ELWYN B. ROBINSON DEPARTMENT OF SPECIAL COLLECTIONS
CHESTER FRITZ LIBRARY
UNIVERSITY OF NORTH DAKOTA
GRAND FORKS, NORTH DAKOTA 58202
COLLECTION: OGL #601
DATES: 1976-1979
SIZE: .25 linear feet
ACQUISITION: The Mary C. Wilde Papers were deposited in the Orin G. Libby Manuscript Collection by Catherine E. Morris, Bismarck, North Dakota, on March 27, 1980 (Acc. #81-697).
ACCESS: Available for inspection under the rules and regulations of the Department of Special Collections.
Mary C. “Minnie” Wilde was born in Emmons County, North Dakota on July 17, 1887. She was the daughter of John C. and Mathilda (Hovind) Wilde. Her father came to the United States from Germany at the age of fourteen, when his parents emigrated with him and the rest of his siblings. Most of his family settled in Dearborn, Michigan. In fact, Minnie Wilde continued to carry a correspondence with her second cousin, Mrs. Lillian M. Raatz, at the time she was writing her autobiography.
Mary Wilde’s mother, Mathilda Hovind, was born in Norway on April 22, 1857. Her parents and her two younger sisters emigrated to Canada where they lived for a couple of years. Later they headed to the United States by way of St. Paul, Minnesota, and eventually moved westward to Bismarck, North Dakota, where she met John C. Wilde. The two married on December 12, 1883.
John C. Wilde and Mathilda Hovind moved to a farm in Emmons County near the Missouri River, where their daughter, Mary C. Wilde, was born. After John Wilde died in 1933, Mary Wilde she was left alone to manage the farm and take care of her invalid mother. In 1941, Mary Wilde and her mother moved to Bismarck. When her mother passed away, Mary Wilde purchased a 10-room apartment house which she managed for 27 years. She retired at the age of 81, selling the apartment house and moving into St. Vincent’s Home. Mary C. Wilde died in Bismarck in July 1980.
The Mary C. Wilde Papers consists of a photocopy of a typescript "Memories of Mary C. Wilde, Minnie Mary Wilde," a thirty-one page autobiography written in 1976. Also included are additional handwritten notes for the essay. In her autobiography, Wilde recalls her early life on her parents' homestead in Emmons County as well as some events and experiences that shaped her life, including the Spicer Family Murder Trial, a diphtheria epidemic in 1897, and the flu epidemic of 1918.
Box 1
Folder
Return to: Pioneer Life
Return to: Women's Papers
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