I’ve been in jail just once n my life . . . It was in San Francisco in 1976.  Before anyone gets too excited, I should tell you that I was taking a tour of Alcatraz Island, and my time in solitary confinement wasn’t very solitary. A tour guide locked ten of us in a cell that went pitch black. He opened the door in a minute later, but that experience is burned into my brain.

With a new proposal in the works, I’ve been digging for new ideas. Those few hours on Alcatraz came back with amazing vividness. I won’t be using “The Rock” as part of the story–it was a military prison until the San Francisco Earthquake in 1906–but I’ve been reading about the Wyoming Territorial Prison.  It’s an interesting place . . . but I wouldn’t want to live there. 

Back in 1869 things were a bit wild in the Wyoming Territory, and the area needed a facility to house convicted criminals. The Wyoming Territorial Prison was built in 1872 near the town of Laramie. Paid for with federal money, the prison had 42 cells when it opened under the direction of Deputy United States Marshall Nathaniel K. Boswell.  Talk about a challenging job!  Over the course of 30 years, the prison had some interesting guests. The most well known was Butch Cassidy (I can’t help but see Paul Newman and his blue eyes from the  movie). Joining him were over 1,000 men and 12 women convicted of crimes that ranged from thievery, illegal liquor sales and manslaughter.

Are you curious about the 12 women? I was. They were housed on the second floor of the south wing of the jail in two cells with a third cell serving as the bathroom.  They were also locked up 24/7 probably for their safety.  Let’s meet some of them…

Nettie Stewart Wright was the first female inmate.  She was suspected of stealing arms and ammunition from Fort McKinney. She was detained for two weeks before the charges were dropped.

Mollie Wrinsinger and Belle Jones were Prisoners No. 10 and 11. They had a lot in common. Both were abandoned by their husbands. To survive they turned to petty theft and prostitution. Belle had six kids, so you can imagine the need.  She and Mollie got caught doing something that today would get them on a “dumbest criminals” TV show. Belle wore a jacket she’d stolen to a large social gathering. The original owner recognized it, and Belle and Mollie ended up behind bars. They served 18 months for their capering.

Nineteen-year-old Florence Gains was Prisoner No. 80.  A prostitute, she got in a fight with a competitor and stabbed the woman six times. 

Stella F. Gatlin was Prisoner No. 150. She was convicted of stealing mail and was the first person to use kleptomania as a defense.

The woman to spend the most time in the Wyoming Territorial Prison was Minnie Snyder (No. 270). She was convicted of manslaughter for being with her husband when he killed a man. While incarcerated, she got in a terrible fight with inmate Lillie Todd. The two of them earned the dubious distinction of being the only two women to spend time in solitary confinement. The punishment must done something, because afterwards Minnie earned a shorter sentence for good behavior. She still spent 1,511 days behind bars, far longer than any other female prisoner.

Eliza Stewart, a known narcotics addict, went to prison for shooting her boyfriend in the neck at a Saturday night dance.  Why they were fighting has been lost to history, but her nickname was “Big Jack.” You’ve got wonder how that came to be.

Another addict was a nurse named Lillie Todd. She was discovered in the halls of the Vendome Hotel, well dressed with her namesake flower in her hat. She was scavenging for things she could steal to support her morphine habit. She stole diamond jewelry and spent eleven months in the Laramie prison before returning to her family.

The stories of women who spent time in the Wyoming Territorial Prison in Laramie are both fascinating and sad.  Some were able to change their ways and went on to live long and typical lives. Others weren’t so fortunate. It’s an interesting mix of humanity, history and headlines that could be read even today.

Undertaking on the frontier was a crucial business. After all, life expectancy was only 37 years of age. So lots of folks were dying and they needed someone to take care of the nasty business of death.

Funeral customs depended on whether the deceased was a city dweller or one who lived on a farm or ranch. People who lived outside of town placed the care of their remains in the hands of those who loved them. After a loved one died, the family lovingly washed their bodies and dressed him or her in their best clothes. Sometimes they made their own coffins if they had the tools. If not, they’d buy a coffin from the undertaker in town. They’d lay the person out in their parlor at home and sit beside the coffin. They called this custom a wake. Then, after no more than a day or two, they’d bury the deceased in a plot on their land. Simple and without fanfare.

