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 The widely acclaimed autobiography of a lone woman rancher and country school teacher--the life she lived on the land she loved.
CHAPTER 1
Kids and Cows
Thirty years and more in the San Pedro Valley have not lessened my sense of awe, as I return from a trip outside to crest the western rim and see the grandeur and color of thousands of square miles spread out before me.
I had been an Arizona resident for a quarter of a century before I learned that the state has two scenic wonders carved out over millions of years by great river systems: the Grand Canyon of the Colorado, and the San Pedro River Valley which was named for St. Peter by the padres and conquistadores who passed this way in 1540, eighty years before the Pilgrims landed. The Grand Canyon is out of this world. But the San Pedro Valley, although far from crowded, is peopled. For the most part its denizens are earthy ones, wresting their living from the ground, in some cases for four or five generations: farmers, ranchers, miners.
I came into it (sent sight unseen by the county school superintendent at Tucson) to teach a small accommodation school at Redington, about halfway the hundred-mile length of the river-the only one of consequence in the United States that flows north in is entirety. Redington School was the most remote in Pima County. It was seventy-five miles from Tucson, mostly over rough, two-wheel unkept roads that literally disappeared when it rained.
The isolation and limited enrollment were appealing. I had overworked audaciously for years while teaching non-readers in overcrowded rooms and earning a university degree simultaneously. Moreover, I had suffered severe emotional damage in my personal life.
I wanted to hide far-off by myself to lick my wounds and have a go at writing. I would do my duty by the handful of little ranchers for the minimum hours a day, then uncover my portable and whack away at my creations secure from interruptions and the cares of the world. Then I met my pupils. ...
Read Woman in Levi's Online
By Eulalia Bourne
The University of Arizona Press, Tucson
CONTENTS
Chapter 1 Kids and Cows
Chapter 2 Please Excuse The Pants
Chapter 3 Water Comes First
Chapter 4 My Trouble With Men
Chapter 5 There Ought To Be A Law
Chapter 6 To Market
Chapter 7 Beware The Buyer
Chapter 8 The Rangeland Order Of The Purple Heart
Chapter 9 Caring For The Green
Chapter 10 They'll Never Be Missed
Chapter 11 Under The Weather
Chapter 12 Too Much Of A Good Thing
Chapter 13 Cooking For Cattle
Chapter 14 The Wide Open Spaces Just Ain't!
Chapter 15 Chicken
Chapter 16 That "Ole" Talk
Chapter 17 And More Cows
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