Babette Josephs: former state rep./time traveler
Please note: This article is published as an archive copy from Philadelphia City Paper. My City Paper is not affiliated with Philadelphia City Paper. Philadelphia City Paper was an alternative weekly newspaper in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The last edition was published on October 8, 2015.
Defeated politician makes a soft landing on a pretty strange public access show.
That's Babette on the right, and, obviously, the third president of the United States on the left.
When former State Rep Babette Josephs met Thomas Jefferson, she didn't hold back.
"What are you accusing me of?" asked the bewildered 18th Century statesmen, likely confused by his inexplicable encounter with a 21st Century politician, much less a hostile one.
"I'm accusing you of raping her, repeatedly." says Josephs, referring to Jefferson's mistress and slave, Sally Hemmings, in this Youtube clip. "That's what I'm accusing you of."
If you want to know how Jefferson reacts to being taken to task by a woman some 200 years his junior, well, you have to tune into "Conversations Across Time," a public access TV show hosted by Josephs and her friend (and recent political donor) Vivienne Crawford that finally forces historical recreationists to answer the tough questions.
Given our glut of historical re-actors, it's kind of amazing we didn't already have a show like this, or sort of like this. But there you go. And all things considered in Philly politics, Josephs could be doing much worse things with her time (machine) than hosting a weird, low-budget, but sort-of-endearing TV show. Brian Sims knocked her out of office in 2012, as predicted by the Mayans.
Past guests, besides a menacingly large pitcher of lemon water, have apparently included "Presidents, Jefferson, Lincoln and Eisenhower, Christopher Columbus, Tupac Shakur, Fidel Castro, Tsar Nicholas II, former slaves, a Native American chief, Malcolm X, Frederick Douglass, John Foster Dulles, Niccolo Machiavelli and Josephine Baker."
The show airs Tuesdays at 10 p.m. on Philadelphia Community Access Media (Comcast Cable 66/966 or Verizon FIOS 29/30), but there's this Vimeo clip with a good chunk of one episode featuring Crawford, Josephs, Woodrow Wilson, Frederick Douglass and Countess Berthold of Swabia, all with strangely Philadelphian manners of speech.
If, for some reason, you have ever wondered what all of these people thought about the menace posed by Hitler, skip to to minute 19:00.
