Count The Cookies - Contest - Ginger Simpson

A Karen Cote Design

I'm stealing a space on this blog to advertise my Countdown to Valentine's Day Contest, promoted and hostessed by Karen Cote.  I'm so fortunate to have all the beautiful art work she's created for my work and to have this contest appear on her beautiful blog, complete with her sexy avatar and voice.  Hope you'll visit and count the Cookies.  Yee Haw...and mosey on over to  http://www.karencote.tv/cookies-fun-ginger-spice-mizging/

Camp Floyd, Utah

 

     Camp Floyd was established in 1859, in Cedar Valley, Utah by Colonel Johnston, as the final headquarters of the Utah Expedition and approximately 20% of the entire U. S. Army, sent to control the "rebellious" Mormons, though not what had been originally planned. Salt Lake City was the objective, but the arrival there proved a disappointment. The city seemed abandoned.
     The Army's march through Salt Lake City did not go unnoticed, however. Mormen men everywhere were prepared to set fire to the buildings if soldiers began looting, unaware of Johnston's orders that his men not enter private property. With the army rode Phillip St. George Cooke, leader only ten years before of the Mormon Battalion, whose sympathies lay with his Mormon brethren. The Army camped first at what is now the general area of 21st. Street South and Redwood Road. Soon, they moved 18 miles west of the city, while searching for a permanent site, since Brigham Young insisted they not camp within forty miles of any town.
     Cedar Valley was 40 miles from SLC, but only a few miles from Lake Utah where nearly 20,000 Mormon refugees had camped. The troop train and the Mormons began on their respective ways at the same time, resulting in a tangle of saints and soldiers.
     The five-mile valley where Camp Floyd was situated had neither enough room for the 3,400 men there, in September, 1858, nor sufficient grazing for the horses, mules and beef cattle they had brought with them. Forage areas had to be commandeered elsewhere which resulted in conflicts between the Army and Mormon citizens. The Spencer family ran a herd of their own on one of the selected sites. An intoxicated Howard Spencer questioned the ability of two soldiers to evict him and charged them with a pitchfork. Sergeant Pike knocked the man over the head with a rifle, fracturing Spencer's skull. Citizens forced Pike's arrest and trial, which was interrupted when Spencer shot Pike. Recognizing the potential powder keg that seeking revenge might ignite, Johnston chose to ignore the incident.
     Camp Floyd soldiers spent their time trying to control the Mormons and patrol the Indian population as well. Only 700 men remained through the final days of the camp. With the Civil War approaching, fractions broke out between the soldiers who took sides. On February 6, 1861, the post was renamed Fort Crittenden. Five months later the Mormons breathed more easily as the Army left Cedar Valley. $4 million worth of improvements were auctioned off for less than $100,000.
     Little remains of the fort now. There is a museum and the cemetery and not much else. This author has visited the site in it's broad, barren valley, "A hot purgatorial spot where winter was long and rigorous, summer hot and uncomfortable, a place where alkaline water curdled soap, and dust storms proved almost unendurable," according to one description. The wind blows continually and sagebrush reins supreme.


 

Charlene Raddon’s first serious attempt at writing fiction came in 1980 when a vivid dream drove her to drag out a typewriter and begin writing. Because of her love of romance novels and the Wild West, her primary genre is historical romance. Kensington Books originally published five of her novels which are now available through Tirgearr Publishing.

http://www.charleneraddon.com

http://www.charleneraddon.blogspot.com

http://www.facebook.com/charleneraddon

Write a Really Short Story by Lyn Horner

I’m a regular follower of the Western Romance Writers Please Post Here ( #2) thread on Amazon’s Meet Our Authors forum. Back in the late fall, a bunch of us on the thread agreed to publish a western romance anthology of short stories to be called Rawhide ‘n Roses.

I thought this project would be fun and probably wouldn’t take much time since our stories were to be in the 2,000 to 3,000 word range, really short. Right. The only problem was I’ve written only a couple other short stories – flash fiction actually – and they were more like parts of a bigger picture. How was I going to tell a complete story, much less a romance, in so few words? Most chapters in my novels are longer than three thousand words. What had I gotten myself into?

Well, I stewed about it for a couple weeks. (I’m good at stewing over things. It’s exhausting!) Finally, I resorted to my favorite trick for roughing out a scene: I grabbed a notebook, clipboard and pen and settled into a nice hot bath. No, I’m not kidding. The wet heat seems to open up the pathways in my brain. Or maybe it’s just that there’s nothing to distract me, a big plus since I’m easily distracted, especially now that my husband is retired and around the house most of the time. Not that I’m blaming him; it’s my own fault for being so eager to do anything but write. Know what I mean?

