For many centuries the world was considered “male” – women had no rights, could not work; they were given in marriage by calculation and expected to see meek guardians of the hearth without their own opinion. But in every century, in every historical period, in every culture, there was a brave woman who tried to change the foundations of society and live the way she herself wants. They had to struggle with difficulties, with a misunderstanding of society, perhaps with their own family, but they found the strength not to give up and go only forward.
This book is about women who were not afraid to follow their hearts and as a result changed the whole world or our idea of it. Jane Austen, Frida Kahlo, Marie Curie, Anne Frank, Coco Chanel – everyone knows these names. So let’s find out together how these fantastic women changed our world and what legacy they left behind!
Maud Wagner
At the beginning of the last century, when American women wore corsets and long skirts with a train, when blouses were buttoned up to the very chin, and showing ankles in public was considered extremely reprehensible, Maud Stevens-Wagner, the first woman tattoo artist, began her career.
An outstanding American woman was born in Kansas in 1877. As a young girl, she began her career as a circus performer as an aerial acrobat, tightrope walker and kite woman in a traveling circus that was a huge success at the turn of the twentieth century. In 1904, the circus went to the World’s Fair in St. Louis. It was then that Maud, who at that time bore the surname Stevens, met her future husband, who radically changed her life, determining the girl’s path to success. Or rather, he opened the world of tattoos for her. His name was Gus Wagner. Thanks to his signature “stick and poke” method, Wagner was considered an established tattoo artist who worked perfectly by hand, without the use of a tattoo machine.
Gus himself claimed that he first saw tattoos on his body at the age of 12, when he met a circus performer known as the “Greek Albanian Captain Costentenus”. He was struck by a man whose body was completely covered with drawings. Then the young American realized that he had found his calling. However, it wasn’t until years later, during sea voyages on merchant ships in the late 1890s, that he learned the technique of tattooing from local tribes on the islands of Java and Borneo. Interestingly, Gus was also known as the Tattooed Traveler, since upon returning home from a sea voyage, he had almost 300 tattoos on his body.
After a fateful meeting, Maud and Gus immediately fell in love with each other. Wagner expressed a desire to tattoo his beloved, to which she agreed. They soon got married. Maud also became interested in her husband’s hobby. Gus began to teach Maud, gradually immersing her in the world of tattoos. As a student of her husband, Maud mastered the traditional art of hand tattooing. It was thanks to her husband that she became an outstanding tattoo artist. Then the Wagner family business was born, and quite profitable, because in those days the simple sketches and lines that the Wagners did well were at the height of fashion.