Katie Havenshaw had never quite belonged in the bustling towns of the East Coast. It wasn't for lack of trying. Year after year, she had sewed petticoats at Miss Abernathy's General Goods, attended every church picnic with her best smile, and baked so many lemon pies for the Ladies' Aid Society that the mere scent of citrus made her knees ache.

But in 1875, eastern society preferred its women clever and sharp-tongued, and Katie's gentle good nature often seemed invisible, her kindness swallowed up by the clamor of city life. Compliments were rare jewels, and even at church socials, her ability to listen and work hard went largely unremarked, lost in the shadows of flashier personalities.

That was why, in the spring of her twenty-first year, she answered an advertisement from the back page of the Philadelphia Ledger: "Sturdy Rancher Seeks Companion—Hardworking, Honorable, and with a Taste for Adventure."