The Women of the Copper Country by Mary Doria Russell: A Review

Mary Doria Russell/Author

From the 1840s through the early 1900s, copper mining was, by far, the biggest industry in Copper Country (Keweenaw Penninsula in Upper Michigan). 

At one point, these Michigan copper mines produced about 90 percent of all the copper mined in the United States. But the life of a miner was fraught with danger. During this time period, a miner typically worked 10 to 12-hour shifts, six days a week. And the miners lived and purchased food and clothing in company-run stores. In a very real way, the mining companies controlled most of their lives.

This troubled history is the subject of Mary Doria Russell's The Women of the Copper Country. Russell zeroes in on the famous strike against the Calumet & Hecla Mining Company by the Western Federation of Miners Union.

The strike lasted about nine months and culminated in the disaster at the Italian Hall on Christmas Eve of  1913. About eighty people were killed, most of them children, who had come for a special Christmas celebration among the mining families who were members of the union.

Of course, the tension between the miners who chose to strike and those who did not, and the company bosses and their workers are ripe backgrounds for the story. And Russell does an excellent job of offering up a spectacular work of fictionalized history.

Most of her book is based on actual fact. Some names are changed and some pieces of the puzzle are smoothed or slightly exaggerated to make for a stronger story. Russell weaves a masterpiece of a tale, incorporating lots of history.

It should be noted that Russell has a Ph.D. in biological anthropology from the University of Michigan, and has taught anatomy at Case Western Reserve University. She has written seven novels - mostly works of historical fiction and most of them are best sellers.

Her writing is crisp, solidly detailed, and moves along quickly. Russell knows a good story when she sees it, and knows how to tell it.

The working conditions the miners faced were horrible. Their daily life was rigidly regimented by their employer. Anyone who wonders why the labor movement in the United States, during this time period especially, was so strong, only need read this book. 

Annie Klobuchar Clemenc

Much of The Women of the Copper Country centers around Anna Klobuchar Clemenc, known as the Joan of Arc of the labor movement among the miners in Calumet. But the arc of the story involves several other women - those who didn't go into the mines, but held their homes together. And, during the strike, they were chiefly responsible for the daily marches held through the town of Calumet to the offices of Calumet & Hecla Mining Company.

It is this focus on the women that gives Russell's book its power. 

As a work of historical fiction, as an account of an important piece of Michigan history, as a record of the labor movement in the United States, and as a tale of everyday life in a mining town, I highly recommend Mary Doria Russell's The Women of Copper Country.