Anyway, when I retreated to the bathtub I had absolutely no story idea in mind, but the moment pen touched paper this guy jumped out of my head, insisting his story be told. What story, I asked? He promptly informed me he was a lawman, a marshal in a small Colorado town. Here’s part of the scene he dictated to me:

 

“Move aside,” Marshal Trace Balfour ordered, pushing through the noisy throng gathered in the street outside the Golden Slipper Saloon. Their shouts and laughter had drawn him from his office up the block. Among the crowd, he saw the local Methodist preacher, the undertaker and the owner of the mercantile across the dusty street. Several ranch hands, in town on their day off, made most of the racket.

Trace also noticed the schoolmarm, Matilda Schoenbrun. With her brown hair wound in a tight bun at her nape and wearing a drab calico gown of the same color, she brought to mind a brown jay such as he’d seen as a boy in south Texas. When she spotted him, she threw her shoulders back and narrowed her lips, looking down her bespectacled little nose, setting his teeth on edge.

“Marshal, please put a stop to this!” she demanded in a haughty voice.

“Ma’am, that’s what I aim to do.” Touching his hat to her, he shouldered aside a pair of cowboys whose laughter and catcalls almost drowned out the shrieks coming from a pair of females rolling in the dirt. Trace recognized them as saloon girls form the Golden Slipper. With red and purple skirts bunched around their knees, they fought viciously, scratching, biting and pulling each other’s hair.

He’d rather face a gang of bank robbers than deal with these snarling wildcats, he thought grimly.

How’s that for an opening scene? Does it grab you? It did me. But then what? Who was the lawman going to get romantic with, one of the feisty fillies rolling around in the dirt? I had doubts about that, and how on earth was he supposed to win the mystery woman’s heart is the space of five or six pages?

My logical plotter’s brain said no, no way. No can do. I’d need at least a hundred pages to get them cozy enough to hop in bed, wouldn’t I? My characters never engage in full blown love scenes until they’ve known each other a while. After that, well, let’s just say things get steamy. But not in 2,000 words, for gosh sakes!

Let me tell you, this short story business had me stumped. It required more stewing and several false starts before I figured out how to bring the marshal and his lady together.

Points to ponder when writing short stories:

• Settings must be bare-bones; no flowery descriptions.
• Forget deep character studies; there’s no room.
• Keep backstory to a minimum; if important, make it concise.
• Every word should move the story along; sentences are like paragraphs, paragraphs are like pages in a book.
• Actions speak louder than words. Show emotions through body language, facial expressions and dialogue. Don’t depend upon introspection; again, there’s no room.
• Save the best for last; a dramatic ending will stick in a reader’s mind.

Short stories are a whole different kettle of fish for an author who normally writes historical novels in the 100,000-word range. After this exercise I have newfound respect for short story writers.

Whew! Now let me share a more familiar subject, my Native American romance:

Dearest Irish

Set in1876, Dearest Irish stars Rose Devlin, the youngest of three psychic siblings who hide their rare talents for fear of persecution. Gifted with the ability to heal with her mind, Rose inadvertently reveals her secret to Choctaw Jack, a half-breed cowboy she finds fascinating but rather frightening.

Choctaw Jack straddles two worlds, dividing his loyalties between his mother’s people and the family of a friend who died in the Civil War. Like Rose, he keeps shocking secrets that could cost him his job, even his life. Yet, he will risk everything to save his dying mother, even if it means kidnapping Rose.

Excerpt:

Rose regained her senses slowly. Feeling herself rock to and fro, she groggily recognized the loping gait of a horse beneath her. But how could that be?

She forced her eyes open, taking in the starlit sky and the dark landscape passing by. Blinking at the sight, she realized she was seated crosswise on the horse – in a man’s lap. Just like that, the scene in her bedroom with Jack came back to her, and she knew whose chest she leaned upon and whose arm was locked around her.

Panicking, she cried out in fright. Pain lanced through her jaw, reminding her of the blow her teacher-turned-abductor had delivered just before she’d sunk into oblivion.

“Easy now,” the brute murmured. “You’re all right. Nobody’s gonna hurt you.”

She threw her head back to see his shadowed features. “I’m not all right, ye . . . ye kidnapper!” Cupping her painful jaw, she demanded, “Take me back this instant!”

“Can’t do that, Toppah.”

“But ye must! Tye and Lil will be looking for me.” Catching the odd word he’d spoken, she repeated it. “Toppah? What’s that?”

“It’s you. It means yellow-hair.”

“Oh. Well, don’t be calling me that again. Now turn this horse around and take me back,” she again demanded.

“Nope. We’re heading for the Nations. You might as well relax and enjoy the ride.”

“Enjoy the ride, is it? You’re daft!” She pushed at his steely arm and attempted to twist free, but, although his hold caused no pain, it was unbreakable. Feeling smothered and panicky, she shoved at his chest, managing to create a small space between them.

