Out Here on Soap Creek -- A Good Read!

  I am reading Out Here on Soap Creek by Inez McAlister Faber (1897-1994) [Ames, IA: The Iowa State University Press, 1982].  Anyone interested in life in rural southern Iowa would enjoy this autobiography by a former Appanoose County resident.

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"Home is here on the farm with my memories."

--Inez McAlister Faber

  In 1927, Inez Faber began writing under the pen name Elizabeth Beresford. A few years later she dropped the pen name but continued to write, and for the next 25 years she wrote "A Farm Woman Speaks Up" for the Des Moines Register and Tribune and "Out Here on Soap Creek" for the Centerville Iowegian.

  This book gathers together some of Faber's columns, sprinkles them with a narrative account of her life in rural Iowa, and treats the reader to rich memories of the rural Midwest.

  Out Here on Soap Creek covers the weather, the Iowa landscape, the kind of farming practiced, the crops, the people, the animals, and the style of life in rural Iowa during the second quarter of this century. The columns tell of life on the farm, Inez and Dick's four sons, their pets, the livestock, Inez's parents and their pioneer ancestors, childhood memories and playmates, the sandpile and swing, the maple trees Inez loves, and the thrill and hard work involved in building their own home. Many of the columns included in this book involve members of Faber's family, close neighbors and friends.

  Out Here on Soap Creek is a reflection of Inez Faber's life and through these columns you will learn that her life has always been interesting. She makes these years come alive in this captivating memoir of growing into adulthood in the early part of the century.

  This book offers a chronological picture of Iowa farm life from the perspective of the woman of the family. The stories are sometimes serious, sometimes hilarious, but always touching. The experiences related are common to farm women of that ear in every part of the country.

--From the 1982 cover of Out Here on Soap Creek