Hearts West by Chris Enss Page A

today,” Holmes reported, “A few ladies present, does my eye good to see a woman once more. Hope Mrs. Farnham will bring 10,000.”
    Not everyone found the idea of supplying single pioneers with potential brides acceptable. Many socialites considered it a scandalous plan, and the campaign was mired in controversy. Rumors that Eliza was little more than a procurer ultimately kept many women from committing to the journey.
    The highly anticipated trip to San Francisco was troublesome from the start. Eliza challenged the authority of the ship’s captain, demanding he make an unscheduled stop for fresh water. Furious with what he referred to as a “brazen female meddler,” the captain lured Eliza and her charges off the ship in Chile and left them stranded there. A long, anxious month passed before they were able to catch another ship for San Francisco. Eliza and her boys arrived at their new home in Santa Cruz in February of 1850, and from there proceeded to find the land that had been left to them. After a short carriage ride through the country, the three arrived at the homestead. The house itself was little more than a shack, but the acreage around it was lush and filled with cattle. “An ideal place to raise a family,” she would later write in her book, California, In-Doors and Out .
    With the help of her good friend, Georgiana Bruce Kirby, the two built a ranch house on the property and began farming the land. Realizing their long, full dresses hampered their work in the fields, Eliza decided the two needed to wear bloomers. She made their wide, loose pants from old gymnastic suits. Like her mail-order bride plan, it was another unconventional action that shocked the community around her.
    In 1852, Eliza accepted a marriage proposal from San Francisco resident and entrepreneur, William Alexander Fitzpatrick. According to Georgiana’s journal, William was the “greatest blackguard in the country.” He frequently mistreated Eliza and their life was a series of stormy partings and reconciliations. The two divorced four years later.
    In 1856, Eliza abandoned ranch life and returned to her work at state women’s prisons, speaking out for reform. She eventually took a job as principal of the first Santa Cruz public school. In her leisure time she toured the state, lecturing on topics ranging from spiritualism to women’s rights. She penned four books on the subject of women and the emerging West. In 1859, she organized a society to assist destitute women in finding homes in the West, and took charge of several such emigrant parties. “None but the pure and strong-hearted of my sex should come alone to this land,” she reasoned.
    Historian Herbert Bancroft boasted that Eliza was one of the “first women to recognize the effects her sex could have on the Wild West—and probably one to be avoided at all costs by the hell-raising male population in the California gold fields.” Her efforts convinced like-minded female pioneers to relocate and cast their influence over the new frontier.

    This is the most gladdening intelligence of the day . . . Eliza Farnham and her girls are coming, and the dawning of brighter days for our golden land is even now perceptible. The day of regeneration is nigh on hand . . . We shall . . . prepare ourselves to witness the great change which is shortly to follow, with feelings akin to hilarious joy.
    California Daily Alta—1849
    Eliza Farnham’s unconventional methods of bringing civility to the Wild West helped transform the frontier and make the emerging country fit for wives and family.

BRIDAL COUPLES
    D uring the late 1880s, Gold Country hostelries were literally filled with blushing brides. Women arrived from eastern locations to wed the men they’d met through mail-order advertisements and set up house in the rich hills of northern California. San Francisco was one of the most popular places in the country to