Women on the Prairie

City Hotel in St. John, Kansas

In searching for images to accompany this blog I observed that often the women photographed in everyday scenes were at the back of the picture, standing behind the men.  You will need to click on the image at the right to enlarge it enough to find the women at the rear door of the City Hotel in St. John, Kansas.  That is an appropriate allegory for how the role of women in homesteading the prairie is often seen--a wife surrounded by children standing behind her husband.  Certainly many of the women on the prairie were wives who came with their husbands to stake a claim, but it must be remembered that those wives, and the children as well, worked side-by-side with their husbands, not necessarily doing the same chores but doing other things that needed to be done if they were to survive and prosper.

 

The requirements for homesteading were that the claimant be the head of the household or be single and at least 21 years of age.  The claimant's gender was not specified.  As a result, many homesteaders were women--single, widowed, or divorced.  The ratio of men to women homesteaders varied from place to place and year to year, but estimates range from five to twenty percent of homesteaders being women.

 

 

Woman gathering buffalo chips for fuel

The women in my family who came to Isaac's community to build a new life on the prairie came with their husbands--Susan Beck, Theresa Hall, and Mary Wilson.  However, two of Isaac's nearest neighbors were women homesteaders.

 

Persis Vosburgh was an unmarried lady, born in New York state in about 1837.  She came to Kansas with her younger brother Jerome and his wife Ann.  After Ann's death, Persis helped raise her brother's children who were still at home--Fay, Leila, and Fannie.  Because of her close connection with her brother, (she was counted in his household in both the 1880 Federal Census and the 1885 Kansas Census), there were those who raised an objection to her claim as a homesteader, believing Persis had not maintained a residence on her claim.  At a vigilance meeting at the Naron School in the spring of 1885 to discuss what to do about claim jumpers, Isaac, William Campbell, and C. W. Shattuc supported Persis against those who said she did not meet the requirement of residing on her land.

 

In 1888 Persis Vosburgh died while on a visit to New York state to see family.  Isaac farmed her land following her death, growing corn and plowing fire guards to protect her trees from prairie fires.  Her heirs eventually conveyed it to G. G. John, the man who cared for Isaac during the final five months Isaac was able to remain in his own home.

 

Isaac's other unmarried neighbor was Isabel Ross, a divorced woman with children still at home.  When Mrs. Ross made the decision to claim her homestead just to the east of Isaac's timber claim, Isaac called on her to make out a lumber list for what would be necessary to build her soddy.  He wrote in his journal that she had so many architectural ideas that he was glad the job of contractor went to Tousley, another neighbor.  However, Isaac worked on the job from the time the soddy was staked until he dug her well after the structure was finished.

 

Although divorce was rather uncommon in those times, the court records on file explain why Isabel Ross filed against her husband.  She claimed he abused her and their children and he claimed she was an unfit mother, but she prevailed in the suit and was given custody of their children.  Over time, Isaac's initial opinion of her changed, and his journal records many kindnesses he showed her--taking corn husks and cobs to her for fuel in storms, helping tie down her stable roof in winds, papering inside her soddy roof to reduce drafts in the winter.  Despite these acts of thoughtfulness, Isaac continued calling her Mrs. Ross, avoiding the more personal use of her first name.

 

Susan Beck & daughter Anna Marie

My great grandmother Susan Beck is a good example of women who remained on the land with their children after misfortune.  Her husband, Aaron, suffered a stroke in about 1891, and Isaac's journal describes a sale at the Beck's about that time. During the 1890s, Susan taught in nearby Pratt County country schools.  Their older child, Royal, was a teenager, old enough to do work on the farm with direction, and by the time of Aaron's death in 1900, Royal and Susan had bought land and had begun building a house.  Daughter Anna Marie was already following her mother's footsteps as a teacher in Stafford County schools, and both mother and daughter spent a year teaching in Colorado before setting up their household in St. John.  Royal remained on the farm and brought his bride, Lillian Hall, to the home he and his mother had built.  Although Susan was not initially widowed, she did become the primary provider for her family as her husband's health failed, and she kept the family together in their prairie home.

