ELINORE PRUITT STEWART

For those of you who are enjoying your Kindles , I have found a nice free book you might want to consider. It is called “Letters of a Woman Homesteader” by Elinore Pruitt Stewart.

It is the true account of a woman in the 1900 who decides to homestead in Wyoming. This was before women were allowed to vote and not that many owned property.

Elinore Pruitt was born at Fort Smith, Arkansas, in 1876 and she spent most of her childhood in Oklahoma Her schooling came to an early end when her teacher was lynched by a group of local men.

At the age of fourteen both her parents died. Elinore eventually married a man much older than she. He was killed in an accident, leaving her with a young daughter and not much of a future.

Stewart’s westward journey from Oklahoma was not unlike that of many women homesteaders. She made the bold move when the Enlarged Homestead Act of 1909 gave her the incentive to attempt homesteading.

To insure employment, she answered Scotsman Clyde Stewart’s ad for a "young or middle-aged lady companion and to assist with housework on a Wyoming ranch." She was accepted and moved with her daughter to Wyoming. She homesteaded the 160 acres adjacent to Clyde’s in Burntfork,Wy and eight weeks later they were married.

Writing was one of Stewart’s goals from an early age. Her writing skills were advanced considering her limited schooling. She accomplished this not with formal education but by reading voraciously.

I got the feeling that Elinore would have loved blogging had she been born a century later. She regularly wrote long letters to a Mrs. Coney, a former employer, describing frontier life and the people she met. Mrs. Coney was impressed with the quality and interest of Elinore's letters and arranged for them to be published in The Atlantic Monthly.

These letters were later compiled into the books “Letters of a Woman Homesteader” (1914) and “Letters on an Elk Hunt” (1915). The books are basically a reprint of these letters. This is not a polished or edited work but quite readable and it gives you a look into life on the frontier at the turn of the century.

Though in reality Stewart’s life was fraught with hardships, her writings illustrate the affirmative aspects on the frontier. Her life was often tough but she chose to focus on the positives and not let the negatives draw her down. This lady was a pure optimist.

Her writings are nothing but up beat and the people she meets are for the most part, colorful, quite quirky and amazingly generous of spirit. Her descriptions of the beauty of Wyoming are quite visual and her humor, appreciation of life and accounts of that early way of life and its people, are worth the time and definitely worth five times the price. Oh--- that's right it is free.

Hope you will check it out and if you don't have Kindle, it is in paperback and am sure most libraries carry it. I found the 1979 movie version of the book, "Heartland" with Rip Torn through Netflix and have it scheduled as my snow entertainment for today.

We got 9 inches of gorgeous snow yesterday and since it is over my shoe tops and I own no boots (yet), I will stay in today after a bit of shoveling , watch the movie and eat popcorn. Some days are just so pleasant.

Have a great weekend.