Assignment task: Provide thoughtful, quality responses to this post. Agree or disagree? Why?
1) Catherine Haun was a young, newly married, and of the middle class women who travelled to California from Iowa. Her story is very important and significant because it displayed the role that women played in the travel to California. Although most men were pioneers, her story showed that women also played a big role in the travel westwards. Women participated in activities such as cooking, washing clothes, and mending clothes while their husbands were busy doing other tasks such as repairing wagons, taking care of animals, etc.
2) It took a lot of patience and perseverance. As she stated, the journey was very long and hard. At first, they were met with very snowy and harsh weather but they still kept going. Then later on they had fears of being attacked by native Americans or catching diseases from them. There was also the difficulties of travel. The distance was 2400 miles and a lot of women had children to take care of as well. As for her group however, it seems like she was paired with good people as only one person died and everyone else made it in pretty good condition.
3) Like mentioned in the question above, the hazards where what made the journey difficult. Indians were always a danger to the traveling people as they would steal their food and animals and sometimes even their women. Another hazard was the harsh weather that they were met with early in their journey. They also had a difficult time in "bad lands". Bad lands was the land of Indians, lizards, and snakes. One of the men got bit by a snake and had to get his leg amputated. Lastly, there was also the fear of diseases. "The Indians spread the disease among themselves by digging up the bodies of the victims for the clothing". Fortunately in her case, though, no one caught any diseases.
4) The journey definitely did have an affect on gender roles. Men were doing the "manly" things and women were doing the "feminine" things. For example, women would hold the guns and prepare to defend in the case of an attack while women would hide. Men would also be responsible for taking care of the animals and repairing the wagons while women would wash clothes and cook food. However, I believe that it showed how much they both needed each other. Without women, the men would not be able to complete the journey and vice versa. Eventually, some women had to take more "manly" roles such as the wife of the man who had his leg amputated.
5) I think her story reveals just how strong of a woman she was. The journey was a very difficult and long journey but she managed to persevere and go through with it. This just displays her determination and strength. This story reflects the pioneer experience as it shows how hard it was for the people who traveled from different states and moved to California in detail.