New York’s Own – Page 5 – The Exasperated Historian

509) Mae Capone

“He was a mobster, but not a monster,” -Deirdre Capone, Al’s great-niece

509: Mae Capone

Al Capone’s Wife and Mother of His Son

Born: 11 April 1897, Brooklyn, New York, United States of America

Died: 16 April 1986, Miami, Florida, United States of America

Real Name: Mary Josephine Capone, nee Coughlin

After one visit to Al at Alcatraz Island, reporters supposedly chased her taxi for sixty-five miles.

Mae did not like Al’s criminal acts but never argued with him over it and remained loyal to him throughout her life—never speaking out or writing a tell all book or anything like that. She did however reportedly tell her son not to grow up to be a criminal and break her heart like his father.

Mae was the daughter of Irish immigrants and had several siblings. She married Al when she was twenty-one, and according to some sources, their marriage took place a month after the birth of their son.

In 1928, Al purchased an estate in Miami, Florida, a vacation/retirement home for his family, for $30,000. Because he placed the estate in his wife’s name, Mae was able to sell it after Al’s death. In 2012, the last living member of the family who still holds the name Capone, Al’s great-niece Deirdre, visited the mansion to see how much her memory held up (Al died when she was seven).

Not much else is known about Mae, she was, understandably, a very private person and the Capone family remains that way to this day; Al’s own son changed his name to Albert Brown. Mae outlived her husband by almost forty years, never remarried, and again, never spoke out.

Badges Earned:

Find a Grave Marked

Located In My Personal Library:

Killing the Mob: The Fight Against Organized Crime in America by Bill O'Reilly and Martin Dugard

Sources:

https://www.facebook.com/Wistorical/photos/al-capones-irish-wife-mae-coughlinthe-beautiful-mary-josephine-coughlin-pictured/738324472941616/

https://www.miamiherald.com/latest-news/article1942963.html

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/14398835/mae-josephine-capone

495) Annie Edson Taylor

"Nobody ought ever to do that again."

495: Annie Edson Taylor

The First Person to Survive After Going Down Niagara Falls in a Barrel

Born: 24 October 1838, Auburn, New York, United States of America

Died: 29 April 1901, Lockport, New York, United States of America

Annie performed this stunt in 1901.

She was sixty-three years old and went down the falls with her cat.

On a regular day, Annie was an unassuming schoolteacher from Michigan. She was born into a family of eleven children and married at the age of eighteen. Annie’s marriage wasn’t a happy one, but her husband died relatively early on in her life.

Annie wanted both fame and fortune but only achieved the fame dying completely destitute twenty years later.

She remains the oldest person and the only solo woman to have survived going down the falls.

Badges Earned:

Find a Grave Marked

Located In My Personal Library:

Uppity Women Speak Their Minds by Vicki Leon

Who Knew Women in History by Sarah Herman

Sources:

http://www.infoniagara.com/niagaradaredevils/annietaylor.aspx

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/01/obituaries/annie-edson-taylor-overlooked.html

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/7698828/annie-edson-taylor

489) Margaret Floy Washburn

489: Margaret Floy Washburn

The First Woman to Earn a PhD in Psychology

Born: 25 July 1871, New York City, New York, United States of America

Died: 29 October 1939, Poughkeepsie, New York, United States of America

Sources differ on where she earned her degree from. Psychology’s Feminist Voices and the National Women’s History Museum claim she earned her degree from Cornell, while the APA claims it was from Harvard. I hope it was from Cornell, because if it was Harvard, then she would not have been actually granted the degree because Harvard wasn’t about to hand out degrees to women at the time.

Margaret is most remembered for her pioneering work in animal behavior and motor theory development. She never married and served as president of Vassar College for thirty-six years.

She was also the second woman to serve as the president of the American Psychological Association.

Sources:

http://www.feministvoices.com/margaret-floy-washburn/

https://www.apa.org/about/governance/president/bio-margaret-washburn

https://www.womenshistory.org/margaret-floy-washburn

473) Deborah E Lipstadt

“In England, I had to prove that what I wrote was not libel. I wanted a trial that proved [I] was right when [I] called David Irving a denier.”

473: Deborah E Lipstadt

Shoah Historian

Born: 18 March 1947, New York City, New York, United States of America

Deborah is currently serving as the Dorot Professor of Modern Jewish History & Holocaust Studies at Emory University in Georgia.

She is most known for her groundbreaking books Denying the Holocaust, History on Trial: My Day In Court With a Holocaust Denier, and The Eichmann Trial.

