The captain's wife who took command

In the mid-19th century, clipper ships raced around the globe carrying valuable cargo through some of the world's most dangerous waters, in an age of speed, risk, and extraordinary ambition. But when illness struck during one such voyage, a young woman found herself in command of a vessel battling storms, mutiny, and impossible odds. In this episode of the History Extra podcast, author and historian Teela J. Matzeo tells Eleanor Evans about the astonishing true story behind her book, To the Edge of the World. Thank you so much, Teela, for joining us on today's History Extra podcast.

How are you? Doing great. Thanks for the invite. It's wonderful to be talking with you about your book, which I loved so much, and I can't wait to get started. And I hoped, before we go into the story proper, whether you can situate us

in the era of the Clipper ship. What is it about this vessel that is so important for our listeners to understand and how is it changing the world at this time? Yeah, so we're talking about the 1850s, right? Just to situate us in time. And then to situate us in space, we're talking about basically cargo routes that go from New York to San Francisco to Hong Kong to London is the primary sort of transit.

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