The Woman Without a Voice: Pioneering in Dugout, Sod House and Homestead

"Two people, husband and wife, sat side by side on the wagon bench. Though they looked down the same rough road and experienced the same dazzling or dismal scenery, the diaries suggest that they lived in different worlds."

Louise Farmer Smith sets us squarely by the side of the woman on the wagon bench and vividly recreates the turmoil, excitement, and trepidation pioneer women experienced as they moved into the unknown.\

The Woman Without a Voice tells the story of a pioneering family―her own, much like that of Laura Ingalls Wilder's. However this story is not seen through the perspective of a child, but of a woman, mother, and wife. Using diaries and family stories, Smith focuses on the pioneer women in her own family. Silence and submission were the lot of married women who had no property and no say in where or how their families would live.