'There isn't even a thing that one can hide behind': Domestic lives of immigrant, ethnic women to the Upper Great Plains, 1880--1910

Official record-keepers and historians have often overlooked the domestic contributions of rural ethnic, immigrant women to their families and to society at large, even though women's domestic activities he at the center of family life, and family life is the bedrock of American Western History.;Using three memoirs written by daughters of ethnic women who immigrated to North Dakota around the turn of the century and a fourth written by the immigrant herself, this dissertation examines the women's domestic tasks in order to better understand the frustrations and problems facing those women and, in turn, better appreciate the overarching history of the Upper Great Plains.;The women who wrote used the memoirs to validate women's experiences and reinforce their worth as home managers in an era that credited wives with no ownership and too little respect as managers. Women's domestic contributions enabled families to rise above the level of meager subsistence and develop as participating members of growing frontier society. That the authors remembered domestic details from forty or more years earlier clearly indicates the significance of these events to the families and the individuals.;In addition to feeding and clothing their families with products made on the farmstead and selling the surplus in order to purchase materials they couldn't produce, immigrant women were the ethnic cultural keepers charged with the responsibility of instilling in their children the values and domestic traditions of their Old Country. Often ethnic traditions revolve around food and clothing---both within the parameters of domestic responsibility. Cultural traditions also influenced health care and child care. All of these, however, were affected by immigrants' poverty. In the context of their domestic chores, women also transmitted religious traditions and educational expectations to their children which are evident in the works authored by the daughters.