Blog Archives
Eliza Pinckney — a Fire in Her Belly and Dye on Her Hands
Poor, oppressed women. We’ve been kept barefoot and pregnant our whole existence with little chance to improve our lot in life. America, this Land of Opportunity, provided no better alternatives…Or so spout the feminazis.
Gimme a break. If you read my blog, then you know women with fire in their bellies rocked their worlds…and no corset could hold them back.
Eliza
Take the refined and educated Eliza Lucas Pinckney. The woman was a Donald Trump before there was a Trump.
Born in the West Indies in 1722, she attended school in England and learned all the proper lady subjects, such as French, needlework, and music, but she adored Botany. Her father, a British military officer, moved the family to Charleston, SC where he owned three plantations. His wife, however, died shortly after this move. At only 16, Eliza stepped up, helping raise her siblings and running the plantations whenever her father was called away for military duties.
A naturally savvy businesswoman, she spotted trends in the burgeoning textile industry right off. Dyes were in high demand world-wide so she actually cultivated an improved indigo plant, the plant that makes the stable blue dye.
Hitting this mark was nothing short of a Herculean task. Her first two crops were crippled by frost and then worms. Her third was robust and healthy, but the gentleman hired to extract the die purposely sabotaged the results. Hailing from Montserrat, he couldn’t allow South Carolina to develop an industry that would rival that of his home country. Eliza and her father both recognized the man for the scoundrel he was and fired him. Ironically, the man’s brother came in and salvaged the mess. Once Eliza knew she had a winner, she shared the seeds with other SC plantations.
In 1745-1746, only 5,000 pounds of indigo were exported from the Charleston area. Eliza’s strain bumped that to more than 130,000 pounds within three years!
When she was twenty-two, she married widower Charles Pinckney, a successful lawyer, politician, and neighbor. He had seen Eliza handle her father’s plantations and fell in love with the bright, independent young woman. He never tried to rein her in and Eliza loved him dearly…perhaps for his wisdom. Pinckney traveled frequently, but was well aware his home was in good hands. She continued to run both her father’s and her husband’s plantations, and raise her own brood of four children.
Amazingly, Eliza also invested a great deal of time in educating her children. To no one’s surprise, her sons played major roles in the Revolutionary War and one would sign the Declaration of Independence. Why am I not surprised?
Eliza Pinckney died in 1793. She and her daughter had hosted George Washington once during his presidency and apparently made quite an impression. Upon hearing of her death, he volunteered to be a pallbearer at her funeral.
Eliza worked hard, loved well, and blessed many. She should inspire us all to become Ladies in Defiance!
Copyright 2014 Heather Blanton
Follow me on https://www.facebook.com/heatherfreyblanton and
https://twitter.com/heatherfblanton
Meliscent Barrett Twirled a British Soldier ‘Round Her Little Finger…and saved Concord?
Meliscent Barrett
Prior to open hostilities between the Colonists and the British, Colonel James Barrett and his son James ran a commissary for the army. A young British officer came by regularly to pick up the wagonload of supplies. While he waited for the items to be gathered and loaded, he would entertain himself by chatting with Col. Barrett’s pretty daughter Meliscent. The Barrett’s weren’t quiet about their opinions regarding Colonial independence, but Meliscent, fifteen in 1774, was a sassy teenager (I know—hard to believe) who loved expounding on her rebel ideas (again, shocking—not). She strongly believed the Americans were more than capable of running their own lives and they certainly didn’t need a royal nanny.
Her spirited defense of the Colonies’ desires delighted the young soldier and he would bait her mercilessly into energetic debates. During one saucy exchange, he insinuated that the country bumpkins in Concord wouldn’t even be able to make cartridges for their rifles. Batting her long eyelashes at the lad, Meliscent informed him they’d do fine using their powder horns and bullets. Self-righteous and smug, the British soldier offered to show Meliscent how the King’s army went about rolling cartridges, a faster, more effective way to load a rifle.
Meliscent watched closely. Very closely.
When the winds of war shifted toward Concord soon thereafter, Meliscent gathered the ladies in town and supervised an ammo-loading party that would have made the NRA proud. Her younger brother, now a major in the Continental army, was the only man in town allowed to assist. With Revere’s announcement that “the Regulars are coming,” he made several trips to remove said cartridges from the approaching British. And he in fact drove the last load out of town as the British came into sight on the infamous morning of April 19, 1775.
However, they made sure the local militia had an ample supply. On that fateful day, over 500 Minute Men from Concord fought and defeated three companies of well-trained, well-supplied British soldiers. Pretty good for country bumpkins.
