Teodora Angela Lefterescu, the first female long-distance captain from Romania

Author: Alexandru Eduard Balaci

Motto:

“I was in the port of Luanda in Angola, where I had arrived for a change of crew. In my cabin, a warm and friendly man purred happily. Because you must know, my dears, that when it comes to animals, I have always broken the rules. The ban on having animals on board was decided only because the sanitary laws had to be respected, the quarantine, more precisely, for 3 weeks, and a ship like ours, for example, stayed in the port for several days. Always in my travels I had friends dogs, cats, parrots, hamsters and even monkeys, who brightened up my relaxation hours and even those of tension. Silently, the crew, made up of good people, allowed my feminine indulgence. The only one by the way! I hope!(Rodica Simionescu recounts in the book “Angela Lefterescu – A captain of a long race”).

Context

Teodora Angela Lefterescu, born on August 3, 1926 in the woods of Suceva, fell in love with the sea and loved it until the end of her life. He struggled with society and finally got to board a ship. It was a job for men at that time. Teodora Angela Lefterescu then became the first female long-distance captain.

The first female long-distance captain

Because she was an exceptional student, her parents directed her to Medicine. She objected, telling them she wanted to become a sailor, but her parents forcibly sent her to the French Institute in Bucharest, to attend medical courses. There were 58 candidates for 17 places, but she managed to take the exam. He didn’t like it and after a while he went to the Directorate of the Merchant Marine in Bucharest. There she met Mr. Magus, who fatherly advised her to choose another job, more suitable for a girl, such as that of a journalist. She left the general director’s office, but in the hallway she met a gentleman who advised her to go to Constanta, to join the sailors’ union. After a period in which she knocks on several doors, someone advises her to go to the bosses and show them the Constitution, which says that women also have the right to work.

This is how she ended up being employed as an assistant officer on one of the merchant fleet ships. Here, he receives the hardest jobs: he washes the toilets, the deck, makes knots, does everything. As the bosses saw that she can handle everything, she is also put to much harder tests: she is asked to bring a barrel full of 200 liters of caustic soda from the warehouse. Since she didn’t have the strength to lift it herself, she resorted to an ingenious solution: she tied the barrel with a thick rope and rolled it. All this time, he went every week to the ministry to get approval to go to sea. Her career began by being an assistant on a commercial ship, then second captain on the ships “Filimon Sîrbu” and “Octombrie Roşu”. Seconded the commanders of the ships “Trotuş”, “Jiul”, “Polar I” or “Dorna”. From February 6, 1982, he was the commander of the ship “Ceahlăul”, specialized in ocean fishing.

On February 6, 1982, he became the commander of the ocean fishing vessel Ceahlău, where he remained until his retirement in 1984. In 1999, he received the title of honorary citizen of the municipality of Fălticeni. In the last years of her life, she lived in Constanța, walking around the places she had not yet had the opportunity to visit, until the end of her life, in April 2007. She was buried in the Dobrogean town of Urluia, where a local craftsman erected a cross for her on which he inlaid the outline of a ship.

Bibliography

Rador calendar

https://www.enciclopediaromaniei.ro/wiki/Teodora_Angela_Lefterescu

https://historia.ro/sectiune/general/femeile-marii-irina-constanziu-vlassopol-teodora-577971.html