(Embalming was unheard of until the early 1900’s. That’s why they had to hurry and get the dead into the ground. They got pretty ripe after a while.)

But if the deceased lived in town, all the needs were seen to by the undertaker. Hearses were horse-drawn and most of the time ornate, some with black feathery plumes, and a glass window on each side from which viewers could see the coffin. Mourners walked on foot behind the hearse to the cemetery which was generally near the church.

The heroine in my story called UNDERTAKING TEXAS in the newest anthology “Give Me a Texas Ranger” with Jodi Thomas, Phyliss Miranda and DeWanna Pace is the town’s undertaker, dentist and barber. Texanna Wilder took over the businesses after her husband, Sam, was gunned down. My story takes place a year after she buried her husband. Texanna and her son are having a very difficult time of things. Her disgusting step-brother-in-law is making life miserable by threatening to take her business from her if she doesn’t marry him.

Then in rides Texas Ranger Stoney Burke. Stoney was Texanna’s husband’s best friend. Stoney promised Sam on his wedding day that he’d look after Texanna if anything happened to Sam.

When Texanna and Stoney are thrust together, he’s forced to face his secret feelings for Texanna. On the one hand, he’s mad as all get-out at her for making Sam give up his job on the Texas Rangers. But on the other hand, Stoney has worshipped Texanna from afar all these years. Memories of her and the kisses they shared long ago keep him awake at night.

There’s also the matter of dealing with Texanna’s six year old son who’s developed a bad habit of stealing, a jail break, and a fire that consumes the town.

Locked in a fight to keep Texanna safe, Stoney comes to see that old grudges have no place in the future and that love can survive past secrets if only he gives it a chance.

GIVE ME A TEXAS RANGER will be in bookstores on July 1st. I hope you’ll pick up a copy.

But today I’m giving away three copies of Give Me a Texas Ranger to visitors who leave a comment. So, come on and put your two cents in. I’d love to hear from you.

Look what I discovered the other night. I’m always on the lookout for a proper weapon of choice for a character. While catching up on the to-be-watched shows on my DVR, I ran across one about old guns, including this little beauty.

The Chicago Palm Pistol.

Originally called the Minneapolis Protector Palm Pistol, The Chicago Palm Pistol began as a copy of the French Turbiaux pistol, Le Protecteur.

The design for this palm-sized weapon was patented in 1883 by the Minneapolis Firearms Company, then sold to Peter Finnegan of Austin, Illinois. Mr. Finnegan created the Chicago Firearms Company and immediately contracted with Ames Sword Company of Chicopee Falls, Massachusetts, to manufacture the pistol in time to introduce it at The Columbian Exhibition–The Chicago World’s Fair of 1892. Because of manufacturer delays, it didn’t make it in time for the Fair, and, in 1898, Mr. Finnegan ended up with 13, 000 pistols to sell.

The moment I saw it, I knew this would be an excellent concealed weapon for a character to carry, whether he’s the hero or the villain. Since it was billed as a small enough weapon to be easily handled by a woman, I suppose my heroine might have one tucked into a pocket or her reticule, as well.

Here, you can see the actual size.

And here’s what the insides look like.

It wasn’t a very powerful gun, so no shootouts from twenty paces, but for an ambush, or a last ditch attempt at protecting the one the hero (or heroine) loves, it would be perfect.

What do you think? Would your character have a need for a Palm Pistol like this one?

Y’all know I love research, right? I’m always on the lookout for a proper weapon of choice for a character. Look what I discovered the other night. While catching up on the to-be-watched shows on my DVR, I ran across one about old guns, including this little beauty.

The Chicago Palm Pistol.

Originally called the Minneapolis Protector Palm Pistol, The Chicago Palm Pistol began as a copy of the French Turbiaux pistol, Le Protecteur.

