Adventurous Women 6 - Justine Kerfoot

 This post is partly a repeat of a previous one, but I said it all very well back then. I just didn't tell you about the book. The book is Woman of the Boundary Waters, and her name is Justine Kerfoot. She had died before I learned about her, but I did know her son and daughter-in-law.

Justine was born in 1906. She completed college with a degree in zoology with minors in philosophy and chemistry. She played sports. She had planned to become a doctor. In the late 1920s, her mother bought the Gundlint Lodge resort on the Gunflint Trail in the Minnesota Arrowhead from the family who had begun it, and Mae (her mother) and Justine began running the lodge. Justine was captivated with the backwoods life. I think this picture might be the lodge even before 1930.


Justine learned how to do everything- carpentry, canoeing, being an electrician, guiding, plumbing, trapping, fishing, you name it. She wrote a newspaper column and several books. She was friends with the Chippewa and anyone else who needed a friend. Although she was a small woman, people soon learned to respect her knowledge and strength.

Her son Bruce, and his wife Sue, ran Gunflint Lodge until just a few years ago when it was sold out of the family.

Justine portaged her own canoe until she was 90. She was responsible for a lot of the planning and deveopment of the Gunflint Trail area, serving on local boards. And more. Quite a lady, don't you think? I would love to have met her, but I have met Bruce and Sue, and I have read a biography of her life. The closest I could get to her was to have my picture taken with her portrait in 2009. This picture no longer hangs in the lodge. It probably belonged to the family, and was not sold with the building.

Today was mixed bag. I did an hour of screen time for clients. I prepared for and did three errands and got an oil change. When I got home I ate something and was literally shaking on my feet. Fell in bed like a rock and have basically been there since.

I have to take whatever successes I can get.

See Justine's Meatloaf

Adventurous Women 5 - Tori McClure

 This is one of my all-time favorite adventure books about a woman. I'm not entirely sure why because I'm usually more captivated by land adventures than watery ones, but it's a combination of a very strong and tough woman who meets a totally unforgiving ocean. The book is A Pearl in the Storm. Tori sets out to row solo across the Atlantic Ocean.



The boat Tori builds just doesn't look very seaworthy. It's clunky and made of plywood. However, the plan is that the design will keep it afloat and self-righting with a water-tight cabin.

She tries to catch the Gulf Stream currents, but isn't sure she's ever actually succeeded.

The accounts of the storms she endures and survives will convince you never to try this at home! It's amazing.

As the book progresses, you learn more about Tori the person and what gave her such a competitive spirit.

After surviving the hurricane on the Atlantic in a wooden boat, she had to abandon this first quest. But this isn't the end of the story.

In 1999, she became the first woman to row solo across the Atlantic Ocean.

My back is much better. I was totally functional for more than half the day, but did spend some time on the heating pad, and I'm headed there again. No headache. I really think that was connected to the back pain. I edited, cleaned the kitchen, took a little walk (moving is better for the back).

See Robyn Davidson

Adventurous Women 4 - Robyn Davidson

 This adventure has always seemed more outrageous and foreign to me than most of the others I've read about, including skiing to the North Pole. That, I can imagine. Riding a camel across Australia just boggles my mind. The name of the book is Tracks. It was also made into a movie, but I haven't seen that. Edited: I have now seen the movie. It's free on YouTube with ads. It's very good.


In 1977, Robyn Davidson decided to cross the Australian Outback by camel. She managed to convince National Geographic to sponsor the event in return for a story. The trek was photographed by NatGeo.

Of course, camels are not indiginous to Australia. She thought they would be perfectly suited to the climate and the task, so she finally procured four of them that had been brought to Australia by other explorers who had also thought the same. A dog also accompanied her expedition. Except for the occasional appearances of the photographer, she trekked 1700 miles with only the camels and a dog.

A great deal of the tale is the preparations. There is a fair amount of Australian cultural tension. She dealt with Aborigines at Alice Springs where she staged the expedition, and learned quite a lot about the treatment of those native peoples.

The trip was hot, lonely, at times desperate. To be honest, I don't know if I could have done something like this. The heat doesn't appeal. The bleakness of the landscape doesn't call me. OK... ice is bleak too. Must just be me.

Taking care of four camels and trying to make miles sounds more like a job than an adventure. But I loved the book.

It's mind-blowing that Robyn is only a couple of years younger than I am. She has also written a recent memoir called Unfinished Woman. I might want to read this.

In other news: I managed to edit a fair amount. We got out of the driveway without too much trouble. I got a (rare for me) migraine after lunch and had to lie down for a while. All better now.

See Ordinary Women

Adventurous Women 3 - Sue Carter, Frida Waara

 This is a book that is special to me. Actually, if I had known about this expedition ahead of time, I might have applied to participate. Yes, seriously. This quest was completed on my birthday in 2001!

I met Sue in maybe 2003 when she came to Ludington to speak about their adventure, and Frida in maybe 2005. Frida and I more or less stay in touch.