 

The roles of women on homesteads, whether as the claimant or the wife, daughter, or unmarried sister or aunt of the male claimant, should not be overlooked or minimized in the settling of the prairie.  You might enjoy Staking Her Claim:  Homesteading the West, by Marcia Meridith Hensley,  http://newwest.net/topic/article/no_husband_no_problem_problem_for_women_staking_her_claim/C39/L39

 P.S.  The woman pictured gathering buffalo chips is Ada McColl, believed to be the first female photographer in Kansas.  She is known for documenting everyday life on the prairie, as well as for portraiture.  Her homestead was in Kearny County, and she began working as a photographer in the late 1800s in Garden City.  The image is taken from an old postcard.  

Chasing Ghosts

"I see dead people."  Of course, that famous movie line is from the 1999 movie, The Sixth Sense.  However, after 2 1/2 years with Isaac and his Stafford County neighbors, I can identify with Cole Sear, the young man from the movie who lived with dead people as real to him as his flesh-and-blood friends and family. 

 

As I finalize my manuscript, I am making an effort to discover details about a few of Isaac's neighbors, and this week, I experienced the historian's idea of hitting the jackpot!

 

G. G. John is first mentioned in Isaac's journal when Isaac went in search of fertile eggs to use in the incubator he designed and built.  What he found at G. G. John's place instead were hens and chicks, saving him the trouble of hatching his chicks in the incubator.

 

However, my specific interest in G. G. John came from the Probate Records detailing the administration of Isaac's estate.  The last two years of Isaac's life were difficult, ending with Isaac receiving round-the-clock care in the homes of others.  The man who allowed Isaac to spend a few more months in his own home was G. G. John, who checked on Isaac every day, ran necessary errands for him, and built an invalid chair to help him move around his house.  When claims were submitted to the estate, John's claim for five months of attending to his neighbor was ten dollars.  In contrast, the couple who took Isaac into their home later claimed ten dollars a month board, plus $2.50 a day and $2.50 a night for his care!  This was during hard times when one young man was willing to work for thirty-eight cents a day and men in search of work rode the rails and could be arrested as tramps in many cities for simply having no sign of gainful employment.

 

I wanted to know more about the man who asked so little for helping a sick neighbor (in contrast to other neighbors who took advantage of an opportunity to cash in on Isaac's care!)



My first clue about G. G. John came from an undated newspaper clipping in my great aunt's scrapbook with the headline:  "Byers Author Is Remembered / Leaves Own Books in Farm Mansion."  A reviewer of the book was quoted in the article as calling John's book, Whose Son is This?, "socialistic is theme, but scintillatingly brilliant."  His home was described in the article as having 13 rooms, with a large library, an elevated music room, a large cold storage room off the kitchen, and two separate wings, each with its own staircase.  That would have been quite a country home for those times--in fact, for today!

Searching for a man who used initials (without knowing the names for which those initials stood) is challenging, and his last name of John created its own problems.  Search engines insisted upon adding an "s" to the end, or putting "St." at the beginning.  Even knowing the state where he was born and his approximate birth date had not allowed me to find him on ancestry.com. 

 

Then, a friend told me about an 87-year-old man living in St. John who might be related somehow.  Crossing my fingers, I made a phone call.  Jackpot!  I spent a delightful couple of hours talking with Milton John about his Great Uncle George.  He shared wih me that George's parents had named all of their sons with double initials--O. O., E. E., and M. M.  Using G. G.'s newly confirmed given name and the names of his brothers, my search on ancestry.com succeeded, and I learned that George's father had an even more unusual pair of names.  His name was John John, a blacksmith and farmer born in 1831 in Virginia.

 

A few hours later I received an e-mail from Milton's sister sharing the birth, marriage, and death dates of George Griffith John!  I wrapped up my research with a trip to the court house deed records to confirm that G. G. lived on the land just to the west of Isaac's timber claim, making an easy walk for him to reach Isaac's house on his daily visits.

 

Neither his niece nor his nephew had a picture of G. G., nor of his Southern-style mansion embraced in porches.  Regardless, I can picture that house in my imagination, with a distinguished gentleman standing on the porch, holding a book.  How happy the kind, book-loving neighbor must have made Isaac each day when he visited those last five months Isaac lived in his own home.

So now you are wondering why I posted the picture of a group of men standing on the steps of the Stafford County Court House, aren't you?  Could one of those men be George Griffith John?  We can only guess...(unless someone out there discovers the real thing!  And, while you are looking for his picture, see if you can find a copy of one of  the books he wrote!!)