Legends of the Old West - LEGENDS LITE | Women of Deadwood

Episode Date: June 16, 2019

An interview with Carolyn Weber, Executive Director of Deadwood History Inc., about three prominent women of Deadwood: Martha Bullock, Aunt Lou Marchbanks and Dr. Flora Hayward Stanford. On location from the Homestake Adams Research and Cultural Center in Deadwood, South Dakota. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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a safe digital space to play in. Download Fortnite on consoles, PC, cloud services, or Android and play Lego Fortnite for free. Rated ESRB E10+. Hello, Legends listeners. This is Mandy Wimmer. And as you may have seen on our social media video, I'm here with something new we're going to try on the show. Between seasons, we're going to try to release a couple smaller episodes about various topics related to the Old West to help fill the void. We're calling these episodes Legends Light and the first two follow up on our Deadwood series. episode you're about to hear is all about the women of Deadwood. And I talked to Carolyn Weber, executive director of Deadwood History, Inc., about Dr. Flora Hayward Stanford, the first female doctor of Deadwood, Lucretia Marchbanks, also known as Aunt Lou for the HBO Deadwood fans, and Martha Bullock, who was a genuine influencer of her time and wife to the famous sheriff, Seth Bullock. But before we get to that interview,

here's a quick message from our friends in Deadwood. Explore the Adams Museum, the Days of 76 Museum, the Adams House, and Mount Moriah Cemetery to fully understand Deadwood's raucous past. At the Adams Museum, get up close and personal with the legends and outlaws who brought Deadwood international notoriety and see Deadwood's own one-of-a-kind Wild Bill Hickok collection. Visitors to the Days of 76 Museum become acquainted with an astonishing collection of wagons and carriages, including the infamous Deadwood Stage, along with an extensive collection of historic firearms and Indian artifacts. The Adams House, built in 1892, is an elegant Victorian-era home with original contents that chronicles Deadwood's transition from a lawless mining camp to a prosperous and technologically rich metropolitan city.

And finally, Deadwood's boot hill, Mount Moriah Cemetery, provides a tranquil location to pay homage and respect to such notables as Wildsville Hickok, Calamity Jane, and Seth Bullock. Let your journey through the Wild West begin in historic Deadwood, South Dakota. As a podcast network, our first priority has always been audio and the stories we're able to share with you. But we also sell merch, and organizing that was made both possible and easy with Shopify. Shopify is the global commerce platform that helps you sell and grow at every stage of your business. From the launch your online shop stage, all the way to the did we just hit a million orders stage. Whether you're selling scented soap or offering outdoor outfits,

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in-store and online. Conditions may Loblaws, in-store and online. Conditions may apply. See in-store for details. And now, here's my conversation with Carolyn Weber. Hello, Legends listeners, and welcome to our first episode of Legends Light. We are very excited to be here today to talk Deadwood, and most importantly importantly the inspirational trailblazing women of Deadwood. We are sitting at the Homestake Adams Research Cultural Center and I am talking today with Executive Director of Deadwood History Inc. Carolyn Webber. Thank You Carolyn for being on the show. Well thank you for having me. Well we're just gonna jump right in because there are three

women that I really want to get to today and again Legends Light is all about series and stories where we don't have enough information necessarily for a full five to six episodes, but they're important. They're important stories. And these women deserve their moments in the spotlight, we think. So we're going to start off with Dr. Flora Hayward Stanford. We're going to move to Aunt Lou, who if you watch the series, you definitely know who that is. And then certainly Martha Bullock. So we'll just start right off with Dr. Flora Hayward Stanford. That's a mouthful. I keep getting that right. So just to set this up. So

Dr. Flora Hayward was the first female doctor in Deadwood. So this was a time period when women particularly were seen as unfit to be in the medical practice. And beyond that, she was married to a very prominent, very successful bricklayer in Pennsylvania. So she also didn't need to work. Yet she chose this path anyway. So just to start that off. So first of all, the unfit piece is a little unsettling. But we hear straight from the president of the American Medical Association at the time that that's they felt women were unfit

to practice medicine so why was that so let's just start there oh well there are so many unfounded reasons why this mindset was going on at the time first of all and most important probably it was the Victorian era and as we know at that time women were thought of as fragile and the weaker of the sex, and they were very frail human beings. And so they were supposed to stay at home. Their sphere was in the private sphere. They were to raise their children to be good citizens, and then they were supposed to be obedient to their husbands at the time. Interesting. Interesting, indeed.