But if it hadn’t been for Miliscent’s spunk, things could have turned out differently.
God bless a lady in defiance!
Copyright 2014 Heather Blanton
Follow me on https://www.facebook.com/heatherfreyblanton and
https://twitter.com/heatherfblanton
John Hancock: Ten Feet Tall and Bulletproof…Because of His Dolly
By Heather Frey Blanton
Dorothy Hancock
The biggest, baddest, most bold signature on the Declaration of Independence belongs to John Hancock. Said signature is the icon for fearless rebellion and raw treason. Did you know that when Hancock put his name to that paper, he was a newlywed?
No wonder he was feeling froggy.
So who was the lady who stoked the fires of revolution and made John think he was ten feet tall and bulletproof?
Dorothy “Dolly” Quincy was the youngest daughter of Judge Edmund Quincy. Born to a life of privilege and wealth, she was blessed with brains and beauty. She seems to have had numerous pretty sisters and cousins, too. Like flowers for bees, the Quincy home attracted many young men, including Samuel and John Adams, and the wealthy John Hancock. John had recently inherited his uncle’s holdings and was using his newly acquired fortune to establish a path in politics.
An ardent patriot, he found that the Quincy family shared his love of liberty. Dorothy eagerly desired to see the British head back across the pond and leave the colonists alone. It didn’t help that in 1775 an arrest order was issued for her new beau John. The British thought to take him into custody while they commandeered the ammunition supplies at Lexington. Dorothy was in Lexington visiting Lydia Hancock, John’s aunt, and actually witnessed the Battle of Lexington.
Fearing for her safety, John forbade his fiancée to return to Boston. Supposedly her response was something meek and acquiescent, like, “Recollect, Mr. Hancock, I am not under your authority yet. I shall go to my father’s to-morrow.” The fact that this story survives speaks, I think, volumes about the woman. It is rather apropos she heard” the shot heard round the world.”
In any event, Aunt Lydia talked her out of going. The writing was on the wall. Revolution had exploded and America was at war with the largest military power on the planet. John sent Dorothy and his Aunt to stay with the Rev. Thaddeus Burr in Fairfield while he and the other founding fathers decided how to respond to the battles of Lexington and Concord. That summer, in the midst of such deeply important strategizing, he made time to marry Dorothy. The two rebels headed off immediately to Philadelphia.
A year later, as president of the Continental Congress, John Hancock signed the Declaration of Independence and officially made himself an enemy of the Crown. Dorothy never second-guessed him. She never asked him to back off. She never asked him to value his fortune or family over the cause of liberty. This country had to be free and they had pledged their lives to it.
Married nearly twenty years, the couple had two children. One died in infancy, the other by the age of eight. Dorothy was by John’s side when he passed away in 1793. She re-married several years later to a friend of the family.
Perhaps she never carried secret intelligence or manned a cannon, but Dorothy Hancock was a loyal wife and valued confidante to her husband. She supported the cause of liberty with boundless passion, and carried herself with admirable dignity, even in in the face of tragedy. Sometimes, keeping your head up and your fist raised is a matter of slow, defiant slogging.
Here’s to another Lady in Defiance.
Copyright 2014 Heather Blanton
Follow me on https://www.facebook.com/heatherfreyblanton and
https://twitter.com/heatherfblanton
Molly Goodnight — Another Rose in Texas
By Heather Frey Blanton
Copyright 2014 Heather Blanton
Follow me on https://www.facebook.com/heatherfreyblanton and
https://twitter.com/heatherfblanton
“When the ranch is in peace, no other life is more perfect.”
― Charles Goodnight
The Palo Duro Canyon in the panhandle of Texas is 10 miles wide, 1500 feet deep and almost 100 miles long. And in the 1870’s, it was about as remote as the moon. At least for a white gal from TN.
Yet, Mary Ann “Molly” Dyer Goodnight willingly followed her husband from their ranch in CO to the harsh, unforgiving frontier. Neither she nor Charles could conceive of the fame and legend their JA Ranch would build. Molly Goodnight was a force of nature, as tough as a Texas twister, as indomitable as the landscape, and Charles was all the better for her tenacity.
An orphan who had spent years raising her siblings, Molly met Charles in Fort Belknap, Texas, in 1864 where she was working as a school teacher. After they married, they ran a ranch together in Colorado, but a combination of unstable economics and bad weather drove them out of business. Returning to Texas, Goodnight struck up a friendship with the wealthy Irishman John Adair. Adair agreed to back Goodnight in a new ranch and in 1877 the JA Ranch was born.