“Be still,” he ordered sharply. “Do you want to fall off and break your neck?”

Before she could reply, another man’s voice sounded nearby, speaking in an unfamiliar tongue. Unaware of his presence until that moment, Rose uttered a frightened cry and instinctively shrank against Jack. His arm tightened around her for a moment. He said something to the other man then spoke softly to her.

“Don’t be afraid, Poe-lah-yee. That’s only Tsoia. He is my friend, my blood brother. He won’t touch you as long as he thinks you’re mine.”

“Yours! I’m not yours!” she shrilled, once more stiffening against him.

“You might not want to let him know that.”

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00CK9LGA2 (Kindle and paperback)

http://tinyurl.com/l64ctss (Nook)

A Fur Trapper's Wife

By: Peggy L Henderson

Life in the early 1800's was extremely difficult for both men and women. The life of a fur trader was even more difficult as he tried to survive in the uncharted wilderness to make a living as a trapper. Women of European descent were virtually unheard of in the fur trade. The very few women, usually wives of managers of fur companies such as the Hudson’s Bay Company or the Northwest Company, who accompanied husbands to remote outposts, were considered “tender exotics.”

Because of society’s class structure in those days, most of these women didn’t last longer than a year on these posts before suffering from mental health problems or returning to cities in the east. Wives of managers were expected to associate only with other wives of other managers, and in those remote posts, these were far and few between. The women were not allowed to associate with Indian women or half-breed women, even if they could communicate somehow. Servants (Indian women) were usually available to perform domestic duties, so there was nothing for a wife to do to even relieve her boredom. Her only duty was to her husband and family, and most of the time the husband wasn’t even at the post, traveling for months at a time.

 

Fur trappers in the Rocky Mountains often took Indian women as wives. An Indian woman’s primary responsibilities in her tribe was that of housekeeping, which included child rearing, butchering, cooking, the labor-intensive task of tanning hides, collecting firewood, preserving food for winter, setting up and maintaining camp, and sewing clothing.

A man who wanted to take a bride would have to provide the woman’s father (or oldest male relative if the father was dead) with certain trade goods such as horses, guns, blankets, etc., in exchange for the woman. The bride price was determined by the father based on the value he placed on his daughter’s loss of productivity around his lodge.

Many Indian women considered it an honor to be chosen as the wife of a fur trapper. It offered the woman a different way of life which was often easier physically and offered her more material things. An Indian woman married to a trapper either remained at her village, or moved to the fort or trading post with her husband. She might also accompany him on his wanderings. If a woman remained with her village, her life probably didn’t change much, except that she had access to many luxury items which were not available to the other women.  Items such as kettles, knives, awls and wool and cotton fabrics greatly eased the domestic burdens of the women.

Because there were no preachers or priests to perform wedding ceremonies, marriages were “after the customs of the country,” or a la facon du pays. This arrangement met both the needs of the Indian and the trapper. By making their women available to trappers and traders, the Indians were able to forge trade alliances and social bonds, and expected access to trading posts, provisions, and trade goods.

Trappers also realized the benefits of marriage to an Indian woman, especially the daughter of a chief or highly respected hunter. Such an arrangement provided the trapper with a translator and cultural liaison within the tribe. The domestic chores the wife performed freed the trapper to spend more time trapping and trading.

Marriages were easy to terminate by either the man or the woman. A man could simply “turn off” his wife by leaving her behind, and a woman who wanted a “divorce” would indicate this by leaving the man’s belongings outside their lodge. Statistically, most marriages lasted up to 15 years, and most ended with the death of one or the other spouse.

Anyone who has read any of my Yellowstone Romance Series books knows that I fudge with the  historical accuracy quite a bit. My mountain men heros live in the remote Yellowstone region year round, which most likely never happened, and even more far-fetched is it that they would marry a white woman and raise a family there. My new trilogy of books is set a little south of Yellowstone in the Teton/Jackson Hole region, and I introduce a new mountain man hero, and the woman who proves herself strong enough to endure all that the wilderness (and the people of the era) can throw at her. 

The Valentine's Day Card

February is here and romance is in the air. Heart-shaped boxes of chocolate, dinner with your sweetheart and the ever-popular Valentine’s Day card make for an exciting celebration. The day is not just for adults. Children join in on the fun, too. Some have parties at school, where they feast on cookies and small candies and create their own cards to give to their parents. Teenagers celebrate by sending secret Valentine’s to their friends. The chocolate we enjoy today originated with the cacao bean, which made its way around the world and eventually came to the United States via Europe. Cocoa powder was sold in small tins. Folks used the powder to make a warm, tasty drink before devising methods to make chocolate cakes and candies. As for the Valentine’s Day card that we know today, that originated in Europe, too.

