Finding the unexpected in the everyday.
In 1983, Elizabeth “Liddy” Dole was appointed by President Ronald Reagan to serve as the eighth U.S. secretary of transportation. She was the first woman to serve in the role. Dole’s accomplishments as secretary of transportation included facilitating the transfer of control of Washington National (now Ronald Regan National) Airport and Washington Dulles International Airport... Continue Reading →
Sarah Clark Kidder (c. 1839-1933) was the first woman in the world to run a railroad. Her husband John Flint Kidder, whom she married in 1870, became president of the California-based Nevada County Narrow Gauge Railroad (NCNGRR) in 1884. After he died in 1901, Sarah – who now found herself in control of three-fourths of... Continue Reading →
One of the more memorable motorcyclists during the 1910s -- an era that has been characterized as the Golden Age of American Motorcycling -- was a woman named Della L. Crewe. She was born in Wisconsin in 1884 and eventually made her way to Texas. By 1910, she was living in Waco and working there... Continue Reading →
Kathleen “Kate” Moore devoted most of her long life serving at the Connecticut-based Black Rock Harbor Light during an era in which lighthouse duties in the United States were generally handled by men only. Her father Stephen Moore became the keeper at the lighthouse, located on Fayerweather Island (just south of Bridgeport), in 1817. Kate,... Continue Reading →
Mary Anderson (1866-1953) was an entrepreneur who worked at various times during her long life as a rancher, real estate developer, and viticulturist (someone who grows grapes). In addition, the Alabama native made a major contribution to transportation by inventing the first practical windshield wiper. Anderson was inspired to create her version of this device... Continue Reading →
Anita King (1884-1963) was a silent-film star who achieved an additional measure of fame for establishing a transportation record. In 1915, King – at the time a Famous Players Film Company actress whose first film had been the Cecil B. De Mille western “The Virginian” – became the first woman to make a transcontinental solo... Continue Reading →
Ellen Church (1904-1965) was the first female flight attendant. The Iowa-born Church was a registered nurse and she also had a pilot’s license. While Boeing Air Transport (predecessor to United Airlines) would not give her a job as a pilot, it did hire her to serve as a flight attendant for the company’s planes. Church... Continue Reading →
During the late 19th century, Katherine T. “Kittie” Knox was a transportation pioneer who bravely confronted the era’s gender and racial barriers. Knox, who was born in 1874 to a white mother and African-American father, earned a living as a seamstress but found her passion in bicycling. Knox became a member of the Riverside Cycling... Continue Reading →
Olive Dennis (1885-1957) was an innovative and influential civil engineer in the U.S. railroad industry at a time when technical opportunities for women in that transportation sector were few and far between. Dennis, who was born in the Pennsylvania community of Thurlow and moved to Baltimore with her family when she was six, became only... Continue Reading →
By the late 1870s, more women than ever before were taking part in the then-popular pedestrian races in the United States. Several of the women participating in the sport achieved widespread fame and impressive records, but it was Amy Howard of Brooklyn, New York, who stood out as the era’s foremost and undisputed female walking... Continue Reading →
Transportation History 