At its peak in 1883, the operation encompassed over a million acres and ran 100,000+ head of cattle. While the ranch provided very little in the way of neighbors (much less female neighbors), Molly was not an idle woman. She was the JA’s doctor, tailor, letter writer, teacher, and even spiritual adviser. She had a soft heart for animals as well and kept three chickens as pets.
Even when the money rolled in and life could have been easier, Molly never stopped looking for challenges or caring about others. She rode the high plains rescuing buffalo calves left behind by hunters. Goodnight indulged his wife and let her start her own herd for their preservation. She even crossed some of the buffalo with cattle and coined the phrase “cattalo.” A pretty savvy cattlewoman in her own right, Molly ran a herd separate from her husband’s under the Flying T brand. Somehow, amongst all this, she found time to run a real school in the bunkhouse for the ranch hands’ children.
In the late 1880’s, the couple moved to northeast Armstrong County to start a new ranch, but they discovered other interests as well. Both were active church members, generous philanthropists, and had quite the passion for educating children. In 1898 they established Goodnight College, a school for boys.
The Goodnights never had any children of their own. Perhaps that’s why Molly felt the need to adopt her community. She believed Texas had given her a beautiful life, it was, therefore, only right to give something back.
A true Texas Lady, she was.
Who Really Wore the Leather Breeches in The Boone Family? Hmmm?
By Heather Frey Blanton
Copyright 2014 Heather Blanton
Follow me on https://www.facebook.com/heatherfreyblanton and
https://twitter.com/heatherfblanton
“In order that she may be able to give her hand with dignity, she must be able to stand alone.”
–Margaret Fuller
Rebecca Bryan should have known she’d have her hands full with Daniel Boone. According to an account from 1852, the two first met when Daniel was out “shining the eyes” of deer, a process similar to modern-day spotlighting. Only thing was, when Daniel drew down on a pair of shining eyes, they happened to belong to the young, pretty, and very human Rebecca. Mercifully, Daniel missed the shot and, after courting for three years, married her in 1756. Some scholars say they met at a wedding. Knowing what was to come for the Boones, I’d be inclined to believe the hunting story.
Over the next 24 years of their marriage, Becky would be pregnant on average every two to four years, giving birth to 10 children. Because of Daniel’s famous (and probably downright annoying) need to explore, she would relocate her home at least six different times. And due to his wanderlust, she also had to run these homes alone, sometimes for months on end. Perhaps that’s why she headed deep into the wilderness whenever Daniel asked. She loved him. Simple as that.
Because of his predilection for remote areas (or a disdain for neighbors) Becky came to epitomize the famous pioneer spirit. She was known and respected as an accomplished midwife, leather tanner, doctor-of-sorts, marksman, seamstress, you name it, she could do it. And did without much grumbling.
For over a decade, Daniel supported his family in North Carolina by hunting and trapping. The endeavor took him away from home for months and months. It was on one of these trips he discovered the magical land of Kentucky.
Smitten with the area, in 1773, Daniel moved there with his family and fifty or so other settlers. Blood was boiling amongst the Delawares, Shawnees, and Cherokees over white encroachment. Eager to send a clear message, the Indians captured the Boone’s oldest son James and another boy. The two, just teenagers, were tortured to death, slowly, in a most horrific manner for the show of it.
Kentucky, though, had her hooks in Daniel. After a brief retreat to Virginia, The Boone’s returned and he set about helping settle the frontier, and building a country. He also served as a captain in the Colonial Army and a state representative for the Virginia House. Daniel could conquer challenges and seize the day because he knew Becky had his back.
By all accounts, she rarely complained about her hard life. I believe that’s because she had a heart overflowing with love. Many of the Boone’s children stayed close to the couple, living either with them or nearby. Adopted children and numerous grandchildren abounded. At one point, Becky presided over a household of twenty people! She didn’t have time to whine. She was too busy living.
Becky gave birth to her last child at the age of 40. In 1799, she moved with Daniel and several of their children to Missouri and enjoyed many peaceful years there. She went to her final rest at the age of 74. And a well-deserved rest it was.
Beware The Waspish Sting of a Patriot Woman’s Pen
By Heather Frey Blanton
Copyright 2014 Heather Blanton
Follow me on https://www.facebook.com/heatherfreyblanton and
https://twitter.com/heatherfblanton
“If I be waspish, best beware my sting.”
