like a history book that has, like, a narrative arc and has, like, these figures that you can sort of follow and, like, get to know and it's done. So, I mean, you've done it. You did it so well. I already said it's like one of my favorite books from last year. I love it. But you do. You do do that so well of getting the history really clearly in the book, but also giving us sort of like a story to follow so it doesn't necessarily feel like you're reading a dry history, which I also like, but not as much as narrative. Okay. Normally I only ask this question once a month to my guest who does book club with me, but because this episode airs on January 22, two days after the administration has changed over, and because you've written a book about a topic that is just like political catnip right now, if you could require the current president of the United States. Current as of January 20th. So as people are listening, if you could require the current president of the United States to read one book, what would it be?
- [49:55]
Michael Waters
Well, I mean, you know, I don't think anything is going to change his mind at this point. And I also don't really think he's going to read this book. But I guess the book that comes to mind for me is this academic book called Sex is As Sex does by Paisley Kara, who is this really incredible scholar. And basically this book is talking about like, essentially how governments have come to define sex and sort of about like construct these ideas of sex. And it's really about like, the ways in which different political concerns filter down into, you know, like DMV policies, for instance. It's a really thoughtful book. You know, another book that I read a lot and thought about a lot as I was writing my own book. I think it's also just for anyone who is like sort of thinking about how bureaucracies work and especially how they affect trans and intersex people. It's really incredible. I don't think Donald Trump would ever read it and I don't think he cares about any of this stuff. Yeah, but you know, I. This is a thought exercise. It's a thought exercise. I think other people should read it. It's called Sex as Sex Does. And yeah, it's actually mentioned kind of like the ending author's note in my book as well. It's really like the theory behind that book really framed a lot of this for me.
- [51:10]
Tracy Thomas
I love that. Okay, last question, Michael. If you could have one person dead or alive read this book, who would you want it to be?
- [51:18]
Michael Waters
Ooh, this is maybe a cop out answer. But I really would love for Kobek, the main athlete in this book, to read it because I think that I don't know that he would like this book. Jury's out.
- [51:33]
Tracy Thomas
Okay.
- [51:34]
Michael Waters
But I think sort of. I spent a lot of time reading his sort of memoir while researching, and he seems he's a very funny guy. He's also, like, kind of a hater and a cynic, which, you know, it's kind of a storied gay tradition. And I think he would be really funny to talk about this book with, even if he doesn't like it. I think he would be really cutting in a way I would kind of enjoy. And I think we would have, like, fun banter about it.
- [51:59]
Tracy Thomas
That's a great answer. And we're gonna get out of here on that. Everyone at home, you can get your copy of the Other Olympians wherever books are sold. You can also request it from your library. If they don't have it, you tell them to get it. I loved this book so much. I hope people read it. It is so engaging and also informative and just like a wild story. And as I mentioned, there are heroes, there are Nazis. There's my personal enemy, Avery Brundage. Like, what else do you need in a book? Michael, thank you so much for being here.
- [52:30]
Michael Waters
Thank you so much for having me. This was really so much fun.
- [52:33]
Tracy Thomas
Oh, God. And everyone else, we will see you in the Stacks, foreign y'all. That does it for us today. Thank you so much for listening. And thank you again to Michael Waters for being my guest. Don't forget, the Stacks Book Club pick for January is the Ministry of Time by Kellyanne Bradley. Jay Wortham will be back to discuss the book with us on Wednesday, January 29th. If you love the show and you want inside access to it, you can head to patreon.com the stacks to join the Stacks Pack. And you can check out my newsletter at Tracy Thomas substack.com make sure you're subscribed to the Stacks wherever you listen to your podcasts. And if you're listening through Apple Podcasts or Spotify, please leave us a rating and a review. For more from the Stacks, follow us on social media at the Stacks Pod, on Instagram threads and TikTok, and you can check out our website atthestacks podcast.com this episode of the Stacks was edited by Christian D, with production assistance from Megan Caballero. Our graphic designer is Robin McKrite, and our theme music is from Tagirigis. The Stacks is created and produced by me, Tracy Thomas.