The design for this palm-sized weapon was patented in 1883 by the Minneapolis Firearms Company, then sold to Peter Finnegan of Austin, Illinois. Mr. Finnegan created the Chicago Firearms Company and immediately contracted with Ames Sword Company of Chicopee Falls, Massachusetts, to manufacture the pistol in time to introduce it at The Columbian Exhibition–The Chicago World’s Fair of 1892. Because of manufacturer delays, it didn’t make it in time for the Fair, and, in 1898, Mr. Finnegan ended up with 13, 000 pistols to sell.

The moment I saw it, I knew this would be an excellent concealed weapon for a character to carry, whether he’s the hero or the villain. Since it was billed as a small enough weapon to be easily handled by a woman, I suppose my heroine might have one tucked into a pocket or her reticule, as well.

Here, you can see the actual size.

It wasn’t a very powerful gun, so no shootouts from twenty paces, but for an ambush, or a last ditch attempt at protecting the one he (or she) loves, it would be perfect.

What do you think? Would your character have a need for a Palm Pistol like this one?

Best known as the place where the Pony Express began in 1860, and where Jesse James met his end in 1882, St. Joseph, Missouri, holds a place of honor in the history of westward expansion.

Situated on the bluffs of the Missouri River, St Joseph began life in 1826 as Joseph Robidoux’s first trading post. Although Missouri had become the 24th state five years earlier, in 1821, the area was still Indian territory. Lewis and Clark had passed by here on their way upriver in 1804.

When the fur trader filed the plat for the new town, he named it for his patron saint. Robidoux had only one stipulation for those wanting to buy lots of his land: no one could take possession until he had harvested his crop of marijuana. In those days, it was used in the making of hemp.

The town was destined to be successful because it’s location on the Missouri River made it easily accessable. Naturalist John James Audubon visited in May of 1843, (two months before its official incorporation) and described Robidoux’s settlement as “a delightful place for a populous city that will be here some 50 years hence.” St. Joseph celebrated its Sesquicentennial in 1993.

The settlement grew steadily, but the discovery of gold in California in 1848 turned it into a boom area. Gold seekers came across Missouri to St. Joseph by steamboat, to where the city’s location on the westward bend of the Missouri River made it one of two choice “jumping-off” points (the other was Independence, about 60 miles southwest). Gold rushers bought supplies here for the westward wagon trek. Estimates say as many as 50,000 passed through St Joseph in 1849 alone.

Another 100,000 or more pioneers would crowd the streets, bound for California and other points west, before the coming of the trains. And that’s why I chose it as a subject for today’s blog post.

Where steamboats helped established St. Joseph as the place for travelers heading west, trains kept it there. The first train from the east arrived here February 14, 1859. Until after the Civil War, St. Joseph was the westernmost point accessible by rail. That means, until around 1870, if you wanted to get to Texas–or Colorado or Montana or anyplace west–by train, you had to go through St. Joseph. By 1900, one hundred passenger trains a day came into St. Joseph. I don’t know about you, but that number boggled my mind!

And where the train tracks ended, the stage coach lines began.

If you read my blog on 11/27/09, you already know St. Joseph was the starting point of The Pony Express in 1860. And in 1887, St. Joseph became only the second city in the U.S.–after Richmond, VA–to have electric streetcars.

Wholesale houses for things like shoes, dry goods and hardware, helped ensure St. Joseph’s prosperity during its Golden Age in the late 19th century. At one time, the town ranked fourth in the nation for dry goods sales and fifth in hardware sales.

Cowboys were familiar with St. Joseph, too, since livestock was a large part of the economy beginning in 1846. Swift and Armour were important names in town.

I’m thinking that song from the musical OKLAHOMA, “Everything’s Up To Date in Kansas City” probably should have been written about St. Joseph.

To top it off, infamous bank and train robber Jesse James, a Missouri native, tried to retire here in 1881. His wife wanted him to live a more normal life. And it was here, in a house on top of the highest hill, where, in 1882, one of his new partners, Bob Ford, decided collecting the reward for Jesse James would pay better than robbing the Platte City Bank.