to their husbands at the time. Interesting. Interesting indeed. And so, and it was also thought that they didn't have a good business sense because they were in the public or the private sector for so long, they didn't have any idea what happened in the public sector and my gosh, what would happen if a patient came in and all that blood and what if one died

and how would they handle it? And they just were, like I said earlier, thought of as the weaker of the sex. So I guess then at that time period, how did she even get accepted to medical school? handle it. And they just were, like I said earlier, thought of as the weaker of the sex. So I guess then at that time period, how did she even get accepted to medical school? Well, I don't exactly know how, but I have some theories from the research that I've done. First of all, she was an older woman. She was 37 years old. She was married and she had two children. So she had a really stable life to begin with. And then her husband was, had enough money through his brick making business that he had, so they had a financial ability. They could pay for

her college and she had taught school before, before she married her husband. And so she had, she was literate, she was well-read, she was educated, and so it would not be a problem to accept her into college. And then the interesting thing is where she applied to was the Boston University School of Medicine, which actually was founded in 1848 as the Boston Female Medical College, then became the New England Female Medical College, and then finally ended up as the Boston University Medical College. So that was a great place to apply because they were welcoming women and wanted to get them into the medical field. And was that, so why was that then? The midwife, I think you said that that was mainly what women

were going to medical school for. Right. But that was not Dr. Hayward's idea. No, no. Okay. And I think she probably, another thing that may have gotten her into this medical school as well was that I think she may have done some midwifing because she was just that kind of a woman and she cared a lot about women's health and children. And so I think she was probably called upon to do that. So given the fact that she was a school teacher and she also had a very successful husband, then why do you think she ultimately chose a path that was so uncertain later in life and everything you know not not a midwife going to medical school she had other ideas and so and other goals it sounds like so what made her choose this path and leave a life of certainty for this well I just think she she was smart for

one thing she was very well educated and she had strong beliefs that women could do things that weren't expected of them or weren't accepted by the things that they might want to do. So she wanted to go out there and prove people wrong. She wanted to make some kind of a social change and make a social statement. And, you know, why not start with yourself? She would be a perfect example of how she changed things by going to medical school, becoming a doctor, and going out there and doing things. She was just driven. She wanted to put her brains and her beliefs in motion, and she wanted to bring about a change. She was an advocate,

a strong advocate for the health and well-being of women and children. Another thing I think that's important is that, although I can't prove it, but I think our conversation will, you know, come out in the end to maybe prove it, that her husband gave her a pretty loose rein, and she was able to do a lot of things that a lot of women were not able to do. So he was supportive of her going to medical school

in this practice, then you think, oh, interesting, interesting, well, that's good. I mean, in that time period, it didn't seem like men were overly supportive. So that's great that she had that. Yeah, she was an exception to the rule, I think. So what took her to Deadwood? And then if I'm understanding it correctly, her husband did not come to Deadwood with her. No, her husband did not come to Deadwood with her. In 1888, her daughter, to Deadwood with her. In 1888 her daughter Emma was diagnosed with consumption which is today pulmonary tuberculosis and so she had that and Flora thought that it would be a change in climate would be the fix for getting

her healthy again so she researched certain things and certain places to live and talk to people and for whatever, she decided upon Deadwood, South Dakota. So here she was. She thought, well, they have a great climate there. They have fresh mountain air, the altitude. And so she thought, I'm going to take my daughter to Deadwood and see if we can't get her well. And she came here, just her and her daughter. She had a son also who lived with her husband back in Pennsylvania.

So they stayed there, and Dr. Flora Hayward came here with her daughter, and her daughter's name was? Emma. Emma, okay. And so when she got here, she was obviously no one when she got here. She had her medical degree, but she came into Deadwood with big goals. So we know that she became the first female doctor of Deadwood. So how did she really make a name for herself at that time period you know

we know you know there were a lot of people that came to dead with deadwood similar you know with the Chinese culture and then making a name for themselves as well and so how did she kind of become a trailblazer well like you say she was the first female doctor there were several doctors in Deadwood at the time but she was the only one that was a female doctor. And interesting enough, she was practicing homeopathic medicines, which of course, you know, is the body can heal itself and they shy away from chemicals and drugs and things like that. And they use natural ingredients such as plants and minerals to try and help the body overcome their illness. So that was interesting.

