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CNN Live Saturday

Silenced Story Of Remarkable Women Retold In New Book

Aired November 30, 2003 - 18:41   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN ANCHOR: A remarkable saga of 2 adventurers who shattered Victorian notions of womanhood is coming to light after being silenced for more than 100 years. "Bold Spirit," by Linda Laurence-Hunt is making best-seller lists in the Pacific Northwest. The book chronicles the true story of a mother and daughter who did something that would be extraordinary, even today, and stunning in the late 19th Century of America. They walked unescorted across 3,500 miles of the continent to win a bet and save the family homestead.
Author Linda Lawrence-Hunt joins us from Seattle. It is wonderful to have you with us. How did you find this story? Or where did you hear of it first?

LINDA LAWRENCE-HUNT, AUTHOR: Martin, they're great-grandson wrote a story called "Grandma Walks From Coast-to-Coast." It was 6 pages entered into a historday (ph) contest for Washington State. And my husband was a judge for that. We're both professors. And said, you've got to read it, he knew I'd love a good story like this.

The story had been silenced for 100 years before that. And he just found out, through his family, the last few years.

SAVIDGE: All right. Tell who these women were and why they did this tremendous walk.

LAWRENCE-HUNT: Well, it was a Norwegian immigrant mother and her daughter, Claire who was 18 and Helga (ph) was desperate. She was a mother of 8 living children, 1 child had just recently died, and she was just really upset because they couldn't pay the mortgage and taxes on the family farm. We'd had a big depression. Very desperate economic times and she had no means. Her husband had had an injury. He was a carpenter. There was no work. And they would be homeless. It was an act of love, wanting to save the family farm.

A woman offered $10,000 if they'd walk unescorted and she trusted that and started to walk across American.

SAVIDGE: And they gave what, left everything behind, left their families behind. The families didn't object?

LAWRENCE-HUNT: Well, I'm sure the family objected. The neighbors in the community could not understand that a woman would do such a thing in this era. And there were tremendous fears, fear of dangerous men, fears of the wild animals, fears of the terrain, fears of bad weather, but she listened to those fears, she faced them and she prepared for dangers. But she chose courage. She felt she could do it. She felt like it was her only solution to keep the family from being homeless.

SAVIDGE: And what we find is that it's not only the journey that's full of hardship, but it is what comes afterwards. I don't want to give too much of it away, but it is a very sad story.

LAWRENCE-HUNT: Parts of it are very sad, yes. They did actually make it across America, but the woman put very strict stipulations, which included that they had to do it within 7 months period of time. That they had to earn their way across the way to prove the endurence of women. So, when she gets across America, she's a few days late and the sponsor refused to give her the money.

And then she has to stay for 6 months and there's tragedy in the home. And that's part of what contributed to the silencing.

SAVIDGE: My, oh my. You mentioned, was this kept secret by the family?

LAWRENCE-HUNT: Yes. It was actually a very silent story. She -- it's one of these kind of taboo stories because the mother had left home. When she came back home to the family tragedy, and it's the death of 2 children from black diptheria.

When this happens, the family bereft, because there was no -- they were quaranteened and no one could give comfort. And she comes home to this tragedy and she feels like she can no longer talk about this story. They don't want to hear her talk about the story. So it's so silenced. Grandchildren lived in the home and never even knew it happened.

But it's not completely sad, because later she does restore and she becomes an active sufferagette. They do lose the farm, but they build a new home eventually, because her husband is a good carpenter and after the economy changed, he was able to restore some of their life.

SAVIDGE: All right. Well, the name of the book is called "Bold Spirit." And we've been talking with the author Linda Lawrence-Hunt. Thank you very much for finding and telling this story for all of us.

LAWRENCE-HUNT: Thank you for having. It belongs to America.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com







Aired November 30, 2003 - 18:41   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN ANCHOR: A remarkable saga of 2 adventurers who shattered Victorian notions of womanhood is coming to light after being silenced for more than 100 years. "Bold Spirit," by Linda Laurence-Hunt is making best-seller lists in the Pacific Northwest. The book chronicles the true story of a mother and daughter who did something that would be extraordinary, even today, and stunning in the late 19th Century of America. They walked unescorted across 3,500 miles of the continent to win a bet and save the family homestead.
Author Linda Lawrence-Hunt joins us from Seattle. It is wonderful to have you with us. How did you find this story? Or where did you hear of it first?

LINDA LAWRENCE-HUNT, AUTHOR: Martin, they're great-grandson wrote a story called "Grandma Walks From Coast-to-Coast." It was 6 pages entered into a historday (ph) contest for Washington State. And my husband was a judge for that. We're both professors. And said, you've got to read it, he knew I'd love a good story like this.

The story had been silenced for 100 years before that. And he just found out, through his family, the last few years.

SAVIDGE: All right. Tell who these women were and why they did this tremendous walk.

LAWRENCE-HUNT: Well, it was a Norwegian immigrant mother and her daughter, Claire who was 18 and Helga (ph) was desperate. She was a mother of 8 living children, 1 child had just recently died, and she was just really upset because they couldn't pay the mortgage and taxes on the family farm. We'd had a big depression. Very desperate economic times and she had no means. Her husband had had an injury. He was a carpenter. There was no work. And they would be homeless. It was an act of love, wanting to save the family farm.

A woman offered $10,000 if they'd walk unescorted and she trusted that and started to walk across American.

SAVIDGE: And they gave what, left everything behind, left their families behind. The families didn't object?

LAWRENCE-HUNT: Well, I'm sure the family objected. The neighbors in the community could not understand that a woman would do such a thing in this era. And there were tremendous fears, fear of dangerous men, fears of the wild animals, fears of the terrain, fears of bad weather, but she listened to those fears, she faced them and she prepared for dangers. But she chose courage. She felt she could do it. She felt like it was her only solution to keep the family from being homeless.

SAVIDGE: And what we find is that it's not only the journey that's full of hardship, but it is what comes afterwards. I don't want to give too much of it away, but it is a very sad story.

LAWRENCE-HUNT: Parts of it are very sad, yes. They did actually make it across America, but the woman put very strict stipulations, which included that they had to do it within 7 months period of time. That they had to earn their way across the way to prove the endurence of women. So, when she gets across America, she's a few days late and the sponsor refused to give her the money.

And then she has to stay for 6 months and there's tragedy in the home. And that's part of what contributed to the silencing.

SAVIDGE: My, oh my. You mentioned, was this kept secret by the family?

LAWRENCE-HUNT: Yes. It was actually a very silent story. She -- it's one of these kind of taboo stories because the mother had left home. When she came back home to the family tragedy, and it's the death of 2 children from black diptheria.

When this happens, the family bereft, because there was no -- they were quaranteened and no one could give comfort. And she comes home to this tragedy and she feels like she can no longer talk about this story. They don't want to hear her talk about the story. So it's so silenced. Grandchildren lived in the home and never even knew it happened.

But it's not completely sad, because later she does restore and she becomes an active sufferagette. They do lose the farm, but they build a new home eventually, because her husband is a good carpenter and after the economy changed, he was able to restore some of their life.

SAVIDGE: All right. Well, the name of the book is called "Bold Spirit." And we've been talking with the author Linda Lawrence-Hunt. Thank you very much for finding and telling this story for all of us.

LAWRENCE-HUNT: Thank you for having. It belongs to America.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com