Beyond the American Pale: The Irish in the West, 1845-1910, by David M. Emmons, $34.95.
We think of the Irish immigrating to the East Coast, where employers posted “No Irish Need Apply” signs. But in fact, many of the Irish pushed on across the country, settling in industrial communities in Montana as well as Colorado.
In 1870, nearly 15 percent of the miners in Colorado were Irish. The Irish also made up 35 percent of the soldiers in Colorado that year. These immigrants were known as “two-boat Irish.” The first boat, of course, was the one in which they crossed the Atlantic. The second was a boat (or train or wagon or even just two legs) that took the Irishman westward.
“The second boat did not always deliver the Irish to more hospitable shores,” writes David M. Emmons in this weighty history, “Beyond the Pale: The Irish in the West, 1845-1910.”
Emmons, professor emeritus of history at the University of Montana, is the author of an acclaimed history of the Irish in Butte. Now he expands his territory to the entire West, which extends from Albany, N.Y., to the Pacific.
Drawing on a variety of sources, from European historical accounts to American documents and records, Emmons says that the Irish were hardly the loners of American myth. They settled in establish towns, in large part because the Catholic church was already there. Their active Catholicism, as much as their nationality, was the reason they were despised and discriminated against. America was virulently anti-Catholic and made outcasts of anyone who practiced the faith.
Emmons’ book is hardly bedtime reading, but it is a comprehensive account that adds to our understanding of the West’s diversity.
Open Range: The Life of Agnes Morley Cleaveland, by Darlis A. Miller, $24.95.
First published 60 years ago, Agnes Morley Cleaveland’s “No Life for a Lady,” the story of her growing up on a cattle ranch in New Mexico in the last quarter of the 19th century, is an American classic. But it doesn’t tell us everything about the woman.
As readers of that autobiography know, Cleaveland was a fearless, independent girl whose mother was not much of a ranch manager. The father died when Cleaveland was a child, and a stepfather was a profligate, so at an early age, Cleaveland and her brother, Ray, took over. That didn’t stop Cleaveland from attending Stanford, where she numbered among her friends Lou and Herbert Hoover.
In “Open Range,” Darlis A. Miller fills us in on what Cleveland omitted from her story. She had a disastrous teenage marriage to a New Mexico neighbor that lasted only weeks, and her marriage to Newton Cleaveland, a mining engineer, was troubled.
Cleaveland spent much of her married life in California, where she was active in the women’s club movement, Republican politics, the Christian Science church and writing. She published many short stories early in her marriage before setting down her pen for 30 years. One of Cleaveland’s four children was the mentally challenged daughter, Morley, who had to be cared for.
Just two years after their marriage, Newton wrote, “My wife’s address is Datil, N.M., My address is Oroville, California.” It wasn’t altogether a joke. When things got tough, Cleaveland escaped California for New Mexico and the ranch.
In this short biography, Miller rounds out this remarkable woman and her brother, Ray, an extraordinary rancher and practical joker in his own right. He once dyed some sheep red to show a tourist how the Navajos got red yarn for their rugs. In fact, Cleaveland considered writing a book about Ray but never put it together.
Sandra Dalls is a Denver novelist who writes regularly about new regional nonfiction.
