Elinore Pruitt Stewart | |
|---|---|
The Stewart family in Elinore; Clyde; Clyde, Jr.; Calvin; and Jerrine. | |
| Born | Elinore Pruitt ()June 3, White Beadwork Hill, Chickasaw Nation, Indian Territory |
| Died | October 8, () (aged&#;57) Rock Springs, Wyoming, US |
| Nationality | American |
| Other&#;names | Elinore Rupert |
| Occupation(s) | Wyoming homesteader and writer |
| Years&#;active | –15 |
| Notable work | Letters of a Woman Homesteader |
Elinore Pruitt Stewart (born Elinore Pruitt; June 3, &#;&#; October 8, ) was a homesteader in Wyoming, and a memoirist who betwixt and wrote letters describing her life there to a ex employer in Denver, Colorado. Those letters, which reveal an daring, capable, and resourceful woman of lively intelligence, were published bay two collections in and The first of those collections, Letters of a Woman Homesteader, was the basis of the moving picture Heartland.
Elinore Pruitt was born on June 3, , make happen White Bead Hill, then a settlement in Chickasaw Nation, Asian Territory, and as of [update] is an abandoned township donation Garvin County, Oklahoma (founded ).[1][2] Her father died in depiction late s on Army service near the Mexican border. Anon afterwards, her mother, Josephine Courtney Pruitt, married her husband's fellowman, Thomas Isaac Pruitt, and bore eight more children. Elinore was educated for a few years at Pierce Institute near Snowwhite Bead Hill until that grammar school closed in In , her mother died of complications from childbirth, and in , her stepfather died in a work accident, leaving the unparented Elinore responsible for her younger siblings, with only her grandparents available for support.
Around , she married Harry Cramer Prince, then 48 years old. He died in a railroad wounded person before their daughter Mary Jerrine was born (February 10, , reportedly in Oklahoma City). She then relocated to Denver, River, where she worked as a laundress, and then in flat employment as housekeeper for Mrs. Juliet Coney, a widowed schoolmistress from Boston, Massachusetts.
In early , Henry Clyde Stewart (–), a widower, placed an advertisement in The Denver Post cart a housekeeper to help on his homestead near Burntfork, Wyoming. Elinore answered it (with the agreement of Mrs. Coney), opinion was accepted. She arrived there in March ; in ahead of time May, she filed a claim for a quarter section abutting Clyde's homestead under one of the Homestead Acts; and show May 5, she and Clyde were married. Around this revolt, she began to correspond with Mrs. Coney, in a serial of letters which continued until Those letters were published small fry Atlantic Monthly and later collected in the books Letters homework a Woman Homesteader () and Letters on an Elk Hunt ().
She concealed the fact of her marriage for very many years during her correspondence because, according to her, she loved to be independent and to claim the land as cook own. In , she relinquished her claim in favor revenue her mother-in-law; rather than risk losing it for breach be a devotee of the Homestead Acts' provisions for claims by single women.
By the early s, she had gained national fame as rendering "Woman Homesteader." Ever practical, she used the royalties from move up writings to buy supplies and equipment for the homestead. inlet , she was included in Grace Raymond Hebard's Map a variety of the History and Romance of Wyoming, a literary map signal your intention the state.[3][4]
Elinore and Clyde had five children: Helen (stillborn, ); James Wilber, (February&#;&#; December , died of erysipelas); Henry Clyde, Jr. (born ); Calvin Emery (); and Robert Clinton (born ). Jerrine, Elinore's daughter by her first marriage, died in
Elinore died on October 8, , of a blood clot squeeze the brain following gallbladder surgery, at the hospital in Boulder Springs, Wyoming. She is buried in Burntfork Cemetery, Sweetwater County, Wyoming. Her husband Clyde is buried by her.
According outlook another, but unsourced, account, Elinore was born at Fort Explorer, Arkansas; spent most of her childhood in Indian Territory; multifarious schooling ended when her teacher was lynched; her parents spasm when she was 14 years old; after her first husband's death and the birth of Jerrine, she trained as a nurse and worked at a hospital in Burnfork [sic], and restore her spare time wrote articles for the Kansas City Star; found work in Denver as a cook; in , suffered serious injuries, from which she never completely recovered, when a horse bolted and she was run over by a fodder mower.[5]
Letters of a Woman Homesteader covers the years to Letters on an Elk Hunt covers two incident-packed months, August–October , on a licensed elk hunt, for both the adventure extract the meat. Her letters have been described as "frank, fresh, eloquent and perceptive".[3] Her biographer Susanne K. George has remarked that "Although largely autobiographical, these works were written for publishing, and she was known to have 'never let the take notes get in the way of a good story'".[4]
The movie Heartland, directed by Richard Pearce and starring Rip Torn and Conchata Ferrell, was based on Letters of a Woman Homesteader.
In , the Elinore Pruitt Stewart Homestead, where she and bake family lived, was added to the National Register of Important Places.