And that's very common today, but it wasn't then. Not then, but it is now. Yeah, it is. And then she opened up a dispensary in her home and her office that was, all the medicines there were free for women that could not afford it. And for those that could, she charged what she paid for it, which was 10 to 25 cents. Si vous faites vos achats tout en travaillant, en mangeant ou même en écoutant ce balado, alors vous connaissez et aimez l'excitation du magasinage. Mais avez-vous ce frisson d'obtenir le meilleur deal?

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Ou allez sur rakuten.ca pour en avoir plus pour votre argent. C'est R-A-K-U-T-E-N. So, you know, we started this off by saying that men thought that women really couldn't handle the sight of blood and, you know, anything really traumatic happening. And even though Dr. Hayward was, you know, in this kind of natural realm and really helpful to women, she had to deal with a number of sites of blood. Yeah, she did. She definitely did. Yeah, and I think there's...so explain that a little bit more, some of the things she had to deal with a number of sites of blood. Yeah, she did. She definitely did. Yeah, and I think there's, so explain that a little bit more, some of the things she

had to deal with. Yeah, I'll give you a really interesting example of what she had to deal with. There was one day when a gentleman appeared at her door, at her office, and so she went out to see who it was, and it was a man who was slumped over, and when she got closer examination of him, he had three bullets in him. So she had to quickly get him into her office, go to work on him with extracting these bullets and dressing the wounds. She never asked who he was.

I don't think she wanted to know maybe who he was. So privacy policies were alive then. Yes, they were. Yep, HIPAA existed. So she took him in. She got him fixed up. She got him dressed. And then she let him, after two hours of working on him, then he went out through the back door so that he wouldn't be seen by anybody.

And after he had left, she thought, okay, I've got to clean my office up. So she got busy with that because the next patient was coming in apparently. Well, it wasn't the next patient. It was the county sheriff who knocked on her door and came in and asked her all sorts of questions about her previous client that she had just a patient that he had just she had just seen and what happened. And she said, Well, I'll tell you what, I don't know who he was. I dressed his wounds and he left ten minutes ago.

And that's all she told him. Oh, my gosh. Sheriff left with hardly any more information than when he started, when he got there. So I'm sure he was kind of disappointed. But wouldn't it be interesting to know who that man was and what became of him after Flora took care of him? Because we probably know stories about him. We just don't know from the doctor because she was good enough not to speak of his name. So how interesting. She worked two hours on this man, three bullets. And at least he walked out alive. doctor because she was good enough not to speak of his name. Right. So how interesting.

She worked two hours on this man. On that man, yeah. Three bullets. Yes. And at least he walked out alive. Yeah, he did. We don't know what happened to him after that. No, we sure don't. So, wow, that is super interesting.

Yeah. And then so beyond that, she was just active in the community. She was. She was very active in the community. She was, here's an interesting thing. She was a strong believer in women's suffrage. So she had at the time in 1897, I think or something, she had purchased a piece of property

over in Wyoming, not too far. So she was practicing both in Wyoming and South Dakota at that time, but because she was a resident of Wyoming, excuse me, she had a residency there, she was able to vote in the 1900 presidential election. And so she voted for William McKinley, who, of course, went on to become the president. So that was kind of cool.

She got to vote, and she was a woman's suffrage. And Wyoming offered women the right to vote in 1870. South Dakota didn't do it until 1918. Oh, wow. And, of course, women didn't become enfranchised in America until 1920. Right. So Wyoming was way ahead of the enfranchised in America until 1920. Right. So, Wyoming was way ahead of the time. Way ahead of the time.

Yes. I didn't realize it was that far ahead of the time. Yeah, I know. Oh my gosh, that's very interesting. Yeah. So, then she, so ultimately, let's go back to Emma, because that's the reason that she came to Deadwood in the first place. So, Emma did not do well in South Dakota.

So, ultimately, if I'm understanding this correctly, they had to move to California. Somewhere in California, she kind of just kept moving west to see if she could help cure her daughter. Exactly. And then talk a little bit about that. Her daughter passed, so I'll give away the ending there. She passed in California. Yet Dr. Hayward came back to Deadwood. So California is lovely.

