Something a Bit Different

[ithildin]

Something you may not know about me: I'm fascinated by anything to do with pioneers, and have been since I was a little girl. I'm particularly interested in the experiences of women who came West, and collect books on the subject. Last night I was reading a volume of Wagon Train Women, this one dealing with letters and diaries of women from 1860-65. There's a whole series, but I picked up this one since it was the time period my great great grandparents came to CA (Something I only discovered a few years ago when I found a copy of my great grandmother's marriage certificate in the B.C. Provincial archives. I about fell over when I saw place of birth listed as Grass Valley CA). I'm also rereading 'The Gentle Tamers' and Isabella Bird's 'A Lady's Life in the Rocky Mountains', which her first person account of her trip in 1873. Another favourite, though it got packed with most of my books that went to Utah, 'They Saw the Elephant: Women in the California Gold Rush'. Now that book I really wanted to reread... need to refresh my memory for a specific purpose :)

Comments

[carenejeans.livejournal.com]

You're welcome!

I read a fair number of books by and about women in the west back in the day -- I was (and still am) interested in women's diaries and letters. I'll poke around on my shelves and see what else I can recommend. Unfortunately, some of my books are in boxes in the garage -- and so might as *well* be in Utah!

[ithildyn.livejournal.com]

I was looking over on Amamzon and couldn't quite remember if some of the books seemed familiar because I have them already, or because I thought about getting them at some point :) But I ended up adding half a dozen to my list regardless!