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[Whorf, Dorothea, and Roslyn Morey.]

“Westward Ho!” Diary and Log of Four Argunots [sic] June to September 1917.

Wyoming, Montana, California, Alaska, and other western locales, 1917. 4to (10.25” x 8.75”), full blue-green buckram with gilt border, leather title piece at spine. 114 pp. typed, with 97 original photographs, 7” x 4” to 1.75” x 2.75”, mounted on gray paperboard. CONDITION: Very good, light wear to cover extremities, paper at inner upper hinge cracked but binding firm; photos very good.

A spirited, photographically illustrated narrative of a trip to Yellowstone, Glacier National Park, Alaska, and other Western points, undertaken by four young women from the Bennett School of Millbrook, New York, just months after the U.S. entered World War I.

The travelers, also known as the “Arguenots” (usually spelled with an “e”), depart from Grand Central Station on Monday, June 25th, at five thirty P.M., and after a stop with friends along the way, arrive in Gardiner, Montana, “the Gateway to the Yellowstone,” on June 30th. They spend ten days in the park, and on July 11th are welcomed by Mr. Frank Stillman Lusk and his wife, prominent residents of Missoula, where they rest, have their hair shampooed (and in one case, a tooth pulled), and see the sights before setting off for Glacier National Park on July 17th. There, they join a rustic, horseback tour with “Uncle” Howard Eaton, the famous dude rancher and guide who after over twenty years in Yellowstone began offering excursions through Glacier in the 1910s, catering to suffragists by advertising that “all ride astride” (rather than side-saddle). On August 4th, the Arguenots venture to Portland, Oregon and Tacoma, Washington, making an excursion to Mt. Rainier and into a glacial crevasse (lowered “like a meat bag on a string”). Three of the four take a spontaneous week-long steamer cruise to Alaska in late August, where they see glaciers galore and visit Juneau, Sitka, and an “Indian village” at Funter Bay before returning to Vancouver. The narrative ends on September 4th, after they rejoin their friend at her home in Des Moines, Iowa.

The Arguenots consist of the elaborately nicknamed Beulah Pack (1896–1971), a.k.a. “Buddy Packerels Pack,” “Buddy Packerellums,” “Packerel,” or “Packerella,” of a prominent naturalist and conservationist family in Lakewood, New Jersey, whose aunt Beulah Pack Rollins built an important collection of Western Americana, now at Princeton; Roslyn Morey (later Shoemaker, 1896–1973), a.k.a. “Phil Chundy Morey,” “Philiamus Chundibod,” “Philiam,” or just “Phil,” also of Lakewood; Dorothy Finkbine (later Souers, 1894–1935), a.k.a. “Chessy Dodo Finkbine” or just “Chessy,” of a wealthy Des Moines business family; and Dorothea Whorf (later Broberg, b. 1884), a.k.a. “Peter Pan Whorf” or “Peter,” the official chaperone. All were affiliated with the Bennett School in Millbrook, New York, a women’s high school and junior college founded by May Bennett in 1890 that taught generations of wealthy and elite girls (including Ray Eames) before closing in the 1970s.

No author is officially credited (except for a few playful and apparently never published dispatches to the Lakewood Times and Journal by Morey). However, the narrative is based on a “log” kept by the women throughout the trip, and was evidently written by both Morey and Whorf, whose accounts flow almost seamlessly together.

In Yellowstone, the Arguenots visit “Mammouth Springs” (“pure turquoise blue”), Devil’s Kitchen, Angel’s Grotto, Morning Glory Pool, and several geysers, including Old Faithful; go fishing; get sick; attend hotel dances (“Straight down the entire length of the room, with elephant like strides he pushed her, then when the haven of a corner had been safely reached, a series of mad twirls began, executed with the feet planted widely apart, varying in number anywhere from four to twelve, and each more desperate than the last!”); take a horseback trip up Mt. Washburn (“We felt very much like old Indian explorers for this was our first real mountain trip on horseback…We made a zigzag trail up the mountain. Tall pines and spruces pointed the way until we reached the timber line. Then we found quantities of brown sand and rock. A little further and we were traveling on a carpet of flowers and snow…”); enjoy stunning vistas (“we came out to the edge of the canyon and gazed across its reddish rugged depth to Silver Thread Falls --- a name self-descriptive”); and are thrilled by numerous bear sightings. One of the most adventurous of these occurs in the company of two portly divines—fellow hotel guests nicknamed the “O’Reillys”:

