Frances Altman of Baltimore shows a copy of her new biography, Destiny’s Daughter, about the American heroine, Mary Edwards Walker. Altman has also written history and biography books for children. Photo by Karen Smith

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At 86, Baltimore writer Frances Altman has reinvented herself many times throughout her life. Her new book, Destiny’s Daughter, published last year, is a biography of a woman who also had to change with the times.

Altman was inspired to write the book more than a decade ago, after seeing a news clipping about Mary Edwards Walker, the first American woman to graduate medical school, in 1855.

She was also first (and only) female to win the Medal of Honor Award — the nation’s highest military decoration awarded for valor in combat. Walker, a suffragist, cared for injured soldiers during the Civil War until she was captured by Confederate soldiers while she was out gathering herbs.

She spent several months in a prison in Richmond before being released. Due to malnutrition in prison, Walker’s eyesight was permanently damaged, and it took months to recover her health.

“At my age, I was having a lot of empathy for what she was going through,” Altman said.

Walker later became an advocate for women’s rights and dress reform (i.e., allowing women to wear comfortable clothing).

She worked for the U.S. Postal Service and streamlined the certified mail process, giving us the system we use today. Walker’s lifelong perseverance was an inspiration for Altman, who wanted to tell readers about this brave American.

Author always loved to write

Born in Los Angeles in 1937, Altman attended class in a one-room schoolhouse before moving to Missouri as a teenager.

She says she “just loved to write reports in high school…The faculty there encouraged me into continuing to write.”

One teacher in particular taught her how to be a stenographer. “Her goal was for every girl who came through [the school] to have her own career,” Altman remembered.

After high school, Altman indeed worked as a stenographer for a law firm. In her free time, she wrote commercials for a local country music radio station.

“It was fun, and I was pretty successful,” she said.

Altman met her husband in Springfield, Missouri, and the couple spent the first six years of their marriage moving to different cities for his job. That’s how she learned to reinvent herself.

“I married someone who was traveling to different cities, so every place we’d move, I’d get a different job,” she said.

At each job, she got more opportunities to write. “I’d get the job, and it always seemed like they’d say, ‘So could you write this?’ or ‘Could you do this for a newsletter?’ and I just sort of fell into writing.”

At the same time, Altman decided to study writing formally. “I was interested in writing, so I started taking classes,” she said.

One of her professors at Tulsa University told the class, “If you sell anything [you write], you’ll get an A,” Altman said. “So, I sold an article to the Future Farmers of America magazine. That was my very first piece that I sold.”

After Altman earned her bachelor’s degree, she landed a job at a community newspaper in Indianapolis.

Publishing for children, adults

When she started to build a family, Altman became attuned to a younger audience. “I started writing more children’s literature,” she said.

Altman published children’s books with whimsical titles like Reggie the Goat and The Something Egg. Her publisher also gave her an assignment to write four biographies for children — her first foray into biographical writing.

She enjoyed finding obscure bits of history, and published a collection of 13 fictional stories featuring little-known facts about famous people such as Paul Revere.

Eventually, Altman and her husband settled in Chicago, where she wrote for the Arlington Day, a large community newspaper owned by the Chicago Sun Times.

Over time she worked her way up to become the “woman’s editor” of the paper which, in those days, meant overseeing the wedding announcements.

“You would write news that would tell about every silver button that was on the bridal gown and all the relatives that attended,” she remembered.

When the Chicago Sun Times shut down its community papers, Altman went to work for the competition, the Daily Herald. As the managing editor of its Suburban Week, she wrote or edited theater reviews, movie reviews and feature stories.

All the while, she was able to make her own hours and work while her children were in school. She went into the office at about 7 a.m. and stayed until noon when kindergarten let out.

After her children went off to college, Altman got a 9 to 5 job as a food editor and wrote for farmers’ trade magazines. While working full-time, she earned a master’s degree in marketing from Roosevelt University.

“My storyline…sounds wacky,” Altman said, “because I’m doing all these things simultaneously.”

Later, she began teaching at Virginia Commonwealth University and North Central Arizona University.

Landing in Baltimore

In 2011, Altman retired and moved to the Baltimore area to be near her daughter. She was far from finished with writing, though.

When she started writing a book about Walker, she began the in-depth research and travel that a biography demands.

Altman first visited the Virginia battlefields where Walker served, then the prison where Walker had been held captive.

When Covid hit, Altman was able to do the rest of her research online. She finally completed the manuscript, and the book was published last April by Apprentice House Press, the nation’s only student-run press, based at Loyola University Maryland in Baltimore.

“Everyone was being told to persevere” during the pandemic, Altman said. It was the perfect time to write about Mary Edwards Walker because that’s what Mary Edwards Walker did, Altman said. “She persevered.”

Altman is passionate about letting people know writing helps older adults persevere — and find hope.

Destiny’s Daughter can be purchased on Amazon.com and BarnesandNoble.com and found at the Baltimore County Public Library.