Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    Fascinating Women In California History
    Fascinating Women In California History
    Fascinating Women In California History
    Ebook145 pages1 hour

    Fascinating Women In California History

    By Alton Pryor

    ()

    Read preview

    About this ebook

    Women were not only the first to find gold, but they were responsible for settling California. T

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherAlton Pryor
    Release dateJul 13, 2011
    ISBN9781465700711
    Fascinating Women In California History
    Author

    Alton Pryor

    Alton Pryor has been a writer for magazines, newspapers, and wire services. After retiring, he turned to writing books. He is the author of 18 books, which he has published himself.

    Read more from Alton Pryor

    Related to Fascinating Women In California History

    Related ebooks

    Americas (North, Central, South, West Indies) History For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      ‘The Last Nomad’: Somali Refugee, Soccer Mom, And Everything In Between

      Aug 30, 2021

      Shugri Said Salh’s memoir strives for an accurate – rather than sensationalized or simplified – account of growing up in, and then fleeing, Somalia.

      4 min read

    • Article

      Also On The Bookshelf

      Oct 28, 2021

      The Burgundians: A Vanished Empire by Bart Van Loo (Head of Zeus, 624 pages, £30) By the end of the 15th century, Burgundy had reached its day of reckoning, undone by poor military and marital decisions and dynastic wrangling. Yet for over 1,000 year

      2 min read

    • Article

      4 Research Routes

      Jul 7, 2021

      Get started with these resources. Native Land is a tool that uses your zip code to drill down into native territories, languages, and treaties—each a keyword to unlocking more information. Go to native-land.ca. Cultural institutions point you to know

      1 min read

    • Article

      Colson Whitehead

      Aug 13, 2016

      The author of The Underground Railroad, Oprah’s new book-club pick, talks about making fiction from history’s great atrocity

      2 min read

    • Article

      The Many Souths

      Aug 13, 2018

      The Many Souths
      5 min read

    • Article

      Power Behind The Throne

      Oct 27, 2022

      Power Behind The Throne
      3 min read

    • Article

      Extinguishing the Self: On Robert Stone

      Nov 25, 2020

      Stone's work reads as if it were composed to the tune of clanging blacksmiths and left to cool under the stars somewhere far from land. This is the conundrum of good writing. It can take you anywhere. The post Extinguishing the Self: On Robert Stone

      18 min read

    • Article

      The Accident

      Jan 5, 2021

      The Accident
      16 min read

    • Article

      Let Freedom Ring

      May 23, 2023

      Let Freedom Ring
      22 min read

    • Article

      Full Circle

      Sep 29, 2020

      Full Circle
      4 min read

    • Article

      Lily King

      Apr 25, 2020

      Award-winning and bestselling author Lily King’s latest book, Writers & Lovers, is set in the Boston area during the 1990s. This cleverly written novel features a compelling protagonist, a struggling 31-year-old writer named Casey. Readers follow Cas

      2 min read

    • Article

      A Northern Farm cradled in Pines

      Jun 23, 2022

      A Northern Farm cradled in Pines
      22 min read

    • Article

      In Atlanta, A Civil War Painting Stops Stretching The Truth

      Apr 11, 2019

      The Cyclorama’s costly restoration has become a teaching moment for Atlanta, whose 1864 defeat by Union troops it portrays.

      4 min read

    • Article

      ‘Too Much’: Featured Nonfiction from Rachel Vorona Cote

      Feb 25, 2020

      In Too Much: How Victorian Constraints Still Bind Women Today, Cote examines how the "unspoken rules" that govern the expression of women’s emotional and physical desires date back to the 19th century. The post ‘Too Much’: Featured Nonfiction from Ra

      6 min read

    • Article

      The Joy of Underperforming

      Dec 9, 2023

      The Joy of Underperforming
      7 min read

    • Article

      Christie’s Gunfight

      Jul 24, 2018

      It’s the October issue, so naturally the thoughts of Wild West editors and longtime readers alike turn to the Gunfight at the O.K. Corral. For those who’ve had their fill of Wyatt Earp, his brothers, Doc Holliday and that Oct. 26, 1881, shootout in a

      2 min read

    • Article

      Where Were They Buried?