Scarcely had they finished supper, than four strong, they hied them to the garbage Dump. Now that was not a poetic place for an evening’s stroll, but hark ye! Of an evening, around that same garbage dump, came bears--- old bears, young bears, big bears, and little bears! Now, it was so decreed that they were to see a nice, big, paw-licking mother bear first, with a wee, capricious cub whom, she sent up a tree when she saw people approach. The cublet was disgruntled at staying up there so long and capered from branch to branch, peering down anxiously. Then they moved on to a deeper part of the wood and all of a sudden met two years and two o’Reillys [sic], which by specie, were two corpulent Catholic priests. Peter and Packerel strolled on, bravely ignoring both bears and O’Reillys. I had a private interview later with Chessy and Phil, and neither of them seemed to know exactly what happened first, but of a sudden, they said, one bear chased t’other up a tree, from which the latter decided to descend, and with galumps and bounds he chased the former, whiffling and chortling towards Brothers O’Reilly. Whereupon said gentlemen jumped like spiders on a hot griddle and each grabbing large cudgels, they hugged each other in fierce excitement, then started on a dead run, taking care to keep Chessy and Philiamus between them and the Bruins, as gentle appetizers…

In Glacier National Park the gang eschews hotels (mostly) for the rustic tents of Howard Eaton’s horseback tour, which begins on July 19th, and is accompanied by the “inevitable movie man,” who is mentioned at various points documenting their adventures. Their first stop is Two-Medicine Lake, where

Our teepees were in three long parallel rows: the maiden’s row facing the forest, then the married couples in the middle, and the bachelor’s row facing lake, mountains and kitchen tent…We were to share it with a tribe of Blackfeet Indians. Such a lovely scene of gaily painted wigwams, befeathered chiefs, vividly colored squaws and lovely dark-eyed children, running among the trees and wigwams. Soon after we arrived a ceremonial began, the initiation of two white men, a geology professor and young student into the tribe. They were almost naked and one old chief was painting strange marks upon their reddened skins…The Chiefs and their families sat in a large circle and rose and danced the Dance of the Grass in answer to summons from the big Chief Two-Guns. It was a glowing barbaric massing of colors and a wonderful sight. There was a slight feeling of regret for the obtrusion of civilization such as white people and cameras, but we must not be too critical. In the evening the Indians gave us a dance in which we all joined. Packerella was feeling the thrill of her life in dancing with a real squaw when suddenly the squaw said, ‘Gee, isn’t there a crowd here tonight.’ Thus our delusions shattered at a blow…

Next stop is a camp site at Lake St. Mary’s, and over the course of ten days, the Arguenots climb Dawson’s, Cut Bank, Swift Current, Gun Sight, and Piegan passes and camp at Cracker and Avalanche Lake, among other locales. Along the way, Chundy flirts with—and is repeatedly separated from—a young man dubbed “the baboon” (“dear, dear, dear! wailed the distracted chaperone. Chundy and another strange man!”). On July 28th they are driven by inclement weather to stop in Many Glacier Hotel: “in the interior, bears climb the huge pine columns and hang limply over the railings. Japanese lanterns swing down from the ceiling and mysterious child-like Indian pictures decorate the walls. One of the most important as well as attractive features was the dining room…We talked of the war but it seemed so far away.” Amid descriptions of landscapes and playful characterizations of their fellow travelers, special attention is given to meals—like all hikers, the Arguenots are extremely motivated by food—and they enjoy “hot, toothsome breakfast[s],” lunches with “bread, jam, sardines, ham and cheese” or “biscuits, jam, peaches, ice-cream, coffee and lemonade,” and “galumptious hot supper[s],” often summoned by the call: “Come get your grub before it’s thrown away.”

Chessy returns home at the end of the tour, while Peter, Packerels, and Chundy board the train to Spokane and then Portland, where, after being guided by a kindly Black conductor (whose conversation is written in dialect) they arrive on August 5th:

That evening, gayly attired, the remaining three strode forth, on an exploration hunt for a gay restaurant, which finally they found with the assistance of four soldiers, but they liked not the looks of the place, it being a little quiet, so back to the hotel they trotted where they could at least have music. But any dissatisfaction with the outcome of the evening which Chundy might have felt, vanished at the proffered sympathy of the negro waiter, who took pains to tell Peter that she was treating poor Chundy like a step-child and that he was going to see that she got what she wanted!

The next day,

Up bright and early, and off for the Pacific Coast--- it seemed too good to be true!…they ran along the hard shore line of the ocean, and truly it was well worth a nine hour’s trip to see the gaunt, jagged rocks that rise out of the sea, breakers sending spray high up on the ocean. WIth many a thrill, the three hopped out of the nimble Ford, and flinging their boots to the wind, they plunged in, knee deep. Peter, having reached the place of her dreams, Packerel and Philiam thought she might shortly go out of her head, so strange and wild were her actions, as out thru the water and to the big rocks she plunged…They had over an hour to race on the beach…with the magnificent tall trees just back of the shore line, truly a wonderful sight to Jerseyites.

