Author Patricia Majher

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00:00:32 Arthur A. Busch

OK, this is Arthur Busch. You're listening to Radio Free Flint. Today's episode is author Pat Major, an author whose book about?

00:00:44 Patricia Majher

Great girls in Michigan history.

00:00:47 Arthur A. Busch

I get it mixed up because you've also written a second book about bold boys.

00:00:51 Patricia Majher

Bold boys.

00:00:54 Arthur A. Busch

I get it mixed up sometimes when thinking about this interview, and I was calling bold girls and great boys, but...

00:01:02 Patricia Majher

I went for the alliteration.

00:01:04 Arthur A. Busch

There you go, so maybe. Great, Patricia is a notable book award. I don't know if it's a winner.

You won an award for the book about the girls from the state of Michigan Library this past year because it was one of the best books according to those in the book business.

I thought I would ask her to come and join us and the hook for me was that she writes about some well-known Flint area residents in her book, so welcome to my podcast.

Tell me about your books. Just introduce them to us, sure.

00:01:47 Patricia Majher

I should probably talk a little bit about my background and how I got to writing these books. I trained as a journalist, and I also have a historic preservation degree, so I love history. I was working at a museum in Lansing, MI, Women's Hall of Fame, and I used to do the exhibits there, among other things, and I did an exhibit on Michigan female Lighthouse keepers. And that ended up as a book because I'd done a lot of research for it, but one of the things that I also have spun off from that experience was there was a story about a child who was a daughter of a lighthouse keeper who had saved a man's life in the Detroit River.

It just got me thinking that there might be. Any more stories about girls who had done something amazing before they were 20?

00:02:40 Arthur A. Busch

The name of the book? About the lighthouse?

00:02:42 Patricia Majher

It's Ladies of the Lights--Michigan women in the US Lighthouse Service.

You know there are so many biographies out there, famous women and famous Michigan women. As a child reading something like that, you can relate a bit more if it's someone her age, so I focused on significant events that occurred early in the lives of these girls.

So, it's, you know, it's 20 chapters, which amounts to 20 mini-biographies of women who had some sort of connection to Michigan, even if they didn't go on to become famous, they did something famous when they were young.

00:03:21 Arthur A. Busch

Right, you had a long-time interest in history in your prior life before you started writing. You were the editor of one of my favorite magazines.

00:03:34 Patricia Majher

Yeah, I was editor of Michigan history for seven years. That was another place that, you know, certainly sparked an interest in me to gather information about girls 1st and then boys. I wrote a second book on boys.

I just came across so many stories and achievements that I felt there was enough to make this series of two books, and Wayne State University Press agreed with me.

00:04:00 Arthur A. Busch

The second book we wrote is about boys, which is a corollary in parallel to the girls. What were the criteria that you used to select the people who you ultimately found? Do you know who ultimately found their way into the book itself?

00:04:18 Patricia Majher

Well,  both the girls.

In the boys (book), as I was making those choices, I could have written a book just about girls and boys in the arts because that's a field where you know you start very young. If you're a singer or a dancer, whatever act. Here and the other field where kids start young is athletics, so that could have been a separate book on its own, but I wanted to make the books accessible to people of all interests or kids of all interests.

00:04:45 Patricia Majher

I varied, you know, the field that these children excelled in, you know, culturally. I also tried to get different time periods and different parts of the state so that any child anywhere in Michigan could hopefully find someone they could relate to in that book.

00:05:04 Arthur A. Busch

The book you wrote for these kids is used again for what age groups?

00:05:09 Patricia Majher

Elementary age.

00:05:10 Arthur A. Busch

Cool, so in the Flint area, you selected three individuals in these two books.

Sarah Emma Edmonds

Jim Abbott

And Michael Moore

Interesting choices. Did you structure the writing to make it a certain level of reading? How do you construct a book like this just targeted at kids?

00:05:35 Patricia Majher

Yeah, it was a little bit challenging. I don't have any training as a teacher, but I did have people who reviewed the text who were teachers. There's also software you can run your text past and see what grade level it is.