Sue was the leader of the expedition. Her book is Ordinary Women. Their adventure is that they were the first group of women to ski to the North Pole from the Russian side of the world. These were not professional explorers, but a group of adventurous women who planned and trained and made it happen.

Persistence and endurance were the qualities that led to their success. Of course, they had done a lot of advance work to know what they needed to do. Each member of the team had an important role.

Adventurous Woman 2 - Alice Ramsey

The next adventurous woman on my list is Alice Huyler Ramsey. You may never have heard of her, but I love her story. She was the first woman to drive an automobile across the United States. The car was a Maxwell, and the year was 1909. She was 22 years old.

Alice had plenty of experience driving and had even won some competitions prior to her trip, despite the fact that women were not encouraged to get behind the wheel of a motorcar. She was accompanied by two sisters-in-law, and a 19-year-old friend named Hermine. None of the others knew how to drive.

This particular book reprints Alice's original work, Veil, Duster, and Tire Iron, but adds additional material by Gregory M. Franzwa. The extra material adds some background and clarity, but the original work is the gem.

Only 152 miles of the 3800-mile trek were paved. The infant AAA provided maps, but more often the ladies followed telephone poles in hopes that they would lead to some sort of town. Getting fuel was an ongoing problem.

Marie and I alternately roared with laughter and gasped at their predicaments as we read this book for one of our selections on a hike.

Alice was the first woman voted into the Automotive Hall of Fame. She continued to enjoy driving her entire life.

In other news: I did some editing, wrote my column for LDN, and Om and I watched Addams Family Values. I've loved Addams Family since childhood- the cartoons, then the TV series, and the first movie. I was a little skeptical since sequels are sometimes lacking. But this was hilarious. If you have any sacred cows, don't watch it, because it has all the glorious upside-down values of the Addams Family. Wednesday and Uncle Fester are the stars, but baby Pubert definitely comes to the rescue.

See Libby Riddles

Adventurous Women 1 - Libby Riddles

 I have a few series of posts going that I add to from time to time, because, honestly, some days just don't have anything very exciting to write about.

There is a feature on Amazon called Listmania. You can still find it if you dig deep although it used to be given better exposure. The list I created was called "Adventurous Women." I love adventure books, and particularly stories that feature the girls who are out to push their physical limits and find that thrill of sport.

I'm going to add this feature to my blog possibilities, and review one book on that list from time to time.

First (for no particular reason), I'll tell you about the book Race Across Alaska, by and about Libby Riddles. She was the first woman to win the Iditerod sled race, in 1985, at age 28. The book was written in 1988.

The narrative jumps right into the race, with a day-by-day account of the action. You don't need to know anything about racing sled dogs, because you'll learn it all as you go. It's an exotic enough sport for most of us to hold the attention. Small maps accompany each entry. Background is woven into the narrative.

There are also sidebars explaining some of the background information needed to understand terminology or sledding philosophy.

Riddles' fame has been somewhat eclipsed by Susan Butcher, who went on to win the Iditarod four times. But Libby Riddles was the first woman to have what it takes to win. And the name of Mary Shields has been completely forgotten. She was the first woman to complete the race. Her time wasn't good, but in 1974, most people didn't even think women could do something like that.

I actually liked this book so much I read it onto tapes for my mother when she was still alive. Maybe that's why I'm sharing it first. It was one of the first books I read about an adventurous woman (although I had read a bio of Amelia Ehrhart before that for sure, and probably others)

In other news: all the usual- I edited, I worked on projects. I wrote chapter 39 in Vacation from DMS, 604 words.

See Books

Sojourner Truth, and, and, and...

 This morning we went to Sojourner Truth State Park. It's quite a new park that was put on the site of a former brickyard and cement factory. There isn't a lot there yet, but we saw most of it. Sojourner Truth grew up in this county, Ulster County. Born in 1797, she was slave to a Dutch family. But she walked away with her infant son and sought refuge with an anti-slavery family. They bought her freedom for $20. She then sued her former owner for the freedom of her son and won! She was the first black woman to win a lawsuit against a white man in New York.

She became known as a speaker, abolitionist, and suffragette. She actually attempted to vote in 1872, although she was turned away.

There is supposedly a nice dock at river level, but we chose to take the hike to the other good destination at the park, an overlook of the Hudson River. The elevation of the surface of the Hudson here is only 16.4 feet above sea level, yet it's a 2-hour drive from here to New York City. No wonder the tides have an effect here. The elevation from this overlook was 160 feet.

There are several interpretive signs about the former industries. Clay at the base of the cliffs was used to make the bricks, and the cliffs were mined for limestone for the cement kilns. This small lake is a former quarry.

I also learned more about that really bad plant Trapa natans. I'm going to not use the common name "Water Chestnut" as that makes it sound like the Chinese vegetable (although the seeds of this are eaten in cultures where it is native). It's also called Water Caltrop. This is a mat of it on the Hudson River. Maybe we should be harvesting it and trying to eat it out of existence.