Her memoir Denial was turned into a Hollywood film starring Rachel Weisz chronicling her trial against a Holocaust Denier who accused her of defamation of character. The Trailer is linked to the left.

Badges Earned:

Located In My Personal Library:

Denial by Deborah Lipstadt

Sources:

http://religion.emory.edu/home/people/faculty/lipstadt-deborah.html

https://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/lipstadt-deborah

458) Chyna

458: Chyna

Professional Wrestler for the World Wrestling Federation

Born: 27 December 1969, Rochester, New York, United States of America

Died: 20 April 2016, Redondo Beach, California, United States of America

Real Name: Joan Marie Laurer

Chyna was also an actress. One of her nicknames was “The Ninth Wonder of the World”.

She is the only woman to have won the Intercontinental Championship.

In 1998, Chyna was the first woman to qualify for the King of the Ring Tournament.

In 2019, she was inducted into the Wrestling Hall of Fame, but controversy reigns from this because she was inducted as part of a group of wrestlers and not on her own for her own accomplishments.

She died from an accidental prescription drug overdose mixed with alcohol.

Badges Earned:

Find a Grave Marked

Sources:

https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0491321/bio

https://nypost.com/2019/08/14/mom-of-wwe-legend-chyna-threatens-to-sue-autopsy-show-on-her-death/

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/161427834/joan-laurer

447) Carlina White

447: Carlina White

Abducted Child Who Solved Her Own Kidnapping Case

Born: 15 July 1987, Harlem, New York, United States of America

Also Known As: Netty Nance

Carlina also found her birth parents twenty-three years after being abducted from a hospital in Harlem as a nineteen-day-old.

She solved her own kidnapping after getting pregnant in 2005. Netty, as she more often goes by, wanted to receive free medical care but needed her birth certificate to get it. Her “mother” was unable to provide a copy of the birth certificate, which aroused Netty’s suspicions. The woman who claimed to be her mother told Netty she’d been abandoned at birth, but this story didn’t sit well with Netty. She started researching missing children’s cases online, and after contacting the National Center For Missing and Exploited Children, she was able to identify herself as Carlina White thanks to a birthmark.

Netty testified on behalf of her kidnapper at her trial, and as far as the media knows, has never turned her back on her completely. Her birth parents and she were initially overjoyed to be together again, but after the media put an intense spotlight on the family they were driven apart again. However, today it is believed Netty and her biological parents are on good terms again.

To this day she remains the only known child, abducted by someone outside of her family, to be reunited with her parents after being missing as long as she was.

A movie was made about her life in 2012, starring Keke Palmer. That same year, Netty’s kidnapper was sentenced to twelve years in prison.

Sources:

https://www.crimeandinvestigation.co.uk/article/the-extraordinary-facts-behind-the-carlina-white-case

https://dianecapri.com/2019/05/abducted-as-a-baby/

423) Joan Whitney-Payson

423: Joan Whitney-Payson

Businesswoman and Major League Baseball Executive

Born: 5 February 1903, New York City, New York, United States of America

Died: 4 October 1975, New York City, New York, United States of America

Joan was the first woman to buy majority control of a team in a North American Sports League and was the third woman overall to own a major baseball club. When she invested into the expansion of the New York Mets in 1962, she became the club’s first majority stockholder.

She was also the owner of several racehorses; two of whom won the Kentucky Derby. While she loved going to the races, Joan was also focused on her baseball teams as well, carrying a portable radio in her purse to listen on the go, or while at stuffy society dinners and functions.

Joan’s passion for sports derived from her parents’ own love of all things sport: whether it be rowing, horse racing, or baseball. Joan’s mother even earned the title, “First Lady of the American Turf” after she overtook the family horse racing legacy once her husband passed away.

Just before her nineteenth birthday, Joan was admitted and introduced to society after her parents threw her a ball at The Plaza. Two years later, after another party to announce her coming of age, Joan was engaged to a man of equal society rank. Their wedding plans made headlines.

The day before the stock market crash that signaled the start of the Great Depression, Joan and an old school friend opened Young Books. Luckily Joan was wealthy enough and had a strong enough business-sense the store remained open for nearly a decade. Besides the bookstore, Joan and her brother Jock also invested in the movie business, with one notable contribution being helping pay for the production of Gone With the Wind.

Joan’s oldest son, PFC Daniel C. Payson, was killed in action at the Battle of the Bulge during World War II. She and her husband had five children in total.

Besides the businesses and sports, Joan was also active in politics, and was a member of the Women’s National Republican Club. During the 1956 Presidential Election, it was noted that Joan made the second highest individual contribution, donating over $65,000 to the Republican Party.