St. Joseph is a town full of history. There are national parks dedicated to the Lewis & Clark expedition, museums housing collections about The Pony Express, Jesse James and westward expansion, and stunning views of the mighty Missouri River. Stop in sometime. You’re bound to learn something new. I did.

I’m still in the thick of revisions for The Outlaw’s Return (LIH, February 2011),  but the end is in sight. That means I’m thinking about the characters for my next book.  The heroine’s easy.  This is Book #4 in a four-book series, so Caroline already has a personality and a problem. She was widowed shortly after the War between the States, and she’s wanted a family of her own for years.

So who do I set her up with? Right off the bat, I’m ruling out a preacher, a lawman or an outlaw.  Those are the heroes in the first three “Swan’s Nest” books.  So what’s left?
A doctor?   I did a lady doctor in Kansas Courtship, plus I want to get Caroline off to an isolated ranch. A newspaperman or a lawyer? Same problem as the doctor. A rancher is an obvious choice, but he has  to be unique in some way.  

 I went through all sorts of possibilities before I settled on a character I’ve never once considered. Dear sweet Caroline is about to meet a retired British officer.  It just so happens he’s settled in Wyoming with this two children and he needs a nanny for them.  He also needs a nurse because he’s ill. And he’s not easy to get along with. The man is bossy. He’s exasperating. He’s accustomed to being obeyed, and he’s terrified he’ll leave this earth without providing a mother for his two not-so-adorable children.  (Change that: the kids will be a little adorable…maybe “a lot” adorable by the time I’m done.)

So how does my British Army officer end up on a ranch in Wyoming in 1876?   History led me right into the perfect set-up for this story.  The Homestead Act of 1862 allowed settlers to claim 160 acres as their own.  The Powder River basin was rich with grass, largely untouched and just waiting for vast herds of cattle. Word traveled to the eastern United States and then across the Atlantic to Great Britain. Wealthy Englishmen began arriving with big ideas. They invested in large herds that grazed freely on the open tracts of government land.

The first Englishman to run a big herd of cattle was Moreton Frewan in 1879. My book is set in 1876, but the conditions are workable for fiction.  I’m going to be doing a lot of research on Moreton Frewan. He came to Wyoming at the age of 25 and immediately made himself known. He built a two-story house near Kaycee that cowboys called Frewan’s Castle, and he had a knack for convincing his wealthy friends to invest in his cattle business.

Here’s a fun bit of trivia.  Frewan married a New York socialite named Clara Jerome. One of Clara’s sisters,  Jennie Jerome, became the mother of Winston Churchill.

This was quite a time in Wyoming. During the 1870s and into the 1880s, this rough-and-tumble landscape was a playground for visiting Englishmen and their families.  Big game hunts, fancy balls and lively parties were common.

As with all periods of history, events conspired to bring about change. More homesteaders arrived, claiming land and fencing it, so that the vast acreage was parceled out. With such large herds, the pasturage was overgrazed. Investors wanted a better return, and the beef prices didn’t cooperate.  The biggest blow came with the winter of 1886-87.  It was disastrous. Ranchers lost up to 80% of their stock in the worst winter Wyoming had ever experienced.  By the 1890s, the British were pretty much gone from Wyoming.

I can hardly wait to get started on this book. My mind’s spinning ideas for scenes–a ball where my heroine feels insecure, a hunting trip gone awry–but first I’ve got to finish those pesky revisions. It’s frustrating, but I don’t really mind . . . Sometimes ideas are like spaghetti sauce. The longer they cook, they better they are.

Solomon D. Butcher arrived in Nebraska in 1880 to farm. Solomon, his father, his brother George, and brother-in-law J.R. Wabel took claims in Nebraska. They dug a hole and pulled their covered wagon over it to serve as temporary shelter. Such was the comfort of Butcher’s farm life. Butcher by his own admission wasn’t suited for the pioneering life. “I soon came to the conclusion,” he said, “that any man that would leave the luxuries of a boarding house, where they had hash every day, and a salary of $125 a month, to lay Nebraska sod for 75 cents a day, was a fool.”