After a day shopping in Portland (resulting in “hunger--- our omnipresent friend”), the three Arguenots venture to Tacoma—and Mt. Rainier:

A hasty breakfast, then an hour’s preparation in the guide’s rooms for the Glacier climb. Chundy was transformed from a presentable figure in brown suit and feathered hat to a vision in parafined trousers and white grease-painted face. Peter and Packerell, though garbed in their own neat knickers were none the less odd in large pan-like gloves and flobbing shirt tails. It was a strange looking group of about fifteen headed by a sturdy guide that emerged from the lobby of the hotel and stalked clumsily across the snow-patched field toward Misqualley Glacier. We had not gone far when we reached the brink of a downward slope where toboganning ‘au natural’ was the method of descent. Soon we came to the edge of the glacier-- a great rugged expanse of rocks, ice and mud…The life lines were brought forth which though but limply clasped, gave us the sensation of being on an excursion of perilous adventure. Arriving at the top of the glacier, the guide asked for volunteers to be lowered into a crevice, so we all three decided to experience the sensation. Peter was the first victim and says she felt like a meat bag on a string.

Inspired by a woman they meet in Washington, the three obtain permission from their families to travel to Alaska, boarding the steamer Spokane (a.k.a. “the donkey”) on August 13th. On the 15th they stop at Ketchikan (“a small village devoted to canning but not to exterminating the odor thereof,” which was nevertheless “a quaint little town built on boardwalks. We all gethered about a huge hideous totem pole to hear snatches of its history”). On the 17th they reach Juneau, where they visit “the Goldstein Emporium to see the four thousand dollar silver fox sets” and “Chundy invested in a ponderous pair of rubbers of which she became inordinately proud,” before strong-arming her friends into an ultimately disappointing visit to the Juneau mines. In Sitka they visit a Russian Church, are “impressed by the sweet, bright faces of the Indian girls” in the mission school, and see more totem poles, which they consider “not things of beauty in themselves, but giving a certain characteristic atmosphere.” They also stop at Funter Bay, where they are greeted by “the fumes of fish in various stages of decomposition--- another cannery!” Finally, on the 21st, they

get up on deck by 8.30 in time to see quantities of icebergs, large and small of the most ethereal blue imaginable. In and out of the mountains the boat wound its way and as the beautiful Taku Glacier loomed in sight, a blast of real arctic wind set teeth chattering…Oh! How grey and frigid the waves looked, even with an occasional burst of sunshine, the first in many, many days. The Taku Glacier was of a very different type from any other ever seen by the three. Instead of being on the precipitous slope of a mountain, it lay in a valley which it had doubtless ground down to sea level, a powerful thing of radiant blue depths, with fantastic pinnacles of glistening white ice, while all about floated huge blue blocks, broken off from the whole by the high tides…the boat drew as close as safety would permit.

After several more days of stunning views, fishy smells, and the painfully boring conviviality of their fellow tourists, the Arguenots manage to pack their trunks (“pause here, in order to properly sympathize with the art of turkey stuffing as performed in a room of state…”) in time to disembark in Victoria. After a couple days “on Canadian soil,” they enjoy a scenic, winding train ride and a stop in Banff before reaching Des Moines, where they spend several days with Chessy and then part ways, “the memory of the West, the glorious free joy-giving west, in our hearts.” Several final pages are filled with poems and songs, many composed or adapted by the Arguenots.

Each section of the narrative is accompanied by a photo—showing a stunning waterfall, the Arguenots on horseback or milling about at the jagged foot of a glacier, and so on—and thirty-one leaves of mounted photos follow the text. Evidently arranged in chronological order, these begin with steaming hot springs, exploding geysers, rugged forests and rivers, and breathtaking alpine views. Photos from Howard Eaton’s tour document the women’s experience with the Blackfeet tribe, and include shots of tribal members dancing, riding horseback, posing for the camera, and (in the case of three young children), sitting outside a tipi. Other photos show the Eaton camp, gleeful travelers sliding down snowy slopes, groups of mounted tourists fording rivers or pausing for a mountainside snack, and Howard Eaton himself, sitting proudly on horseback and posing affectionately with two young women—presumably the Arguenots. Several photos show Pacific beaches, and one seems to be taken from within a glacial crevasse, looking up at those standing on the rim. Shots from the Alaskan cruise show the steamer and various stark, glacial landscapes. Various photos throughout capture the Argue-nots themselves—posing cheek to cheek with a horse; holding a companion’s coattails as she flings something off a precipice; standing as a cheerful group on the stony slope of mountain; and—the only shot evidently taken upon their reunion in Des Moines—lounging in a park with a beloved dog.

A descriptive and delightful account of the West, including Alaska, as it was experienced by four frolicsome and well-to-do young women, just two years before the passage of the 19th Amendment.

Item #8992

Price: $4,750.00

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