wild woman

Among the many short news articles included in the October 5, 1886, edition of the Daily Tombstone was the announcement of a new teacher to the well-known Arizona town.  Miss Sarah Herring, her four siblings, and mother, Mary arrived in Tombstone in 1882 to join her father, mine owner and lawyer, Colonel William Herring.  Born...

The light from a spectacular full moon spilled into the windows of the parlor at the Strentzel Ranch near the town of Martinez in the Alhambra Valley in California.  The room was filled to overflowing with well-dressed guests, owners, and operators of farms in the area and their wives and family.  All eyes were on...

Yosemite’s Half Dome, the hooded monk in stone, brooding over its eastern end, rises thousands of feet from the ground below, so high that its summit is wreathed in clouds.  In October 1876, three men scaled the mountain face slowly working their way to the top.  All were dressed in woolen caps and trousers, thick...

When twenty four-year old Mildred Douglas rode a steer in the Garden City, Kansas, rodeo in 1919, it was a big deal.  No woman had ever ridden a steer in competition before.  But Douglas was no ordinary woman.  Born in Philadelphia on August 21, 1895, Mildred knew at the age of seven what she wanted...

Bronc busting champion Kitty Wilkes won her first title at the Wild West Celebration Rodeo in Miles City, Montana, in 1916.  The seventeen-year-old, New York native’s straightforwardness and untamed physical daring gave fans the impression she was born and bred into the rugged life of a Wyoming ranch. Few would have guessed she was new to...

(1894-1986) The stylish lobby of the Texas Hotel in Fort Worth was a bustle of activity on Saturday, March 11, 1922.  Well-dressed patrons were arriving and departing.  A string quartet in the corner of the massive entryway serenaded white-haired, prosperous looking gentlemen and their stocky, bejeweled wives being escorted to their rooms by attentive bellboys. ...

“The West is overrun with bawdy houses and soiled doves.” Gold miner Charles Bartlett in a letter home to his family in Virginia – 1872 Madam Laura Bell McDaniel’s broken body lay in a ditch beside a snowy thoroughfare conjoined with the twisted rubble of what was once her pristine Mitchell sedan. It was late...

“Wanted:  A nice, plump, healthy, good natured, good looking domestic and affectionate lady to correspond.  Object – matrimony.  She must be between 22 and 35 years of age.  She must be a believer in God and immortality, but no sectarian.  She must not be a gad-about or given to scandal but must be one who...