Tag: Copper Sky

Guest Post – Milana Marsenich

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Copper Sky

Milana MarsenichCopper Sky

I have a strong affection for my hometown of Butte, Montana, a mining town with a rich history. As a natural listener and a therapist, I’ve witnessed amazing generosity and courage in others. I first witnessed this in the Butte people. As a child, a teen, and a young adult I also witnessed multiple tragedies and incredible resilience in overcoming these tragedies. It made me think about the ways that a town affects us, especially a town as spirited and as wild as Butte, Montana. In writing Copper Sky I attempted to capture the town’s kindness, its bold spirit, its heartbreak, and its amazing courage and compassion.

The White Dog

Milana Marsenich dogI have always loved dogs. Huskies are my breed. Every dog I’ve had as adult has either been a husky, a malamute, or a stray that lived with a husky or a malamute. Consequently, writing the four 1895 parts of Copper Sky from the dog’s point of view was easy for me. Both the white dog and the wolf dog in Copper Sky are attempts to give the reader a close look at the town’s enduring nature. I thought of both dogs as “the town’s dog”. As it turns out, there actually was a town’s dog that the people of Butte took care of and memorialized with a sculpture. You can read about Auditor here: http://www.ohmidog.com/2010/11/02/surviving-butte-the-story-of-the-auditor/
I didn’t know about Auditor when I wrote Copper Sky. I learned about him after he died. I was at my father’s house in Butte and noticed an article about him in the Montana Standard, the Butte paper. Granted, he’s not a wolf dog, or any version of husky, but he definitely represents the town’s spirit: lovable, loyal, and generous.

The Accidents

Butte has had multiple mining accidents as well as frequent fires. People died all the time. Copper Camp, a book published in 1943, states that the accidents probably created 50-100 widows a year. In 1889 fire broke out in the Anaconda Mine shaft killing 6 men. A fire in the Silver Bow mine in 1893 killed 9 men. An1895 warehouse fire and dynamite explosion killed at least 51 people. In 1911 the mine cage dropped from the surface to the sump of the Leonard mine, some 1500 feet, killing five men. Later that year, before the introduction of child-labor laws, 6 boys were killed in a tragic accident in the Black Rock Mine. In 1917, the year of Copper Sky, fire broke out in the shaft of the Speculator Mine, killing 168 men. The people of Butte have learned to grieve, comfort, and understand, to absorb sorrow and transform it. They have learned to be strong, to rise up proud and full of grace, to fight for justice, to carry on. It is this strong spirit that I hoped to portray in Copper Sky.

The Orphans

Men were not the only ones to die. Women also fell prey to misfortune. They were victims of violence, oppression, and sickness. In 1918 alone the Spanish Flu killed 1000 people in Butte. As I wrote Copper Sky I wondered about the motherless children. How did the town manage so many orphans? And what was the effect of such loss on the children? As a therapist I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about the many ways trauma affects our lives. In Copper Sky I explore, not just the effects of our own traumas, but also the effects of the traumas of our parents, the traumas of a town, the traumas that happened before we were even born. I couldn’t help but wonder if the people of Butte had absorbed this ability to deal compassionately with tragedy simply by living and growing up in a town like Butte. Did their very good and generous hearts spring from a town filled with such tragedies?

The Love

Copper Sky tells the story of two women with opposite lives. Orphaned and alone, Kaly Shane suffers hardship and gets bound up in prostitution. Finding herself pregnant she struggles to find a safe home for her unborn child. She searches for a family and faces those she has loved and those she has lost. Somehow, in the mess of it all, she makes peace with her past. Marika Lailich, a Slavic immigrant, dodges a prearranged marriage. Marika wants to be a doctor. To follow her love of medicine, she tries to escape the responsibilities of family love. I like to say that Copper Sky is a mining city love tale, ful of disturbed, loyal and fierce love, love that is ultimately a reconciling force in a community laced with tragedy. When the Speculator mineshaft catches fire both Kaly and Marika help to minimize the damage of the tragedy. They find courage, strength, and wisdom they didn’t know they had. In spite of themselves, they find love.