Here's a closer look. The mats are pretty dense. That has to be impacting the ecosystem.

There were also a lot of nice wildflowers at this park. I think they must have been mass planted to be so prolific and concentrated in a former industrial area. It's a mix of Bee Balm (Monarda), one of the wild sunflowers, and a coneflower. They do look great.

We also visited a preserve called Falling Waters (not the Frank Lloyd Wright one- that's in Pennsylvania). This has a nice loop trail and a little waterfall.

More grocery shopping, a little work time, and then this evening we were finally able to start the project that Marie would like to get done. We started staining her new deck. Hopefully we'll be able to finish while I'm still here. We got one coat on most of the railing.

Miles hiked so far in 2024: 354.6.

Overlook trail at Sojourner Truth State park, 1.7 miles. Falling Waters Preserve loop trail, 1.8 miles

See Saugerties Lighthouse

Anna Botsford Comstock

  Some of these winter days there isn't very much to blog about. And, there is no Philadelphia Flower Show this year. I usually show you pictures from that for more than a week. And, there will also be no trip to Philly to see David's family and Marie. Instead, I'm going to start a series of posts about something very close to my heart. I'll keep it a secret where we are going with this until the next post in this series, and for now I will just say that we are starting here.

This is a picture of a person I never met. In fact, she was dead before I was even thought of. Her name is Anna Botsford Comstock. She was born in 1854 and died in 1930.

Anna Botsford was born in western New York, an only child. She grew up on a farm and developed a love of nature study early in life. She was admitted to Cornell University (Ithaca, New York- and now much closer to where I grew up) in 1874. She fell in love with her entomology (study of insects) instructor, John Henry Comstock. They married and she dropped out of school. However, she taught herself to do illustrations for his books about insects. She later returned to school and received a degree in Natural History, and was one of the first women inducted into Sigma Xi, a sorority for honor students.

She went on to study wood engraving, to prepare plates for many more book illustrations. She became the third woman to be admitted to the Society of American Wood-Engravers. This is one of her engravings. She wrote, among other books, The Handbook of Nature Study, which is still in print! She was a pioneer in the practice of actually taking students outside to study, rather than bringing specimens into a classroom. She was the first female professor at Cornell. (Although she was not the first to receive a full professorship. All women were denied that until many years later.)

Stay tuned over the coming days to learn why this woman is important to me. I'll add a post on days when there is nothing current of interest.

In other news: I worked really hard on editing/formatting jobs today.

See Nora Stanton Blatch

A New Hero- Nora Stanton Blatch

I think I have a new "hero." This lady is Nora Stanton Blatch, the granddaughter of Elizabeth Cady Stanton who was one of the founders of the woman's rights movement in the United States. She lived from 1883-1971, and the picture was taken in 1921. (Oddly enough, my grandmother was born in 1882 and died in 1973.)

It turns out that Nora seems to have had plenty of her grandmother's spunk. For one thing, she was the first woman to earn a degree in Civil Engineering. She graduated from Cornell University in 1905, and worked her entire life as an engineer, mostly in the steel industry. She also continued the family tradition of fighting for the vote for women.

However, the reason that I came across her name is because she was also the first woman to swim across Cayuga Lake in New York, in 1904. Here's the connection. Since completing my big North Country Trail quest, people have been asking me what I want to do next. For sure, I want to finish hiking the Buckeye and Finger Lakes Trails (both of them have miles that aren't NCT). But I've been thinking about another idea.

When I was a child, it was a local badge of athleticism and stamina to swim across Cayuga Lake. I never had a chance to do it, back then.

But I've now walked 4400 miles on the longest hiking trail in the US. I've ridden sea to sea on a bicycle. This is beginning to sound like some sort of lifetime triathlon; it only needs a swimming component. So... my mind wanders back to that old dream.

There are lots of places to swim across Cayuga Lake. As it turns out there's an annual swim at the south end, just 1.25 miles. Hundreds of women participate in that each year to raise money for the local hospice. But I want my swim to be longer; for most of its length the lake is two or more miles wide. Where Nora swam it, the width was 2.25 miles. I found a newspaper article that gives the approximate location. It's quite a bit north of where I lived, but there is some appeal to using her same route.

In any case, I've made up my mind that next summer I'll be working up to a swim of that length and crossing Cayuga Lake. I have to arrange for a boat to accompany me... one doesn't swim across a large body of water without an escort. There are too many power boats and too many ways to get in trouble.

Thus, my interest in completing the 1.25-mile swim this Saturday. I swam at least a full mile both yesterday and today. That distance is estimated, but I think it's pretty close. I'll swim it again tomorrow, and then take Friday off.

Om is planning to go to the start with me on Saturday, so I hope he'll take some pictures. The swim is not a race. It's to raise money for the Hamlin Lake Preservation Society. I have no interest in racing- I'm sure there will be many strong young swimmers entered. I just hope I don't come in dead last.