This biography is reprinted in full with permission from the National Women’s History Museum (United States of America). NWHM biographies are generously supported by Susan D. Whiting. All rights reserved.
Born: 1911 or 1912, United States
Died: 16 February 1993
Country most active: United States
Also known as: Betsy Leonora Ellis
“The Motorcycle Queen of Miami” Bessie Stringfield loved riding so much that she would drop a penny on a map and ride to wherever it landed. Over sixty years of riding, she proved that “nice girls” did indeed ride motorcycles. And ride them well.
Born in Jamaica in 1911 and adopted by a white Boston couple at age five, Stringfield was naturally drawn to motorcycles, learning to ride at 16. Though her first motorcycle was a 1928 Indian Scout, she was a Harley woman at heart, owning 27 over her lifetime.
By age 19, Stringfield was taking solo cross-country trips, calling them her “penny rides”. Like most African American travelers in the 1930s, Stringfield faced prejudice and intimidation. Motels refused to rent rooms to her. A pickup truck driver once forced her off the road. But she did not give up on adventure.
If you had black skin you couldn’t get a place to stay. I knew the Lord would take care of me and He did. If I found black folks, I’d stay with them. If not, I’d sleep at filling stations on my motorcycle.
Stringfield financed her road trips by performing motorcycle stunts at carnivals where she astounded audiences with her skill and daring. A favorite trick was to ride standing up on the saddle.
During World War II, Stringfield joined the Department of the Army as a civilian motorcycle dispatch rider. She crisscrossed the country eight times delivering messages between military bases. After the war was over, she re-located to Miami, Florida where she continued to perform as a stunt rider and earned the “Motorcycle Queen” moniker. Stringfield rode well into old age, and before dying at age 82 in 1993 reflected to her biographer, “I was somethin’! What I did was fun and I loved it.
The doctor wanted to stop me from riding. I told him if I don’t ride, I won’t live long. And so I never did quit.”
IW note: Although Stringfield later claimed to have been born in Jamaica, she was actually born in Edenton, North Carolina.