      Jul 31, 2020

      Where Were They Buried?
      4 min read

    • Article

      Ott v. Ott

      Nov 25, 2022

      Ott v. Ott
      24 min read

    • Article

      Comanche Trail

      Dec 23, 2021

      Comanche Trail
      1 min read

    • Article

      “As We Say Here In The South, ‘He Was Raised Right, Not Jerked Up’”

      Sep 12, 2019

      Reading the August/September 2019 issue, I marveled at a couple who collect buildings, laughed out loud at the naming of a dog, snickered at Elvis and creative cussin’, cried at the saving of a sea turtle, and got hungry from all the delicious food a

      2 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for Fascinating Women In California History

    0 ratings

    0 ratings0 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

      Book preview

      Fascinating Women In California History - Alton Pryor

      Fascinating Women In California History

      By Alton Pryor

      Smashwords Edition

      Copyright 2011 by Alton Pryor

      All Rights Reserved

      Smashwords License Agreement

      This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please pur-chase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

      "Remember the Ladies, and

      be more generous and favorable

      to them than your ancestors."

      "Do not put such unlimited

      power into the hands of the

      husbands. Remember all men

      would be tyrants if they could."

      (Quotes by Abigail Adams,

      wife of John Adams, second

      President of the United States.)

      Table of Contents

      Chapter 1 Mother Mary Baptist Russell

      Chapter 2 Donaldina Cameron

      Chapter 3 Dorothea Lange

      Chapter 4 The Ladies of the Evening

      Chapter 5 Juanita

      Chapter 6 Clara Bow

      Chapter 7 Mary Ballou

      Chapter 8 Amelia Earhart

      Chapter 9 Clara Shortridge Foltz

      Chapter 10 Women Printers

      Chapter 11 Olive Mann Isbell

      Chapter 12 Helen Hunt Jackson

      Chapter 13 Lillie Coit

      Chapter 14 Charley Parkhurst

      Chapter 15 Isadora Duncan

      Chapter 16 Mary Ellen Pleasant

      Chapter 17 Lucille Ball

      Chapter 18 Wakano Mukai

      Chapter 19 Emma Nevada

      Chapter 20 Sarah Winchester

      Chapter 21 Mrs. F.A. Van Winkle

      Chapter 22 Olive Oatman

      Chapter 23 Jessie Benton Fremont

      Chapter 24 Nancy Kelsey

      Chapter 25 Mrs. Bassett

      Chapter 26 Biddy’ Mason

      Meet the Author

      Chapter 1

      The Sisters of Mercy

      Mother Frances Bridgerman

      Mother Frances Bridgerman, superior of the Sisters of Mercy in Kinsale, Ireland, had a problem. When a priest asked Mother Frances to select recruits to go to San Francisco in 1854, she hesitated, fearing the women would get scalped.

      Despite San Francisco’s reputation as a lawless city, twenty-nine Irish Sisters of Mercy volunteered to serve there. From that group, Mother Frances chose eight. She selected 26-year-old Sr. Mary Baptist Russell as the group’s leader. Thus, from the Irish seaport town of Kinsale in 1854 came eight young women to a completely different environment, one that was populated with gold prospectors, fortune hunters, and opportunists.

      When the Sisters of Mercy arrived in San Francisco December 8, 1854, what they found was jarring.

      Gold fever hit the men, and many left their wives and children to fend for themselves while they went off to pursue their fortunes.

      The exploitation and sale of women were common practices in the roaring city, and the aged and infirm fared little better. Mother Mary Baptist Russell was determined to help the suffering.

      One of her first activities was to create a safe haven for women. Under her leadership, the Sisters of Mercy began taking in abandoned wives and mothers, prostitutes, and naïve young girls. They also took in the elderly and began visiting the sick in their homes.

      Less than a month after their arrival, the sisters were asked to visit a woman who had just died. While kneeling to pray for the woman, said author Sr. Mary Katherine Doyle, They realized she was not dead. After sending for the priest, they revived the woman and sent her to the county hospital.