― William Shakespeare, The Taming of the Shrew
If I asked you to name American writers who stirred hearts and passions during the American Revolution, most likely you’d mention Thomas Pain or Ben Franklin or Thomas Jefferson. Surely, each man made his invaluable contribution to the fight for independence.
Lesser known, though, is the crisp, satirical wit of Mercy Otis Warren. Her plays pricked the pride of pompous Tories and entertained the likes of John and Abigail Adams.
Mercy was a determined woman and I believe she exemplified the kind who struck fear in Cornwallis’ heart. Born to a somewhat wealthy family in England, her father didn’t care to educate her. To most, this would have been a high barrier. To Mercy, it was merely an inconvenience. Focused and self-disciplined, she learned to read by sitting in on her brother’s lessons when she could, and going through his text books on her own. Her perseverance prompted more familial support and an education was provided.
Mercy was quite intelligent, clearly, and a mind like hers was always inquiring. Her family moved to Massachusetts in 1754 and when she married James Warren, found herself surrounded by pro-American voices. Her husband and her brother both were passionately in support of the colonies throwing off the yolk of a tyrant king. Her home was a popular meeting spot for the local revolutionaries and Mercy became lifetime friends with several of our Founding Fathers and their wives.
But standing around serving tea wasn’t all she wanted to do. Mercy knew there was a reason for her quick wit and sharp tongue. So did her husband. She married a remarkably open-minded man who appreciated that she was a gifted writer. James often sent her works to friends, and even submitted some for publication. Mercy’s first play, The Adulateur, was published anonymously in 1772. It unabashedly criticized the lieutenant governors attacks on personal freedoms in Boston. This was the first of several plays that had the indignant Tories throwing their tea cups across the room.
After the war, Mercy wrote a comprehensive history of the Revolution, a book of valuable insights even today. In it, however, she slighted John Adams, or so that is how he took it. His response? He chastised by Mercy by telling her, “History is not the Providence of Ladies.”
It was for this Lady in Defiance.
Ah, Keep Your Skirt on…While You Ride, Rope, Shoot, Brand, Bust a Bronc…
By Heather Frey Blanton
Copyright 2014 Heather Blanton
Follow me on https://www.facebook.com/heatherfreyblanton and
https://twitter.com/heatherfblanton
Eastern Montana is, in my opinion, one of the most beautiful and lonely places in the US. It is not an area for the faint of heart. The weather, the wide-open spaces, the solitude…it’s the kind of place that makes you or breaks you.
Which is why the story of May, Myrtle, and Mabel Buckley is all the more remarkable.
When Franklin and Susannah Buckley started having children, surely they hoped for boys. After all, farming in the Dakotas and ranching in Montana was man’s work. But the Buckley daughters were born for this land. Franklin was smart enough to know it…or perhaps his precocious, fearless, ambitious daughters gave him no choice. They bloomed on those prairies like a wildflowers after a snowy winter. They took to the saddle as if they’d been born to it. Their father’s ranch hands taught the girls to ride, rope, shoot, brand, round up, even break broncs, and called them, with affection, the Red Yearlings.
Confident in his daughters’ abilities, Franklin turned his 160-acre ranch in Terry, Montana over to the girls. This freed him up to manage the farm in North Dakota, other business ventures, and serve as a state representative. Papa was also confident that men would be men, especially where his three pretty daughters were concerned. Hence, he did not leave them unattended. The girls’ mother stayed close, keeping a watchful eye on her lovely Red Yearlings.
In 1914, neighbor and friend Evelyn Cameron photographed the girls working and playing on the ranch. Cameron wrote an article about Montana cowgirls and featured the feisty ranching sisters doing what they did best. While this article spread their fame to Europe, the girls had already been fielding invitations from Wild West shows and even President Roosevelt. Turned’em all down flat. May, Myrtle, and Mabel were ranchers. The profession was no game to them. The most play-acting they did was posing for the now famous and very collectible Cameron photos.
And I’d like to point out, they did all this in skirts. Oh, there was a brief scandal whereby the girls tried wearing split skirts. Apparently, Montana was not ready for culottes. The lady photographer was threatened with arrest over in Miles City for wearing the things. So the girls went back to skirts, wearing said culottes when nobody was looking.
May, the oldest of the sisters, never married. The more reserved of the three, she nursed her mother for years after a stroke, then died at only 50 years of age.