Butcher lasted two-week.

Which lends to my theory that Nebraska is not for wimps.

In fact I’ve petitioned the governor to make that the state motto.

Nebraska-It’s Not for Wimps

Governor Heineman hasn’t gotten back to me yet.

Butcher turned his land back to the government and enrolled in medical school. He quit after a year. And thus began a five year strings of failures as his family grew. In 1886 he decided to become a photographer of pioneers. This picture of the cow on the roof (look close, it’s not REALLY on the roof) is particularly well known. And they’ve done painstaking computer studies and can see things inside the sod house through the open door. I’ve left these pictures large in an effort to not distort them by shrinking them and so you can see them better, they almost spill off the page.

His father loaned him a wagon and Butcher began his odyssey and would end up recording a legacy for the whole nation. Travel was hard. Roads barely existed. Farms were hours apart. Just study these photos for a while. The longer you look the more details you see. It’s really amazing.

This family was ashamed of their sod house, but proud of their pump organ. So they settled on this pose. Look how many cows they had. Rich people. Butcher accepted food, lodging and a stable for his horses in exchange for a picture. He supported himself with donations citizens made to the project, as well as by the sale of photographs.

It took him fifteen years to get his book published, including a fire in 1899 that burned all his pictures, but not the glass negatives.

I know how hard it is to get a book published and,  as a writer, I’d just like to pause here for a moment and pity the poor man.

Okay, we’ll proceed with the story.

Look at this picture. The woman is fat. I’ll bet they were prosperous. Look at all those chickens. Dinner on the hoof, or claw…whatever. Butcher’s book, Pioneer History of Custer County and Short Sketches of Early Days in Nebraska was his single financial success until the day he sold his life’s work. In fact he was so poor he had to take his wife and child and stay at his father’s house every time it rained, because his house was so decrepit.

Along with his photographs he also collected pioneer stories that endure to this day. I love this one. Sisters who were alone in the west.  They each filed a claim and ended up with their own farm. Can’t you just write that story right now? Butcher’s photographs can be found illustrating  many history texts about the settlement period and are considered iconic.

After Custer County he expanded his photography to other counties but couldn’t raise the funds to publish his books. He continued to move his family and take photographs. The moves began to be massive undertakings because he had so many negatives to haul, each negative was a glass plate 6 ½ by 8 ½ inches.

In 1911 he decided to move to Texas and he couldn’t haul the plates along. He attempted to sell them to the Nebraska State Historical Society and after three years spent trying to raise the money, the Historical Society bought the entire collection for $1000 and they hired Butcher to archive the collection–I guess he’d given up on the whole Texas idea by then.

Solomon D. Butcher–shown here beside his own sod house–was a truly insightful photographer, but he died before the full impact of his photographs was realized.

Using computer technology, Butcher’s pictures have been restored and are considered among the best depictions of pioneer life in existance.

Still, I’m glad I wasn’t married to him.

Have you ever seen these pictures before? I recognized a few of them, especially the cow on the roof.

http://www.maryconnealy.com

Wildflower Bride (Montana Marriages)

About thirty miles from where I live in West Texas is an historical site called Ransom Canyon. It was incorporated into a town in 1977, but in the 1800’s it was the scene of trading in human flesh.

Originally called Yellow House Canyon, it became known as Ransom Canyon after it became the regular meeting place for the Comancheros and the Comanche Indians. The Comancheros would trade guns and whiskey for stolen cattle or, more often than not, white captives. The Comancheros would then ransom off the captives back to their families for a hefty sum. If the families didn’t or couldn’t meet the price, the captives were sold to the highest bidder. Not a pleasant life for sure.

Here’s a pretty good shot of the canyon.

But who were these Comancheros, you ask?

They were a blood-thirsty group mostly of Mexican descent who roamed the Llano Estacado commonly known as The Staked Plains (an area that covers western Texas and the Panhandle and extends into eastern New Mexico.) It’s one of the largest mesas or tablelands on the North American continent. One source says it’s over 32,000 square miles.

