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Dorothy M. Johnson
The western fiction genre is rife with scenes of the violent, lawless west and is the realm of the male author. Yet, one Montana woman stands out as a prolific western storyteller who made an indelible mark on the writing world.
Dorothy Johnson at a book signing
"Everybody out!" yelled the masked man. "With your hands up."
The printer, as he half fell out of the coach (trying to keep his hands up but having to hang on with on them), noted details about the bandit: tall from the waist up but sort of short-legged, dusty brown hat, dusty blue shirt, red bandanna over his face.
The whiskey salesman stumbled out hastily - he had been through this a couple of times before and knew better than to argue - and wondered why a man would hold up stage going into a gold camp. The sensible thing was to hold up one going out.
The blacksmith, suddenly wide awake, was the third to descend. He accepted the situation philosophically, having no money with him anyway, and not even a watch.
But Mr. Armistead tried to defend his daughter and all of them. He warned her, "Don’t get out of the coach."
As he stepped down he tried to fire a small pistol he had brought along for emergencies like this.
The bandit shot him.
Billy McGinnis, jerking on the lines to hold the frightened horses, startled the masked man into firing a second shot. As Billy pitched off the seat the team lit out running, with Elizbeth Armistead screaming in the coach.
Excerpt from "The Hanging Tree."
Dorothy Marie Johnson was born in Iowa 1905. As a child, Dorothy moved with her parents to Whitefish, Montana. Her dad died just a few years later and she and her mother stayed in what was then a rough and tumble town. She graduated from Whitefish High School in 1922.
Whitefish was carved from the woods and had the stumps to prove it. There were few respectable work opportunities available to women in Whitefish in the early 1900s. Dorothy's mother pieced together several part-time jobs to keep the two afloat after her husband passed. She wrote the personal columns for the Whitefish Pilot Newspaper, was an assistant to the City Water Commissioner, and she was elected to be the City Treasurer. She left the City Water Commissioner position and went to work for the Local Power Company. In addition to her jobs, she kept a garden and raised chickens and earned money selling produce and chickens.
Dorothy helped her mother with these jobs and also worked to save for college. She worked as a relief telephone operator whenever she was available.
Dorothy M. Johnson senior portrait.
After high school she went to college first in Bozeman and then in Missoula. She graduated with an English degree from University of Montana in 1928.
She married briefly while she was in Missoula, but he was a gambler and ran up huge debts. She worked as a secretary first in Washington State and then Wisconsin. At first, most of her income was spent repaying her ex-husband's gambling debts. She vowed to never marry again.
She sold her first story about a cowboy and his girl, "Bonnie George Campbell," to the Saturday Evening Post for $400. She thought this would be the beginning of a lucrative writing career. However, it was another 11 years before she sold another story. She worked in business journalism writing for a textbook publishing company and a women's digest magazine, for a steady income.
She spent her time off writing short stories and continuing to hone her craft.
In 1935 she was hired as an editor in New York City, and she continued writing. She claimed her focus on western stories was due to homesickness. In 1941 she sold 4 more stories to the Saturday Evening Post. She sold dozens of stories to different magazines including Colliers, Argosy, and Cosmopolitan, and made a name for herself as a western fiction writer. She visited Montana on vacations and stayed at dude ranches to learn more about the western life she loved to write about.
She visited Whitefish in 1950 and was offered a position as editor with the Whitefish Pilot. She accepted and she moved home. The position pay was not enough to keep her in Whitefish long. Within three years she was offered a more lucrative position in Missoula.
Depot at Whitefish, Montana on Great Northern Railroad
She moved to Missoula and began working at the University of Montana as the secretary-manager of the Montana State Press Association and as a member of the teaching staff in the School of Journalism.
She was awarded an honorary Doctor of Letters by the University of Montana in 1973.
Portrait of Montana writer Dorothy M. Johnson.
Eventually she sold two volumes of short stories. The first was titled Indian Country and was published in 1953. "The Hanging tree" was published in 1958 as a bound volume of 10 short stories including "Lost Sister," "The Last Boast," and "The Man Who Knew the Buckskin Kid."
The Hanging Tree was released as a motion picture film in 1959 starring Gary Cooper, Maria Schell and Karl Malden and George C. Scott. It takes place in Montana during the gold rush.
Fox Theater, Premiere of 'The Hanging Tree'
Two more of her stories were made into movies for the big screen.
The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance starring Jimmy Stewart, John Wayne, and Vera Miles was released in 1962.
A Man Called Horse starring Richard Harris, alongside Judith Anderson, Jean Gascon, Manu Tupou, Corinna Tsopei, Dub Taylor, and James Gammon was released in 1970.
Dorothy M. Johnson, Gary Cooper, and others at a press conference.
Dorothy M. Johnson was honored with many awards during her writing career including the 1956 Spur Award of the Western Writers of America for the best short story of the west. In 1959 she was given the key to Whitefish, and she was named an Honorary Police Chief of the same city. In 1976 she was awarded the Levi Stauss Golden Saddleman Award. She was adopted by the Blackfeet tribe and was given the name Kills Both Places.
Dorothy died on November 11, 1984. During her life she published 17 books and 52 short stories, most of which focused on the American West.
Photo Credits
University of Montana Mansfield Library
Dorothy Johnson at a book signing (Unknown). Montana History Portal, accessed 06/03/2024, https://www.mtmemory.org/nodes/view/18399
Harris, Charles L., -1942, Dorothy Johnson at a press conference (Unknown). Montana History Portal, accessed 06/03/2024, https://www.mtmemory.org/nodes/view/18387
Dorothy Johnson in New York (Circa 1940-1949). Montana History Portal, accessed 06/03/2024, https://www.mtmemory.org/nodes/view/18381
Dorothy M. Johnson (1970). Montana History Portal, accessed 06/03/2024, https://www.mtmemory.org/nodes/view/18405
Dorothy M. Johnson (1922). Montana History Portal, accessed 06/03/2024, https://www.mtmemory.org/nodes/view/18376
Unidentified photographer, Dorothy M. Johnson. (Between 1960-1970). Montana History Portal, accessed 06/03/2024, https://www.mtmemory.org/nodes/view/73450
Fox Theater, Premiere of 'The Hanging Tree' (Unknown). Montana History Portal, accessed 06/03/2024, https://www.mtmemory.org/nodes/view/13025
Bibliography
Elwood, Henry, Kalispell, Montana and the Upper Flathead Valley (1989). Montana History Portal, accessed 06/03/2024, https://www.mtmemory.org/nodes/view/5595
Sands, Diane, Women of Montana Essays 1981-1985 (1986). Montana History Portal, accessed 06/03/2024, https://www.mtmemory.org/nodes/view/90422
Montana PBS, Gravel in her Gut and Spit in her Eye (2005). Montana PBS, accessed on 03/06/2024 https://www.pbs.org/video/montanapbs-presents-gravel-in-her-gut-and-spit-in-her-eye/
Johnson, Dorothy M., When You and I Were Young Whitefish (1982) Dorothy M. Johnson
