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| Plot Summary of One Thousand White Women |
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"May is a headstrong daughter of a wealthy but controlling society family in Chicago in the 1800's. When May runs away from home to to be with her impoverished lover and bear his two children, May's family tracks her down and commits her to a mental institution. After several years of languishing in an asylum, May is offered the chance of escape, provided that she join a government program to marry a group of white women to Native Americans. Viewing life as a challenge, May approaches the journey as an explorer, and is seduced by an Army Captain and an Indian Chief. Although May basically likes living with the tribe, she is also the victim of rape by warring groups and witnesses murders as well."
Holly H, Resident Scholar
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"Mary Dodd is a young white woman, living in Chicago in the 1870s. To her very rich and powerful father's dismay, she moves out of his house to live with Harry Ames, one of his employees, whom her family considers beneath her. They have two children together out of wedlock. Her father has her committed to a mental institution becuase of what one of her doctors describes as her promiscuity. Throughout the book, she will wonder if Ames was in on her commitment or not. She is also always deeply concerned about the children she's been separated (she assumes they've been taken to live with her family).
In order to escape the lunatic asylum, Mary becomes part of a very unusual government program. The government is recruiting one thousand white women to go out west and marry and become pregnant by Native Americans, members of the Northern Cheyenne group. A Cheyenne leader has suggested this as a means of assimilating his tribe into white society (the Cheyenne society is matrilineal).
Dodd and a small group of other recruits - including a mute, a spinster nurse, a English naturalist who foregoes skirts in favor or trousers, a stuckup Southern belle who goes nowhere without her small dog, a feisty black woman who escaped slavery via the underground railroad, a huge Swiss woman whose face resembles a potato, and a pair of lusty Irish twins - go west via train to Fort Laramie. There Mary Dodd has a brief but meaningful fling with an army officer. Nevertheless, she goes on with the other women to join the Cheyenne tribe, marrying their chief, Little Wolf. (She's his third wife.) She and her white friends gradually begin to live as Native Americans. By the end of the book, Mary Dodd has had her baby, but conflict has begun to arise between the Cheyenne and the U.S. Army.
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Ann Gaines, Resident Scholar
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| Review Analysis of One Thousand White Women |
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Our unique search engine provides a wealth of detail about books by breaking them down into many different literary elements, all of which are searchable (click here).
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Ratings are on a 1-10 scale (Low to High)
Plot
Tone of book?
- thoughtful
Time/era of story
- 19th century
Romance/Romance Problems
Yes
Inside culture (main char)
- American Indian
Culture clash?
- Being oppressed by outside culture
Is this an adult or child's book?
- Adult or Young Adult Book
Ethnic/regional/gender life
Yes
Lover is
- of a different race (interracial loving!)
Main Character
Gender
- Female
Profession/status:
- homemaker
- explorer
Age:
- 20's-30's
Eccentric/Mental
Yes
Eccentric:
- eccentric
- wild
Is this an ordinary person caught up in events?
Yes
Ethnicity/Nationality
- White (American)
How sensitive is this character?
- sensitive to others' feelings
Sense of humor
- Strong but gentle sense of humor
- Mostly serious with occasional humor
Intelligence
- Smarter than most other characters
- Very much smarter than other characters
Physique
- average physique
Main Adversary
Identity:
- society
Age:
- long-lived adults
Profession/status:
- explorer
How much of work is main antagonist actually present in:
- an average amount
- throughout most of the book.
How sensitive is this character?
- mean, arrogant
Intelligence
- Average intelligence
Setting
How much descriptions of surroundings?
- 5 ()
United States
Yes
The US:
- West
Prairie?
Yes
City?
Yes
City:
- Chicago
Misc setting
- fort/military installation
Style
Person
- mostly 1st
Accounts of torture and death?
- moderately detailed references to deaths
- very explicit references to deaths and torture
Sex in book?
Yes
What kind of sex:
- descript of kissing
- touching of anatomy
- impregnation/reproduction
- actual description of hetero sex
- descript. of nude males (the big P)
- rape/molest (yeech!)
Unusual Style:
- written like a journal/diary/letters
Amount of dialog
- roughly even amounts of descript and dialog
- significantly more descript than dialog
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Click here for more information about this book
Jim Fergus Resident Scholar Profiles
TOP SCHOLAR:
 Ann Gaines
SCHOLARS:
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Note: the views expressed here are only those of the reviewer(s). | |
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