Cowman's Wife

Women played a vital and, until recently, frequently overlooked role in the settlement of the American West. They were not only mothers, schoolteachers, and nurses, but also cowgirls, outlaws, and ranchers. Mary Rak's career as a ranchwoman, and eventually an author, began in 1919, when she and her husband Charles Lukeman Rak purchased a 22,000-acre spread fifty miles north of Douglas, Arizona. She went on to recount her struggle to learn the cattle business and cope with the numerous problems of life on an isolated ranch.The new introduction to this rangeland classic was written by the late Sandra L. Myres. Her research into the lives and writings of ranchwomen provides an excellent background for understanding Mary Rak and her work.

Mary Kidder Rak was born in Iowa and earned a degree at Stanford University in California. She first moved to Arizona to teach at the University of Arizona. In 1918, she and her husband Charlie Rak, a forester, bought a remote ranch in the Chiricahua Mountains. She wrote four books about her life as a rancher, including A Cowman's Wife (1934) and Mountain Cattle (1936). A historian, author, and educator, Sandra L. Myres was born in 1933 in Columbus, Ohio. She received her B.A. and M.A. degrees from Texas Tech University and her Ph.D. (1967) from Texas Christian University. She joined the faculty of the University of Texas at Arlington in 1967, and was made full professor in 1983. Her published works include Westering Women and the Frontier Experience, Ho for California, The Ranch in Spanish Texas, and Force without Fanfare: the Autobiography of K. M. Van Zandt. Active in various professional associations, Myres also served as president of Westerners International in 1985. She died on October 16, 1991.