Julia Pastrana—
"The Bearded Lady"

Julia Pastrana, a Mexican Digger Indian, was born in 1834 and was four and a half feet tall. Her whole face and body was covered with straight black hair (congenital, generalized hypertrichosis terminalis), and her ears and nose were extraordinarily large. Her teeth were irregular and abnormal; according to one account she had a double row in each jaw, though a recent examination of her mummy says otherwise. She was discovered by a man named Theodor Lent, who began exhibiting her worldwide. Her act displayed the fact that she was an accomplished dancer and singer. She eventually married Lent, and even to her deathbed truly believed that he loved her for her own sake. She died from complications of childbirth in 1860. Her similarly hairy and deformed baby boy lived for three days and she died shortly thereafter. After their death, Lent allowed a Professor Sokoloff to mummify her and her baby. Then, he resumed the tour, continuing to exhibit them both. Lent eventually died of a brain disease—one of his final acts was to run around on a bridge, throwing money into the river. For many years, Julia's mummy was believed to have been lost. But, in 1990 it was discovered at the Oslo Forensic Institute—a little the worse for wear. The mummies ended up in Norway in 1921; they were on display until the mid-1970s, when Norwegian authorities threatened confiscation. The mummies were stolen in 1979, then recovered by police from a dump and stored at the Institute. Julia was by all accounts a bright, sweet and interesting woman. She loved to read. Exhibiting herself saved her from the grinding poverty of her birth home and allowed her to see the world.

Pictures-click for larger image Julia's dress is based on the one the mummy wore. It was a Russian dance costume that she made and embroidered herself. I have also hand-embroidered this small version. I had to make up the colors, since the only depictions of it that I could find are black and white. I thought that the gold fabric would look great in contrast to her dark hair and beautiful dark skin. I painstakingly sewed all the little hairs onto her leather body for a more realistically hairy effect.