I’m in the midst of writing the final book in my Burrton Springs Brides series. So far, I’ve had to do a bit of research for this book. I’ve looked up information on the US Marshals in the 1870s, scouts during the Civil War, blizzards in the MidWest during the time period, along with some other things. It’s often easy to get caught up in the research, that I don’t get as many pages written for the day.
A number of years ago, I picked up this copy of a Montgomery Ward & Co. catalogue from 1875. It’s a small book – only 3 1/4″ x almost 5″. It’s only about 1/8″ thick. There aren’t many pictures of items in the book. Mostly it just has lists of the items offered.
I had my heroine along the trail, and it’s starting to rain. I wanted to know what type of coat she’d be able to put on to ward off the moisture. Much to my surprise, I found that rubber coats were available in 1875. In case you’re interested, they cost anywhere from $2 – $7.50.
I often find myself checking through this little catalogue to see what was offered and how much it would have cost. Most times the information I find is barely mentioned in my story, sometimes not at all, but I do try to be as historically accurate as possible when I write a book.
What about you… do you ever get caught up with researching something?