The Personal History of Rachel DuPree_ A Novel - Ann Weisgarber [0]
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
Chapter 1 - THE BADLANDS
Chapter 2 - LIZ
Chapter 3 - MRS. DUPREE
Chapter 4 - SERGEANT DUPREE
Chapter 5 - ROUNDER
Chapter 6 - MRS. FILLS THE PIPE
Chapter 7 - ISAAC
Chapter 8 - INDIANS
Chapter 9 - IDA B. WELLS-BARNETT
Chapter 10 - JERSEYBELL
Chapter 11 - ALAND MINDY MCKEE
Chapter 12 - JOHNNY
Chapter 13 - MARY
Chapter 14 - THE MANDOLIN PLAYER
Chapter 15 - EMMA
Chapter 16 - MARY AND JOHN
Chapter 17 - PAUL LAURENCE DUNBAR
Chapter 18 - WANAGI CANKU
Chapter 19 - RACHEL
Acknowledgements
VIKING
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Copyright © Ann Weisgarber, 2008
All rights reserved
Publisher’s Note
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING IN PUBLICATION DATA
Weisgarber, Ann.
The personal history of Rachel DuPree : a novel / Ann Weisgarber.
p. cm.
eISBN : 978-1-101-19036-4
1. African American women—Fiction. 2. Ranchers—South Dakota—Fiction. 3. African American veterans—Fiction. 4. Badlands—South Dakota—Fiction. 5. South Dakota—History—20th century—
Fiction. I. Title.
PS3623.E4537P47 2010
813’.6—dc22 2010004713
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For my husband, Robert L. Weisgarber
We Can; We Will
—MOTTO OF THE NINTH CAVALRY
Again, I think it would be somewhat different if it weren’t for the wind. It blows and blows until it makes me feel lonesome and so far away from . . . Illinois.
—OSCAR MICHEAUX,
SOUTH DAKOTA HOMESTEADER
1
THE BADLANDS
I still see her, our Liz, sitting on a plank, dangling over that well. She held on to the rope that hung from the pulley, her bare feet pressed together so tight that the points on her ankle bones were nearly white. She was six. She had on her brother’s cast-off pants, and earlier, when I’d given them to her, she’d asked if wearing pants made her a boy. I’d told her we’d wait and see, and that had made her giggle.
The plank Liz sat on swayed and twisted in a wind that blew stinging grit. Her bandanna covered her nose and mouth. The rope around her waist was knotted to the one that held the plank. Isaac, my husband, called it a harness. He said it’d keep her from falling off.
“We’re right here,