I sort of wrote each chapter and then returned and ensured that the words were something children in elementary or middle school would understand. I developed a glossary for each because there were just some things that are associated with different fields.

Most people would know I was writing about Julie Krone. She was a jockey, and one of the words I came across reading about her was odd. Walking that's essentially a talk about cooling down the horse after it's been running. I thought, well, this isn't something everybody knows, and I had never heard the term either.

There is a glossary in the back for some of those terms or explaining some of the bigger concepts like prohibition mode or whatever.

Yeah, it's still about writing a good story, engaging story no matter what your audience is.

00:06:46 Arthur A. Busch

The subjects in the book focused on their accomplishments before the age of 20.

So that is how you picked? Jim Abbott, for example. Most of us know his story. For the sake of repeating it. For many in my audience who may not know his story, why don't you just give us a little summary of that chapter?

00:07:12 Patricia Majher

Sure, yeah. Why is my is important? And one of the reasons why I picked him was that I wanted to have someone who had overcome physical challenges. In his case, he was born without one of his hands, his right hand. I generally try to bring these inspirational elements to the fore in the books because, again, that's something I want.

The kids to come away with that, you know you can overcome difficulties, whether it's poverty or were abused or you know you had a disability, or your family didn't have a father or whatever, and you still overcame that.

So, Jim, I have to say, Jude, the focus for Jim was on, you know, lacking at hand. And how challenging it was for him to become the great pitcher, he was starting with that. Baseball, the University of Michigan football player, played in the NFL.

00:08:10 Arthur A. Busch

He spoke about Jim Abbott. If we want to know what kind of person Jim Abbott is because he's a person. He's a whole person. He said all you got to do is go back and look at some film because, during the Olympics, I forget what year it was he pitched in the Olympics. He was the guy that carried the flag out.

He was selected by all the people there. All the Olympians on the American side. To be the one guy they wanted most to be out front and represent our country demonstrated at least he has some general leadership skills.

Yeah, and even today, he speaks as a motivational speaker, so that continues his strength, you know, that can-do spirit.

00:09:00 Patricia Majher

You know there haven't been too many people in any major sports that have risen in their sport. You know, with some sort of disability. I thought his story was astounding, and what? I told people who I included in my book. I would list the names, and they'd be like, oh yeah, Jim Abbott.

I remember him, so you know. I think he resonated with people outside of baseball and outsider sports too. So, I think he was thought of very highly even as a child. You know he wasn't an underdog, but he was a star at Flint Central and even the quarterback on the football team for a while.

And frankly, I would have put him in the book even without him going on too, you know to U of M and to, you know, the professional. I mean, who pitches in the Olympic Games he's pitching just in the World Series?

00:09:51 Arthur A. Busch

The University of Michigan.

00:09:54 Patricia Majher

It was very enjoyable to work with.

00:09:55 Arthur A. Busch

Just read a book. I'd like to add my editorial on him. He comes from a wonderful family. Kathy and Mike Abbott are Jim's parents. And they're just wonderful people, and they've been involved in the Flint community, and his grandpa was a well-known businessman here in town.

He just exhibits all the great qualities of his parents and his grandparents, and we're still very proud of him here in Flint.

Alright, moving along with giving him accolades

00:10:32 Arthur A. Busch

The one that I know you wrote about 40 people, or some such thing, is this, but I want to ask you a question about what I thought was one of the most interesting historical figures before I ever knew you wrote a book, and that was Sarah Emma Edmonds.

And tell us her story and what you think. In terms of the vantage point of history.

00:10:58 Patricia Majher

Sarah was the person I came to know when I was at the Michigan Women's Hall of Fame.

She was in the Hall of Fame, one of the female historical figures from the Civil War period who served during the Civil War. generally, those women served undercover, if you will, portraying men, and we're not known, you know, to be women at the time they served, but Sarah was certainly one of the more colorful characters the in that history.

