SPEAKER_01: Hello! From WonderMedia Network, I'm Jenny Kaplan, and this is Womanica. This month we're talking about movers and shakers. Dancers, stuntwomen, martial artists, and other pioneering women who use their physical prowess to shake things up. Today we're talking about the motorcycle queen of Miami. A woman who crisscrossed the U.S. eight times over on her Harley-Davidson motorcycles. Let's talk about Bessie Stringfield. Bessie was born in Jamaica and immigrated to the U.S. as a child, where she was abandoned by her father on a street in Boston and was later adopted by an Irish woman. At least, that's one of the stories Bessie told her biographer years later. After Bessie's death, the New York Times unearthed different information about Bessie's early life. Records confirm that Bessie's parents were actually two Black Americans living in North Carolina. One thing we know for sure about Bessie's early life, by the time she was a teenager, she started to like motorcycles. She never had any formal training on how to ride them, but the first time she got behind the handlebars, she knew she was a natural. According to Bessie, by the time she was 19 years old, she started tossing pennies on maps and then riding her motorcycle out to wherever the penny landed. By 1930, Bessie became the first Black woman to ride her bike alone, through the 48 continental United States. This was before interstate highways. Bessie was often riding on unpaved roads. When she stopped in towns for the night, most motels wouldn't give her a room because of her race. She either had to find Black families to sleep with, or she'd sleep outside, perched on her motorcycle. Bessie rode with nothing but a leather jacket, a money belt, and some spare clothes. When her bike broke down, she'd fix it herself. To make money on the road, she performed stunts on her bike at carnivals. One stunt, called the Wall of Death, involved a huge arena with almost vertical walls. Bessie would ride her motorcycle along the walls, practically sideways. During the 1930s and 1940s, Bessie made eight trips across the United States in her motorcycle. She also took her motorcycle abroad, riding through Brazil, Haiti, and parts of Europe. Then World War II began, and Bessie started working as a civilian motorcycle dispatch rider. She delivered classified documents to various military bases, speeding down roadways in a blue Harley with a military crest on the front. After the war, Bessie settled down in Miami, Florida, and became a certified nursing assistant. But the police didn't want a Black woman riding around the streets on a motorcycle, so Bessie had trouble getting her license. That is, until the police chief took Bessie out to a nearby park and challenged her to perform bike tricks. Bessie nailed every one. Still, people weren't used to the idea of a Black woman on the back of a motorcycle. According to Bessie, she once disguised herself as a man, entered a local motorcycle racing competition, and won. When she took off her helmet and everyone realized she was a woman, she was denied her prize money. Eventually, people in Bessie's neighborhood grew used to seeing her riding around on her Harley, sometimes with a couple of her pet dogs on the back. She earned the nickname the Motorcycle Queen of Miami. As she grew older, Bessie started to suffer from problems caused by an enlarged heart. Her doctor advised her to stop riding her motorcycle, but Bessie told him, if I don't ride, I won't live long. Even in her 70s, she rode her motorcycle to church and back. Bessie died in 1993 at the age of 82. Nine years later, she was inducted into the Motorcycle Hall of Fame. All month, we're talking about movers and shakers. For more information, check us out on Facebook and Instagram at Wamanica Podcast. Special thanks to Liz Kaplan, my favorite sister and co-creator. As always, we'll be taking a break for the weekend. Talk to you on Monday.