As early as the 1700’s, people gave Valentine’s Day cards to their sweethearts. The cards were handwritten on plain paper. By the 1820’s, paper specifically made for Valentine’s Day cards was marketed. Using this type of paper became fashionable in both Britain and the United States. Britain adopted commercial postal rates in the 1840’s and the use of commercially produced Valentine’s Day cards grew. The cards were constructed of flat sheets of paper, printed with colorful illustrations and embossed borders, folded and sealed with wax. One such card made its way to Esther A. Howland in Worcester, Massachusetts. According to legend, the card Esther received inspired her to create the American Valentine’s Day greeting card.

Esther’s father was a stationer. She approached him with the card and an idea to make her own cards. Her father agreed and she made some sample cards, sent them out with her brother with the notion if she received orders for the cards, the amount ordered would be low, maybe two hundred cards. She was wrong. The order she received was for five thousand cards. Creating an assembly line on the third floor of her home, she hired her friends to help produce and fill the order. Two years later, she went into business for herself, opening the New England Valentine Company.

The sending of commercially produced Valentine’s Day cards grew throughout the 1850’s. During the Civil War, the amount of cards sent declined, but after the war, the amount escalated. Sending Valentine’s Cards turned into a big business.

Ester kept her company flourishing for forty years. She eventually sold her business to George C. Whitney in 1888. She never married and today some of her cards are still in existence. Collectors are always on the lookout for them. If found and in mint condition, collectors pay anywhere from $300 to $400 for one. (And you thought roses were expensive, lol)

Happy Valentine’s Day! Enjoy your day with the ones you love. 

Julie

Color Me Something Authentic by Ciara Gold

Most of us try real hard to immerse the reader in whatever time period we’re writing about. I love working on historical westerns and do my best but I ran across a blurb that really got me to thinking. Hopefully I haven’t been guilty of this, but in an article by Denise Chow on the Live Science Website regarding the color of the train that transported Abraham Lincoln’s body, Wayne Wesolowski explained, "I didn't find color records in the newspapers, and a lot of the other descriptions were written long after the Civil War. Some described the car as being a rich chocolate brown, and others said it was more like claret, or red wine. But it's very hard to describe colors with words, and paint names today have very different meanings. For instance, chocolate bars did not exist in 1865, so "chocolate brown" referred more to Dutch chocolate, which, because of the way it was prepared, was a darker, redder brown than we imagine today,”

This got me to thinking about other color descriptors. Consider a pioneer in west Texas. Doubtful he or she would think of yellow in terms of “lemon” yellow.

With that in mind, I tried to compile a list of color descriptors that might ring true in the 1870s. Mind you this is not a very complete list but was done in hopes of making us all mindful of what existed in plenty at the time of our stories.

Yellow:  Lemons didn’t really get going in Texas until the early 1900s, along with grapefruits, limes and kumquats. Also, cornsilk, gold and butter.

Orange:  Persimmons, polished brass, carrots ( introduced to America in 1700s; peaches were introduced in Texas by German immigrants, and oranges were introduced to Hildalgo County, Texas in the 18^th century but most of the citrus trees didn’t become popular until the early 1900s.) Early pumpkins were really a form of squash and looked different from the traditional pumpkin of today (but it was still orange just really bright).

Red:  carmine, cherry trees didn’t come to America until 1912 as a sign of friendship from the Japanese, Apples seeds could be bought in 1845 from an American Nursery Catalogue,  pomegranate, garnet is a gemstone that can be found naturally in Arizona, Tomatoes are native of South America and Central America and the first varieties were more yellow then red.  

Purple:  Mulberries are native to Texas, as well as dewberries,  

Blue:  Whortleberries (also known as farkleberries, gooseberries and huckleberries) can range from blue to red and can be found in east Texas,  bluebonnets, and

Green:  Horse apples are native to Oklahoma, Texas, and Arkansas. Mint, ivy, moss, grass, forest, and clover

Brown:  Dr. Pepper was developed in 1880 in Texas, Root beer also known as Sarsaparilla was quite popular by the 1890s but didn’t really become commercialized until 1876.

I’m sure I can think of a lot of other things to look up but the point being that to remain authentic to the time period one must dig pretty deep for even the most insignificant of details like color descriptors. I know I plan to be more cautious in the future.  

Check Me Out

I'm borrowing an empty day on Cowboy Kisses to promote ME!  A great friend, Karen Cote, is acting as my promotional manager and trying a new idea using Pinterest.  I hope you'll honor the time she's spent and check out her innovative ideas.  I'm also using this post to check my 'feed' on Triberr because for the past four days, my feeds haven't been working, which means I'm doing a lot of posting for other people and they aren't having a chance to pay me back.  *lol*

Anyhow...check out http://pinterest.com/mizging