She was a Canadian by birth and came from very challenging family life, just made her way very early on, leaving Canada and making her way to Flint. I don't exactly know why she chose Flint because she moved a couple of times, but that was the place from which she was listed in the Civil War. She had her father abusive, and so that's why she fled Canada. He wanted to marry her off as a young teen, and he's having none of it.

So, she came to America. She changed her name. Her name was Edmundson, but she dropped the son part, hoping to stay. You know, under the radar from her father and certainly after she joined the army. She got away from him.

She did some interesting things that were kind of nontraditional. You know, she wasn't necessarily somebody who was, you know, had her Springfield grateful it was on the front lines.

She would carry mail between the various Union encampments, and she was to be a spy at one point. They were looking for spies, or people could portray a spy and get into the Confederate side of things on the backside of the battlefield.

They or did portray a slave as a means of getting into these tapes while working hard for the Confederate Army. Being able to ask, they were giving to enslaved people.

She would gather information about how many troops they were at this particular place or what their weapons were. Then she would escape at night, run back to where the Union army was camped, and deliver those messages. She wrote a book about herself in which some historians think she embellished the stories a bit, but I'm sure some parts of it were true, and it was probably just an exaggeration more than that.

Anything well, anyway, and any of that ** *** did. She was a nurse. She acted as a male nurse. She called herself Frank Thompson, and then she contracted malaria. She was quite sick, and she wanted, you know, she wanted to be helped, but she couldn't go to the doctor. Because he would have exposed her as a woman, so she left the army.

Just, you know, AWOL and then came back as a woman and a nurse again. So, she just felt very strongly that the Union army should be the victor in that war. That enslaved people should be freed. So, she did her best to stay in the war as long as possible until malaria and later leg injury caught up with her.

00:14:18 Arthur A. Busch

So, for those of you that are listening to this. Let me go downtown Flint; the corner is Saginaw and Court Street.

You'll see a large stone that honors Sarah Emma Edmonds. And it's been there for a long time, and it has her story as well.

There, so what do you want the kids to draw from? This story of Sarah?

00:14:41 Patricia Majher

Well, again, difficult beginnings. Which she overcame by leaving and leaving her father. You know, sort of resilience, even though she was injured at one point and got malaria at another point, she kept coming back to serve. She obviously had some risk to herself. She would have been sent home if she had been found out at any point.

But she just, you know, embraced any opportunity that came her way. To advance the Union cause. Even though she was an impostor for a time, she could get a pension from the government and be elected to the membership of the Grand Army of the Republic.

So, she was even in her time. She was well regarded, let alone ours.

You know, we still talk about her.

00:15:31 Arthur A. Busch

OK, the third one picked was a filmmaker. Why did you select Michael Moore? What do you think his significance is to history?

Well, I was intrigued by him. I knew of Michael Moore from his movies, but I was intrigued that he was a very early officeholder. The school board and Davison, you know, shortly after the voting age dropped, young people could run for office. He did.

I thought that that was the hook for me. You know that someone so young would care so much about political and social issues that what some people would regard as a child was serving on the school board, a cause near and dear to his heart as he was in school.

So that's why I selected him again.

I wasn't focused on what he did afterward, but what did this famous person do as a child?

That sort of showed us early on; you know what he was made of and how his strong opinions and passion for social issues were evident.

00:16:41 Arthur A. Busch

And it continued. I don't think he was welcomed with open arms by the school's administration, yeah?

00:16:50 Patricia Majher

Yeah, well, by the end of his tenure on the board, the principal of his school was the motivator for him to get involved in school politics. The principal had resigned.

So, you know, he was instrumental in making big changes in Davison, and at the time, he was the youngest person serving in an office. You know, political office in the country.

00:17:16 Arthur A. Busch

And he got involved with and involved in many causes when he was under 20.

And then he turned that all into an effort to write a paper. I mean, he published a newspaper. Then he was involved in other sorts of issues, especially women's issues, counseling, and so forth. He has quite a colorful past and great parents too.

Also, I know his parent's mother passed away now, but they were wonderful parents. Have you talked to the parents? You'll say, where'd he come from? Right, particularly with an older guy, devoutly religious. That's another story about Michael Moore that a lot of people don't know, he wanted to be a priest, and I think he even attempted the seminarian at that Under the age of 20. I don't know if you put that in your story.