Myrtle, the middle sister, was a handful. One could guess she occasionally had bouts of the “Marsha, Marsha, Marsha” syndrome. She eloped with a ranch hand and had two children with him. The marriage failed and Myrtle late married rancher and neighbor George Straugh. That one stuck.
Mabel married Milton Gile and lived to a ripe old age.
Maybe they didn’t lead fairy tale lives, but the Buckley Sisters sure can inspire us to think past the prince and glass slipper and enjoy the lives we’re given.
Evelyn Cameron’s Disasters Led Her to a Life Most Worthy…
By Heather Frey Blanton
Copyright 2014 Heather Blanton
Follow me on https://www.facebook.com/heatherfreyblanton and
https://twitter.com/heatherfblanton
“Manual labour . . . is all I care about, and, after all, is what will really make a strong woman. I like to break colts, brand calves, cut down trees, ride and work in a garden.” Evelyn Cameron
Born in England in 1868, Evelyn Flower was the daughter of a wealthy East Indian merchant. She was born to a life of leisure and comfort. But not for it.
In 1889, Evelyn decided to walk away from the feather beds and army of servants. She married Ewen Cameron, a man who preferred the stars above to a roof over his head. He and Evelyn honeymooned in the Bad Lands of eastern Montana and fell in love with the area. They both lived to ride, hunt, and explore, and the chance to determine their own destinies was a siren’s song.
Full of hope, they bought a ranch and commenced to raising horses. The venture turned out to be beyond their experience, however, so they down-sized and attempted to breed polo ponies for the boys back in England. If the first ranching effort was a failure, this second idea was a complete disaster. Shipping horses all the way to England wasn’t exactly easy. Horses died in rail road cars, on the docks, on the ships. Adding insult to injury, the bank where the Cameron’s kept their money failed. Evelyn contacted the cousin in charge of her trust fund to request money…her money. Much to her dismay, the gentleman said no.
Plan B. Evelyn started taking in wealthy borders…who made more work for her and often didn’t pay their bills. Even better, Ewen couldn’t step into help, due to poor health. Broke, dispirited, sickly, he had had enough of the Land of Opportunity and suggested they head home.
Evelyn wouldn’t do it. The wide open spaces and seas of grass still held her heart.
So she tried farming. She grew vegetables, harvested them, and carried them all over the range, selling them to everyone from chuck wagon cooks to housewives to cowboys. Again, without any help from Ewen. Her days were long, often lonely, always exhausting. Still, she didn’t want to leave Montana.
One day, a border offered to teach her photography. With the first click of the lens, Evelyn knew she had found her purpose in life. After so much trial and error, it seemed the missteps had been leading her to the wonderful world of Kodak. And in the years to come, sometimes this new passion would even pay the bills!
With natural skill, she photographed friends, families and wildlife. She wrote articles for magazines and submitted them with her photos. She took publicity shots for the rail roads. From 1894 to 1928, Evelyn snapped thousands of pictures and chronicled life in Montana. She also covered with extraordinary honesty the contributions of women on the rugged ranches.
When Evelyn died in 1928, her worldly goods were stored at a friend’s home, tucked away in the basement. Thankfully, a writer, Donna Lucey, discovered the stash in 1978 and brought Evelyn back to life with her book Photographing Montana, 1894–1928: The Life and Work of Evelyn Cameron.
Trepidatious about the move to Montana, Evelyn once wrote in her diary, “I wish I would lead a life worthy to look back upon. I am far out of the path now.”
No, she was just taking the long way to it…
Mollie Fly–The Woman at the OK Corral
By Heather Frey Blanton
Copyright 2014 Heather Blanton
Follow me on https://www.facebook.com/authorheatherblanton/?fref=ts and
https://twitter.com/heatherfblanton
Mollie Fly
Not much is known about Mollie. You’ve probably never heard of her. But you know her husband. C.S. “Buck” Fly was THE photographer in Tombstone when the shoot-out at the OK Corral went down.
Mary “Mollie” McKie moved with her family to San Francisco sometime in the 1850’s, when she was around 8 or 10. The boisterous town may well be what fostered her desire for adventure, but a good upbringing kept her from falling into vice. In Defiance of the times, she took up the male-dominated hobby of photography. She also took up a husband, Samuel D. Goodrich. Apparently he wasn’t a good fit and, in a day when divorce was rare, Mollie showed him the door after only two years.
Soon, she met the dashing and adventurous Camillus Sidney “Buck” Fly, a young man who had grown up in the Napa Valley. He also loved capturing still life. We don’t know how they met. It’s a shame because they made a lasting impression on each other. We do know they married in Sept. of ‘79 and by December had arrived in the silver boomtown of Tombstone, AZ.
