Howdy–
Since you are a fan of Stegner’s Angle of Repose, a little story for you.
One day my grandmother asked me if I had ever heard the story of what happened to her mother. I knew that she had been raised by a wonderful and beloved stepmother from when she was quite young, but didn’t know much more. So she told me.
Her parents (my great grandparents) had a cattle ranch in South Dakota. My great grandmother ran away with one of the ranch hands, abandoning her three children. The oldest was about 4. They left the ranch in a wagon, faked wrecking the wagon off the road, sent the horse home alone, and ran off together.
My great grand father apparently tracked her down but she refused to return. We gather than she and her partner ended up in the West somewhere, but never learned the end of her story. My grand father did secure a divorce. It was a pretty scandalous thing and apparently was reported on in papers, etc.
Not so long after the divorce, my great grandfather went to San Francisco (without the children). When he returned he had a young wife with him. A woman who agreed to leave California and move to a cattle ranch in the Dakotas, marry a man much older than she was, and take on three little children. My grandmother told me that when she arrived and met them, her brother, ther oldest, just crawled up into her lap and she completely took him in her arms and held him. The children knew her as Mother for the rest of her life.
Needless to say, my grandmother grew up somewhat stigmatized --the daughter of a divorced man and a runaway mother. In fact her future in-laws – upper middle class people – looked down on her when she and my grandfather were courting because of the family story. Didn’t deter him though, and they had one of those 70+ year marriages.
When I read Angle of Repose, I didn’t know anything about the plot, but I tell ya, I about fell off my chair when I read it. I have always wondered if Stegner perhaps saw some of the stories about my great grandmother.
That’s not why I loved the book though. It is just a fine and elegant novel. Stegner was so very gifted.
Zonder