Now all right, so we got going down the way.

So basically, you think his significance to history is his age. He's the youngest guy in the country to hold office. He's part of The Cultural Revolution at the tail end. Uh, stuff like that, right?

00:18:39 Patricia Majher

Well, at least as a young person. That was he is significant, so you know. He's an Oscar winner, which I'm a Movie lover, so I appreciate. That, but that came later.

So yeah, I think as a child, what drew me to his story was you know, such a passion for social and political issues at a young age and serving in an office that most people didn't that at the age of 18.

00:19:04 Arthur A. Busch

Moving along, I know the book that was selected as notable. What was that about the girls?

So, let's, uh, let's go over to that. What might, might the readers find in that of great significance?

00:19:20 Patricia Majher

The story, as I said, that motivated me to start with the children's books was about this girl who had been a lifesaver in the Detroit River.

Excuse me, and she was the daughter of a lighthouse keeper on an island in the river, and her father had gone away from the lighthouse station to this nearby Wyandotte where they would, you know, shop and get their mail and such, and she and her mother were left there.

They received a call from a passing steamer notifying them that there was somebody who was floundering in the river; even though she was only 13 or 14 at the time, he jumped in the row boats that they were left with after their dance shoot, the big book and rode out a mile and saved this man and brought him back. It was cold water, and he probably would have succumbed if she hadn't come to his rescue.

00:20:14 Arthur A. Busch

What was her name?

00:20:15 Patricia Majher

Her name was Maybelle Mason.

00:20:18 Patricia Majher

And there was big news in Detroit that she had done this, but it became big news nationally, and the US Gov gave her an award, a silver medal, or lifesaving. The gold medal is only given if you lose your life.

That's a posthumous award. You don't want that one. So anyway, as a child again and a female child who bought for her to save someone's life and be recognized, you know, at the national level, she also received a separate medal from the Shipmasters Association, which were the captains who sailed the Great Lakes?

They took her under their wing as they were enthralled with her story legend that certain captains would toot their horns when they passed by the island as sort of a tip of the hat to her.

After she had done this amazing thing and before she got married and left the island. So yeah, I just thought that was incredibly elite for a child. Even moment's notice to take upon yourself.

00:21:22 Arthur A. Busch

Wait, what year was this?

00:21:22 Patricia Majher

The best food. Oh boy, you're going to make me look this one up, Busch.

00:21:28 Arthur A. Busch

I'm sorry you don't know.

00:21:31 Patricia Majher

So many people, so many dates, and as such, they did not memorize.

00:21:36 Arthur A. Busch

I just thought that if this happened today, she'd end up on 60 minutes.

00:21:41 Patricia Majher

It was in 1890, and there's a wonderful picture in the book of her wearing her two medals. She had gotten a formal portrait done as a young team.

You know, she didn't end up becoming a lighthouse keeper herself or anything we could document. Besides wife and mother, that was part of the thing.

You know, what I wanted to do with this book was show that I did not just focus on people who are famous adults, you know, and find out what they did as children. I looked from the child's perspective, which was most important to me.

00:22:14 Arthur A. Busch

Any others that come to mind?

00:22:17 Patricia Majher

I cannot help but have somebody like Diana Ross in the book. You know she and the Supreme started very early.

Again, as Barry Gordy recognized young teens, he essentially made them wait a little while like he did not want them to lose out on school and their lives. You know, as young girls.

So, you know, he made them come.

00:22:41 Arthur A. Busch

Back in a couple of years, she just had this, you know, natural talent that was recognized in the neighborhood and in singing contests around Detroit.

00:22:50 Patricia Majher

Right, you know? Eventually, she came to be, you know, the shining, shining female star, at least of the Motown Empire.

00:22:58 Arthur A. Busch

Were you able to interview any of these people? Some of them are still alive.

