Davy Crockett's Riproarious Shemales and Sentimental Sisters
by Michael A. Lofaro
Do the names Florinda Fury, Katy Goodgrit, Hippotamus Zephyr, Sal Fink, Comfort Crockett, and Sally Ann Thunder Ann Whirlwind Crockett draw only a blank? The legendary feats of Davy Crockett, who could tree a ghost, ride his thirty-seven foot- long alligator up Niagara Falls, and drink up the Mississippi River, are common knowledge to the devotees of this nineteenth-century superhero. But what may come as a surprise to many is that the legendary frontiersman also served as the narrator of a collection of outrageous tales about women in the same Crockett Almanacs in which he "recorded" his own adventures. Such stories made the Almanacs the best-selling and longest-running series of comic almanacs published before the Civil War. Looking back at them now, the stories offer a true fun-house-mirror view of the culture of antebellum America.
Davy Crockett's Riproarious Shemales and Sentimental Sisters provides the full text and accompanying illustrations for 122 original tales that prove that backwoods women could be just as wild as their male counterparts. Their portrayals, which range from the heroic to the satiric, from the comic to the sentimental, create uproarious laughter and provoke serious commentary―often in the same tale. A lengthy historical and critical introduction places these shemales into a continuum and offers new insight into this fascinating aspect of nineteenth-century American culture.
About The Author
Michael A. Lofaro is Lindsay Young Professor of American Studies and American literature. A recognized authority on the early west, he has authored or edited eight books and written over fifty articles on Crockett, Boone, and the frontier.