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By Mary Corcoran  In March [2021] and Women’s History Month it seems important to honor women homesteaders.
Mary Ann Tape was the first woman to take out a homestead claim in Williamsport, Emmons County, North Dakota. She was an unlikely transplant to the Dakotas from Providence, Rhode Island. Mary Ann was born 25 June 1850 in Walpole, MA. The oldest of three “stair-step” daughters, all two years apart, she studied to be a doctor in Rhode Island. It appeared that at least two of the Tape daughters suffered from heart disease (possibly the results of rheumatic fever, or a hereditary condition.) In 1878, Mary Ann was told by her doctor to give up her medical studies, as they were too taxing for her. At that time, it was believed that too much intellectual study was harmful to women and could danger their internal organs. The same theory held for strenuous exercise; it was thought debilitating to women’s health. However, Mary Ann convinced her parents to “Go West” to homestead in North Dakota in 1883. The prevailing belief was that wide open spaces might build up her health.
Her father, Joseph Tape, was a jeweler, watchmaker, and silversmith. Along with her mother Mary Guin, and younger sister Lizzie (Sarah Elizabeth) Tape, the family journeyed to Bismarck, where her father found work as a watchmaker, at E. L. Strauss and Brothers. By 1884, Joseph Tape had started acquiring land in Emmons County in Williamsport. In October of 1884, Joseph Tape was named official County Assessor, and collected taxes and analyzed land and holdings.
Mary Ann Tape took out her homestead claim around 1883 and enjoyed the first summer on her claim in Township 135, Range 76, Section 26. She collected wild-flowers, and painted botanical watercolors of them, as she had a deep interest in botany. However, her health was failing, and her doctor told her she must relinquish the idea of staying in “the West.” It was said that she never complained about her long illness. Mary Ann Tape died on 13 August 1884. Her obituary in The Emmons County Record was titled “A Patient Sufferer at Rest.”
Her sister, Lizzie Tape had married Albert Cordner, (1835-1912) a Civil War veteran who also homesteaded in Emmons County. Mary Ann left her homestead claim to Lizzie, who “proved it out” and received final proof in September 1890. Her father, Joseph Tape, along with wife Mary Tape finally returned East in 1911 to their old home in Rhode Island, explaining that they were “beyond midlife” when they lived in Williamsport. “Mrs. Tape and I are too old to transplant from New England to the western frontier.”
Mary Ann Tape, despite her poor health, and dashed career plans, exemplified the many brave women in pioneer times who took a chance on “land of their own.”
The above newspaper land clipping was provided, and the article written, by Mary Corcoran.
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