The Kimball graphic. (Kimball, Brule County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1883-1905, 1886-07-02

OF Ism have had to battle with pow
arTv. but few with reelected education.
Mis. Somerville, the only woman who
has become renowned as geologist,
was one OF the exceptions to the
rule. AS child she was allowed
to run wild, at the age OF eleven she
did not know how to spell. As
she grew up she was kept help
ing in the family housework until
marriage seemed to offer her deliver
ance. In this hope she was doomed
to most bitter disappointment. Her
husband was a narrow-minded man,
who hated clever or even educated
women. He considered them inferior
mentally to his sex, and if case oc-
Cured where woman proved herself
OF superior intellect. he was Mortified
and frowned her down as "unwoman.
ly." He thought that his wife unsexed
herself by pursuing her geological
studies, and made her keep strictly to
her domestic duties. His death hap
PLY left this gifted woman free to fol-
low the bent of her genius. Her Sec
ond husband encouraged her in her
chosen pursuit until she became the
most distinguished scientific woman
OF her day. She died as recently as
1872, having nearly completed her
one-hundreth year. She made intri-
cate astronomical calculations when
in her ninety-second year.
Lady Morgan was another instance
of q woman who had little early edu-
cation becoming distinguished in lit
erature. Her father was q poor
"barnstormer" in Ireland at the close
OF the last century, and the authoress
of 'The Wild Irish Girl" and other
popular novels of that time had to
overcome the prejudice against her
fathers profession. She had also to
contend with poverty and poor edu-
cation. Yet she became famous.
We have had two great female as.
tronomers, Miss Herschell and Miss
Mitchell. Both We're single women
and both took up thestudy ofastron.
omy in order to assist their brothers.
Miss Herschell's pathway to fame was
over a smooth road. but Miss Maria
| Mitchell had everything to battle
| with. She was the daughter OF q small
farmer in Nantucket, who was obliged
to exc out his income by teaching
school at 50 a week Maria was con
stantly occupied with household
| duties, and she describes her child
hood as "being an endless washing of
Dishes"
| 1t ia curious fact that so many of
our celebrated literary women were
the daughters OF farmers and began
their life work by teaching school
gradually acquiring fame and atfiuence
by writing Take the Cary sisters to
begin with and Mrs. Lydia Sigourney,
tho poetess, before them, then Grace
Greenwood, and lastly Ella Wheeler.
Ella Wheeler never taught school,
but her parents were poor farm peo.
pie in the West. The first poem she
wrote she sent to Mrs. Frank Leslie,
who saw enough merit in it to accept
it. Ella has bought her parents d
home out of her own earnings, and is
in every respect most excellent
daughter.
No female novelist worthy of fame
appeared in England until the reign
OF George III. That was 'little" Miss
Frances Burney. She was sort of
governess TO some OF the royal chill
A dren, which gave her an entrance into
society, and this made her books
fashionable. They possessed merits,
however. She was the daughter of a
physician, not-well-to-do, and Miss
Burney had to maintain herself.
The lady doctors and lawyers have
had the hardest time to enter profess
lsional ranks. Nevertheless they have
made great Roadway &nce Elizabeth
Blackwell vainly applied for admission
to the medical colleges in New York,
Boston, and Philadelphia. She was
finally admitted as a student in
| the medical college in Geneva, n Y.
Her youth was one ofstrugsle, hard
ship, encouragement, and restricted
means.
The grandfather OF Nine. Dudevant
| George SANDY peddled birds about
| the streets OF Paris-made money
F! enough by that to open u little tavern
I and billiard room for cabmen and 9TH
ers OF like grade. Her grandmother
was an illegitimate daughter OF Mar
| shall Sake, son of Augustus, king of
Poland. In Nine. Sand s '.Life" writ
ten by herself, she naively remarks
4 that she does not know whether she
is most proud of having q peddler's or
n kings blood in her veins. George
| 1otiN tAAObACl was - ocl SlIlS WOilldl,
| and the whole family had hard fight
for bare existence. Her first romance
| depicted the adventures Of young
girl fascinated by birds.
| Nine. Dudevant made herself a
deathless name by the brilllancy of
her own great genius, and may fairly
rank among the foremost seif-made
women OF the world. She had every
thing to contend with-poverty, OBJ
scurity, an untutored girlhood, a
wretched marriage, and opinions in
advance of her time Ever her first
choice of a profession was q mistake,
as she thought her talent lay in paint
ing.
female painters have had less to strug-
gle against than others OF their sex.
Almost all inherited their genius, and
became proficient in their art. their
| talent encouraged and fostered by
their father in his studio. From An
gelica Kaufman down to Elizabeth
Thompson, the painters have been the
only women who have trod the royal
road to falne and fortune.
Singers come next as instances of
the ease with which some women at.
tain high places, and at the head of
these stands Patti, who, with the ex-
ception of q few failures to draw as a
child artist. has had no uphill work
at all. Yet she has worked, and all
her life, too, and has never in all her
long career been known to disappoint
an audience, either through caprice or
sickness.
Grace Darling and our own Ida
Lewis were sslf-made women. Both
occupied the same position in life-as-
sistants in a lighthouse-and both be-
came celebrated orsavinglife. Among
| the list of self.made women these hero