19th Century Childcare by Charlene Raddon

One of the things I enjoy in writing is the research. I love learning new things. For my current series, Bachelors & Babies, I needed to learn about childbirth and childcare in the 19th Century.

During the 1800s, infant mortality was shockingly high. Many died before the age of one, and a relative few lived to adulthood. Drownings, falls, snake bites, accidents, diseases, bad water, spoiled food due to the lack of refrigeration, poor hygiene, poor diet—the causes were numerous.

My hero in my second Bachelor & Babies book, JARED, was a rancher who happened to enjoy inventing things, such as a recording device like the phonograph invented in 1877 by Thomas Edison. After the arrival of triplets in the household, Jared’s interests veered toward ways to aid mothers. First, he created a window box made with a wooden frame and using chicken wire for the top and sides. The box fit into an open window, with the bulk of it sticking outside. The infant could enjoy sunshine and fresh air without insects and be relatively safe (have to wonder about that).

 

He also created a walker much like those sold today. This wasn’t too unusual. Walkers were used back beyond the 17th century. His other inventions included a swing that resembled a porch swing except with a baby bed and a mechanism to make it rock. He also designed folding highchairs. The key was to make these items safe enough for the child and then pray they would be used safely.

                   

 

At the time, when my story takes place (1879), baby formula had yet to be invented. There were baby bottles (some called murder bottles—see bottle like baby’s face & picture of several bottles—because of harmful bacteria housewives couldn’t easily wash away.) Rubber nipples tended to develop cracks that harbored bacteria. They could also release carcinogens and cause allergic reactions. Although the first rubber nipple was patented in 1845, it wasn’t until the early 1900s that a practical rubber nipple for nursing bottles was developed.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Nineteenth Century medicines, even those made for children, tended to contain shocking levels of alcohol and opium. Bayer Pharmaceutical Products invented heroin (diacetylmorphine) and started selling it from 1898. Sigmund Freud extolled the virtues of cocaine for its supposed ability to treat depression and impotence. Kimball White Pine and Tar Cough Syrup, which contained four minims of chloroform, was marketed for colds and bronchitis. In 1849, Mrs. Charlotte N. Winslow launched her Soothing Syrup containing sodium carbonate and aqua ammonia, as well as 65mg of morphine per ounce. It was advertised as effective for children who were teething. Babies were also spoon-fed laudanum for teething pain, bowel problems, flatulence and convulsions.

 

If that wasn’t enough to explain the high infant mortality rate in the 20th century, there was also premature birth, birth asphyxia, pneumonia, congenital malformations, term birth complications such as abnormal presentation of the fetus, umbilical cord prolapse, or prolonged labor, neonatal infection, diarrhea, malaria, measles and malnutrition.

When you think about it, you have to wonder that children survived at all.

AMAZON

#kindleunlimited

To win an ebook copy of JARED, Book 7 in the BACHELORS & BABIES sweet romance series,

tell me . . . 

 

What crazy things did you do as a child that you were lucky to survive?

I had a swing in my backyard and a driveway that went downhill. I’d swing as high as I could, wearing roller skates, jump off and skate down the drive. The trick was to turn onto the sidewalk at the foot of the hill and avoid flying into the busy street.

Charlene Raddon likes to claim that her fiction career began in the third grade when she told her class she’d had a nonexistent baby sister killed by a black widow spider. Her first serious attempt at writing came in 1980 when a vivid dream drove her to drag out a typewriter and begin writing. She’s been writing ever since. She grew up certain she’d been born in the wrong era and truly belonged in the Old West. Her genre is, of course, historical romance set in the American West. At present, she has five books, originally published in paperback by Kensington Books, two anthologies and a novella available on Amazon. Now an indie author, Charlene is busy on her next novel. She also designs book covers and other graphic materials for authors, specializing in western, at http://silversagebookcovers.com.

Website: http://charleneraddon.com

Amazon author page: https://amzn.to/2ThzsNY

Facebook:    https://www.facebook.com/CharleneRaddon/

Divine Gamble buy link: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B074P686Q5/a/p?tag=pettpist-20

New Release – Sawyer

Hello Everyone, Winnie Griggs here. 

I’m taking a break from my series on female law enforcement trail blazers this month to post on something a little more personal.  I’m excited to announce that, as of Nov 1, I have a new release out.

This one, SAWYER,  is part of the Bachelors and Babies series, Book 6 to be exact.  I was really excited to be invited to take part in this series – the authors are all great and it was the first time I’ve had the chance to be involved in a project like this. It also gave me the opportunity to try my hand at an indy work. I did one last spring, The Unexpected Bride, but it was a little different since that was an old backlist work I was tweaking, repackaging and reissuing. Sawyer is an entirely shiny new work and one I had a lot of fun writing. And I must say this has been a great, and sometimes scary, learning experience.

