The Folks in the Woods

The Folks in the Woods focuses on Mary Ann Ackerson, 1904-91, in an isolated French village located in southeast Missouri. When she was seven years old, her parents--Daly and Sarah Ackeson--died of typhoid fever on successive days in 1911. Because Missouri was not yet a state, there were no adoption procedures for Mary Ann and her two brothers and one sister. The author's maternal great-grandfather and great-grandmother, Zeno and Sarah Osia, took Mary Ann to live with them. She grew up with their son--Joseph, who died at the age of seventeen two years later--and their daughter, Margaret--the author's maternal grandmother--who was a few years older than Mary Ann. Mary Ann became a feminist before feminism was invented. At her time in history, she entered a man's world and adopted it instead of maintaining the customs of a woman's world. This is her story and the stories of other folks who lived near her in the woods.