Lesson Objectives
To understand the lives and professions of rural women in the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries, specifically those in Carbon County, Wyoming.
Topics: US History, Women’s History, Western History, Rural History.
Age Group/Grades: Ten – Thirteen years old, 5th – 8th Grades.
Download Lesson Plan & Worksheets
Learning Objectives:
- Literacy: Students will read and research women in Carbon County, Wyoming who engaged in professional and non-traditional occupations in the late 19th and early 20th
- Writing: Students will use the printable sheets to create a “journal” of their selected subject, making their own booklets to create their own adventures of diaries of a woman based upon one of the women studied.
- Active Learning Activities:
- Activity 1: Students will complete a poster, digital presentation, work of art, or a video based on their reading and research, utilizing their journals created using our template.
- Activity 2: Students will complete the printable word search.
Learning Outcomes:
- Students will analyze the historical roles rural, American frontier women played in their communities.
- Students will identify and research women who engaged in “non-traditional” occupations in the late nineteenth/early twentieth centuries.
- Students will create original work to examine and describe the lives of one of the women studied.
- Students will evaluate how the rural environment impacted the women’s roles and careers.
Women to be Studied:
- Lillian Heath Nelson, MD
- Gertrude Huntington Merrell, Co-Editor, The Platte Valley Lyre
- Laura Huntington Heath, Co-Editor, The Platte Valley Lyre
- Lora Webb Nichols, Photographer
Online Resources:
Lillian Heath Nelson, MD:
Van Pelt, Lori, “Lillian Heath: Wyoming’s First Female Physician Packed a Pistol.” Published at WyoHistory.org. Access here: https://www.wyohistory.org/encyclopedia/lillian-heath
Hill, Sharon, “Feisty Females: Dr. Lillian Heath.” Digging History June 12, 2015 Access here: https://digging-history.com/2015/06/12/feisty-females-dr-lillian-heath/
Gertrude Huntington Merrell and Laura Huntington Heath:
Van Pelt, Lori, “The ‘Lyre Girls:’ First Women Newspaper Owners in Wyoming.” Published at WyoHistory.org. Access here: https://www.wyohistory.org/encyclopedia/lyre-girls-first-women-newspaper-owners-wyoming
Lora Webb Nichols
View the PBS program, “Wyoming Chronicle” to see their episode “The Photography of Lora Webb Nichols” here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y0wc9t4Sht0
Some of her photographs can be viewed here: https://www.wyominghistoryday.org/theme-topics/collections/lora-webb-nichols