00:23:02 Patricia Majher

I did interview some people, and others I sent a message to and did not receive any callback, so it wasn't anything I was writing about that was, you know, controversial. So I felt comfortable moving ahead.

Without a formal interview with them.

00:23:21 Arthur A. Busch

Did you ever get a chance to interview Michael Moore?

00:23:25 Patricia Majher

He was one person I didn't get a response back from.

00:23:30 Arthur A. Busch

Well, I think you should show up on his podcast is what I think. He's got a podcast called Rumble, and respect you. You are selecting young people for one of the top awards in Michigan. He owes you that.

00:23:44 Patricia Majher

Well, you put in a good word for me.

00:23:48 Arthur A. Busch

All right, so what about Jim Abbott? Did you get the chance to talk to him?

00:23:55 Patricia Majher

I did with Jim. Yes, not with Diana is another person, but I am sure they had dozens or hundreds of requests. You know they only respond to something. Not from a person they've never heard of.

00:24:08 Arthur A. Busch

All right, so my curiosity was satisfied on that subject question. Who is the most unusual one that You spoke to?

00:24:15 Patricia Majher

Well, I think Julie Krone, the jockey was from southwest Michigan.

I appreciate women who, you know, step outside the norm in terms of their career choices.

And you know, proceed no matter what, and she was that in spades. I mean, you know, not only did she have to work her way up in the horse racing thoroughbred horse racing ranks because there were jockeys already there, but she physically fought the jockeys.

That is how you know how determined she was to be a Jockey and to show that she was tough enough to be part of their fraternity.

00:24:55 Arthur A. Busch

One of the people that you interviewed was Jack White.

He's the rocker from Detroit.

00:25:03 Patricia Majher

Yep, you know, he is still very interested in Detroit. You know he has a record store and employs many people in the area in Detroit.

Though he now lives in Nashville, yes, he was kind enough to provide photos to read my text, and they will give me a thumbs up or thumbs down. And you know, he seemed thrilled to be part of the book, recognized that way. Very accommodating, very open.

00:25:31 Arthur A. Busch

Why did you include Jack and White Stripes?

00:25:35 Patricia Majher

I again tried to get that variety of fields you know of endeavor in his case. He is one of the younger people I included in the book, so there was that too.

00:25:48 Arthur A. Busch

I mean, what was it about his life that merited being chosen on your list?

00:25:54 Patricia Majher

He was a musical prodigy. You know, could just pick up an instrument, learn it, and was playing in bands before he turned 20, so you know not The White Stripes came after that and all the other bands he has been a part of since then. Yeah, he was considered a musical prodigy the in the rock world in Detroit.

00:26:14 Arthur A. Busch

Did any of these people get into some alternative? I mean, you talk about lighthouse keepers. You've talked about social activism. You talked about military service. And talked about musical artists. How about some other? Did you talk to any lawyers?

00:26:36 Patricia Majher

Stevens T Mason. In the book for Boys, he was called the Boy Governor of Michigan.

00:26:43 Arthur A. Busch

A great story, I know.

00:26:44 Patricia Majher

Yeah, so you know he was reading the law as they would have said, I guess in that era, he was kind of, you know, making that rise in politics. His father was the secretary of the state of the territory. I should say that. His father was, you know, he did not wish to continue in that role, but he had brought Stevens along with him when he moved to Michigan from his home in Kentucky. Stevens, or as he was called Tom at that time. Both of you know the political life he loved being in Detroit, where the capital was at that time.

It was kind of a Man about town. Even as a teenager, he just served in a very interim way when there was a time period between the two governors of the territory. But he was such a young governor when he was elected. That's why they refer to him as the boy down here. He is the person for whom Mason County and the city of Mason are named. There are a lot of schools named for him.

As he was the 1st. Governor after Michigan became a state in 1831 when he was the interim.

00:27:57 Arthur A. Busch

You'll get your book about girls in particular. Women have made a lot of progress over the years in America.

Sarah Emma Edmonds could fight in the war, but she could vote. What does your research tell you about the trajectory of women? So, like, 50 years from now, some Podcaster is going to interview somebody about women of great accomplishment in Michigan? Where is that going?

