Welcome to Women’s History Wednesdays!
Every Wednesday we will feature a little known but important women in history.
If you watched the movie “The Harder They Fall” in 2021 you would have seen the real-life historical figure named Stagecoach Mary played by Zazie Beetz. Mary Fields was a 6 ft tall, 200 lbs. woman who drank whiskey, cursed like a sailor, wore pants under her skirt, and packed a pistol in the folds of her apron. She definitely was NOT a delicate flower! She was allowed to patronize saloons and taverns at a time when women could not.
Mary Fields was born enslaved in Hickman County, Tennessee, in about 1832. After Emancipation, she made her way to Florida, worked on a Mississippi River riverboat and lived in a convent in Ohio. She eventually ended up in Montana to nurse her friend, Mother Superior Mary Amadeus Dunne, back to health. She lived in her convent with the nuns but was kicked out by the Bishop because she swore and drank too much. She did odd jobs to get by – laundress, restauranteur, and took on roles that were considered men’s work – maintenance, repairs hauling freight, and construction. She was the first African American woman to work as a mail carrier for the US Postal Service. She got the job because she was the fastest applicant to hitch a 6-horse stagecoach; that was how she got her nickname, Stagecoach Mary. She worked as a mail carrier from 1895 to 1903. She was fearless but carried several guns to protect herself from wild animals, stagecoach bandits and robbers. Her life story has been portrayed by Esther Rolle, Dawnn Lewis, Kimberly Elise, Erykah Badu, Zazie Beetz, and Whoopi Goldberg between 1976 and 2024.
