Making a living was important to pioneers on the frontier, just as it has been at all periods of American history. I wrote last month about farming in the 1850s. Land was free for white males in Oregon to claim, so if a man was willing to clear the land […]
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On Writing and Editing and Procrastination
I talked to a friend the other day and found her in the process of making tomato sauce. “I haven’t made tomato sauce in years,” I said. “Not since someone gave me an excess of tomatoes one summer.” “Well, it was either this or edit the book I’m working on,” […]
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Farming in Oregon in the 1850s
I wrote in February of this year that I didn’t know which issues in Oregon’s history in 1850-1852 might impact my current work-in-progress. I’m slowly answering my own question as I move through the first draft. The land laws are a major factor. The discovery of gold in the Rogue […]
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Our Alla Tour in Helsinki
As I mentioned recently, my sister did most of the planning for our Baltic Sea cruise. She decided to use Alla Tours for the St. Petersburg shore tour, rather than the cruise line (Celebrity). As she and I explored at the Alla Tour options described on their website, we found […]
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I’m Back!
The reason I took most of July off from blogging is that I’ve been traveling a lot in the last couple of months. First a trip to the Los Angeles area in June, and then a cruise on the Baltic Sea during the first half of July. I couldn’t write […]
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ON HIATUS FOR JULY
I have been blogging regularly since early 2012. In over six years, I think I have only taken one short Christmas break. But this month I have too many obligations to post regularly. Therefore, I am putting the blog on hiatus until August. I am taking my own Independence Day […]
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Early Roads and Railroads in Oregon in the 1850s
As I write my fourth historical novel about the West, I’m finding more and more things I need to research. Researching travel along the Oregon Trail itself was easy by comparison—all I needed to do was to decide on a route, describe the landmarks and the difficulties of daily life, […]
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Party Like It’s 1843: Celebrating the 175th Anniversary of the Great Migration to Oregon
I’ve written before about the Great Migration of 1843—the first large wagon train along the Oregon Trail. This was the first organized company to take wagons to Oregon from Missouri. That year, over 700 people set out for Oregon, transported in more than 100 wagons. Men like Jesse Applegate, Peter […]
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The Oregon Donation Land Claim Act and Marriage
I wrote back in October 2015 about the Oregon land laws in the 1840s, and in that post I mentioned the Oregon Donation Land Claim Act (known as the Donation Land Law), which was passed by Congress on September 27, 1850. My current work-in-progress takes place in late 1850 and […]
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Whining about Writing
Sometimes you just have to whine. Or rant. I’m doing some of both today. For the past several weeks, I’ve only been able to work on my novel about one day a week. Maybe two. I am in a weekly critique group, in which each participant (there are six of […]
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