The Redwood gazette. [volume] (Redwood Falls, Minn.) 1873-1940, 1878-02-21
Habit Makes the Woman.

Mrs. MYRA CLARK GAINES, having es-
tablished her claim to $35, OOO, 900 worth
of property in Louisiana. is about to
enter upon proceedings to establish her
claim to 10000 or 1900 acres of land
in Missouri. She doesn't need the
land; there is only a possibility that
she will ever secure it; but litigation is
with her q matter of habit, and this
new step would indicate that she cannot
be contented or happy without quar-
rel about land and other property on
her hands.
A business man who has been intense
ly active for thirty or forty years cannot
be easy in retirement. He is lost with
out the care, worry and excitement in
cident to the management OF business
complications, and more often than
otherwise such man returns to the
work and worry of business life. and
falls, when he does fall, in working
animate Mrs. Gaines in her present ac-
ton to recover lands in Missouri. She
has been so long a litigant that to be i'll
the midst of litigation is, for her, as we
have said, the only chance for content
ment or happiness. Her talents and
her energies have been for so many
years devoted to establishing her claims
to property whose ownership was in
dispute, that she has an irresistible in
clination to continue in the business.
Myra Clark, when beautiful young
woman OF twenty-five, made the dis
covery that she was her fathers heir,
and as such the rightful owner of val
liable property in New Orleans. This
was nearly half q century ago, and she
entered at once upon what proved to be
the work of life time, and made her
the most famous litigant in the world.
In 1882, rs Mrs. Whitney, she took the
first steps to prove the existence of
will making her the heir of Daniel
Clark. She was just twenty-four years
in establishing the fact that such will
had been in existence, and in this time
had buried her first husband and mar
ricd II second and buried him. Then
her legitimacy was denied, and it took
some years to establish the fact of her
fathers marriage TO her mother. This
accomplished, she in 1856 filed in the
| Supreme Court OF the United States Il
bill in equity to recover valuable prop
erty then in the possession of the City
of New Orleans. After struggle OF
eleven years the Court decided the case
in her favor. Many minor suits fol-
lowed, and last year she gained the
browning victory that substantially cs-
tablished her right to all the property
claimed.
Forty-sevcn wears after she discOv-
cred certain important papers in an old
trunk she stood before the world the
personiiication of persistent and tire
less energy, having vindicated her ia
lished her own claims. 1t was expected
then that this old lady of seventy thee,
having fought so good II fight, and hay
ing accomplished SO much, would be
willing to rest on her lau:els.
But she was untitled for quiet life.
Like the warrior of old, she sighed for
more worlds to conquer; like the re-
tired business men of to-day, she was
uneasy as Il fish out of water. Forty
years porting over old documents and
dwelling on the intricacies of disputed
titles has SO bent her nature to the
work that investigation and disputation
had become necessary to her existence.
The decisions of the courts last year
having left nothing in New Orleans for
her to quarrel about, she gladly seizes
the remote possibilities in Missouri.
The picture of this old lady, of more
than the allotted thrcescore and ten
years of human existence, entering up
on such work is as striking as the
now historic tableau incident to her
first appearance in court. The one
marked the dedication of high-spirited
and courageous woman to the accom-
plishment of what seemed a hopeless
undertaking. The other shows that
the habits of life and thought, encour-
aged by the struggle that ended after
SO long a time in success, have made
for her a second nature, with inclina-
tons and .longings as strong rs were the
aspirations OF her young womanhood
Chicago Inter- ocean.