Back to Ransom Canyon though….

It was carved out by a tributary of the Brazos River. The huge canyon was protected by steep walls.

The comancheros and Comanche weren’t the only ones who used it. Because of its clear trickling streams and towering cottonwoods, it became regularly traveled. Besides the Comanche and Comancheros, buffalo hunters, U.S. Army soldiers, frontier settlers, and cowboys with their cattle herds camped here.

I drove over to take some pictures of the Texas Historical marker and see what else I could see. When I stepped out of the car, I got goosebumps. Just standing on the ground where so much happened was pretty emotional. When I closed my eyes I could feel their spirits and see the frightened faces of the captives. They say the canyon is haunted and I can believe it.

Have you had a strong connection to a historical place where it felt like you’d stepped back in time?

We have a new anthology that’ll be out July 1st. I team up again with the Queen of Texas romance Jodi Thomas, Phyliss Miranda, and DeWanna Pace. Click on the cover to Preorder your copy today!

You’re reading about a cowboy. . .which leads you to Wyoming. . .which leads you to a house made purely of fossils. . .which leads you to animal

extinction. . .which led me to something called a genetic bottleneck.

I’d never heard of such a thing.

Here’s the definition of a genetic bottleneck. (It has NOTHING to do with cowboys) A genetic bottleneck is a significant reduction in the size of a population that causes the extinction of many genetic lineages within that population, thus decreasing genetic diversity.

Now what tickled in the back of my brain was endangered species. If there are very, very few of the animals left they tend to all be related. You start running into trouble like you would if a. . .oh. . .a male dog had puppies with one of it’s own daughters. There are tendencies for birth defects, the same reason cousins are forbidden to marry.

So, though I wasn’t familiar with the term, as I read I realized I was familiar with the concept.

Did you know there is a genetic bottleneck for people? Huh? Huh?

Humans have remarkably little genetic diversity, especially in comparison to our closest living relative, the chimpanzee. I read that online. I’d never heard that humans were more or less genetically diverse than other creatures. What does that even mean?

The genetic bottle neck brings me to creatures like Neanderthal Man, troglodytes, to use a more generic–and no doubt incorrect–term. Cave men.

All of the ‘human-like’ cave men come BEFORE a genetic bottle neck in human history.

NOW YOU JUST KEEP READING. I SWEAR THIS IS INTERESTING. TRUST ME.

Here’s one of the more popular theories about why there aren’t human-like creatures on the earth besides humans. The Toba supereruption occurred between 69,000 and 77,000 years ago in Indonesia, and it is recognized as one of Earth’s largest known eruptions. The related catastrophe theory holds that this supervolcanic event plunged the planet into a volcanic winter, which resulted in the world’s human population being reduced to as few as 1,000 breeding pairs. This created a bottleneck in human evolution.

Okay, now think about it. This is SIXTY-NINE THOUSAND YEARS AGO.

We read all the time about earth history being millions and millions of years old. And yet here they’re saying that about. . .oh. . .70,000 years ago, a drop in the bucket of earth’s history, there might have been as few as 1000 ‘breeding pairs’ (let’s go ahead and humanize this and call them PEOPLE. . .MARRIED PEOPLE) on the planet.

Another place used FIFTY THOUSAND years ago. Another said Neaderthal Man vanished THIRTY THOUSAND years ago.

Okay, now we’re getting down to a very imaginable number because honestly it’s impossible to think of one million and not just be overwhelmed by it.

So, I’ve just got a question.

If the ‘genetic bottleneck’ proves that whatever men survived grew into the current population of the earth. And they’re theorizing a catastrophe of some sort, the Toba supereruption being one possibility. . .I’d like to submit my own theory of why, suddenly as recently as 30,000 years ago human life on earth became SMALL and very genetically similar–sort of like FAMILY. Now I’m no scientist. Not a paleontologist or biologist, but I am a THINKER.

How about (brace yourself) ………..CREATION!

How about if that was the point in the creation of the earth when God made man.

Or (brace yourself again) how about  a Great Flood. Noah and his family. . .now there’s a genetic bottleneck for you.

