‘Maintaining our legacy:’ Miami’s Motorcycle Queen gets a street named in her honor
Wind gusts were fierce in Miami Gardens Wednesday afternoon – a fitting allegory for a tribute to Bessie Stringfield, the first Black woman to ride cross country in the United States on her motorcycle.
Known as the “Motorcycle Queen of Miami,” Stringfield completed eight trips total across the U.S. starting in the 1930s. Now, as people cruise through Miami Gardens along Northwest 153rd Street on the way to Opa-locka, they will see a street sign bearing her name: Bessie Stringfield Way.
“This is what community and commitment and dedication from groups of residents and people, who don’t even live in our city, looks like,” Miami Gardens Mayor Rodney Harris said to a crowd of at least 75 people, including local all-female biker group Sunshine Divas In Motion Excelling (D.I.M.E.S.) and the Bessie Stringfield All Female Ride, a group dedicated to Stringfield’s memory.
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Stringfield’s honor comes at a time when Black historical figures are being removed from government websites and the way Black history is taught is policed statewide and nationally, and as diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives are being rolled back by national corporations.
“We’re maintaining our legacy and our history despite what anyone else’s plans are,” said Miami Gardens Councilwoman Michelle C. Powell, whose district is home to the newly designated street. “We’re going to continue remembering our history and celebrating it and keeping it in the history books, at least through the people of Miami Gardens.”
The street renaming also comes as Miami Gardens is poised to host the Miami Grand Prix a few miles from where Stringfield last lived, at the intersection of Northwest 154th Street and Northwest 24th Avenue.
Mandy Mackie, 74, a member of local all female motorcycling group the Sunshine D.I.M.E.S., said there were a lot of starts and stops since efforts to name a street after Bessie Stringfield began in 2014, but the push for the street renaming cranked back up in the past year. For Mackie, the ceremony was personal.
“To have that street named after Miss Bessie means so much to me because of the miles that I’ve ridden my motorcycle cross country to different rides,” she said, choking back tears. Mackie said she’s known people to ride miles just to stand in Stringfield’s former yard. “She is the queen of motorcycles all over the world.”
Born in 1911 in Kingston, Jamaica, Stringfield lived in North Carolina for a short time before her family relocated and raised her in Boston. As detailed in the documentary “To Myself With Love: The Bessie Stringfield Story,” the young Stringfield had a strained relationship with her father and experienced racism from classmates and a white woman teacher, who would often blame Bessie for the negative experiences she had.
The documentary also includes snapshots of Stringfield’s life, such as dressing as a man to compete in motorcycle races and her many marriages (and penchant for younger men).
In 1952, Stringfield bought a home in Opa-locka putting down roots in South Florida. She died in 1993 at 81, and nearly a decade later, in 2002, Stringfield was inducted into the AMA Motorcycle Museum Hall of Fame in Pickerington, Ohio.
The longtime resident of Opa-locka founded her own riding crew, Iron Horse Motorcycle Club, and inspired a whole generation of Black women, such as Tameka Singleton with the Bessie Stringfield All Female Ride. She likened Stringfield’s success to the Black women in 6888th Central Postal Directory Battalion, who were the subject of the Tyler Perry film “Six Triple Eight.”
“I feel like Bessie is a part of that, Black women that have paved the way that have been ignored, but we refuse to be ignored any longer,” she said.
