The Ocala banner. (Ocala, Marion County, Fla.) 1883-194?, 1914-07-24
STRANGE STORY or Al WOMAN
MAsQuERADlNc AS Al MAN

35 years brings the following story to
light from Baltimore:
News of the death of Hannah Cal
der in Orlando, Fla, yesterday recall
ed to the minds of persons familiar
with Hartford county affairs the
strange case of the daughter of a
wealthy farmer there, who from her
earliest childhood rebelled at being
| girl or woman. She lived for years
in Florida as a man, dressed as a man,
associated with men and lived with
a woman who was supposed to be her
wife. Only on her deathbed was her
sex discovered. The wife" died two
years ago.
The same woman was a sensation in
Baltimore % years ago, when she took
a pretty Hartford county girl before a
clergyman in that part of the state,
told the clergyman, who knew her
family, that she was a man in spite
of the fact that she had dressed in
feminine attire since she could walk,
and persuaded him to pronounce two
persons, both of whom wore skirts,
man and wife.
After the marriage she came to
Baltimore. A week later the family
of her bride took the bride away
from her, and that woman is now
married and the mother of a happy
brood of children. She is living in
Hartford county. There are persons
living in Baltimore familiar with all
the details of the story.
Hannah Calder was about so years
old at the time of her death. She was
the daughter of Martin Calder, a well
known and rich farmer of Federal
Hill, near Rocks of Deer Creek, Har.
ford county. Her brother, James Cal
der, was sheriff of the county at one
time.
From her earliest girlhood Hannah
Calder manifested a distate for femi-
nine society, say those who knew e
She went to school with the other
girls and she went about to the coun-
try dances and such things, but, in
spite of the fact that she wore skirts,
she wouldn't play the part of woman.
She didn't seek the society of men,
but rather avoided intimate associa-
ton with anybody and preferred to be
alone. When she was in her teens,
she began to use tobacco, both smok-
ing and chewing it. She did not have
to think of making her living, but she
began when she was in her twenties
to be known as the Hartford County
Barber and would drive from farm
house to farmhouse to shave the men
and cut their hair and that of their
children.
Suddenly she manifested an inter-
est in the girl with wLom she man.
aged the mock marriage. Hannah
was about 80 years old then and the
girl was about 16, just blooming into
womanhood and one of the beauties
of the neighborhood. Her parents
were not so we'll to do as were those
of her woman sutton. When Hannah
Calder told her that she was a mar
and that she wanted to marry her the
young girl is said to have been fatter-
ed.
After the marriage" the couple
came to Baltimore and going to a
house on North Gilmore street, where
a male connection of the Calder's
lived, Hannah Calder dumfounded
this mans wife by announcing that
she was not a woman, but a man and
that the pretty creature who accom-
panied her was her bride.
"You are a pretty-loking bride
grom in skirts" the relatives wife
said. And Hannah went out forth
with and bought herself a suit of
mems clothes. She never went back
to skirts after that, it is said. For a
week or two after her bride" had
been torn from her Hannah Calder
was on exhibition at the Masonic
Temple. Then she disappeared.
Her relatives had heard nothing
from her from the time of her disap-
pearance until the news of her death
| came. 1t is is supposed that she be-
came a barber in earnest after her de-
parture from Baltimore. The report
from Florida says that she always
associated with men there and voted
regularly at each election.