HIT, ELEM> Women in Tall Tales

[Suzanne Weinheimer <suzanne@WHATEXIT.COM>]

Many of you (at least 15)  responded quickly with one of two suggestions:
All in all I got at least 50 responses in less than 3 days.

Swamp Angel by Anne Isaacs (recent Caldecott Honor book)(Dutton, c1994)
Sally Ann Thunder Ann Whirlwind Crockett by Steven Kellogg (someone
suggested author may be Cohen?)

Someone suggested checking in _From A to Zoo_

Other suggestions  are:
Angelica Longrider also known as _Swamp Angel_ (see book with same title)
_The Bunyans_
Slue Foot Sue (Pecos Bill's girlfriend or wife)
Annie Christmas (built the levees in Mississippi)
Wiley and the Harry Man
Three strong women  (Stamm)
Renata, Whizbrain and the ghost (Cohen)
The tea squall (Dewey) ( mentioned 3 times)
Betsy Blizzard
Her Stories by Virginia Hamilton
"Beat's me Claude" by Joan Lowry Nixon. [There are at least 2 other books
in this series. They are about a woman named Shirley who does incredible
feats, but can't bake a pie.]

Chuck Pauley writes:
>You might try "Sally Ann Thunder Ann Whirlwind" from _American Tall
>Tales_ by Mary Pope Osborne;  New York : Alfred Knopf, 1991.
>ISBN:  0-679-900089-6 (lib. bdg.)

>BTW, it's not too surprising that examples are difficult to recall.  Osborne
>writes, "Though no early tall tales celebrate an abiding heroine,
>the Davy Crockett Almanacks do present rugged frontier women in a number
>of vignettes . . ."  Sally Ann is a composite character, a blend of several
>frontier women mentioned in the Almanacks, and the woman who captures Davy
Crockett's
>gizzard . . with a little help from Cupid's arrow.

I had found a book on http://www.amazon.com called _Cut from the Same
Cloth: American Women of Myth, Legend and Tall Tale_ (c1993).   R. Jean
Gustafson was kind enough (Thanks, Jean!) to send me the list of
characters profiled in the book:

Women of the Northeast
        Star Maiden (Chippewa)
        Bess Call (Anglo American)
        Drog Star (Seneca)
Women of the South
        Molly cottontail (African American)
        Annie Christmas (African American)
        Susanna and Simon (African American)
Women of the Midwest
        Sal Fink (Anglo American)
        Sweet Betsey from Pike (Anglo American)
        Old Sally Cato (African American)
Women of the Southwest
        Pale-Faced Lightning (Pueblo)
        Pohaha (Tewa)
        Sister fox and Brother coyote (Mexican American)
Women of the West
        Sally Ann Thunder Ann Whirlwind Crocket (Anglo American)
        Hekeke (Miwok)
        Otoonah (Eskimo)
        Hiiaka (Hawaiian)

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Suzanne Weinheimer, Library Media Specialist
South Mountain School/Annex (K-4)
South Orange, NJ  07079
school email:    SMtnSchLib@aol.com
personal email:  suzanne@whatexit.com
school web page: http://southmountain.somsd.k12.nj.us
(note new Web address)
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Opinions expressed are my own...