Later Life
In 1857, a pastor named Royal B. Stratton wrote a book about Olive and Mary Ann titled Life Among the Indians. The book sold 30,000 copies, a best-seller for that era. Royalties from the book paid for Lorenzo and Olive's college education at the University of the Pacific. Olive went on the lecture circuit to help promote the book.
In November 1865, Olive married cattleman John B. Fairchild. Though it was rumored that she died in an asylum in New York in 1877, she actually went to live with Fairchild in Sherman, Texas, where they adopted a baby girl, Mamie.
Rumors of Olive Oatman being raped by the Yavapai were denied vehemently, and she declared in Stratton's book that "to the honor of these savages let it be said, they never offered the least unchaste abuse to me".
In 1981, a writer named Richard Dillon reported in a famous western magazine that there was evidence that Olive had told a friend that she was married to the son of the Mojave chief and that she gave birth to two boys when married to him. This account was never verified.
Read more about this topic: Olive Oatman
Famous quotes containing the word life:
“You find no man, at all intellectual, who is willing to leave London. No, Sir, when a man is tired of London, he is tired of life; for there is in London all that life can afford.”
—Samuel Johnson (1709–1784)
“The truth is, I do indulge myself a little the more in pleasure, knowing that this is the proper age of my life to do it; and, out of my observation that most men that do thrive in the world do forget to take pleasure during the time that they are getting their estate, but reserve that till they have got one, and then it is too late for them to enjoy it.”
—Samuel Pepys (1633–1703)