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133 reviews for:
Nothing Daunted: The Unexpected Education of Two Society Girls in the West
Dorothy Wickenden
3.38 AVERAGE
133 reviews for:
Nothing Daunted: The Unexpected Education of Two Society Girls in the West
Dorothy Wickenden
3.38 AVERAGE
What I really liked in this book was the culture shock of two very different worlds. I would have preferred a slightly more linear narration, as it did jump about a bit. Also, it should have had a map. I decided all good non-fiction should have maps.
This book should be renamed "Nothing to Do with Anything: The Unexciting History of Random People in Colorado." This book was absolutely painstaking to get through. The author took what should have been an interesting subject and made it painfully dry. It was also full of so many sidebars that it would be easy to forget what it was *supposed* to be about. If you want to read about the girls teaching in Colorado, skip to at least page 100. If you want to be taken on a journey of their entire lives, their family histories, as well as the back story of every person they ever met, lived near, or had any remote connection to; plus an excruciatingly detailed history of every industry to ever exist in Colorado; then by all means, please start on page 1 and subject yourself to this torture. If you are smart, however, you will not waste your time with this at all!
adventurous
challenging
funny
hopeful
informative
inspiring
lighthearted
relaxing
fast-paced
Loved this book, based on an article published in The New Yorker. The two women were fascinating people. I fell in love with them, their world, and I learned a lot about time period.
This is a true story about two society girls in 1916 who decided to go off to barely settled Colorado to teach school. Both women were unmarried Smith College graduates who made a decision in favor of risk and adventure. Their decision forever changed them and the people with whom they lived and taught. The author is the granddaughter of one of the women and she wrote the book using over 100 letters the girls wrote back home. She also interviewed the women and their descendents. I didn't like the first 25% (can you tell I read it on a Kindle?) of the book -- too many historical facts and not enough story but the last 75% was fun to read. It was also interesting to learn a bit about the first railroad through the Rocky Mountains.
Recently I submitted a query to BookPage-Book Fortune looking for a few suggestions of non-fiction that would leave me breathless. I've had one of the books, Nothing Daunted: The Unexpected Education of Two Society Girls in the West by Dorothy Wickenden on my TBR pile since it came out in 2011. I decided it was high time I read it.
Eliza knows me almost as well as I know myself. Nothing Daunted was a great pick. Starting from the opening chapter where Wickenden finds a forgotten file folder labeled, "Dorothy Woodruff Letters, Elkhead 1916-17", to the very end, this was a compelling, adventuresome read. Wickenden, the granddaughter of Dorothy Woodruff begins reading the first letter dated Friday, July 28th, 1916. It came on the stationary of the Hayden Inn and exclaimed ""My dearest family: Can you believe that I am actually far out here in Colorado?" How Woodruff and her friend, Rosamund (Ros) Underwood came to be here is the crux of the tale. Two young women of privilege, they were fast friends their whole lives since meeting in Kindergarten 1892. Unusual for the day, they also were both students at Smith College in 1906. After graduating, they had little idea of what job they might pursue, instead initially taking a year grand tour of Europe. As was the norm, it probably was expected that they would marry and as is stated in the book, marry well. And yet, by 1916, neither had found a mate. Enter Ferry Carpenter, a lawyer in Hayden, a small outpost of 400 in Routt County, Colorado. More rancher than lawyer, he decided the small Elkhead, north of Hayden, needed its own school as the children living there had to travel too far, under sometimes horrific weather conditions to get to the school in Hayden. He came up with a scheme to entice young women to teach at this new 1 room school house. Word was put out via his sister Ruth, and an ad was placed in a teachers; magazine describing Elkhead's school as being "a superb school in the virgin hills" and promised good pay. Candidates should send a photo. The latter was part of Carpenter's plan. Young, pretty teachers might marry some of the many bachelors in the region. Dorothy and Ros applied and were hired. That's just the beginning of the adventure for these two.
Elkhead was not New York, neither had ever taught, didn't how to cook or sew, but were expected to teach domestic science. They were not used to the harsh winters Colorado would meat out, nor were they used to traveling many miles by horse to get to work. They did not know what supplies or the proper clothing to bring on the journey. Imagine when they found out they needed a rifle to kill sage chickens. And yet they were strong women, with a sense of purpose, and let little get in their way. They made it work.
There are wonderful stories here, beautiful descriptive passages of the landscape, history of gold and mining, the building of railways, and enough vicarious adventure for the best of us. Yes, Eliza, got it right. A darned good book, one I'll be recommending to others.
Eliza knows me almost as well as I know myself. Nothing Daunted was a great pick. Starting from the opening chapter where Wickenden finds a forgotten file folder labeled, "Dorothy Woodruff Letters, Elkhead 1916-17", to the very end, this was a compelling, adventuresome read. Wickenden, the granddaughter of Dorothy Woodruff begins reading the first letter dated Friday, July 28th, 1916. It came on the stationary of the Hayden Inn and exclaimed ""My dearest family: Can you believe that I am actually far out here in Colorado?" How Woodruff and her friend, Rosamund (Ros) Underwood came to be here is the crux of the tale. Two young women of privilege, they were fast friends their whole lives since meeting in Kindergarten 1892. Unusual for the day, they also were both students at Smith College in 1906. After graduating, they had little idea of what job they might pursue, instead initially taking a year grand tour of Europe. As was the norm, it probably was expected that they would marry and as is stated in the book, marry well. And yet, by 1916, neither had found a mate. Enter Ferry Carpenter, a lawyer in Hayden, a small outpost of 400 in Routt County, Colorado. More rancher than lawyer, he decided the small Elkhead, north of Hayden, needed its own school as the children living there had to travel too far, under sometimes horrific weather conditions to get to the school in Hayden. He came up with a scheme to entice young women to teach at this new 1 room school house. Word was put out via his sister Ruth, and an ad was placed in a teachers; magazine describing Elkhead's school as being "a superb school in the virgin hills" and promised good pay. Candidates should send a photo. The latter was part of Carpenter's plan. Young, pretty teachers might marry some of the many bachelors in the region. Dorothy and Ros applied and were hired. That's just the beginning of the adventure for these two.
Elkhead was not New York, neither had ever taught, didn't how to cook or sew, but were expected to teach domestic science. They were not used to the harsh winters Colorado would meat out, nor were they used to traveling many miles by horse to get to work. They did not know what supplies or the proper clothing to bring on the journey. Imagine when they found out they needed a rifle to kill sage chickens. And yet they were strong women, with a sense of purpose, and let little get in their way. They made it work.
There are wonderful stories here, beautiful descriptive passages of the landscape, history of gold and mining, the building of railways, and enough vicarious adventure for the best of us. Yes, Eliza, got it right. A darned good book, one I'll be recommending to others.
Too much chaff with the wheat of what might have been an otherwise very interesting tale.
I was glad when this arrived in the mail for my postal book club, as I had a copy on my TBR for several years. I enjoyed reading the story of the 2 women who left the coziness of early 20th century New York for the frontier to teach. Their stories were so interesting, but the book took me a little while to get through. Some of the background was too detailed and history bookish, but overall, a great selection!
A great, fascinating look at life at the turn of the 20th century. Really enjoyed it.
The story is good, it's just poorly written. One minute, you're reading about these two young ladies that go off to Colorado to teach, the next minute the author is off on a whole other tangent that didn't matter to me at all. I got lost a few times, then learned to skim through.