Writing Themselves into History: Emily and Matilda Bancroft in Journals and Letters

by Kim Bancroft

A window into the world of nineteenth-century California, from two women who experienced it firsthand In the early years of California's statehood, Emily Brist Ketchum Bancroft (1834-1869) and Matilda Coley Griffing Bancroft (1848-1910) had front-row seats to the unfolding of the Golden State's history. The first and second wives of historian extraordinaire Hubert Howe Bancroft, these two women were deeply engaged members of society and perceptive chroniclers of their times, and they left behind extensive records of their lives and work. Writing Themselves into History offers a rich immersion in nineteenth-century California, detailing Emily's and Matilda's experiences with public life, motherhood, and business against the backdrop of San Francisco's high society and the state's growth amidst the tumult of the American Civil War. The book also highlights Matilda's significant involvement in Hubert Howe's trailblazing research on the history of the American West--including her work collecting oral histories from women members of the LDS Church--and her evocative descriptions of travels throughout the Pacific Northwest and beyond. Kim Bancroft's commentary offers historical context and points up Emily's and Matilda's keen insights, and she pays special attention to the two women's complex and nuanced portraits of gender, race, and class in the nineteenth-century West. This book is a valuable resource for American West and women's studies scholars, and for anyone with an interest in California's first decades as a state.

400 pages, Hardcover

Published November 8, 2022

About the author

Time for a change! After teaching for 30 years, I turned to editing and writing larger works. First the 1890 autobiography of my great-great-grandfather, H.H. Bancroft, the founder of the Bancroft Library at UC Berkeley (Heyday Books 2014). Next "The Heyday of Malcolm Margolin: The Damn Good Times of a Fiercely Independent Publisher," about Heyday Books' iconoclastic founder. Then I discovered the intriguing papers of my great-great-grandmother and her predecessor. These 19th-century stories comprise "Writing Themselves into History: Emily and Matilda Bancroft in Journals and Letters." I encourage all to examine legacy, that of our ancestors and our own lives, to save stories for future generations.

Reviews

[David Kessler · Rating 4 out of 5]

I am a retired Bancroft Library staff member. Accounts of the work of H.H. Bancroft in building his library are of special interest to me. Kim Bancroft's book about his two spouses, including her own great-great grandmother Matilda, provide a heretofore unexplored dimension to accounts of the Library's history. The contributions of these women to the great work have been neglected, especially as H.H. Bancroft himself was essentially a misogynist. The book is a patient, gentle read, based on letters and especially the "journals" which Matilda wrote for each of her four children up until the age of 10. We get to meet them, and other Bancroft descendants through the present day, some after some serious sleuthing by the author. Recounting the peregrinations of H.H. Bancroft and family provides vivid descriptions of the late 19th century West. I especially appreciated the accounts of the gathering of "dictations," what we call today oral histories. The pictures of the Vancouver area and our northwestern American states, traversed by steamer, railroad and carriage over rough roads, when their forests and rivers were still essentially unspoiled, to collect them were vivid and unforgettable. A great book about the creation of one of American's great libraries!

[Lorraine Herbon · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a charming book!

The author here was a teacher and editor—and she is a descendant of the famous western historian and collector, Hubert Howe Bancroft. In this book, she uses heretofore unexamined archival materials to explore the lives of Bancroft’s two wives, Emily and Matilda.

This author is not an historian, and she doesn’t pretend to be. She is a curious intellectual who saw an opportunity to share her famous ancestors with the world. And I am so here for it!

This was a fun read. She does a great job with contextualizing two forgotten women. She also obviously loves her ancestors, but she does not hide the less-than-stellar aspects of anybody’s character. HH Bancroft was pretty much a product of his time, and his misogyny and patriarchal attitudes are not hidden. He was what he was.

As someone who benefited from the Bancroft Library at Cal, I especially appreciated this look at the women who made it possible for HH to do what he did.

Highly recommend for anyone who wants to turn their family history into an enjoyable and meaningful narrative.

[EmelineB]

Based on the correspondence and diaries of H.H. Bancroft's wives, the book is a fantastic window into the lives of the upper middle class (and above) in the Bay Area and the American West circa 1860-1910. It almost incidentally tells the story of Bancroft's life, a rare (it seems to me) insight in how we shape and are shaped by our social environment. Mostly, I enjoyed sitting with these two women's stories about themselves, their days, their experiences as mothers as citizens.