Archives West Finding Aid

The eight volumes of diaries in this collection provide a daily account of the authors’ lives between the years 1894 and 1922. Many of the daily accounts include events taking place as the Crable-Bennett family struggles during a long stretch of severe economic troubles. The earliest diary from 1894 begins with Marion Harriett Crable detailing her family’s poor financial state and misfortune after being abandoned by her fiancé and subsequent move with her mother and brother to Oregon in 1889. In addition to her financial troubles, Marion describes her mounting health issues including having most of her teeth extracted, and painful boils on her back, in addition to suffering from bouts of neuralgia, a painful condition which affects her throughout her diaries.

Besides financial and medical difficulties, the diaries also recount Marion’s everyday activities including time spent sewing, crocheting, performing chores or attending church services, and prayer meetings. In addition to these everyday occurrences Marion chronicles who she visits, who visits her, what lectures and sermons she attended, the topic of these services, and whether or not she spent time reading her bible.

Each entry in Marion Harriett Crable’s diaries includes a daily account of the weather conditions for the area in which she lives, as well as an account of the time she arose in the morning and retired in the evening. This particular aspect of each daily entry continues on in the diaries of her daughter Marion Hope Bennett.

Throughout the diaries Marion describes her life, that of her mother Mary Jane (Jasperson) Crable and her younger brother of five years Worthington Crable as they travel between cities in Washington and Oregon in an effort to find work and stabilize their meager living conditions. Burdened with mounting debt, Marion and her mother perform odd jobs including nursing the sick and elderly as well as providing care for an acquaintance's infant child. This child, referred to only as “baby”, is mentioned several times between 1894 and 1896 and is most likely the child of a family friend who has become ill and is unable to take care of the child. After decades of hardship many of Marion’s troubles are alleviated when she marries civil engineer George Bennett in 1903, giving birth to her daughter Marion Hope Bennett the following year.

Marion Hope Bennett, like her mother, keeps two diaries in the same style. In addition to her daily accounts of weather, chores, religious functions, and sleep schedules, Marion Hope Bennett also details many of her daily adventures as a young woman of approximately 14-18 years old. These often include details of her time spent with friends, movies she attends on a regular basis, and her personal feelings.