Written by Ethel Waxham Love, a Wellesley College graduate who went to Wyoming in 1905 as a teacher in a one-room schoolhouse, and her son, J. David Love, who later became an eminent geologist, Life on Muskrat Creek tells the fascinating story of a family’s day-to-day life on an isolated ranch in early twentieth-century Wyoming. Readers will be held in suspense as they learn about the family’s battle with a variety of challenges, including a near-fatal bout with Spanish influenza, life-threatening encounters with livestock and wildlife, and disastrous episodes of fires, flooding, blizzards, and drought. The book’s depiction of more ordinary events is equally engaging; Ethel describes becoming a wife and raising children without the support of neighbors, women friends, or a wider family network, and David recounts growing up in a wild and remote place where there was no local school to attend. Readers from all walks of life will find Life on Muskrat Creek to be a lively and provocative book.
Frances Love Froidevaux (1942–2011) taught French and ESL and founded the Bartlesville, OK, school system’s first foreign language program.Barbara Love has worked as an archaeologist, ESL and English professor, and freelance editor.
AcknowledgmentsMapsPreface Family BackgroundChapter 1: 1910: "Rome Was Not Built in a Day"Chapter 2: 1911: "The Customs of the Country"Chapter 3: 1912: "Roll, Jordan, Roll"Chapter 4:1912-13: "Love's Labor Lost and the 3 D's"Chapter 5: 1913-15: "Raw Material"Chapter 6: 1916-17: Growing ChallengesChapter 7: 1918: The Beginning of the MirageChapter 8: 1919: "The Equalizer"Chapter 9: 1920: "We Will Rebuild, Again"Chapter 10: 1921: "Never a Light But One's Own"Chapter 11: 1922: "Earned Not Given"Chapter 12: 1923: Daily Life on Muskrat CreekChapter 13: 1924: "Problems of Education"Chapter 14: 1925: Changing HorizonsEpilogueBibliography
Life on Muskrat Creek is a riveting account of the realities of life on an isolated ranch in the early years of the Twentieth Century, a must-read for all who wonder what life was like back in "the good old days."