Guest Author - Pam Garlick

With Mother’s Day 2007 only days away, I choose writing about this interesting book as a tribute to mothers. The book is old, published in 1954, so I don’t know how many readers will find, but it is a book well worth reading as the author, Elisabeth Logan Davis unfolds the stories of the mother’s behind several famous names.

Jane Lampton Clemens, mother of Sam Clemens, was known for her strength and wit seeing her sickly child through many difficult times. It quickly becomes clear where Sam, better known to readers everywhere as Mark Twain, gained at least some of his wit. Wit that many of us grew up on and thoroughly enjoyed.

In this book we read that Susan Catherine Wright “exemplified the old adage that necessity is the mother of invention,” for her ability to manage a family with five children on $900 a year. Of course the word “invention” is the key word here, as she is the mother of Wilbur and Orville Wright.

Today when we hear the words “Mayo Clinic” many of us might not even know the names of the brothers William and Charles who founded that clinic. If that is the case, it is doubtful we’ve heard of their mother, yet she was a woman who impacted greatly on their lives. She was a mother who struggled to bring up a family of four in the baron regions of early Minnesota, yet took the time to put together a four-foot telescope so she and her sons could look at the stars.

Ida Stover Eisenhower realized early in her marriage that she was going to be the manager in their family. She raised six sons, all of whom she was quite proud. She was over eighty years old when her son, a general, returned home from WWII, a hero. In later years, she would say to that same son, President of the United States Dwight D. Eisenhower, “Lead the world toward peace whose foundation is brotherly love”.

This book describes other mothers and women of influence to famous people. There is, however, one common theme, I believe had much to do with the greatness these children would eventually achieve. These women raised their families by the book, the greatest book, the Bible.

This book can be a great inspiration to help women everywhere realize just how much influence they have on the children they raise. It would also make a good resource book.

You can find this book below but I can't guarantee how many are available:



Here's another great book about mothers: