Great write up over at Atlas Obscura about Bessie Stringfield.
In the 1930s, Bessie Stringfield practically disappeared in a cloud of smoke, bolting across the walls of a wooden, bowl-shaped arena: the Wall of Death. She was on her way across the country, traveling completely alone—again—on a Harley. Bessie Stringfield, an African-American Bostonian originally from Jamaica, had already earned a title that would be given to her years later: “The Motorcycle Queen.” From 1929 until her death in 1993, she rode her motorcycle around the Americas, defying several stereotypes about what black women could do.
Source: Bessie Stringfield, the Bad-Ass Black Motorcycle Queen of the 1930s – Atlas Obscura