Why did she come back to Deadwood? Yeah, I think you know, California is lovely. Why did she come back to Deadwood? Yeah, she, I think she came back because she still had a home here. She still had her practice here. And she was just, like I said earlier in describing her, she was driven to do social change. She wanted to help those people that were marginalized and living on the fringes, living on the edge, in the shadows kind of. So she really thought that she could bring about change. And again, Deadwood was a good place to go. She was an active member of the community before she left for California. And so she had a lot of friends here and she had a lot of involvement in the community. So I think that's probably some of

the reasons why she came back. I'm going to guess she was a good friend of Martha Bullock from what we're hearing right now. I think we can safely assume. I think they traveled in the same circles. It sounds like it. So we'll get to Martha in a little bit, but I want to transition now to Aunt Lou. So Lucretia Marchbanks. And if you've seen the HBO series, you certainly know who Aunt Lou is. And this woman has probably one of the more inspirational stories of anyone that I've ever heard. I mean, she is one of those people that if you ever think that thing the deck is stacked against you just listen to the story of Aunt Lou and you know that you can make it right she was unbelievable so this

woman was a slave and then she became a chef and then she became the most respected chef in the Black Hills then she became the most respected chef in the Black Hills. Then she became the most popular woman in Deadwood, which will explain how she got there. And then a hotel owner. So from slave and then all of a sudden you own a hotel. Not all of a sudden, it took her some time. But so just tell me a little bit about this life journey of hers and how we got from slave to hotel owner to start us off. It's interesting, that's for sure. As you mentioned, she was born a slave in Tennessee, and she was trained in housekeeping and cooking skills, and which, although she wasn't literate,

which you always think that's the best way to get ahead in the world, and believe me, it is, but at this time, it was not possible for her, but she acquired these great domestic skills that helped her throughout her entire life, and that's what really propelled her to move forward with things. And when she was a teenage girl, her owner gifted her to his daughter, and so now Lucretia belonged to his daughter.

So those two women in 1849 went to the gold rush in California. So they went to California. They didn't stay there long. I don't know why, whether it wasn't, they weren't successful in whatever endeavor they tried to do there, but then they went back to Tennessee. Then in 1858 to 59, that was when the gold rush

was happening in Colorado. so they went out there. So they went to another gold rush. And then it was in Colorado when the 13th Amendment and the Emancipation Proclamation came into effect, and so that led to Lucretia's being a free woman. So she was free at that time while she was living in Colorado. And then she had heard of Custer's 1874 expedition to the Black Hills. George Custer. Yes.

The famous. The famous general. Yes, that one. And so then decided that she was really intrigued by what he had found. And she waited a little while to see, is this really a gold rush? Is something really going to happen? You know, because we get these false starts sometimes. Well it it did and so in 1876 she said I'm going to Deadwood so she hopped on the Cheyenne to Deadwood stagecoach and she ended up

here she got a job immediately at the Grand Central Hotel and then later at the Golden Gate Hotel because of her excellent culinary skills well this is this is amazing so we know how she got to be a chef. And then I personally love strong women. I think most of our listeners probably do. And I was the most intrigued by the story about her bravery. So not only is she known for her ability to cook amazing food, which was known all over that people were coming to Deadwood for her cooking, but her bravery. So there's a specific story about that. So you know the details better than I do, so I'll let you share that.

Well, it's a good story, too. Well, she was working at one of the hotels, and she was in the restaurant there at the hotel as their cook, their chef. And this gentleman came in one day. He was loud. He was boisterous. He was just, just so much excitement going on with him. He was walking around the restaurant proudly announcing that he had just killed an Indian and that he

wasn't afraid to kill again. And he was just ranting and raving all over the restaurant. And of course, the patrons there were nervous and they were scared and they were anticipating, oh my gosh, what's going to come next from this guy? Well, Aunt Lou, she wasn't nervous. She was fed up. She says, I've had enough of this guy. So she gets in the kitchen, grabs a sharp knife, goes out there and the gentleman looks up and here is Aunt Lou with this sharp knife and this attitude. He took one look at both of them and he quickly turned and went out the door right then and there. Took his business elsewhere. I love it. She was ready to attack. She was and talk about brave. That was so brave and I'm sure there had to have

been gentlemen in the restaurant as well. They were doing nothing. But nobody confronted him but she sure did. She should have got a standing ovation after that. Maybe she did. Maybe she did. That's amazing. So how much of this do you think corresponds to the Aunt Lou in the HBO series? Do you think that was she portrayed this way in the series? Or what do you think were the similarities, the differences? As far as similarities, I don't see too many. I know she was a caregiver to a lot of people.

And she kind of did take care of George Hurst in the series. But she definitely was not his cook. She definitely did not come out here with him. And I don't think the two probably even met. Because George Hurst was very seldom in Deadwood. And they may have met one time when he ate at her restaurant or something but that's about the extent of their relationship and then another real difference between the

myth and the reality is that Lucretia had no children right in the movie remember Odell was supposed to be her son and died. And so that's another myth that is not a reality. So there are some drastic differences. But she was a chef and a really, really good one. She was very good. They nailed that. They did. They got that one right.