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Book Review: Copper Sky – Milana Marsenich

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***I was very kindly provided with a free copy of this book by the author, via OpenBooks, in exchange for an honest review. All the opinions stated below are my own ***

One hundred years on – the times have changed, as have our struggles… and nothing reminds us of that more than Copper Sky:-

Copper Sky

Goodreads – Copper Sky

The feminine spirit of the West comes alive in early twentieth century Montana.

Set in the Copper Camp of Butte, Montana in 1917, Copper Sky tells the story of two women with opposite lives. Kaly Shane, mired in prostitution, struggles to find a safe home for her unborn child, while Marika Lailich, a Slavic immigrant, dodges a pre-arranged marriage to become a doctor. As their paths cross, and they become unlikely friends, neither knows the family secret that ties them together.

 

Writing as somebody who has had the stability and privilege of 1st world background, this has naturally had some influence over the way in which I have interpreted the book. Some people may disagree with my comments, but please understand that I write them as generalisations only. In no way am I discrediting anybody else’s opinion or experience just because it is not a majority.

Comparing the lifestyle of these two women is a far cry from that expected and experienced by many others in modern day. That being said, we still have our modern day issues to contend with.

One of the topics Milana brings to the table, in a variety of ways, is the rights of women. This is still a hot topic today, albeit for different reasons. By way of example, one of our local topical debates at the moment is the issue of legalising abortion. My home town is the very place that allowed landowning women to vote from 1881 – some 37 years before the UK even introduced it, yet to get an abortion, women usually travel as they cannot be accessed here!

Anyway, that is a discussion for another time perhaps. The point is this; society has adapted within the past 100 years and thankfully our living and working conditions are not so harsh (for the most part).

Kaly, one of many prostitutes in Butte, has to battle with the reality that she is pregnant. The father, whom Kaly has known since childhood, wants to help her raise the child. Having had a difficult, parentless childhood herself, she faces inner turmoil, wondering what kind of life her child will ever have. Should she raise the child, (most likely into prostitution), or allow the child to be raised in an unsafe foster home? Those are not the only options either, but they are not pretty at all.

Marika has different troubles of her own. Does she respect her father’s wishes and marry the husband he has found for her, or pursue her dreams of training to be a doctor? Marika is a stubborn girl and I admire her mettle, as even in fighting into a profession she has longed to join since girlhood – it is very much a man’s world. Time and again she is not taken seriously, but she keeps trying all the same!

Copper Sky is based around real events and disasters within Butte, Montana. Mining disasters, fires and later civil unrest were frequent occurrences and as Milana correctly highlights – mining is a dangerous profession. Working conditions were less than ideal and many men lost their lives labouring in those mineshafts.

Despite the serious themes of the book, it is not without beauty. Gorgeous, vivid descriptions of the landscape and community reflect the author’s love of her hometown, and the depth of both Kaly’s and Marika’s perspective is absorbing. I was never in any doubt as to whose perspective the narrative was being relayed from due to the contrasting ideas and attitudes of the women.

Whereas Kaly, through hardship and experience has a perhaps pessimistic attitude to life (as can only be expected given everything she has gone through), Marika is youthful, hopeful and has an arguably more naïve innocence about her. Each character is complex; even though Kaly has little hope or stability for her child, she still moderates herself for the health of the baby so doesn’t dismiss having it outright. Marika, on the other hand, has a fiery temper and willfulness to be her own person and not be given by one man into the possession of another.

Living in a small community myself, I sense, relate to and love the community spirit that comes together anytime disaster strikes. When it comes to saving lives, all social and economic disparities are set aside, as they should be, in my humble opinion. The author has captured the soul and portrayed both sides of the double-sided coin of life in a way that broadens perspective. It is one thing to know what lengths people will go to and what motivates them, and quite another to experience it by seeing through their eyes.
Rebecca mono