Frontier Children

by Linda Peavy, Ursula Smith

“Peppered with letters and diaries written by children and liberally illustrated with photographs of children in their best clothes, or hard at work, this is a book for the entire family to read, look at, savor, and enjoy."— American Cowboy

Enriched by over 200 vintage photographs, Frontier Children is a visual and verbal montage of childhood in the nineteenth-century West. From a wide range of primary and secondary sources, Linda Peavy and Ursula Smith, well known for their books on western women, have brought together stories and images that erase the stereotypes and bring to life the infinite variety of the experience of growing up in the American West.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, American History, 19th Century

176 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1999

Reviews

[A B · Rating 4 out of 5]

There's a photo in this collection of a cute little boy - Eddie- in a cowboy outfit pulling a wagon containing a watermelon. He caught the eye of a professional photographer who was just setting up his studio. The photographer called young Eddie in for a photograph so that he could test out his camera.

Eddie died a few days later and the photographer gave his mother the photograph, the only one she'd ever have of her son. That's the kind of story that chokes you up, thinking about how many things we take for granted - like having a tactile image of your loved one. And it also makes us realize how tough these frontier residents were.

I tend to think of the bread basket/great plains when I picture the frontier. I'm completely wrong and probably based that impression on reruns of "Little House on the Prairie". The frontier was so much more. It expanded through the Rockies to the Pacific Northwest and down to the deserts of the Southwest (my favorite, naturally). The book covers many areas of the frontier for an inclusive and wide-reaching content.

90% of the appeal of this book is the excellent and diverse collection of photographs. The narrative is information, if a bit dry at times. There are stories-within-stories awkwardly set in boxed off sections of the page that can be jarring. You're reading something only to turn the page and be in a completely different story.

I also appreciate the diversity of this collection. The frontier was a true melting pot of Native American tribes, freemen of African origin, immigrants from eastern Asia, Hispanics, Mexicans, and Americans of European descent. The stories and photographs do a good job of covering all ethnic groups, particularly those so often overlooked.

A great addition for any home or school library.

[Nicole Northrup · Rating 5 out of 5]

I picked this up in the back of the Manteo Library. It went perfectly with "Grant" since this book is all stories and photos from the later 19th Century and very early 20th Century. Good history with great photos.

[Cheri Yecke · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a treasure! This book provides first-hand accounts of the lives of children on the American frontier. It ached my heart to read of the toil and drudgery these children had to endure--facts that can be used to explain their unbelievable resilience of these children s both children and adults. A must-read.

[Judy · Rating 4 out of 5]

The basic information is familiar, but there were quite a few reports that I hadn't seen before, and most of the photos were new to me. I've quoted some passages that gave me pause.

p 28: Despite the fact that fewer than one-tenth of all wagon trains reported any sort of hostile act by Native Americans and most children crossed the plains without ever seeing an Indian, reports of isolated incidents kept the possibility of an attack uppermost in the emigrant mind.
One-tenth. Interesting. I've often wondered about the likelihood of settlers meeting the Natives.

Cradleboards have always held a fascination for me.
p 61: Cradleboard designs and decorations varied from tribe to tribe. In some groups, cradleboards were painted different colors—white for boys, yellow for girls—or decorated with different objects—feathers for boys, beads for girls—to accent and infant's gender. The covering of the boy's board had a penis hole, allowing the child to urinate outside the pouch.

Obviously, some pregnant women would have found themselves alone when they went into labor, but I hadn't thought about what they'd do with their young children who happened to be at home.
p 64: An Oregon woman who went into labor while her husband was temporarily away from the homestead found herself in a difficult dilemma. With no one available to fetch the midwife or to watch after her two little girls while she went through labor, she had the girls, aged five and three, bring to her bedside a basket of apples that stood in a corner in the kitchen. Then, from the vantage point of her bed, she rolled one apple after another across the bedroom, through the kitchen, and out into the yard, sending the little girls into peals of laughter as they chased after and retrieved the bright red fruit while their mother delivered their baby sister.

P 98: The children in Helena made use of the local library. "It was the Elsie Dinsmore books that we cried over and Mother said she didn't want us to cry over books. That we would have to get different kinds of books. ... But we kept on bringing home the Elsie books, and she would hide them from us."
This is a Christian series that Goodreads reviewers rate highly.

p 121: Lone Wolf, a Blackfoot, was eight years old in 1893 when he was taken from his parents and sent to Fort Shaw Indian School outside Great Falls, Montana. "It was very cold that day when we were loaded into the wagons," he recalled. "Oh, we cried for this was the first time we were to be separated from our parents. ... [At school,] our belongings were taken from us, even the little medicine bags our mothers had given us to protect us from harm. Everything was placed in a heap and set afire."
Such cruelty. American leaders mistreated the native tribes in every possible way.

But apparently the Shoshone Girls School on the Wind River Reservation in Wyoming had a thoughtful leader.
p 121: Any time the little girls felt homesick they could go to a wooden tipi that stood in the middle of the campus, and there thy could speak their own language, sing their native songs, and practice traditional ares like beadwork.

[Jennifer · Rating 4 out of 5]

I don't know how those mothers did it...

Fascinating

[Mirele Kessous · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fabulous photos, clear text.

[Aren Lerner · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wonderful book about children of all races and situations on the frontier!

[Connie D]

Had to stop on page 107 and return it to the library, but I've been really enjoying it.