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Friday, April 11, 2025

Betty Lowman makes it to Ketchikan (1937)

Betty Lowman would forever immortalize herself in history when she paddled 1,300 miles, for 66 days, through the Inside Passage of British Columbia, from Guemes Island to Ketchikan, Alaska. Betty had always been one to push limits, at 14 she woke up early one school day to swim a half hour trip across the Guemes Channel, she was a sports hero, valedictorian, journalist extraordinaire and also had a healthy passion for choral music. It was only two days after her graduation from The University of Washington when she departed for her trip. A friend, Florence Steele would start the trip with Betty though returned after just a week after a strong reaction to a small-pox vaccination. Betty would make the rest of the trip alone, on the way lodging with locals where she could and roughing it on the beach where she couldn't. The trip was perilous at times and she would find herself stranded on multiple occasions. In the end though, she was greeted back home to an excited crowd, she was a hero.

Date:

August 19, 2022

Time:

All Day

Location:

Ketchikan, Alaska

Address:

Anacortes, WA 98221

Link:

Check out the full adventure in the autobiographical "Bijaboji" by Betty Lowman Carey

Original source can be found here.

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