Stella Walthall PattersonStella Walthall Patterson (October 14, 1866 - December 23, 1955), orphaned at seven, led a life of adventure and accomplishments as a teacher, artist, pianist, wife, mother, adventurer, and above all a writer and storyteller. She attended Mills Collee in Oakland, California, whose president later said Mrs. Patterson is the closest thing to a feminine Thoreau that this country has produced. She also went to Paris to study painting. At age 80, after being told by her doctor she had young legs, she vowed to spend one full year on her remote mining claim near Happy Camp, California for solitude to write. Instead, she met interesting small-town characters and faced the challenges of wildland living along the Klamath River in the Siskiyou Mountains-the story she tells humorously in Dear Mad'm. Read More Read Less