From informant for prohibition agents to the wife of Seattle’s biggest rumrunner. The amazing...

December marks the 90th anniversary of the end of prohibition. It’s an era of history riddled with larger-than-life characters — people like Lucky Luciano in New York and Al Capone in Chicago.

In the Seattle area, there was Roy Olmstead — no relation to the Olmsteds who planned many of the city’s famous parks. Roy was a maverick; a local cop turned bootlegger. So often when stories of the wild prohibition era are re-told, it’s figures like Roy Olmstead at the center.

But he wasn't in it alone.

Alongside him, somewhat hidden in his larger-than-life shadow, was his second wife, Elise, often known as Elsie. And her story, like those of so many other women, is just as fascinating in its own right, though it's less often told.

“It's only now that we're spending more time looking at the women around these large men, that we're finding people like Elsie,” said Rebecca Demarest, an author, researcher, and project manager for the recruiting department of a quantum computing company.