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Article Excerpt
THE PINK AND WHITE, HELPLESS prettiness; the delicate, fainting, clinging doll is fast becoming a thing of the past," (1) Harriet Williams Russell Strong advised fellow members of the Ebell Club of Los Angeles in 1895. Although she herself was described as dainty and fragile, Harriet was by no means helpless. Widowed at the age of thirty-nine, with four daughters to support and no experience in business and agriculture, she took over the management of the 220-acre Rancho del Fuerte ("Strong Ranch") and built a reputation as the most successful woman rancher in California. At the time of her death, the land produced some $25,000 a year. (2)
During her remarkable career, Harriet Strong played a variety of roles that reflected her commitment to innovation and independence. As a suffragist, she wrote and spoke eloquently on the subject of voting and business opportunities for women and founded four influential organizations for women. As an inventor, she held patents for three household devices and two ingenious designs for irrigation and flood control. As a rancher, she planted specialty crops that earned her a fortune, due especially to her successful marketing schemes.
A pioneer in the struggle for women's rights, Harriet Strong demonstrated in her own life what a woman of vision and courage could accomplish. Active in many civic and cultural organizations, she used her influence to promote her ideas and put them into practice in a meaningful way. Through her campaigns for conservation and flood control, she not only helped to bring water and electricity to southern California, but also improved the safety and well-being of those living in the flood-prone Los Angeles basin.
EARLY YEARS
Harriet Strong was born in 1844 in Buffalo, New York, but spent most of her life in the West. Her family moved to California in 1852 and settled in Plumas County, in the northeastern part of the state, near the town of Quincy. For two years, Harriet studied in Benicia at the Young Ladies' Seminary of Miss Mary Atkins, forerunner of Mills College. In 1861, lured by news of a silver bonanza on the Comstock Lode, her father relocated the family to Carson City, Nevada. There she fell in love with Charles Lyman Strong, superintendent of the fabled Gould & Curry Mining Company. The couple married in 1863 in Virginia City, Nevada. Four daughters were born to them: Harriet Russell (1864), Mary Lyman (1866), Georgina Pierrepont (1868), and Nelle de Luce (1873).
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In 1864, his health mined by overwork, Charles suffered a breakdown, resigned his position, and for several months underwent treatment at Warm Springs in Alameda County. Harriet also had health problems, due to a disorder of the spine, and frequently was bedridden. Not until 1883 was her health completely restored. Charles, meanwhile, was well enough by 1865 to begin working again and accepted a job offer to examine unexplored mines along the Pacific coast, reporting on the most promising ones to several New York investors. After a disappointing two years, he wrote to Harriet from Hardyville, Arizona, "I wish I might never hear of another mine." (3)
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In 1867, Charles returned to California and settled as a farmer on Rancho del Fuerte, the 220-acre property that the Strongs and Harriet's brother, William Henry Russell, had just purchased from Don Pio Pico, the last governor of California under Mexican rule. The property, in what now is the city of Whittier, was semi-arid and unplanted except for eight acres of seedling oranges. The farming venture of Strong and Russell proved a failure, however, due to drought and unsuccessful attempts to supply the ranch with water.
Charles returned again to mining in 1872, trying his luck in Arizona, Nevada, and California. His frequent absences, his continued illness, and Harriet's poor health put a serious strain on their marriage. During their time apart, the couple corresponded regularly, and Charles expressed anxiety when he did not hear from Harriet. His letters--sometimes addressed to "My precious wife" or "My darling wife" and signed "Your loving husband"--express concern about her health and their precarious finances. In a letter addressed to "My dear Husband" but never mailed, Harriet wrote, "I have always dreamed & wished & prayed for the wealth of human love wh[ich] belongs to a good woman. It was mine for a few months only. Why no longer I shall never know in this world.... To think that I who have been loved always should live an unloved wife." (4)
After one misunderstanding, Charles wrote from Nevada, "Truth is we have no business to live so apart. If it is absolutely necessary that I should live here, then here should all mine be with me." About a week later,...
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