Document 15.1 MARTHA JANE CANNARY BURK, The Life and Adventures of Calamity Jane (1896)
Document 15.2 Black Migrants to Kansas (1880)
Document 15.3 A Prostitute’s Contract (1886)
Document 15.4 ABIGAIL SCOTT DUNIWAY, Speaking Out for the Right to Vote (1914)
Document 15.5 CAROLINE NICHOLS CHURCHILL, Fighting for Woman Suffrage in Colorado (1909)
Essay Questions for Thinking through Sources 15
Celebrate Women Migrants’ Experiences in the West: Using information from these sources, write an essay that celebrates the ways the West offered some women migrants excitement, better economic opportunities, and new and more flexible gender roles. Which groups of women, in particular, experienced the West in this way?
Assess Women’s Hardships in the West: Using information from these sources, write an essay that emphasizes the ways life in the American West in this period was difficult for many women. Make sure to discuss the specific hardships and challenges they faced. Which groups of women, in particular, experienced the West in this way?
Consider Purpose and Audience: Examine each of these five sources, considering the purpose for which it was created and the audience it was intended to reach. How does each source’s purpose and audience shape its content and message? Which sources seem fully credible and which seem less believable? Why?
Notice What’s Missing: While these five sources shed light on the situation, they do not tell the whole story of women’s experiences in the West after the Civil War. Which women’s voices are missing from this collection? How might documents representing those perspectives broaden or change your understanding of women’s lives in the West in this period?
Thinking through Sources forExploring American Histories, Volume 2Printed Page 120