Letters of a Woman Homesteader, Elinore Pruitt Stewart

These fascinating letters written between 1909 and 1913 by a woman who homesteaded in Wyoming were free on Kindle. I enjoy learning about those intrepid pioneer women who went west when conditions were harsh and dangerous. Perhaps I want to know more because my own great-grandparents homesteaded in Nebraska, and both my grandfather and his sister were born on the homestead. That's also where my great-grandfather lost one eye when he was chopping wood, a friend of theirs was murdered by an outlaw, and then my grandfather got polio. After all that, they returned to Illinois and a more peaceful life.

If ever a woman was made for the life of a pioneer, though, it was Elinore Rupert, as she signed her name before marrying Clyde Stewart. She was the single mother of a toddler and full of dreams to see Alaska and Hawaii and do all sorts of things when she decided to skip the Civil Service exam she had registered for and take a job as a housekeeper for a homesteader in Wyoming. Eventually she married her employer, a "gude mon" who played his bugpeep (bagpipes) every evening.

Her daughter Jerrine called her stepdad "our Clyde." Soon she had a little brother but he died as a baby. Later two more boys were born. Jerrine wrote about one of them, "My brother Calvin is very sweet. God had to give him to us because he squealed so much he sturbed the angels. We are not angels so he Dont sturb us."

They have many adventures which Elinore writes about in her letters to a former employer and friend, Mrs. Coney. She and her daughter get lost in a blizzard at one point and are running out of food. Then they see a light and hear a voice which fortuitously is that of a bachelor settler. He takes them to his cabin to warm and feed them, and he becomes a lifelong friend. In another excursion Elinore, Clyde and friends discover two Mormon women who have been left in cabins alone, and one is in labor. They deliver the baby and later return with an old-fashioned Christmas including tree and gifts for the Mormons.

One thing I do like about my Kindle is that I can find free books like this, something I would probably never have discovered without Kindle. I recommend this for anyone who is interested in the pioneer life in America.

Pioneer Women, Voices from the Kansas Frontier

Since I've been so busy catching up with yard work, I feel like I've been reading this old book forever, but it was so good it was worth the time. It was published in 1981, authored by Joanna L. Stratton, with an introduction by Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr.

Stratton used a collection of journals and letters from women who homesteaded in Kansas prior to the Civil War, and some memoirs from their daughters to tell what their life on the homestead was like. That's what makes the book so fascinating. As Stratton writes, "This is an unusual history of the frontier, for it is written through the eyes and the words of the women who lived it." One limitation is that these memoirs were written only by white homesteading women simply because the experiences of Indian and black women of the time, as well as the saloon girls and other marginal residents, were not recorded anywhere. It is also the story of those who stayed, rather than including those who returned east for whatever reason.

And there were plenty of reasons. Crop failure due to weather or locusts or stampedes. Hungry wolves lunging at the door and windows lured by the smell of food in the cabin or dugout or soddy. Horrible loneliness, especially when the husband had to go away for supplies or work and the wife was left alone or with small children, and the closest neighbors were a mile or more away. Curious Indians who walked in unannounced and looked at everything, sometimes taking food. They didn't have any concept of ownership so they didn't know they were doing anything wrong.

Their days were filled with hard work that I doubt many of us would stand. For instance, the cover photo shows a woman with a wheelbarrow full of buffalo chips (hardened manure) that they burned for cooking and heating since there were so few trees on the prairie. Water had to be hauled from streams, animals cared for, and in all kinds of weather. Childbirth alone in a sod house was a normal event.

Despite the distance between homes, people helped each other. They joined together particularly during the time known as "Bleeding Kansas" when proslavery folks and abolitionists fought violent battles, and Quantrill's Raiders made incursions into Kansas from Missouri, drinking and killing indiscriminately. That terrifying time made the earlier years look easy by comparison.

This book is such an eye-opener about the life of those women and children it makes me wonder how anyone survived without going crazy. I'm in awe of their courage and stamina. This is good reading and I recommend it.

I'm Still Among the Living

I haven't really dropped off the face of the earth. I've just been mowing and mowing and mowing some more. Most of our grass was a good 12" high so I've been mowing it twice - once to get it down a little, the second time to mow it lower and make it look good. It's hard enough to mow it once, but twice is a bit much. I think I'll take a break from it today; partly because a bolt came off of the seat of my rider so the seat rocks as I mow. I don't think I've ever gotten seasick mowing the yard before! We'll look for the right bolt today (since I have no idea where the old one is) and if we can't find one, Dave will make one. Nice to have a machinist for a husband. :D

The whole yard is actually dry now! Of course it's cloudy today, and chilly the last 3 days, and showers are in the forecast for the weekend. I simply cannot win.

I've also been reading but haven't had a lot of time for it. I'm reading an old book about pioneer women of the early 19th century who settled Kansas. My great-grandparents homesteaded in Nebraska and I knew their life must have been difficult there but this book has opened my eyes to just how hard it was. The dirt floors, sod houses or dugouts cut into small hills or riverbanks, the crop failures, the wild animals, all of these things are pretty scary. In my great-grandparents' case, he lost an eye while splitting wood, a friend of theirs was murdered by an outlaw, she gave birth to my grandfather and his sister on the homestead, and then Gramps had polio. And that's just the hard luck stories I know about. It's no wonder they returned to Illinois where he got his desk job back at the railroad. My great-grandmother made the best doggone biscuits you could ever dream of, and her pies were to die for.

The book is fascinating and I'll review it, probably tomorrow, because I only have a few pages left to read. That's a relief since I have three ARCs waiting for me that look very good too.

Update on Scaredy Cat: She has a litter which Dave has seen but I haven't and she let me pet her head one morning but not since. Not sure what we're going to do about all this but I don't want her to spend another winter outside, and we would love to adopt one of the kittens and momma. We'll see what happens.