Christy Karras - Remarkable Utah Women

Utah native Christy Karras comes from a long line of stubborn pioneer women who crossed plains, married good men, toiled on farms, took low-paying jobs, and generally did whatever it took to help their descendants thrive in the Beehive State.

She has worked as a staff reporter for the Salt Lake Tribune and the Associated Press and as an editor for Wasatch Journal magazine. She writes about arts, culture, history, travel, and the outdoors for publications including the Seattle Times. She also writes motorcycle touring guides with coauthor Stephen Zusy. She divides her time between Utah and the Pacific Northwest and shares adventures with her sweetheart, Bill, and their diabolical pets.

Surely, to-day, whoever inflicts an additional volume upon a long-suffering public, ought to be able to set up an unassailable plea in justification thereof.

CORNELIA PADDOCK, IN THE TOILS

Anyone writing about the past relies on the work of many, and this project made me appreciate all the more those who help write the stories of their timeswhether they be newspaper reporters or private citizens keeping diaries.

Then there are the people who carefully preserve and share those accounts, including historians who put it all together and make sense of what it means. Their work is all the more valuable in traditionally neglected areas like womens history.

In the years after I wrote the first edition of this book, Utah has seen an explosion of people investigating, sharing, and celebrating women from all aspects of its history. This made my job easieralthough it did make it difficult to narrow down the list of which women to include in this edition!

Michele Welch spearheaded the Utah Womens Walk, which collects and publishes interviews of and about Utah women. Within a few short years, she has built an invaluable resource for anyone interested in womens stories.

In 2020, to celebrate the one hundredth anniversary of the nineteenth Amendment and the 150th anniversary of Utah Territory giving women the right to vote, a group of volunteers formed the nonprofit Better Days project. Its educational resources include biographies of notable Utah women, many from traditionally underrepresented backgrounds.

Several entities in particular made my research possible and deserve recognition and huge thanks.

The Utah State Historical Societys helpful staff made working at its archives a pleasure.

A joint project of Utahs academic and research institutions, the Mountain West Digital Library maintains an invaluable electronic database of statewide documents and photos, which are now easily available to the world.

I am indebted to the very helpful special collections librarians at Utah State Universitys Merrill-Cazier Library, the University of Utahs Marriott Library, and Brigham Young Universitys Harold B. Lee Library. They patiently answered my many questions and went the extra mile to locate resources.

The Marriott Library also hosts the Utah Digital Newspapers Project, a searchable database of papers large and small, old and new. No more microfilm!

The Salt Lake City Public Library has a lovely collection of resources on Utah and Mormon history.

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints welcomes all kinds of researchers, and its mostly volunteer staff cheerfully handles all kinds of requests.

I am grateful to Jennifer Toomer-Cook and Darren Parry for their help in telling their mothers and grandmothers stories. I hope I have in some small way done them justice. Thanks to my patient and capable editors at The Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, Inc.

Finally, thanks to my family and friends, and especially Bill, for help, encouragement, and putting up with me in general when I was paying more attention to the book than I was to you.

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