      Mary Baptist deliberately rented a house near the hospital. Daily the sisters visited the sick, intent on bringing what com-fort they could to the patients. At that time, people who went into the hospital rarely left alive, said author Doyle.

      They were left all night in the dark with no water and no one attending them. They had no linen or pillows (they were expected to bring their own if they had any). The nurses in the hospital were were not employable any-where else.

      When the 1855 cholera outbreak struck San Francisco, the Sisters of Mercy themselves went to work as nurses in the county hospital.

      The San Francisco Daily News described the sisters’ labors during the health crisis:

      A more horrible and ghastly sight we have seldom wit-nessed. In the midst of this scene of sorrow, pain, anguish, and danger were ministering angels who disregarded everything to aid their distressed fellow creatures. The Sisters of Mercy did not stop to inquire whether the poor sufferers were Protestants or Catholics, Americans or foreigners, but with the noblest devotion applied themselves to their relief.

      The cholera disease ultimately killed about five percent of the population.

      While Mother Russell’s most significant contributions were medical, it was ironic in that she had absolutely no formal medical training. Still, according to the San Francisco Ex-aminer, more than any other single individual, she helped Cali-fornia emerge from the dark ages of hospital care.

      Because of their effectiveness during the cholera epidemic, the sisters were asked to take charge of the county hospital. Mother Baptist agreed, but after months of caring for the indigent at the sisters’ expense, she told the county it would have to meet its financial obligation to the sisters.

      She ended up buying the hospital for $14,000, and when the county built a new hospital, Mother Baptist opened Saint Mary’s in 1857, the first Catholic Hospital on the West Coast.

      Baptist Russell apparently didn’t plan ahead on what she was going to do. She simply experienced reality and then be-gan to build. For instance, she had not planned to build a home for the aged, but when someone came and asked for shelter and there was no place to put her, she began her project for sheltering the infirm aged.

      She relied heavily on the providence of God, and often be-gan a project without funding. This prompted one bishop to comment, Her heart was bigger than her purse.

      In 1868, the city was besieged with a different disease outbreak. Smallpox hit the city. The disease was so contagious that even ministers would not visit their dying parishioners.

      City officials opened pest houses for those inflicted with the disease. Nurses worked only during the day, leaving vic-tims of smallpox unattended in the darkness from dusk until dawn.

      Sr. Mary Baptist asked for and received permission for the sisters to work in the pest houses. For ten months the sisters lived among the smallpox victims.

      Mother Baptist worked with atheists, agnostics, bigots, criminals, murderers, as well as those more upstanding. One writer said, "She loved to help people—especially the poor—and in so doing, she became a legend.

      She provided wedding dresses for brides too poor to pur-chase them. She visited men in prisons. She stole from the hospital linen supply to give to the poor. Legend has it that Mother Baptist would pull up her petticoat and wrap the hospital bed linens around her waist and stuff them in her sleeves.

      When she reached the home of a needy family, she would pull the linen out and make the beds. She did this so often that the sisters put locks on the linen closets. One time, she pulled her own mattress down the stairs to give it to a poor man.

      As good as her works were, she and her Sisters of Mercy had their detractors. An anti-catholic writer accused the Sisters of mismanaging the hospital and of abusing the patients. In her direct way of getting to the issue, Mother Baptist urged a grand jury investigation into the allegations of the accuser.

      The grand jury lauded the hospital as one of three out-standing institutions of San Francisco, along with the schools and the fire department.

      Mother Baptist Russell died in August 1898, and thou-sands came to her funeral. Fr. R.E. Kenna, a Jesuit priest, summed up her life in a letter to the bereaved sisters:

      Gentle as a little child, she was brave and resolute as a crusader. Prudence itself, yet she was fearless in doing good to the needy…all who met her were forced to admire; and those who knew her best loved her most.

      (Author’s note: Much of this material was first published in the book, A Call to Care: The Women Who Built Catholic Healthcare in America. The book is now out of print.)

      The Sisters of Mercy Convent in Grass Valley is part of St. Pa-trick’s Church built there in 1858. The Henry Scadden house on the right was first used as an orphanage for small boys and later as a Sisters Chapel.

      School Established in Grass Valley

      Enjoying the preview?
      Page 1 of 1