The Milan exchange. (Milan, Gibson County, Tenn.) 1874-1978, 1880-07-22
Women in the Far West.

Beginning Life in new country with
small capital involves many years of
hard work and strict economy, perhaps
privation and loneliness. This comes
especially hard ON the farmers wives,
many of whom have grown up in homes
of comfort and plenty in the older
States. Ask the men what they think
of Iowa and they will say that it is
fine State; it has many resources and
advantages; there is room for develop
ment here; the avenues to positions of
profit and honor are not so crowded as
they are in the older States; q GOOD
class of emigrants are settling up the
State; that, On the whole, Iowa has a
bright future before it. But the women
do not deal in such generalities. Their
own home and individual life is all the
world to them, and if that is encOm-
passed with toll and hardship, if all
their cherished lOngings and ambitions
are denied and their hearts sick with
hope deferred, this talk about the I'M
developed resources of Iowa and its
future greatness has no interest or
meaning for them. In their isolated
homes on the bleak prairie they have
few social opportunities and their strait
ened means do not allow them to buy
books or pictures, to take papers or
magazines, or to indulge in many of the
little household ornaments dear to the
feminine heart. What wonder, then, if
their eyes have weary, questioning
look as if they were always searching
the fiat prairie horizon for some prom
Use or hope of better days, something
fresh and stimulating to vary the dull
mOnOtony of toll?
"There's better time coming" the
farmer says. When we get the farm
paid for we will build new house and
send the children to town to SCHOOL,
and so the slow years 90 by. If every
new country is not actually fortified
with the hearts blood of women, the
settling and development of it none the
less require the sacrifice of their lives.
l see many women who have thus
sacrificed and are sacrificing their lives
Their faces are wrinkled, their hands
are hard with rough, coarse work, they
have long ago ceased to have any per-
sonal ambitions; but their hopes are
centered in their children Their self |
abnegation is pathetic beyond words.
After foOthold has been gained in a
new country and home established, a
generation, perhaps two, must pass
away before fine type of humanity is
produced. The fathers and mothers |.
have toiled for the actual necessaries of /
life, and gained them. The children
are supplied with physical comforts. /.
Plenty of food and exercise in the pure
air give them stalwart frames, GOOD |
blood and perfect animal health, but |
there is bovine stolidity of expression .
in their faces, a suggestion of kinship /
with the clOd. They are hOnest-hearted /
and well-meaning stupid, not natural |
ly, but because their minds have never .
been quickened and stimulated. They /
grOpe in a blind way for better things, F.
and wonder if life means no more than .
to pillow and SOW and reap, to wash and .
cook and sew. Perhaps one out of every
hundred viii break from the slowly
ranks and run ahead to taste
of the springs Of knowledge reserved .
for the next generation, but the vast
will go down to their graves
without ever attaining to the ripeness
and symmetry of fully-developed life.
Their children, perhaps their
grandchildren-will attain fine physi-
cal and mental type
What character shall | choose as a
typical Iowan? Not the occupant of
the large brick house with tall ever
green's in front which meets nv sight
whenever l look toward the country.
An old woman lives there alone, except |.
for a servant or two, having buried her
husband and ten children. She is worth
100000, but can neither read nor
write. Her strong cOmmOn-sense and
deep fund Of experience supply her lack
Of education, and one would not think
while listening to her that she was igno-
rant Of letters. Her life has been one
Of toll and sorrow. but her expression
IS one ofsbrave, cheerfulness. She and
her husband came to this place FORTY
years ago. They were the first white
settlers, and for neighbOrs thew had
Indians and wolves. They entered most
Of the land on which the town now
stands, and when other settlers came in
and the town was Laid out. their land /
became valuable, and thus the founda-
ion OF their fortune was laid. But as
riches increased, cares also increased;
the husband was so weighed down bv
and anxiety that his mind
gave way, and in fit of dependency