Within a year, they had gone from working in a tent to owning a 12-room boardinghouse that also housed the famous photography studio (the door of which was within spitting distance to the OK Corral). Buck spent a great deal of time riding the range, snapping beautiful photographs of the landscapes, as well as capturing historically valuable pictures of the Indian campaigns. A tiny gal known for her spunk, Mollie accepted the long absences and kept things humming at home. She ran the boardinghouse, took portraits for customers, and raised a daughter. Sometime in the early 1880’s, a young girl by the name of Kitty appeared on the census as a member of their household. It is not known whether she was Fly’s daughter or a simply a child they adopted, but Mollie loved her and took care of her like she was blood.
Part of that care included removing Kitty and herself from a bad situation when Fly’s drinking spiraled out of control. In ’87, Mollie divorced him and the famous photographer left Tombstone. Soldiering on, she kept the studio and boardinghouse running, but there is clear evidence she was nursing a broken heart. Mollie never remarried. She was at Fly’s side in Bisbee, AZ in 1901 when he breathed his last. She then arranged to have him buried in Tombstone, and bought him a nice, well, tombstone.
Mollie was Fly Gallery until 1912. Feeling her age, she retired to Los Angeles and died there in 1925. Prior to her death, she donated all of Fly’s negatives to the Smithsonian, well aware of the contribution her husband had made to history by chronicling the West.
Queen of the Klondike…A Great Ride While it Lasted
One of the few pretty faces in the Klondike.
By Heather Frey Blanton
Copyright 2014 Heather Blanton
Follow me on https://www.facebook.com/heatherfreyblanton and
https://twitter.com/heatherfblanton
Freedom. A true lady in Defiance cries out for it. Refuses to live without it. Pursues it at any cost. Society, propriety—even common sense won’t stop her from wrapping her slender fingers around it.
In the end, she may only have her memories of it, but at least she tasted it. For a time, Kate lived free.
Kathleen Eloise Rockwell (1873-1957) came from an unstable home, growing up in at least four different states. Perhaps the shifting sand beneath her feet contributed to her headstrong ways and desire for adventure. Dubbed a tomboy by the neighborhood kids, Katie played better with the boys than with the frilly little girls. She was a bit sassy and, arguably, incorrigible—at least according to the boarding school that kicked her out.
In the early1890’s, Kate’s mother divorced her father and the two girls wound up in New York City. The young girl got involved with the theater scene and learned to sing and dance, but eventually even the Big Apple wasn’t big enough for the free spirit. The siren call of the Alaska Gold Rush reached her ears and Kate headed off for the Klondike.
The Royal Canadian Mounted Police, however, denied her entry. Because she was a woman. Alone. On the frontier.
Can’t you hear the wheels turning in her head? Kate lived to circumvent rules and live her life on her terms.
So she dressed up like a boy and waltzed right into the Klondike. (Well, actually she took a boat.) I can see her waving at the RCMP as she sailed by.
Now, it’s one thing to try to make it on the Great White Way. Lots of competition and all that. Kate had a suspicion that in Alaska she could be a big fish in a little pond. I mean, really, how many pretty girls could there be willing to face the wild frontier? Sub-zero temperatures, knee-deep spring mud, lawless towns. Sounded like her kind of party. Kate just wanted to sing and dance. It didn’t matter if the audience was comprised of desperately hungry, cold, mud-encrusted miners who hadn’t seen a woman, much less a pretty one, in months.
She intended to mesmerize them and had a grand plan. For her “Flame Dance” she came on stage wearing an elaborate gown covered in red sequins and trailing an enormous cape. She took off the cape to reveal a cane that was attached to more than 200 yards of red chiffon. Kate leaped and twirled with the shimmering, floating fabric, spellbinding the hapless men. At the end she would dramatically drop to the floor, as did the men’s jaws.
Yeah. She was a big hit. For three years, she was the belle of the ball. Parisian gowns, gold jewelry, men falling at her feet. They called her Klondike Kate and Queen of the Yukon.
But the gold eventually petered out and Kate drifted around, along with a few different husbands. She ran a movie theater, even coached starlets in the 1940’s. Time and age catch us all, though. Kate slowed down then finally finished the ride in Oregon in 1957.
By no means an angel, Kate was a woman who defied conventionality, shook her fist at the lack of social mobility for women, and cut her own path through life.
I tip my hat to this trailblazer.
Ladies in Defiance 