wild women column

As Ella “Kate” Watson sashayed down the crude staircase of the Rawlins, Wyoming saloon and brothel where she worked she inspected the potential customers in the smoke-filled bar.  Eager cowboys eyed her hourglass form as she brushed by them.  They sniffed the air after her, breathing in the scent of jasmine she left behind.  Kate...

Ellis Meredith was the daughter of pioneers. Born in Montana Territory, in 1865, she was the daughter of Emily R. Meredith, a well-known advocate for woman suffrage, and Frederick Allison, a journalist. The family had been drawn to the gold-rush boomtown and territorial capital of Bannack Montana, living there for a couple of years before...

Esther Hobart Morris carefully arranged borrowed chairs and warmed borrowed teacups as she prepared for her visitors to arrive. Her tiny mountain cabin, perched at 7,500 feet of elevation in the mountains at South Pass City, Wyoming Territory, was cleaned, decorated, and full of all of the delectable morsels she could contrive for the important...

Bitterly cold snow flurries pelted the determined features of twenty-one-year-old Ethel Berry’s face as she drove her dog sled over the Chilkoot Pass in Alaska. Clad in a pair of men’s mackinaw breeches and moccasins, she cracked her whip over the team of animals hauling an enormous mound of supplies behind them. Ethel was slowly...

A hush fell over the large crowd at the rodeo arena in Salt Lake City, Utah, in July 1938 as daredevil rider Alice Sisty raced into the arena atop two English jumpers. She was standing on the backs of the animals with one foot on one horse and the other foot on the second mount,...

Shakespearean actor Edwin Forrest rifled through the desk drawer in the sitting room of the New York home he shared with his wife, socialite turned actress and theatre manager Catherine Norton Sinclair.  The contents of the drawer belonged to Catherine, but Edwin wasn’t interested in maintaining her privacy.  In his frantic search, he uncovered a...

More than 150 years have passed since President Abraham Lincoln was shot and killed at Ford’s Theatre.  Tragedy ensued for many people with Lincoln that night in April 1865.  For example, Lincoln’s guest Major Henry Rathbone was cut savagely with the knife John Wilkes Booth unsheathed after emptying his Derringer at Lincoln.   Laura Keene, the...

The green, silk robe shimmered in the light of the dressing room.  Adjusting the neckline, Lillian Russell glanced into the mirror and considered the interviewer’s question about beauties never appreciating their good looks.  “I think they do,” she countered.  “They are glad to have it, as they are grateful for any other gift.  I am...