A Child of the Sea and Life Among the Mormons

by Elizabeth W. Williams

This scarce antiquarian book is a facsimile reprint of the original. Due to its age, it may contain imperfections such as marks, notations, marginalia and flawed pages. Because we believe this work is culturally important, we have made it available as part of our commitment for protecting, preserving, and promoting the world's literature in affordable, high quality, modern editions that are true to the original work.

Genres: Memoir, History

248 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2005

About the author

Elizabeth Whitney Williams

Reviews

[Elizabeth · Rating 4 out of 5]

The old-fashioned style of writing was a little hard to get used to, but the history was fascinating.
Even better, since I've been to Beaver Island myself twice, I could picture many places she was talking about - such as the mansion by Font Lake (and Font Lake itself).
After reading it though, now I'm stuck with WHERE DID IT ALL GO?!
Dad had to remind me the book is a hundred years old...but still. If you love history, once you get into this, it is really interesting. It was probably a little more interesting to me because I could recall the way it looks now and try to picture how it must've looked back then.

[Greg · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed the book because of the well written descriptions of life, during the author's time on Beaver Island. The story of survival as a young child was also interesting. I currently live on Beaver Island. My mother was 1 of 13 children raised on the island. Her mother was born on Beaver Island and lived her for the 97 years of her life.
This book helped detail how life was on Beaver Island prior to my grandmother's birth.
The story of the Mormons and their time on Beaver Island is unique and the topic of some good books. Their leader King Strang has been researched and written about by those outside and inside of the Mormon faith.
The author was the lighthouse keeper at the harbor lighthouse on Beaver Island, after her husband drowned, trying to save a troubled crew at sea. The author learned the job from her husband while he was the official keeper.
She later was remarried and then transferred to The Little Traverse Lighthouse.

[Sabrina Saxton · Rating 5 out of 5]

Randomly came across this on Project Gutenberg; read on my new Nook. Written in 1905 by a woman who was born, raised, and lighthouse keeper on Lake Michigan islands. A Mormon offshoot took over Beaver Island for several years in the 1850's and there was a lot of violence from them and against them. Extremely interesting to rea about the early days of life in upper Michigan.

[Donna Nova · Rating 5 out of 5]

A pleasant surprise about early life in Northern Michigan.

This is one young woman's story of her life in the 1800's. The struggles of island life on Mackinaw, and other islands in the area. So much rich history about the natives and how they had once occupied the islands for fishing then left no trace after leaving for winter. The Mormon story is dramatic and telling. Not so far off as the Jim Jones tragedy. If you're at all familiar with the islands and mainland northern Michigan you will enjoy this look into the history not widely known.

[Eric · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is not a literary classic, but it's lovely, just the same. It reads more like a journal and feels like sitting by a fire with a cup of cocoa listening to your grandmother telling tales of her childhood. Having recently read "The King of Confidence" and then visited Beaver Island, we had an idea of the history of King Strang and his Mormon followers, but this adds another dimension to that knowledge. This puts a real, personal touch on the story, written by someone who was there. Very enjoyable.

[Rachel Adrianna · Rating 2 out of 5]

Standard print from the library

Yikes- you can tell this was a book written by a fascinating lady who unfortunately, did not use any kind of editor. The book has short sections that jump from event to event without transition, and the poor writing structure distracts/ confuses the reader about what is happening. Some of the stories were interesting and written in a more approachable way, but I was disappointed with the level of this publication.

[Kathleen Neher · Rating 4 out of 5]

So interesting to read descriptions of life on the Great Lakes when Mackinaw was a fort, travel by paddlewheel steam ships, people making their living (a good one) by seasonal fishing, many Native Americans still populating the area... Who knew that Mormans settled on Beaver Island and what it was happened to the non-Morman community because of it. Really interesting.

[Maureen · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’ve wanted to learn more about the history of Beaver Island and our area in Northern Michigan and this book does just that. Elizabeth Whitney Williams writes of her life growing up on Beaver Island during the rein of King Strang, in his Kingdom of St. James. It’s pretty interesting!

[Marlene · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting story to help give some background to life on Beaver Island which we visited this summer

[Jan Wood · Rating 5 out of 5]

Such historical information, what a childhood. Love her way of sharing her life.

[Steven May · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 Intriguing stories of northern Michigan history in 1850’s including King Strange on Beaver Island.

[Lis · Rating 4 out of 5]

A delightfully informative book about life on Beaver Island (MI) and what it was like with King James and his Mormon followers sharing the island. Well worth reading!

[David Devine · Rating 4 out of 5]

While the island is still beautiful, the difference in wildlife is apparent. Interesting history of the “King”

[Henry DeForest · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a really stellar book. I have frequently been to many of the places Williams had talked about, and I felt that these first-hand accounts really did a wonderful job of giving life to these places as they were in the past. I felt like Williams often relied too heavily on hyperbole, sometimes undercutting the believability of her tales, but this fact does very little to demerit the book.

[Sonya · Rating 3 out of 5]

The lack of punctuation was truly frightening in this nineteenth century tale of life on Mackinac Island and then with John Strang's poorly used Mormons on Beaver Island but a good "Michigan read" nevertheless.

[Wanda · Rating 5 out of 5]

Most enlightening and surprising.

[Cecil · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was an interesting book. Although entitled Life among the Mormons, it is really about an off sect of Mormonism--the Strangites.