View source for Determined Homesteader's Wife

{{trope}}
{{quote|''Travelers in the backcountry often reported that women and men routinely shared the heaviest manual labor. Both sexes worked together in the fields, not merely at harvest time but through the entire growing season. Women not only tended the livestock but did the slaughtering of even the largest animals. Travelers were often startled to observe delicate females knock down beef cattle with a felling ax, and then roll down their sleeves, remove their bloody aprons, tidy their hair, and invite their visitors to tea.''|''Albion's Seed'' by David Hackett Fischer}}

A [[Determined Homesteader]] can't do it alone, no matter how stubborn he may be. He needs an equally determined wife. At least in fiction, the '''Determined Homesteader's Wife''' is usually a strong-willed woman who's handy around the cabin and fields, and probably knows how to [[Action Girl|load and shoot a gun]]. And if she doesn't have those capabilities at the beginning of the story, she soon will have. Especially when those skills are required [[Mama Bear|to protect]] the [[Determined Homesteader's Children]].

The "prairie romance" subgenre of [[Romance Novel]] will often have the protagonist becoming one of these, either from the beginning of the homestead, or as a mail order bride.

Has a tendency to become the [[Determined Widow]] if the main character of the story is [[The Drifter]] or [[The Gunslinger]].

A variation of this which may be called "determined captain's wife" existed along the Atlantic coast. The wives of America's old [[Proud Merchant Race|nautical aristocracy]] would have [[Iron Lady|influential posts]] in seaports because their husbands were away at sea. Some went to sea with their husbands and became [[The Medic|medics]] or [[The Lancer|de facto ships' officers]]. They had the same sort of determination and resilience as their Western sisters though they didn't have homesteads per se and even though at first glance they often seemed [[More Than Meets the Eye|prim and delicate]] from their high breeding. West or East, they raised 'em tough then.

{{examples}}
== Film ==
* There's Nell McLaughlin of ''[[Flicka]]'' who talks some some sense into her stubborn, horse rancher husband.

== Literature ==
* Ma Ingalls of the ''[[Little House on the Prairie]]'' series.
** Her daughter, Laura Ingalls Wilder, becomes this in ''The First Four Years'' and the sequel series about her own daughter.
* Emily "Auntie Em" Gale of ''[[The Wonderful Wizard of Oz]]'' book.
* ''[[Sarah, Plain and Tall]]'' was the mail order bride subtype.
* [[Robert A. Heinlein]] loved the uber version of this trope for female leads in space frontier settings. The ideal frontier wife, to roughly paraphrase, "should be able to fire a gun, pilot a ship, navigate by stars in space and on planets, skin and gut animals, build cabins and solve quadratic equations in their head while raising children." See, for example, ''[[Time Enough for Love]]''.
* Claire Fraser becomes one of these (while retaining her status of ginormous [[Badass]]) in the later books in the ''[[Outlander (novel)|Outlander]]'' series. 18th Century American wilderness? Pssh, it can be beaten. (It helps that she has [[Portal to the Past|all the medical expertise of a 20th century medical doctor]] and a good set of vaccinations.)
* Sabra Cravat of the Edna Ferber novel ''[[Cimarron]]'' and its two subsequent film adaptations. She settles in Oklahoma with her husband during the land rush and toughs out many years on the frontier, then takes over the family newspaper business when her husband leaves her due to wanderlust. She ends up becoming an important frontier figure in her own right.
* Marianne in ''[[Cloud of Sparrows]]'' was one of these before [[Posthumous Character|dying]].
* An example of the "determined captain's wife" variant: British Sea Captains in the Napoleonic Wars would have their wives with them, as the Admiral and Mrs Croft show in ''[[Persuasion]]''.

== Live-Action TV ==
* Alma Garrett of ''[[Deadwood]]'' was one of these—for a very short time. When her husband died, however, she used her new-found freedom to pursue the life she'd always wanted for herself but that staid Eastern civilization wouldn't have allowed.
* Lisa Douglas of ''[[Green Acres]]'' is a subversion of the type, being not at all interested in helping her husband make a success of the farm. Then again, he's something of a parody of the [[Determined Homesteader]] type himself.
* Mrs Onedin is the "determined captain's wife" variation of this trope in the old British series ''[[The Onedin Line]]'' about a [[Family Business]] of nineteenth century English [[Intrepid Merchant]] s. Like her husband she seems a [[Jerk with a Heart of Gold|grim old sourpuss, until you know her better]]. But she is also a tough [[Apron Matron]], and [[Good with Numbers]] and knows well how to [[Iron Lady|berate rebellious underlings]]. She is tough and [[The Stoic|stoical]] and [[Mama Bear|remarkably brave]]. She is almost the Onedin Line's [[Man Behind the Man|Woman Behind the Man]]. And in general she is a [[Crowning Moment of Awesome|Crowning Character of Awesome]].

== Oral Tradition, Myths and Legends ==
* Some of the women in [[The Icelandic Sagas]] seem to have been like this.

== Music ==
* An old record of Alaska songs that tells of one sourdough's idea of a dream mail order bride: "If she can mush through ice and snow when its 45 below, hurry up and send me the lady... If she can pitch a tent at night, don't need matches for a light when howling winds do blow... if she's like her photo looks... hurry up and send me the lady."

== Tabletop Games ==
* The [[Traveller]] volume ''Sword Worlds'' contains in a sidenote, a [[Crowning Moment of Heartwarming]] in which a soldier returns from the Fifth Frontier War to see his [[Downer Ending|home wrecked by the war]]. Then he sees his wife, Ilja, gallantly rebuilding the house and after [["Glad to Be Alive" Sex|a suitable reunion]] joins her in rebuilding their family home to prove that nothing can break the spirit of a true Sword Worlder or a true Sword Worlder's wife.
** At the end of the book his brother comes along asking him to go on an [[The Epic|epic]] [[The Migration|voyage]] [[Space Cossacks|to save the Sword Worlder people]]. The returned soldier agrees that it is a worthy goal but not for him. He wants to take care of the homestead with his brave wife because [[There's No Place Like Home]].

== Web Original ==
* Chewbot's [[Let's Play]] of ''[[The Oregon Trail]]'', ''[[Plague and Treachery On The Oregon Trail]]'' has Susan Neckebard, who was not that determined to follow manifest destiny as her husband at first, but his incompetence forced her to show off her phenomenal survival skills.


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[[Category:Marriage Tropes]]
[[Category:Western Characters]]
[[Category:Always Female]]
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