American’s first woman doctor was admitted to New York’s Geneva College in 1847 as a joke, and was expected to flunk out within months.  Nevertheless, Blackwell prevailed and triumphed over taunts and bias while at medical school to earn her degree two years later.  While in her last year of medical training, she was cleaning the infected eye of an infant when she accidentally splattered a drop of water into her own eye.  Six months later she had the eye taken out and had it replaced with a glass eye.  Afterward, American hospitals refused to hire her.  She then borrowed a few thousand dollars to open a clinic in New York City, which she called the New York Infirmary for Indigent Women and Children.  She charged patients only four dollars a day at the going rate.  During the Civil War she set up an organization to train nurses, Women’s Central Association of Relief, which later became the United States Sanitary Commission.  In 1910 at age eighty-nine she died after a fall from which she never fully recovered.

For more information about the brave women who dared practice medicine read The Doctor Wore Petticoats: Women Physicians of the Old West.  Visit www.chrisenss.com.

The Doctor Wore Petticoats:  Women Physicians of the Old West has made the New York Times Bestseller List.

Visit www.chrisenss.com for more information about the highly trained doctors who headed west and solidified a place for women in the medical field.

The West was full of promise for women.  To succeed they had to fight off Indian raids and endure starvation, privation and the aching sense of being alone in an endless, empty land.  But as partners to their menfolk they performed labor worth more than all of the West’s gold by pressing for schools and churches, law and order.  Here are a few interesting facts about those brave women of the Old West.

In 1890 there were fewer than 600 women physicians in the United States.

In 1842, Nancy Kelsey became the first white woman to cross over the Sierras and she did so barefoot and carrying a one-year-old baby on her hip.

Madam Jessie Hayman’s palatial bordello was one of the most popular businesses in San Francisco in 1906.

Many westward pioneer women believed carrying an onion in your pocket prevented smallpox?

The first woman hanged in the state of California was Juanita.  She was sentenced to the gallows for murder on July 5, 1851.

Famous gambler Madame Moustache aka Eleanora Dumont got her start in the business in 1850 in San Francisco.

Award winning frontier actress Maude Adams began her stage career on August 1, 1873 at the tender age of nine months.

Mark Twain’s favorite entertainer was Adah Menken aka The Frenzy of Frisco. He saw her perform numerous times in 1864 in Virginia City and reviewed her work for the Humboldt Register.

From 1868 to 1870, former slave Cathy Williams disguised herself as a man in order to join the Buffalo Soldiers and fight against warring Indians in the Southwest.

Visit www.chrisenss.com to learn more about the women who helped settle the untamed frontier.

Western legends, such as Wild Bill Hickok, found successful businesswomen attractive.  According to the cowboy slang of the day, “Hosses an’ smart wimmen will shore make a man go whistlin’, provided he’s still young ‘nough to pucker.”

For more quips and other stories about love lessons learned by wild women of the west plan to read Love Lessons from the Old West: Wisdom from Wild Women coming soon. Order your copy now through Amazon.com.

Attend the national launch of the book on Saturday, February 8, 2014 at the Nevada County Narrow Gauge Railroad in Nevada City.

Enter to win a Love Lessons Learned gift package when you submit your own love lesson.

The gift package includes a copy of Love Lessons from the Old West: Wisdom from Wild Women, Love Lessons coffee mugs, cocoa, soap, candles, day planners, pen, and a journal to keep track of every love lesson that comes your way. To enter the Love Lessons gift package giveaway visit send a brief note about the love lesson you’ve learned. The best love lesson wins the gift package. A winner will be announced on February 14, 2014.  Good luck!

Forget love, I’d rather fall in chocolate.

For more quips and other stories about love lessons learned by wild women of the west plan to read Love Lessons from the Old West: Wisdom from Wild Women coming soon. Order your copy now through Amazon.com.

Attend the national launch of the book on Saturday, February 8, 2014 at the Nevada County Narrow Gauge Railroad in Nevada City.

Enter to win a Love Lessons Learned gift package when you submit your own love lesson.

The gift package includes a copy of Love Lessons from the Old West: Wisdom from Wild Women, Love Lessons coffee mugs, cocoa, soap, candles, day planners, pen, and a journal to keep track of every love lesson that comes your way. To enter the Love Lessons gift package giveaway visit send a brief note about the love lesson you’ve learned. The best love lesson wins the gift package. A winner will be announced on February 14, 2014. Good luck!

Submit your Love Lesson here!

National Book Launch on February 8 @

the Nevada County Narrow Gauge Railroad Museum in Nevada City, CA. 

Noon – 3 p.m

FOR MORE INFORMATION :

Sharon Kunz, Senior Publicist

TwoDot/Globe Pequot Press

203.458.4509, sharon.kunz@globepequot.com MUSEUM   NOON – 3 P.M.

Advance praise:

“From Etta Place and her relationship with Butch and Sundance in Bolivia, to Deadwood City with Calamity Jane and Wild Bill Hickok, to Dodge City with Zoe Stratton and beyond…these are stories you won’t forget.”

~ Howard Kazanjian, film producer and author, former VP of LucasFilm, Ltd.

“A marvelous collection…Laugh, smile, and cry with Agnes, Lotta, Maria, and other hopeless romantics living on the frontier.”~ Sherry Monahan, Contributing Editor, True West magazine, VP, Western Writers of America

Looking for some new and different advice to give your audience as Valentine’s Day approaches? How about some old advice?

LOVE LESSONS FROM THE OLD WEST:

Wisdom From Wild Women, By Chris Enss

With a foreword by New York Times-best-selling author Brenda Novak

TwoDot, an imprint of Globe Pequot Press, is proud to announce the January 7, 2014, release of LOVE LESSONS FROM THE OLD WEST: Wisdom from Wild Women(978-0-7627-7400-2; $16.95 paperback; 10 b&w photos).

From Calamity Jane’s relentless pursuit of Wild Bill Hickok to Emma Walters, who gave it all up for the dashing Bat Masterson and lived to regret it, many Love Lessons from the Old West still resonate today — and all are entertaining!

Readers will meet Agnes Lake Hickok, the intrepid wife of Wild Bill Hickok and learn about the last love letter he sent before being dealt the dead man’s hand. Learn the story behind the charming performer Lotta Crabtree’s heartaches. And discover the tale of the dashing Kit Carson and his beautiful bride.

This latest collection from popular author Chris Enss (Hearts West, Object Matrimony, and many others) assembles the lessons learned by the women who shaped the West — and from whom we can still learn a thing or two today.

Author Chris Enss is an author, scriptwriter and comedienne who has written for television and film, and performed on cruise ships and on stage. She has worked with award-winning musicians, writers, directors, producers, and as a screenwriter for Tricor Entertainment, but her passion is for telling the stories of the men and women who shaped the history and mythology of the American West. Some of the most famous names in history, not to mention film and popular culture, populate her more than 20 published books.