I’m just saying–all these scientific theories–well, I get it. I get that they’re trying to explain earth history without including miraculous intervention by God. That’s their job. “If God didn’t do it, then how did it happen? Maybe this, what if that…?”

But just once in a while, like when I’m looking at muddy water, I wonder–How long would I need to stare before LIFE would come crawling out. And if it did, how long would I have to stare at a one-celled mud slug before it evolved into a kangaroo and a Swedish Ivy plant?

Think about the land around you, the spectacular spring blooms and the magnificent trees and the Grand Canyon and the sweeping plains of Nebraska and Kansas and buffalo and mountain lions and alligators and carrots and watermelons and bumblebees and cockroaches, ask yourself, if this all did come from some one celled critter crawling out of a prehistoric mud hole, then isn’t that a BIGGER miracle than God just saying, “Let there be light!”

And I’d also like ONE example from anyone of one living creature that, in recorded history, has evolved. Seriously, I mean I know these things take a long time but c’mon, one thing. One time a chicken laid an egg and a baby was born that could…breathe under water. I can think of some animals that have adapted… adapting is very different from evolving. Where a black and white moth changed to more black than white when London became sooty. But there’s no genetic difference there. 

Either way, out of supposedly millions of years of earth history, i think we can make three statements.

1) Humans only appear in their current form a few thousand years ago.

2) Nothing has evolved since we’ve started paying attention–an no, going extinct doesn’t count.

3) The world around us is a miracle.

http://www.maryconnealy.com/

We tend to think of log cabins as symbols of early American life, and indeed they embodied the inventive and hardy spirits of those who blazed new trails and settled on the frontier. The first log cabin in the Unites States was most likely built along the Delaware River in New Sweden by Scandinavian immigrants. The Swedes, Germans, Russians had been making cabins for years. Swedish settlers built log cabins when they came to Delaware in 1638. Other colonists followed their example.

When great numbers of settlers began to move westward after the Revolution, they found thick forests in Tennessee, Kentucky, and the Northwest Territory, and the log cabin became the typical home of the backwoodsman. The log cabin made the transition to the New World beautifully. With lush forests and raw materials at hand, log cabins were the perfect homes for settlers. Many times trees had to be cut to create living space or to clear fields for farming anyway.

Building with logs didn’t require much skill or special tools. A sharp axe, an adz and a strong back did the job, and the new lodging went up quickly. Most could last a couple hundred years if built well, and the inhabitants were warm in winter and cool in summer.

Once the trees were cut, the farmer stripped away branches and bark so insects weren’t left behind to crawl into the house or weaken the structure. The builder then cut notches for fitting the logs atop each other. Once stacked and fitted, he then chinked or calked with mud or clay, grass and moss mixtures.

Roofs were made of available material, though cedar was prized because the wood split straight and resisted rot. The owner nailed the shingles to a beam and board framework. More logs could also be used as roofing, provided they were split lengthwise and fitted close on the frame. The gaps could be filled the same as the walls. A thatched roof needed a lot of upkeep, had to be replaced every year and often harbored insects, small animals and snakes. Many used sod placed flat over planks, and after a few years the earth compacted and became waterproof. Later in the 1800s, builders used corrugated tin. Can you imagine the sound of a rainstorm or hail?

Log cabins were not all one room dwellings with lofts, as we tend to imagine or like we see on Little House on the Prairie reruns. Many had several rooms and even second stories. Fireplaces and chimneys were made of stones and chinked with mud or clay. Sometimes the chimney was made of sticks or wood.

The floor was hard-packed clay or dirt. Since living in a cabin made its occupants vulnerable to attack, there were usually no windows. Besides glass was expensive and difficult to transport. Most people hung wooden shutters over oiled paper. In summer, the inventive settlers covered the openings with cheesecloth to allow air in and keep bugs out.

Probably the world’s most famous log cabin is the one in which Abraham Lincoln was born. When we think of log cabins we think of hard work, ingenuity and independence, all virtues of our pioneer ancestors.