How Cleo Lythgoe, Queen of Rum Row, Inspired Me to Navigate with Intention

Fourteenth Installment of Writing for Latina Entrepreneurs, written from the POV of Dr. Nutmeg's bisabuela Maria La Gata, a rum-running gangster in 1920s Harlem and Puerto Rico.

Welcome back to Maria La Gata’s Writing & Entrepreneurship User Journey Workshop, aka Brujeria Navigation 101. I’m Maria La Gata, your fabulous hostess from the spirit world! If you missed last week’s interview with Josephine Baker, check it out here.

This week, I’m interviewing Gertrude “Cleo” Lythgoe, also known as the Queen of Rum Row in the 1920s. The night I unconsciously navigated my way to Cleo’s boat on Rum Row, my life changed forever. She was a woman who was doing exactly what I wanted to do: selling rum and making a lot of money. I couldn’t believe it. Before I met her, I had only seen MEN selling rum. But there she was, looking like Cleopatra herself, calling all the shots. Seeing her was enough for me to believe that I could do it too.

After you read my interview with Cleo, I’m sure you’ll want to check out her autobiography, which I was lucky enough to find on Goodreads last year, but now it’s a bit pricey on Amazon. Haz clic below for details:

Just like me, young Cleo unconsciously starts navigating her career by water, by train, by taxi, but always following the signs toward the opportunities that are aligned with her heart and soul. She doesn’t follow trends or rules or allow society to limit her movement, not even in the 1920s. She is unapologetically herself, not really knowing ALL the time where she will end up, but always knowing that her own path was worth navigating. As she moves forward on her journey, she starts gaining confidence, which allows her to start consciously navigating toward her goals with intention.

And that’s what Brujeria Navigation 101 is, chicas! That’s what I’ve been trying to teach all of you Latinas in the 21st century, entiendes? In a way, it’s not even something I can TEACH because YOU gotta figure it out yourself. Maybe you’re not sure which way to go right now, and maybe you’re just following other people who are doing what you want to do, but eventually, if you keep on keeping on, you’ll get to a niche place in the market where no other human has gone before. Like me. Like Josephine. Like Cleo! Like YOU!

If you’ve just recently started breaking rules and navigating your career like a brujita, share your story!

One more thing before I get to our interview with Cleo. I’d like to share some valuable feedback from UCLA Professor Mark Sarvas on the Queen of Rum Row Chapter — he didn’t understand why Tex Guinan, the speakeasy owner, (who I will interview next week) would bring Maria and her roommate Angelina Rivera (our interviewee the week after that) to Rum Row.

“It felt like the writer just needed Maria to meet the Queen of Rum Row,” he said. “And even though party-hopping is fun, it doesn’t make a reader want to turn the page.”

Uh, yup. Busted. I agree. La verdad? I thought I could be like Forest Gump, just bumping into famous people along my unconscious journey toward success. I also thought I could use the excuse of Uranus Retrograde leading me to all the places I needed to be, but apparently I need to explain that more — which I will.

The real painful truth, however? Mi mente…está tostado! My memory is fuzzy. I’m dead, chingonas! All I remember is that I met the Queen of Rum Row one July night in 1922 or 1923, so…

Question of the Day: Can you help me make up a good motivation for leaving the speakeasy with Tex?

For the record, Cleo’s memory was better mine. She wrote the following excerpt in her autobiography about the trip she made to deliver a load of rye whiskey to Rum Row with Captain Bill McCoy:

“Three women were with one party. They came out ‘just for the novelty of the trip.’ When they came aboard and went below deck into the stuffy cabin, they became seasick and rushed back to their speedboat. I was sorry they had to rush away. Strange to say, their presence had forced upon me the full realization of how long I had been isolated from my own sex. They were almost a curiosity to me, but I seemed to be more of a curiosity to them.”

— Cleo Lythgoe, in “The Bahama Queen”

Eventually, I’ll gel it all together — especially with your help, so don’t be shy, readers! And now, drumroll, porfa! Our main event for the night…

An Interview With Cleo Lythgoe 

By Maria La Gata

As the enterprising representative of two London distillers, Gertrude "Cleo" Lythgoe was the only woman to hold a wholesale liquor license in Nassau, Bahamas, during Prohibition. Although she never broke the law, she used her beauty, charm and business acumen to send shipload after shipload of the finest whiskey to thirsty America. This little modern re-enactment of Cleo’s life made me chuckle a bit: