#clipper-ships

#clipper-ships

A couple of years ago, I stumbled across a most unusual story from the annals of old San Francisco. It concerned a 19-year-old woman named Mary Ann Patten who spent two months captaining a 216-foot-long clipper ship after her husband fell deathly ill during an around-the-world journey. In that time, Patten squashed an on-board mutiny, won the loyalty of the crew and kept her husband alive. The kicker? She did all of this while pregnant with her first child.