"Thirty-two years after the great Klondike Gold Rush, a White Pass packer who had known Mollie Walsh gave her to posterity in a bronze bust. In the inscription for the monument, erected in 1931, her admirer wrote, "Generations shall surely know this inspiring spirit." The sculpture of this woman stands quietly in Skagway, Alaska, to this day. Until now, she has been a figure of myth and mystery, waiting to be known. This biography, comprehensive and documented, dispels the myths and much of her mystery as it explores her life and "inspiring spirit." Mollie's biography is also about the late 19th-century Yukon and Alaska stampedes to the gold-filled creeks of the Klondike and the golden sands of Nome. Mollie's story also tells of the working and living conditions of women in the Midwest, West, and North. Additionally, it looks into the sociological phenomena of "blackface," Tom Shows, Topsy as a masque ball costume, suicide choices, women horsewhippers of men, and why women are murdered by men who say they love them. Finally, this is also a human story about what was of value to one woman in the West, the grit and discipline she exercised to claim her land of promise, and the events that led to her being robbed of it. Others like and unlike Mollie appear in this story of humanity in search of promised lands."--Back cover