Annie Edson Taylor, a 63 year old schoolteacher from Michigan, gambled on gaining quick fame and fortune with a barrel trip over the thundering Niagara Falls on October 24, 1901. Her vessel was a large oak barrel, equipped with a 100-pound blacksmith’s anvil on the bottom to keep it floating upright. Padding was placed all around her and sufficient air for the trip was pumped into the barrel via a bicycle pump before the lid was carefully screwed on with ordinary wood screws. With her pet kitten inside the barrel with her, the tie rope was severed about 4:40 pm. The barrel rode through the upper rapids, and within minutes, Taylor passed over the 163 foot high Horseshoe Falls. The barrel disappeared from view into the swirling waters before bobbing to the surface and gradually floating to the Canadian shore where it was stranded until rescuers could reach it. Once released, Taylor emerged quite bruised and shocked but alive. Her attempt to cash in on the stunt was far from successful. She died in poverty, but for ten years held the honor of being the only person to have ever gone over the Falls until the first man attempted it in 1911. Taylor’s barrel is on display today as part of the Daredevil Gallery at the Imax Theatre in Niagara Falls.
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