Charlotte Martin was born on February 12, 1870 in Catskill, New York. She travelled to Bozeman, Montana sometime in the early 1890s and eventually lived with her sister and brother-in-law, Jenny and Feron Mack. On September 11, 1893 Charlotte married Edward L. Stowe (1868-1948), who had been a boarder in the Mack home and owner of a small restaurant in town. The couple afterwards purchased and operated a hotel, and the business apparently flourished due to a temporary housing shortage resulting from the establishment of the Montana State College of Agriculture and Mechanic Arts. The Stowes left Bozeman after 1900, settling first in Seattle and afterwards in British Columbia and California. They eventually returned to Washington, and Charlotte died on Christmas Day, 1968 in Spokane.
The Charlotte Stowe Autobiography consists of a handwritten manuscript prepared by her at the age of 90, consisting of 167 numbered pages, although the first eighteen pages are missing. An eighty-seven page typed transcription with extensive handwritten addendum is also included. The identity of the preparer of the typescript is unknown. The author describes her childhood in New York, her journey to Bozeman and her years there, and subsequent travels and homes with her husband and son, Edward Jr. The description of family members is extensive, along with the minutiae of their daily lives.
This collection is open for research.
An original handwritten reminiscence, with accompanying typed transcription, was donated to the Museum of the Rockies by Donald McRoberts of Brookings, South Dakota and transferred to the Merrill G. Burlingame Special Collections in the summer of 1983.
This collection was processed 2014 November 19