Children's author Anne Bustard on her favorite picture book biographies and a few collected biographies, too, birthday by birthday.
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
Unknown Birthday: Blanche Leathers
Blanche Leathers, steamboat captain
c. 1860-?
Steamboat! The Story of Captain Blanche Leathers by Judith Heide Gilliland, illustrated by Holly Meade (DK, 2000)
Blanche Leathers didn't listen when as a child she was told, "Girls don't grow up to be steamboatmen." America's first woman steamboat captain proudly sailed the Mississippi River for years.
View a photo of a steamboat Captain Blanche Leathers commanded, on this link to the Tennessee Genealogy & History site.