Mary Hallock Foote (1847-1938) was one of the most popular female writers of her generation, and one of the first women to make a living producing fiction about the West. Born to a middle-class Upstate New York family, she early made a name for herself as a writer and illustrator of magazines and books. As a young wife, she came west with her husband, an engineer who found little success in the villages of Idaho and California where they settled. Foote continued her writing and illustrating as a way to supplement her husband's uncertain income. Unlike writers who celebrated the lawless,...