Vulcana
Kate Roberts, better known as Vulcana, was a Welsh strongwoman. In 1901, she suprised a crowd in London by lifting a wagon that was stuck on a street.
Miriam Kate Williams (1874 – 1946), sometimes called Kate Roberts and better known by her stage name Vulcana, was a Welsh strongwoman born of Irish parents in Abergavenny, Monmouthshire. With strongman William Hedley Roberts, better known as Atlas, she toured music halls in Britain, Europe, and Australia. The couple performed as The Atlas and Vulcana Group of Society Athletes. == Early life == Kate Williams was born to a popular local preacher, and worked at a tannery in Abergavenny. She met William Roberts at the local women's gymnasium he ran in 1890, when she was fifteen. They fell in love; in spite of Roberts already having a wife and family, they left town together and were never parted for the rest of their lives. == Performing career == Williams's first professional appearance was as a replacement act at a fete hosted by Roberts in Pontypool, Wales. They began to be billed together as Atlas and Vulcana from the time of their first appearances in London in 1892. In 1903, Vulcana and Atlas were engaged by Harry Rickards and toured Australia. Atlas, a true showman of his times, greatly exaggerated his own and Vulcana's lifting capacities, and most of his published boasts have been dismissed.