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Tillie the Terrible Swede: How One Woman, a Sewing Needle, and a Bicycle Changed History

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Tillie the Terrible Swede: How One Woman, A Sewing Needle, and a Bicycle Changed History
by Sue Stauffacher, illustrated by Sarah McMenemy
Knopf, 2011. Unpaged. Picture Book.


Tillie Anderson began her life in America as a seamstress in a tailor shop, but when she sees a bicycle roll past the window, she is smitten with the idea of having one and riding it at top speed. None of the lazy figure eights carved out by most lady riders for her, nor the ungainly side-saddle bikes with both pedals on the same side. Tillie wanted to race, and race she did, becoming the women's bicycle racing champion of the world even though her audacity lost her many friends and caused her mother to faint! Tillie . . . is a terrific story of a young woman who didn't care what anyone thought of her and did what she was born to do--go fast! (And she gets the guy, too.)




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