As an heiress she used much of her own money to invest in hospitals and advancing medical research. In fact, she donated $8.3 Million to the New York Hospital, the place she would later take her last breath. Other medical centers that received donations from Joan include St. Mary’s Hospital in Long Beach, Florida, The United Hospital Fund, the North Shore Hospital in Manhasset, New York, The Lighthouse in Manhattan, and the Helen Hay Whitney Foundation. She was also the owner of several art galleries.

One of her daughters would assume the title of President of the New York Mets after Joan’s death. In 1980, the Payson family made the decision to sell the New York Mets. The following year, the new owners established a Mets Hall of Fame. Joan was one of the first two admitted into it. The family also decided to sell some of Joan’s works of art, one of which, a Van Gogh, sold for $39.9 Million—the proceeds were donated to charity.

Badges Earned:

Find a Grave Marked

Sources:

https://sabr.org/bioproj/person/88dc3fa9

https://www.nytimes.com/1975/10/05/archives/joan-whitney-payson-72-mets-owner-dies-head-of-greentree-stables-in.html

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/8748/joan-payson

422) Nancy Lieberman

422: Nancy Lieberman

The First Woman to Be the Head Coach of a Men’s Professional Sports Team

Born: 1 July 1958, Brooklyn, New York, United States of America

Nancy was the first in any men’s professional sport.

As of 2018 she is the Coach of the BIG3 Team Power. BIG3 Is a Men's Three on Three Basketball League.

She previously was a player in the Women’s Professional Basketball League and the Women's National Basketball Association, and was the first woman to ever try out for an NBA Team. She later became the first woman to compete in a Globetrotters World Tour. Nancy made history again when she played a single game after turning fifty.

Nancy was also a broadcaster for ESPN and ABC.

She is also an Olympic Silver Medalist (1976) and was a Gold Medalist in the USA World Basketball Championship, competing there in 1979.

Her nickname is Lady Magic and in 1996 she was entered into the Basketball Hall of Fame.

Sources:

https://big3.com/players/nancy-lieberman/

https://www.britannica.com/biography/Nancy-Lieberman

https://www.espn.com/wnba/story/_/id/27498877/wnba-vet-nancy-lieberman-inspiring-others-61-body-issue-2019

https://big3.com/news/nancy-lieberman-named-head-coach-of-power/

417) Gertrude Ederle

417: Gertrude Ederle

The First woman to Swim the English Channel

Born: 23 October 1905, New York City, New York, United States of America

Died: 30 November 2003, Wyckoff, New Jersey, United States of America

Olympic Gold Medalist; Gertrude also used to be the world record holder in several different swimming events. She even recovered from a spinal injury to swim at the 1939 World’s Fair.

Gertrude retired from professional swimming in the 1940’s after losing her hearing. The exact cause was never confirmed, with people suspecting either an illness like measles as a child, or even damage from her record-breaking swim across the English Channel. Whatever caused the damage, Gertrude spent the rest of her career as a swimming instructor for deaf children.

Badges Earned:

Find a Grave Marked

Located In My Personal Library:

The Only Woman by Immy Humes

The Who, the What, and the When: 65 Artists Illustrate the Secret Sidekicks of History by Jenny Volvovski, Julia Rothman, and Matt LaMothe

Sources:

https://www.britannica.com/biography/Gertrude-Ederle

https://www.nytimes.com/2003/12/01/sports/gertrude-ederle-the-first-woman-to-swim-across-the-english-channel-dies-at-98.html

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/8142767/gertrude-ederle

415) Marie Maynard Daly

415: Marie Maynard Daly

Chemist Who Studied the Chemical Makeup of the Human Body

Born: 16 April 1921, Queens, New York, United States of America

Died: 28 October 2003, New York City, New York, United States of America

Marie was the first African American woman to receive a PhD in chemistry in the United States. After facing heavy gender bias and experiencing the struggles of being a minority in early 20^th century America, Marie became committed to helping increase the number of minority students in both graduate science programs and medical school.

She studied how the human body worked on the chemical level with her first grant becoming a seven-year project on how proteins are constructed within the body.

Marie was also one of the main scientists who uncovered how clogged arteries and high cholesterol are caused in part by diet.

Sources:

https://www.sciencehistory.org/historical-profile/marie-maynard-daly

https://blackhistory.news.columbia.edu/people/marie-maynard-daly

http://ignite.globalfundforwomen.org/be-the-spark/marie-maynard-daly