Baby Doe Tabor: The Madwoman in the Cabin

by Judy Nolte Temple

Looks at the life and writings of the Colorado mining pioneer.

Genres: Nonfiction, Historical, History

260 pages, Hardcover

First published October 1, 2007

Reviews

[Roberta Smith · Rating 5 out of 5]

Anyone interested in the legend of Baby Doe Tabor should read this book. I first learned of Baby Doe in the 1960s on a family vacation to Denver. My mother told me about her. Of course, she told me the legend: Baby Doe was a beautiful woman who came to the mining town of Leadville and married a man 25 years older than she was. The man was Horace Tabor, the richest man in Leadville -- a Silver King. He left his stern-looking wife for Baby Doe. The two were married and lived richly, if not wisely. They had two children. Then, Horace lost everything and everyone said Baby Doe was just a gold digger who would leave him. She didn't. He died six years after becoming poor and on his death bed told her to hang on to their Matchless Mine; it would make her wealthy again. She did as he said and lived into her 80s, close to 35 years in a shack on the Matchless property. She was found frozen to death inside the cabin.

I was intrigued by the two photos of her shown to me when I heard the story. One, the beautiful young woman who came to Leadville. The other, an old woman stepping outside her cabin. My view was that Baby Doe was a hermit who never left the cabin and just hung around, pining for her dead husband.

This book got rid of my false ideas about Baby Doe. It explores the woman's life and psyche through the writings she left behind. So much of the legend is not accurate. And where facts can't be known, Judy Nolte Temple provides plausible scenarios for what might have really happened based on years of research.

If you've ever read a book about Baby Doe Tabor, do yourself a favor and read this one as well.

[Emily · Rating 3 out of 5]

I have started this book on 6.29.10 and I am so enjoying reading about the history of Colorado mining towns. But this book holds a speacil place in my heart seeing that I was born in Leadville and have been in the Matchless Mine. So I will keep you guys updated on how I am getting along. Well I read the first three chapters and then it started to talk more about the two biographers who wrote about the Tabors in the past and so I lost interest. I also think there was alot of repeating so that also made my mind up.

I will keep my eyes open for any other books about Leadville and the history.

Bye for now, Emily

[Labruja_dietra · Rating 4 out of 5]

Baby Doe is what started my love for history back in elementary school and I've been fascinated with the Tabor's and Colorado history ever since. I really appreciated Temple dislodging the legend from truth and shining a light on the actual woman Lizzie was. However, I did find the last part a little tough to get through, as Temple dived into Lizzie's "dreams and visions", which became a little too academic for me. But I truly enjoyed getting a better understanding of the real Mrs. H.A.W. Tabor.

[Megan · Rating 2 out of 5]

I am even on the fence about giving this one 2 stars, but I did like the first part of the book which was more biography of Baby Doe Tabor. However the rest of the book with Baby Doe's 'dreams and visions' was really difficult for me to get through. She led an interesting life to be sure. I always wonder how people with that much wealth can squander it away so quickly and end up destitute. The book mentions this is somewhat common for those who are bipolar or manic and from Baby Doe's 'dreams and visions' I think she probably did have some sort of mental illness. Alas we will never know for sure.

[Stephanie Mitchell · Rating 3 out of 5]

I had actually never heard of "Baby Doe" before seeing this book. Odd, since I have read a fair amount of non-fiction about women in the (newly-settled) west. Since I have read about several "infamous" (and some not-so) women in both biographical and published-letter/diary format, this was a helpful book. (I'm thinking Winnie Ruth Judd, Louise Marshall, Elinore Pruitt Stewart, etc.) The primary purpose seems to be to deconstruct the genre and scholarship associated with writings about Tabor. Much of what she deconstructs applies to the myths surrounding many such women. The author is very forthcoming with her bias and how it affects her interpretation of Tabor's story.

The feminist and sociological approach to the book is heavy-handed and could be rough going if you're not in the mood. I happened to be so I got through it pretty quickly.

As a former Archivist, I do appreciate the trouble that archivists must have had dealing with Tabor's papers. "Personal papers" are tricky enough to describe and arrange when they have dates, a pre-existing order and are on standard paper. I cannot imagine the headache of trying to deal with a collection that consists of handwritten notes on every conceivable type of paper (scraps, envelopes, calendars...). That, and the politics that came with the collection. Yikes.

[Natalie · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've always held a facination with the Tabor legend. And recently I made a trip up to Leadville for the first time last summer. After seeing "Tabor" on many things and drinking a beer across the street from the Tabor Opera House and wondering why it's in such a state of disrepair, who wouldn't be curious.

I believe there's many books on Baby Doe, but this one is probably going to be the least biased and most academic. The author focuses on Mrs. Tabor's strange writings she kept once she retreated to the shack next to the Matchless Mine. The author's jist is that she saw Mrs. Tabor as sort of a mystic, a Christian zealot, looking for answers in her dreams. The actual "love story" between her and Horace is quickly covered in under 50 pgs., going on the assumption that you have probably read that before in another biography.

The author defends Mrs. Tabor, arguing that she was not insane, as apparently other historicans have speculated. You end up feeling real empathy for this woman and her rags to riches to rags saga.

[Christine Whittington · Rating 5 out of 5]

Of the myriad nonfiction books about silver baron Horace Tabor's wife, Baby Doe Tabor, Judy Nolte Temple's is by far the best. Many of the books about Baby Doe are the result of authors quoting and citing the same unsubstantiated myths over and over. Many of the previous books were based on a series of articles published in 1938, three years after Baby Doe's death, in the confidential magazine "True Story." The title of the series was "Silver Queen: Baby Doe Tabor's Life Story as told to Sue Bonnie." The author of the series was actually popular historian Caroline Bancroft, who had purchased the right to use Baby Doe Tabor's friend and neighbor Sue Bonnie's name for the series. Bancroft did not read any Tabor papers and "invented a voice for Baby Doe" that was then repeatedly cited in later books. I am a Visitor Services Representative at the Tabor's Matchless Mine and many of our visitors still think that Horace Tabor's last words to Baby Doe were "hold onto the Matchless" and that Baby Doe froze to death on the floor of her cabin in the shape of a cross.

