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Fish and Fetish: travels in Africa with Mary Kingsley

In Person

2022-06-26 14:00:00 2022-06-26 15:00:00 America/Chicago Fish and Fetish: travels in Africa with Mary Kingsley In the long list of African explorers one remarkable woman stands out: Mary Henrietta Kingsley (1862-1900) who set sail for Equatorial Africa in 1893. Batavia Public Library - Founders Room

Sunday, June 26
2:00pm - 3:00pm

Add to Calendar 2022-06-26 14:00:00 2022-06-26 15:00:00 America/Chicago Fish and Fetish: travels in Africa with Mary Kingsley In the long list of African explorers one remarkable woman stands out: Mary Henrietta Kingsley (1862-1900) who set sail for Equatorial Africa in 1893. Batavia Public Library - Founders Room

Batavia Public Library

Founders Room

In the long list of African explorers one remarkable woman stands out: Mary Henrietta Kingsley (1862-1900) who set sail for Equatorial Africa in 1893.

We're excited to have Betsey Means from Womanlore presenting live in the library!  She will bring Mary Kingsley to life in the Founders Room.

Kingsley had two objectives:

• to bring back specimens of fish for the British Museum
• to collect information on African religion

Kingsley undertook two voyages, one from July to December 1893 and the other from December 1894 to November 1895. She had no financial support beyond her private means, which were modest. She traveled light, refused to be carried, swam across marshlands, learned to handle a canoe single-handed, slept under the stars and ate whatever was locally available. Her one luxury was tea.

By the time she returned to England in 1895 the articles she had published had already made her famous and her readers were eager for more. She wrote a first book published in 1897: Travels in West Africa. An instant success, the book was reprinted four times in its first year. It was followed by a second volume, West African Studies (1899). She was quickly acknowledged as an authority on the African world.

AGE GROUP: | Adults |

EVENT TYPE: | Sundays on Stage | Adult |

TAGS: | |

Batavia Public Library

askus@bataviapubliclibrary.org
Phone: (630) 879-1393
Branch manager
Josephine Tucci

Hours
About the branch

The Library is located at the southeast corner of the intersection of Batavia Avenue (IL-31) and Wilson Street (the main east-west street through town).

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