Introduce students to the life of “Fearless Mary,” the first female stagecoach driver.
Meet Mary Fields, a trailblazer of the American West. She was formerly enslaved, tough-as-nails and eventually became the first African American woman stagecoach driver in 1895, when, in her 60s, she beat out all the cowboys who wanted the job by being the fastest to hitch a team of six horses. Fields excelled and opened the door for other women and people of color to become stagecoach drivers and postal workers.
Great lesson plan for Women’s History Month.