Olive Lyons, first female ferry owner/operator in Washington

Washington state has the largest ferry system in the United States and the second largest in the world. Twenty-three ferries are currently in operation, but to date only six women have been captains. The first was Olive Lyons, co-owner of the Palouse Ferry from 1893 until 1926. Located near the confluence of the Palouse and Snake Rivers, and later known as Lyons’ Ferry, it connected southwestern Whitman County and northern Columbia County for 108 years, from 1859 to 1968.

Born in Marion County, Ohio, in 1844, Olive was the seventh of the 12 children of Jacob and Mercy Holderman. But tragedy marked the first half of Olive’s life. She lost six of her siblings before they reached the age of 24, and she was widowed three times.

In 1854, her 18-year-old twin sisters, Adaline and Jane, drowned while swimming in Knox County, Ill. Subsequently, four of her five brothers, as well as her father, served in the Union Army during the Civil War. All survived, but her oldest brother Gilderoy and her father later died as a result of their injuries. In the summer of 1867, Olive’s brother Guildford was “accidentally” shot and killed by “bushwhackers” in Kansas; and in September her brother Scott was hanged in Lawrence, Kan., for allegedly murdering more than 17 men. In 1873, her sister Elenor died of acute uremia at the age of 23.

Olive’s first husband, John Wood, whom she married in 1872 in Kansas, died in Walla Walla, not long after surviving family members moved west in 1879. Olive quickly remarried: on May 1, 1880, she wed William Tanksley, who died only three years later. Neither union produced children.

Her third husband was Daniel Lyons (1829-93) of Starbuck. He had immigrated to Canada from Ireland and later crossed the border into Washington. A widower with two grown children, he and a man named John Markley were co-owners of the Palouse Ferry. Olive and Daniel were married in March of 1883 in Columbia County.

The couple lived on Daniel’s ranch on the Columbia County side of the Snake, where he owned approximately 200 head of horses near the ferry crossing. At some point, they purchased Markley’s share of the ferry. The couple provided exceptional service, even ferrying people across the river in the middle of the night after they rang a bell to signal that they needed to cross. Dan and Olive also sold fresh mounts and livestock feed; and, if needed, Olive provided hot meals and sometimes sleeping accommodations. They also ferried herds of sheep, charging one cent per animal.

When Daniel died in August of 1893, his will stipulated that Olive and his son Perry were each to inherit three sections of land (each measuring 640 acres in size) and the buildings on them, plus half ownership of the Palouse Ferry. To Olive alone went her husband’s interest in the Farmers’ Alliance Store in Dayton, all his cattle, a large assortment of farm machinery, and 10 horses of her choice. Perry received two thirds of the remaining horses, and his sister Mary received one third.

For the next 33 years, Olive ran the ferry and the ranch, although she was often assisted by two men, in tandem. The first was her stepson Perry, whose help she lost when he was seriously injured in an accident in 1906. She then employed a man named Everett Truitt, who was 30 years her junior and boarded with her. Both men were listed, respectively, on the 1900 and 1910 censuses as “ferrymen.” Although Olive was not technically a ferryman, nor was she an actual captain, she ran it herself on many occasions.

Olive and Perry sold the ferry in 1926, a year before her death at 82. Perry died in 1931. The new owner, W.C. Cummings, renamed it Lyons’ Ferry in honor of Olive and the family who had operated it for more than 50 years.

Only a handful of women since Olive’s time have operated ferries in Washington. The next was Berte H. Olson (1882-1959), who ran the ferry at Deception Pass in Skagit County from 1924-35 and who was the first woman to hold a ferry captain’s license in Washington. She was succeeded by four women in Puget Sound and the San Juan Islands, beginning in 2002. One has retired and three are currently working.

Meyer taught history at Washington State University for 25 years. She has been active in Whitman County Historical Society since 1992.