Yeah. So we know that everyone in the Old West has a nickname. So the last thing I want to cover with Aunt Lou is that, to your point, she had no children and she had no family in Deadwood. She had a large family. She had a lot of siblings, but none of them came with her to Deadwood, if I'm correct on that. But she was known as Aunt Lou to everybody. So how do you think she got that?

We think Lou, short for Lucretia, but where do you think the aunt came from for everyone in Deadwood? Well, again, it's just kind of speculation. But think about her position in life at the time. She was a black woman. from for everyone in Deadwood? Well again it's just kind of speculation but think about her position in life at the time. She was a black woman, she was in her 40s, she was single, she had never had children, so it wouldn't be that people would call her mom or mother but I could see where they might want to call her aunt because she was very caring. She took a care of a lot of the young single miners that were in town and the people that were down and caring. She took a care of a lot of the young single minors that

were in town and the people that were down and out. She took care of them for a while. And so really it was a term of endearment, I think. And one interesting thing, another example I have is that a woman named Sarah Campbell, she was the first black woman who came into Deadwood and she became known as Aunt Sally. Oh interesting. Or Aunt Sally, yes. So there's that. Both those women with the same kind of background were both called an aunt and it would be like if you were to walk into your girlfriend's house who had three kids and they'd go, oh, Aunt Mandy's here. Right, no, and that makes sense. And so then was

Aunt Sally George Custer's chef? Yes. Okay. So I thought I had read that. So that is the same person you're talking about. Okay. That's very, very cool. So yeah, I mean, Aunt Lou, an amazing, amazing woman. Dr. Flora Hayward, amazing. So I want to end with another person that almost anyone who's heard the name Deadwood has heard the name Bullock. So Seth Bullock, very, very famous sheriff of Deadwood. He had a wife named Martha, but she was amazing in her own right, completely outside of him. She was very much known for being a pillar of Deadwood,

bringing, I guess, order to chaos. I mean, a little bit like her husband, but on a different level. So tell me a little bit about how she was able to do that. Well, I think she brought a sense of culture and stability to Deadwood and she did that through her advocacy of literature, music, education, and equality. I mean before she became Mrs. Seth Bullock, she was a schoolteacher back in Wisconsin so she

had an education, she was an educator, and she strongly believed in even everybody had the right to just a basic education so she was an educator, and she strongly believed in even everybody had the right to just a basic education. So she was always promoting that. And she was a member of the Roundtable Club, which was formed in Deadwood in 1887. And they promoted literacy and literature. And they got enough funds from the Carnegie Foundation to build Deadwoods Library, which still stands and operates today. And also she had a beautiful voice. I understand she had a beautiful voice and she sang in a lot of

choirs in the area and she encouraged others to join her in doing that so that they could experience the beauty of music and how how it was great for your emotional well-being you know and everybody's happy when they're listening to music yeah so so yeah that was interesting and she she was a doer she was an organizer she was a promoter and she ran in pretty good circles as we mentioned once before right so she had those influential people helping her. It was like these women that she ran with watched out for her and she watched out for them. They kind of had each other's back at the time, so to speak. So then the distinction between

the real Martha Bullock and the HBO series Martha Bullock. So talk to me a little bit about the differences there. Well, there are some differences. For instance, in the show, it says that she was married to Seth's brother and had a child with him. Well, that never happened. She was not married, nor did she have his child. In fact, she was a teenage sweetheart of Seth's. They were sweethearts back in in Michigan before he left for Montana. Oh interesting so they they dated then in high school then

she went on to be a schoolteacher right and then they got married along the way then when she was a schoolteacher and then they both moved to Deadwood together. Well no they didn't. They moved to Montana. Oh okay. And she stayed there for a while. Seth came to Deadwood and while he was in Deadwood, she went back to Michigan to be with her family until he got settled. Oh, interesting. And then he brought her out here. Got it. Got it. Okay. Well, unbelievable women, these three. I mean, we just felt like these stories needed to be told of these women. So thank you so much, Carolyn, for joining us for our first episode of Legends Light kicking us off right so we appreciate your time very very much and thank you for hosting

us here in Deadwood it's been a lovely time well thanks for coming to Deadwood we're glad you made it here absolutely and we'll be back soon I hope so