Writing Women Back into History
When I created Jane’s grandmother, I wanted her to symbolize the strength and quiet courage woven through women’s history. What I discovered in the world of abolitionists amazed me. While the anonymous name M.L. Hope that I created was fiction, she stands firmly in the tradition of several wealthy and influential women in late 18th‑century…
The Great Black Jockeys
In shaping Peter of Chasing Freedom into a character who loves animals and finds his place as a stable boy, I dug deeply into the history of horse racing in the late 1700s and early 1800s. That research led me to an extraordinary source: The Great Black Jockeys by Edward Hotaling.On its cover is a…
Congressman Cutler and Macaroni
One of the most interesting figures I stumbled upon while researching the Myers Tavern at Matildaville was Congressman Manasseh Cutler. His published journals contain one of the few surviving references to the Widow Jane Myers, which gave me some of the only factual grounding I had for her character. That single detail sent me down…
