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Diaries And Reminiscences Of Women On The Oregon Trail: A Study In Consciousness, Amy Kesselman

Dissertations and Theses

This study is an attempt to discover how women participating in the mid-nineteenth century migration to Oregon viewed the westward journey and themselves in relationship to it. It is not a survey of the responses of all women in the westward movement, but, rather, an exploration of the perspective of those women who left a written record of their perceptions or recollections. The thesis focuses on the diaries and reminiscences of women travelling, primarily but not exclusively, in the years 1851-1853.

The introductory material consists of a review of the existing historical literature on women and the West, and a …