Temple is a superb, trained historian and professor of women's studies, but her book is also approachable to the nonspecialist. She wisely includes a chapter about the myth of Baby Doe, so that all the readers know what the conventional wisdom has been up to now and the origins of that myth. One of her most valuable chapters is a historiography, unpacking the previous writing on Baby Doe and how it fits into the canon.

Unlike other biographers, Temple had access to thousands of pages of Baby Doe's writing, sealed for thirty years after her death. These include writing on calendars, diaries, and her "Dreams and Visions." Many of Baby Doe's thoughts, visions, and dreams were written on any available scrap of paper and the task of structuring this wealth of ideas was enormous. This writing was one source of Temple's reexamination of Baby Doe's life, using the tools of the postmodern historian. Temple explores the possibility that Baby Doe was mentally impaired at the end, citing her age, malnutrition, and the possibility of the health impact of drinking water from her mine shafts after the city had cut off access to water for nonpayment. She also compares her to the medieval Catholic mystics who so inspired her. Temple also devotes many pages to Baby Doe's relationships with her daughters, Lily and Silver Dollar, and explores the myths about them as well.

"Baby Doe Tabor" The Madwoman in the Cabin" is essential reading for anyone interested in the role of women in the "wild west" and specifically in the mining camps. It is mandatory for anyone seeking to understand the complexity of Baby Doe Tabor's life and thought.

[Kim · Rating 3 out of 5]

Be prepared- if you’re looking for biography, stop after the first half. While the author does an impressive job of attempting to find Lizzie/Baby Doe through the mire of legend, the book ends in a twisted convoluted literary analysis that is a slog to get through. While that depth of analysis of Lizzies writings is commendable, it leaves this book feeling disjointed and like multiple books crammed into one. The further along we got the more I found myself looking up definitions for unnecessarily complicated phrases (hegemonic colonization of consciousness and female opprobrium weren’t what I was expecting out of this book).

[Chelsea Pyykkonen · Rating 3 out of 5]

I found this repetitive and hard to finish, however; I appreciate the authors thorough research and admiration for Baby Doe and uncovering her truth. I love Leadville history and this doesn’t touch on it as much as I had hoped.

[Ella Rupp · Rating 4 out of 5]

A little redundant in places but overall very well researched and interesting

[Kelly Schuknecht · Rating 3 out of 5]

I wanted to like this book, I really did, but I have to admit that it took me two years to finish it. I kept putting it aside and finally had to force myself to read the last few chapters.

Fortunately the first two chapters (or so) were great. Judy Nolte Temple covers the history of the Tabor family and the Leadville area in great detail, and that was exactly what I was looking for. However, somewhere around chapter 3 Temple started really pushing a feminist sociological agenda, which would be fine if that's what the reader is looking for, but it wasn't what I was looking for. I just wanted to know the real story of the Tabor family. Now, having read the book all the way through, I realize I probably should have just stopped in the middle and called it good.

If you're interested in the history of Leadville and/or the Tabor family, I highly recommend the first 2-3 chapters of this book. The beginning is worth reading, but I wouldn't waste your time with the rest of it unless you're really interested in things like the author's detailed theories about the encrypted notes on Baby Doe's calendar and whether or not they meant that Silver Dollar may have had one or more abortions. (yawn)

[Tanya M. M. · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great book for anyone that wants to learn more about Baby Doe or the Matchless Mine. I got interested in Baby Doe when I went to the Matchless Mine in Leadville, Colorado. In the book you can read Dreams and Visions supposedly written by Baby Doe Tabor herself. I don't know if she was a mad woman or just a woman that was upset with the way she was treated in life. Maybe she was just a brilliant author and wrote about her dreams and thoughts. Maybe she was suffering from dementia or Alzheimers , or maybe she was just a woman trying to deal with her past. Whatever the case maybe, we will never know because we can't ask her personally, we can go by what history and authors tell us. I wish I could ask her, what stories she could tell about the silver mines and being the Silver Queen of Colorado.

[Nancy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Non fiction. Great book-a new favorite, changed my understanding and allowed me to connect with Baby Doe! Examines Baby Doe from a Feminist perspective which seeks to give voice and dignity to Elizabeth Tabor. Looks at how the story of Tabors was used to further goals of the teller (a morality play, a love story, the fall of a “home wrecker” etc) and how it furthered the goals of particular authors as 'historians'. Temple then examines Elizabeth’s writings from her later years in the cabin at the Matchless Mine. She also examines the story of Elizabeth's daughter Silver and her tragic demise.

[Justina · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was surprised at Tabor's life and Temple's magnificent historical work looking through Tabor's journals written on tatted and torn scraps of paper. The book is very interesting and reads like a novel although a thorough history of the mining boom, women, and the effects of wealth, status, and greed in the "wild" west.

[Brandi · Rating 4 out of 5]

It took me a while to read cuz some of it went slow. It have some good insight on Lizzie Tabor tho. Also some of the words the author used made me feel like I needed a thesaurus lol!! Parsimoniously?? Just one example!

[Sara Giacalone · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fascinating insight into the mind of Elizabeth McCourt Tabor ("Lizzie"), although it may be a bit academic for some (the author is a women's studies professor).