There will be 14 books in this series, coming out one a month, and while they are all standalone, they share a common theme – what happens when a bachelor in the old west suddenly finds himself unexpectedly saddled with a baby. And this series is certainly a showcase for the saying that if you give a dozen people a story idea you’ll end up with a dozen different stories. I’ve read the first five books of the series and they are all very different, coming at the theme from a number of different angles.

As you can see from this graphic, there are some familiar names among the participating authors, including my Filly-sister Pam Crooks who kicked off the series with TRACE, former Filly Cheryl St.John who’ll wrap us up with TANNER, and several authors who have popped up here in the past as guests.

 

Here’s a little more info about Sawyer:

Sawyer Flynn vows to see that the man who murdered his brother pays for his crimes, but becoming the sole caretaker of an orphaned infant sidetracks him from the mission. Sawyer can’t do it all—run his mercantile, care for the baby, and find justice for his brother. He needs help. But not from Emma Jean Gilley.

When her father flees town after killing a man, Emma Jean is left alone to care for her kid brother, but her father’s crime has made her a pariah and no one will give her a job. Learning of Sawyer’s need, Emma Jean makes her case to step in as nanny.

Sawyer is outraged by Emma Jean’s offer, but he’s also desperate and he reluctantly agrees to a temporary trial. Working together brings understanding, and maybe something more. But just when things heat up between Sawyer and Emma Jean, the specter of her father’s crimes threatens to drive them apart forever.

 

You can get your copy at this link on AMAZON  

When I was writing this book I set up a Pinterest board to save images of how I imagined my characters would look, as well as their homes and the mercantile where the hero works. You can view it HERE if you’re interested.

If you’re interested in reading an excerpt, you can find one on my website HERE

And you can join the Bachelors & Babies Readers Group on Facebook to meet all the authors and learn about upcoming releases!  https://www.facebook.com/groups/2143576775865837/

So let’s chat

How do you feel about series like this one that are connected by theme rather than more tightly connected by location or family or some such?
When there is a long running one like this, do you normally stick with it all the way through or at some point do you feel like you’ve had enough, and if so what is that tipping point for you?
Is there some theme you haven’t seen recently that you’d like to see a series built around?

Comment here and you just might find yourself on the winning end of a signed copy of Sawyer!

(FYI – I’ll be traveling until early afternoon, so my responses may be sparse until I get home but I promise to answer every comment  whenever I have access to the internet)

 

 

Taking a Book and Making it REAL ~ Pam Crooks

Just this past Saturday, June 1st, I had the pleasure of releasing a new book.  TRACE is Book 1 in the Bachelors and Babies series, and I threw a baby shower in our readers group to celebrate.  It was fun, a little different, and the whole event was very celebratory.

But to get to that point–a finished book–is not nearly as much fun and much more stressful.  Since I was the launch book, the pressure doubled.  I had to have a book as good as I could possibly make it to build the buzz and give my sister-authors a boost.

One of the ways to make a book GOOD is to make it REAL.  To do that, I relied on pictures to help my writing about Trace and Morgana (the hero and heroine) be more vivid and to immerse the reader in the time period.

TRACE is set in Wallace, Kansas, which was an authentic cow town in 1881.  Today, it’s a shadow of its former self. Here’s a few of my pictures.

I based Morgana’s home on this photo, and a large portion of the book is set here.  It really was a house in Wallace and still stands today.

One of Morgana’s dresses.

After a terrible tragedy, Morgana immerses herself in music.  The harp is her favorite.

Another picture crucial to the story.  Baby’s carriage.  (You’ll just have to read the book to figure out why a baby carriage is crucial.  Ha!)

Any idea what this is?  It’s a vaporizer!  They were new to the medical community at the time, and I was thrilled to find that they were just beginning to use them in 1881.  This vaporizer is extra, extra crucial to the story.  Yep!  Read the book to find out how.

These are the books in the series.  They’ll come out the first of every month.  You’ll see some familiar names, including my sister-filly, WINNIE GRIGGS, and former filly, CHERYL ST.JOHN.

 

And the most important picture of all!

Buy on Amazon.

#sweetromance

#kindleunlimited

Let’s chat and you can win a copy of TRACE (ebook).

TRACE is Book 1 of the Bachelors and Babies series.  The books are not connected (except for the sudden arrival of a baby!) and stand on their own.

Do you like to read series books, connected or not?  What is their appeal to you?  Do you prefer a sweeter romance or something a little more gritty?

Join the Bachelors & Babies Readers Group on Facebook to meet the authors and learn about upcoming releases!  https://www.facebook.com/groups/2143576775865837/