I’ve been posting regularly (at least weekly) on this blog for a year now, and since May 2012 I’ve posted twice a week (on Mondays and Wednesdays). I’ve had some successes, but I also know I can improve. Here are the top ten lessons I’ve learned in the past year […]
Continue readingTag Archives: history
Accidents on the Oregon Trail: Catherine Sager Pringle
This past week, while I’ve been caring for my daughter with a broken leg, I’ve thought about the injuries the pioneers to Oregon suffered on their journey. Accidents and disease were much greater risks to the emigrants than Indians, despite what we see in Western movies. One of every seventeen […]
Continue readingWhiskey Warehouse: History & Fine Dining in Alma, Missouri
Last Saturday evening, four of us went to the Whiskey Warehouse in Alma, Missouri, to celebrate a milestone birthday of one of our party. We wanted to make an occasion of the evening, but had no idea what to expect from this restaurant that opened in October 2012. We were […]
Continue readingWriting Across Time
The Middlebury College Admissions Office uses interviews by alumni volunteers to supplement the online application process. As one of the volunteers, I’ve been talking to Middlebury applicants this month, and of course I have told them about my experiences at college. One of the things I talk to applicants about […]
Continue readingPreparing for the Trip to Oregon: Keturah Belknap
Last year I posted several times about travel along the Oregon Trail in 1847, the year in which the novel I am working on takes place. (Click here and here for samples, or search this blog for “Oregon Trail.”) Several readers have asked what I’m going to do in 2013. My […]
Continue readingChristmas Traditions in the Late 1840s
Because the emigrants in my first Oregon Trail novel traveled between April and October, I didn’t have to write about their Christmas celebrations in that book. But the sequel covers a three-year time span, so as I work on this draft, I am learning about Christmas traditions in the late […]
Continue readingThe Travails of Elizabeth Dixon Smith Geer
As I wrote in my last post about the Oregon Trail, the emigrants wanted to get to Oregon before the winter weather set in. Most travelers arrived by the end of October, but some were not so lucky. One of the unfortunate travelers was Elizabeth Dixon Smith Geer. Elizabeth kept […]
Continue readingHaunting Book: Unbroken, by Laura Hillenbrand
The third haunting book I’ve read in recent months is Unbroken, by Laura Hillenbrand. Unbroken is the true story of Louis Zamperini, a man who lived a life that can only be called “larger than life.” During his boyhood in California, Louie Zamperini was a juvenile delinquent. To keep Louie out of […]
Continue readingOregon City: End of the Trail
If the emigrants on the Oregon Trail were fortunate, they reached Oregon City in the Willamette Valley sometime in October – about six months after they began their journey from what was then the United States. The dangers of their trek continued even through the last weeks, when the travelers […]
Continue readingHaunting Book: The Sandcastle Girls, by Chris Bohjalian
The second of the haunting books in my October series is The Sandcastle Girls, by Chris Bohjalian. This novel is set in two time periods – the narrator lives in current times, and her grandparents met and fell in love during the Armenian Genocide in World War I. Like all […]
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