photo by Hannah Victoria Photography, Jennifer DeBarros Photography

Spokane podcasters Rita Vigil and Amanda Mead get deep into tales of women you don’t know—but you should

For Rita Vigil and Amanda Mead, deep discussions come naturally.

The two were introduced when Rita hit it off with Amanda’s wife, a coworker at a Spokane restaurant. Next thing they knew, Rita and Amanda were training for a marathon together. And not long after that, deep in conversation during a leisurely bike ride, they ended up pedaling twenty-six miles.

“It should be easy to run out of things to talk about around the twentieth mile,” Vigil says. “But we didn’t really find that was a problem.”

It only seemed natural, then, to record their conversations out of a blanket-lined room in Mead’s Spokane home for the whole Internet to hear.

Mead, an avid podcast listener, had long kept a journal of ideas for one day starting their own show. But each bolt of inspiration was met with defeat when a quick Google search revealed the idea had been taken.

“So I suddenly had this thought—what if we tell the stories from history that we never got to hear because all our history books are written by white men?” Mead says. “It turns out I didn’t look hard enough, because other shows like that do exist, but I’d like to think we’re doing something unique—there’s more swearing and rage.”

Rita and Amanda channel the righteous rage of long-overlooked women from the past into I Don’t Know Her, a weekly podcast blending the stories of female pioneers with the natural intimacy of the hosts’ friendship (and the occasional insight about Spokane politics and cuisine).

The show’s title—which Rita admits was inspired by that Mariah Carey meme—reflects how most of their subjects, from early filmmaker Alice Guy-Blaché to warrior nun Ani Pachen Dolma, have been brushed aside by mainstream histories.

Each episode begins with Rita and Amanda discussing what’s happened in their own lives that week, from work struggles to emotional breakthroughs in therapy, and ends with both hosts in awe of the subject’s accomplishments—and, frequently, fury at the lack of recognition they received. They don’t shy away from the ugly details in the stories they tell, nor the ones in their own lived experiences. The result is an intimate, personal take on the depths of history that gives its subjects a shot at a second life.

IDK Her’s stories often mesh with the hosts’ own, whether intentionally or serendipitously. Rita is frequently drawn to stories of physical endurance, like that of Lorena Ramirez, a member of the indigenous Rarámuri tribe who runs ultramarathons through the Mexican desert dressed in a traditional skirt and huaraches.

“I always thought I could never be a runner,” Rita says. “But reading her story, learning that the tribes of Mexico are designed to be some of the most ideal runners in the world—I thought, ‘This is in my blood, that’s why I am who I am.’”

Amanda’s stories often feature people whose early lives were marred by abuse, poverty, or voicelessness. One of their favorites is the episode on Emma “Grandma” Gatewood, who, after decades of domestic abuse, escaped her husband and at age sixty-seven became the first woman to hike the Appalachian Trail solo.

“She took on her own demons, and out of the ashes of this really terrible, crushing thing, she built something new,” Amanda says. “That’s been a theme in my own life, of doing my damnedest to not let my experiences as a young person hold me back while still honoring those parts of my identity.”

The podcast has kept strong through the COVID-19 pandemic, despite brief lulls in production when both Vigil and Mead were stricken by the virus. And as they now approach 100 episodes and twenty thousand subscribers, Rita and Amanda feel pretty proud of the stories they’ve told—but there are infinitely more to tell, and they don’t plan to slow down anytime soon.

Amanda says their “shoot-for-the-moon goal” is to one day join the Exactly Right podcast network, which produces the wildly popular true crime show My Favorite Murder.

“I want to be part of something bigger and reach a wider audience so more people can hear these stories,” Amanda says. “Because ultimately, that’s what we set out to do, and these women and queer people and people of color all deserve so much more than they’ve got.”