00:28:28 Patricia Majher

Fortunately, somebody like Sarah had to start as an impostor in the field she was interested in.

That then there came the point where women were a minority in the field, you know. And even today, you could say that the military and then you know. The next step is where women are more evenly represented. You know, across different jobs Fields.  I think, though, there are certain traits that the girls shared that I picked, and I did not know that until they explored their lives further, and there is a good example of this.

One of the traits of both the boys and the girls was that they had a strong father figure, negative or positive.

Hers were negative. You know, because he was an abusive man, other girls had very positive relationships with their fathers, who, you know, were encouraged by their fathers to try in these fields. So, I found that very interesting, but you know most of these girls lived during a time when their mothers were, you know, working at home.

You know, there were no careers for women in the 1830s or whatever, so I think that's why the mother's influence was not as strong, but there was this very dominant pattern of either, you know, a very positive or a very negative father.

And usually, it was positive for the girls, and for the boys, it was usually negative that their father left the family or he was a drinker. Or, you know, somebody who could not hold a job or whatever. So, these boys would look at that situation and say, I got to step up for my whole family.

So as you know, that was interesting to me in both cases that the father was such a strong figure.

Whether you know a lot of the kids came from some sort of challenge, you know whether it was a physical challenge or poverty slavery. That was another thing their life was challenging, but they did not feel sorry for themselves. They picked themselves up, and did you know, whatever they were doing, they were determined to excel. They all also did their work for fun.

They enjoyed what they did. Didn't think it was work that was a big motivator to was they just really enjoyed what they were doing?

00:30:54 Arthur A. Busch

If you look at the future for women and girls. The most obvious one that we might talk about at some point now in our lives or in the next generation of our children. Is a woman president?

00:31:12 Patricia Majher

Yeah, and we have had two women governors here in Michigan. When I wrote the book, Jennifer Granholm would have been a candidate, except she grew up in Canada. And this book was about Michigan.

00:31:25 Arthur A. Busch

What is the oldest example that you have?

00:31:29 Patricia Majher

Jane Johnston Schoolcraft. She was a Native American who became the first Native American writer literary writer in America, and she was born in 1800. She was the youngest.

00:31:43 Arthur A. Busch

The more recent ones are the Jack whites of the world and so.

00:31:46 Patricia Majher

Forth yeah, Serena Williams is the very recent one. She is still in her career as a tennis player. She was born in Saginaw, which was her mom's hometown. She never lived in Michigan for any, you know, extended period. But we claim her. She was born here.

00:32:06 Arthur A. Busch

Wow, that's amazing. I didn't realize that. Well, some women you left off, so you know every Uh, every book, every movie it what is on the cutting floor for some people may be more interesting than what is in the book.

What was on your cutting floor? That you just could not squeeze in.

00:32:26 Patricia Majher

There were probably more people in the arts and athletics because there were so many candidates.

And since I've read or authored the books, I have had people ask me about this person. What about that person?  I'd love to write a volume. Two of both books.

00:32:41 Arthur A. Busch

But if somebody wants to buy this book, I mean whether it is a grandma or a mom. Or, as a gift or whatever, how would they go about doing that through Wayne State University Press?

00:32:52 Patricia Majher

They can certainly go to their website.

They can buy a debt through Amazon, and many bookstores carry them in the children's section. So those would be, you know, my third, my three best suggestions for getting it.

00:33:06 Arthur A. Busch

The other thing that I wanted to ask you is, are you working on another project just as you leave?

00:33:11 Patricia Majher

I just published a book. It came out in October, and it. It is the worst thing to do during a pandemic. The worst book is a travel guide. And they travel down to the town. I live in Ann Arbor and have lived here for 40 years. It is about everything you might think it would be shopping, entertainment, restaurants, sports, all of this.

And it's 100 things to do with food dye in Ann Arbor, and it is part of a series, so I did not have any choice in that title. But yes, it was a big hit at Target. Publishes that book 3D press Rey Press.

Arthur Busch

Thank you for joining us here.