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Nothing Daunted: The Unexpected Education of Two Society Girls in the West Audiobook
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Publisher Description
From the author of The Agitators, the acclaimed and captivating true story of two restless society girls who left their affluent lives to “rough it” as teachers in the wilds of Colorado in 1916.
In the summer of 1916, Dorothy Woodruff and Rosamond Underwood, bored by society luncheons, charity work, and the effete men who courted them, left their families in Auburn, New York, to teach school in the wilds of northwestern Colorado. They lived with a family of homesteaders in the Elkhead Mountains and rode to school on horseback, often in blinding blizzards. Their students walked or skied, in tattered clothes and shoes tied together with string. The young cattle rancher who had lured them west, Ferry Carpenter, had promised them the adventure of a lifetime. He hadn’t let on that they would be considered dazzling prospective brides for the locals.
Nearly a hundred years later, Dorothy Wickenden, the granddaughter of Dorothy Woodruff, found the teachers’ buoyant letters home, which captured the voices of the pioneer women, the children, and other unforgettable people the women got to know. In reconstructing their journey, Wickenden has created an exhilarating saga about two intrepid women and the “settling up” of the West.
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“In Nothing Daunted, Dorothy Wickenden has beautifully captured a world in transition, a pivotal chapter not just in the life of her bold and spirited grandmother, but also in the life of the American west. Dorothy Woodruff and her friend Rosamond are like young women who walked out of a Henry James novel and headed west instead of east. Imagine Isabel Archer wrangling the ragged, half-wild children of homesteaders, whirling through dances with hopeful cowboys, and strapping on snowshoes in the middle of the night to urge a fallen horse onto an invisible trail in high snowdrifts, and you’ll have some idea of the intense charm and adventure of this remarkable book.”
— Maile Meloy, author of Both Ways Is the Only Way I Want It
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“A superb, stirring book. Through the eyes of two spirited and resourceful women from the civilized East, Wickenden makes the story of the American West engaging and personal. A delight to read.”
— Susan Orlean, author of The Orchid Thief -
“The adventures of two well-bred Yankee ladies in the still wild West makes a remarkable, funny story. But evoked through Dorothy Wickenden's skillful use of letters, diaries, and memoirs, Nothing Daunted is also a slow parade through young America. Cowboys carefully-mannered before the ladies; the bare-legged, ragged children in their brand-new school; winter sleigh rides under the new moon—all these moments have been preserved, their colors fresh for modern wonderment: A haunting evocation of a vanished world.”
— Caroline Alexander, author of The Bounty and The War that Killed Achilles -
“Wickenden has painstakingly recreated the story of how that earlier Dorothy and her friend Rosamond Underwood embarked on a brief but life-changing adventure, teaching the children of struggling homesteaders…Wickenden lets their tale of personal transformation open out to reveal the larger changes in the rough-and-tumble society of the West…Fascinating…scenes emerge with a lovely clarity.”
— New York Times Book Review -
“Wickenden uses personal history to illuminate the larger story of manifest destiny.”
— New Yorker -
“Dorothy Wickenden was lucky to have such intriguing forebears...but the satisfying depth and vivacity of Nothing Daunted, the intimate, report-from the ground American saga the author has created with that correspondence as a foundation, have nothing to do with good fortune. Wickenden’s talents for research, observation, description, and narrative flow turn this unfaded snapshot of these early-20th-century women in the West into something even more resonant— a brightly painted mural of America under construction a century ago, personified by two ladies of true grit who were nothing daunted and everything enthusiastic about where the new century would take them.”
— Entertainment Weekly -
“An enchanting family memoir…A brilliant gem of Americana.”
— Washington Post Book World -
“Wickenden is a very good storyteller, and bracingly unsentimental. The sweep of the land and the stoicism of the people move her to some beautiful writing.”
— Newsweek -
“A superb biography…Wickenden summons up the last moments of frontier life, where books were a luxury and, when blizzards hit, homesteader’s children would ski miles to school on curved barrel staves…Nothing Daunted also reminds us that different strains of courage can be found, not just on the battlefield, but on the home front, too.”
— Fresh Air -
“Dorothy Woodruff and Rosamond Underwood come alive in Nothing Daunted, Dorothy Wickenden’s fascinating slice of social history…Their story is blessed with a cast of supporting characters that novelists would envy.”
— USA Today -
“Dorothy Wickenden has crafted an exquisite book.”
— Boston Globe -
“If you were impressed with Laura Hillenbrand’s efforts to breathe life into Seabiscuit—or wax romantic about Willa Cather’s classic My Antonia—this is a book for you.”
— Grand Rapids Press
Awards
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A New York Times bestseller
Nothing Daunted Listener Reviews
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" I always enjoy stories of unconventional women. However, this is not exactly a pioneer story. These women arrived after electricity and automobiles. Not that they didn't go through some hardships, it just wasn't what I was expecting. "
— Petex4, 7/23/2011 -
" A little circuitous in the story telling, but interesting nevertheless. "
— Karen, 7/23/2011 -
" This was a very interesting account of two school teachers in Colorado in the early 1900's. Ms. Wickendom clearly did her research on the subject matter. You get the feling that this telling of her grandmother's adventures was a real labor of love. "
— Mrs., 7/22/2011 -
" Ros is my great grandmother and the author writes for the New Yorker so I had high hopes. It was really cool in that it was stories I had grown up hearing- especially the kidnapping and the snowy rides to school. But I was disappointed with the writing. Its a good story though. "
— Molly, 7/12/2011
About Dorothy Wickenden
Dorothy Wickenden has been the executive editor of the New Yorker since January 1996. A Nieman Fellow at Harvard, she was the former national affairs editor at Newsweek and a longtime executive editor at the New Republic. Entering the fiction world, she is the author of Nothing Daunted: The Unexpected Education of Two Society Girls in the West.