New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1911-09-17


| oneering from Missouri TO the PACING
and from Alaska to Mexico, by carrie
AdeI Strahorn. With $50 illustrations
from drawings by Charles VI. Russell
and others and from photographs. SvO.,
pp. XIV. 673. G. 7. Putnams Sons.
This is the record of a life unique even
among the women who took part in and
did their arduous share Of the work OF
the pioneers Of our civilization IN the
West. The author, looking backward
finds that the picturesque side of her
experiences has chung to her memory
more insistently than have their many
hardships, but of these, too, there is
enough in her pages Her stories, Wlth-
out being methodically grouped, sue
coed i'm simple chronological sequence
in impressing upon the readers mind II
vivid picture of conditions that are pass
ing from the memory of living men ana
women and being transformed into the
romance of history and fiction.
Miss Carrie Adell married, in 1871. Mr..
Robert T.. Strahorn, newspaper CORE
spondent who had been with Crook NJ
Powder River and had written a pook
on the resources of Wyoming, then a ter
ritory but sparsely settled by cattlemen
and mostly given over 10 marauding
Indians and buffalo in untold numbers.
| This book suggested to the late jay
Gould the establishment Of publicity
department by the Union Paclfic Kali
road. Mr. Strahorn being engaged 70
| write similar volume on the other
Western states with the purpose of at
tracing settlers, his duties further IN
Guiding the gathering for the company
own use Of all available information con-
corning possible extensions of the road
tillable acreage, prospective tonnage
etc:
| II meant going the length Of nearly every
| stage road across our great frontier many
| times over. into remote districts, into lonely
valleys and far-rcaching mountains
meant going into hundreds OF mines com
| putting millions Of feet OF timber, the num-
her OF cattle and sheep and their increase
II involved the study Of the prairies ana
hIllsideo with reference 10 their aTailahiIlty
| for raising cereals and fruits: the eNamlna-
tion of water courses and drainage, the de-
| termination OF the climatic and scenic CON
ditions and, in short every FACTOR ths
would make attractive and instructive rcad,
ing FOR the home seeker. Fifteen Thousand
miles by stage was but an incident Of those
| strenuous years as the work pTogresseh'
:. Then came the locating OF nI tTThs;
! bridges and irrigating canals. scncoiS'
| churches and colleges nnul f.I-
man cars traversed the one-time wilder
| ness on eight overland lines.
The authors "reminiscences arc, how
ever. not so much concerned with this
gigantic work Of colonization as with the
incidents and adventures that fell 70 her
and her husbands share in the course of
It's accomplishment. the bride having
given her consent 10 Mr.. Strahorns ac-
ceptancc Of the post only on condition
that she should accompany him wherever
he went at least at first. But the pill
grimage once begun, she took to- this
wandering life, as her narrative amply
testifes. and so, year after year, she saw
that vast region grow up, saw the old
give place TO the new, saw the Indian
pass, and the soldier and the cowboy
give way to the settler. She passed
through the SHOWS Of winters and the
parching heat of summers. In 1888 she
went alone to Alaska on a mission for
the Union Pacific Company.
The types of the old frontier cowboy
and miner, bad man" and vigilantes,
the stage driver. the prospector, the
leaders who passing through many
changes, became prominent citizens and
men of Importance in state and nation;
II. primitive conditions Of existence,
their makeshfts and Improvement, road
houses, settlements, early Western hos
pitality, the beginnings Of social differ
entiations as towns settled down TO an
ordered and permanent existence-all
this and much more is dealt with by the
author She is blessed with a much and
often needed sense of humor, and does
not fail to leaven her account with
samples of the unsmiling and often
rough sense of humor Of the earlier
West.