Ella Smith of Pine Bluff, Arkansas, was a fearless and feisty young woman who had lost more than most at the tender age of thirteen. Her part Cherokee mother passed when she was seven, leaving Ella to take on the roles and responsibilities of womanhood during World War I. Her father worked hard to provide for them physically and spiritually. But he worked for the Cotton Belt Railroad weeks at a time and was missing from their daily lives. While her father was away working on the lonesome train, she ran the house loosely yet courageously. There were bouts of serious illness, hunger, ice...