Check it out

Mom’s come a long way since the days when it took two days by covered

wagon to restock the family larder. Find out just how far the journey has

taken her with American History Collection resources from the Newport

Beach Public Library.

The experiences of women who traveled the 2,000-mile trail from the

Midwest to Oregon some 150 years ago are artfully evoked in “Women’s

Voices from the Oregon Trail,” featuring diaries, songs, history, poetry

and recipes that recall the trek west.

In addition, this account of brutal expeditions retraces the trail as

it is today for readers interested in revisiting it via car or armchair.

You can read a firsthand account of a woman “bred up to silver and old

mahogany, pretty clothes, servants and leisure,” who left it all to find

fulfillment between log walls, in “A Bride Goes West.” Relayed in the

words of one of the last generation of American pioneer women, this

collection of tales about the Wild West paints a vivid portrait of life

on the range.

Other personal recollections of pioneer women are in “Covered Wagon

Women,” a series of letters, memoirs and diaries of female trailblazers.

The hardships of contemporary women may pale when compared to adversities

described in this account of continent crossings in prairie schooners in

the face of inclement weather, starvation and bandit attacks.

These and other gritty realities are depicted in “Uncommon Common

Women: Ordinary Lives of the West,” a historical narrative interwoven

with storytelling and photographs. Rather than focusing on school marms

and dance hall girls, this dramatic rendering of heroic women

concentrates on the experience of female pioneers, nuns, educators and

suffragists during the western emigration era. While today’s mothers may

deal with some of the same child-rearing issues as their pioneer

ancestors, much about parenting has changed since the days when scurvy

threatened young lives, when infants were fed beef juice and mutton broth

and when playing with babies was considered dangerous. Learn about these

and other issues mothers faced at the turn of the century in “The Care

and Feeding of Children,” published in 1894 by an obstetrician and

Columbia University professor of children’s diseases.

Frontier women who began to evolve from helpmates to wage earners in

post revolutionary times forged the survival tools needed by today’s

working wives. Read about these early breadwinners in “The Great American

Housewife,” an innovative historical survey that traces the need for

homemakers to adapt to the additional role of working women. Alongside

the frontier women who called on courage and fortitude to survive, there

were those who swindled their way to success. Learn about the exploits of

such female blackmailers as “Chicago May” Churchill and “Big Bertha”

Heyman in “Swindler, Spy, Rebel,” a fascinating account of criminals, con

artists and gold diggers in 19th-century America.

CHECK IT OUT is written by the staff of the Newport Beach Public Library.

This week’s column is by Melissa Adams.