The Divorce Colony

How Women Revolutionized Marriage and Found Freedom on the American Frontier

By: April White

Narrated by: April White, Lisa Flanagan

From a historian and senior editor at Atlas Obscura comes a fascinating account of the daring nineteenth-century women who moved to South Dakota to divorce their husbands and start living on their own terms.

For a woman traveling without her husband in the late nineteenth century, there was only one reason to take the train all the way to Sioux Falls, South Dakota—one sure to garner disapproval from fellow passengers. On the American frontier, the new state offered a tempting freedom often difficult to obtain elsewhere: divorce.

With the laxest divorce laws in the country, five railroad lines, and the finest hotel for hundreds of miles, the small city became the unexpected headquarters for unhappy spouses—the infamous “The Divorce Colony”. These society divorcees put Sioux Falls at the center of a heated national debate over the future of American marriage. As clashes mounted in the country's gossip columns, church halls, courtrooms and even the White House, the women caught in the crosshairs in Sioux Falls geared up for a fight they didn’t go looking for, a fight that was the only path to their freedom.

In The Divorce Colony, writer and historian April White unveils the incredible social, political, and personal dramas that unfolded in Sioux Falls and reverberated around the country through the stories of four very different women: Maggie De Stuers, a descendent of the influential New York Astors whose divorce captivated the world; Mary Nevins Blaine, a daughter-in-law to a presidential hopeful with a vendetta against her meddling mother-in-law; Blanche Molineux, an aspiring actress escaping a husband she believed to be a murderer; and Flora Bigelow Dodge, a vivacious woman determined, against all odds, to obtain a “dignified” divorce.

Entertaining, enlightening, and utterly feminist, The Divorce Colony is a rich, deeply researched tapestry of social history and human drama that reads like a novel. Amidst salacious newspaper headlines, juicy court documents, and high-profile cameos from the era’s most well-known players, this story lays bare the journey of the turn-of-the-century socialites who took their lives into their own hands and reshaped the country’s attitudes about marriage and divorce.

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Critic reviews

"For those out there who have an abiding fascination with nineteenth-century railways, with matters concerning sex, scandal, divorce, exile, and refuge, with the Frontier and the prairies—for anyone who would fain meld Peyton Place with West by Northwest and The Shining, April White has done us all a great favor. I loved every word of this most surprising book."

—Simon Winchester,, New York Times bestselling author of The Professor and the Madman and The Men Who United the States

“Unearthing a hidden gem previously lost to history, April White weaves impeccable research and elegant prose into a thought-provoking page turner. The Divorce Colony is an irresistible work of narrative nonfiction.”

—Matthew Pearl, New York Times bestselling author of The Dante Club and The Taking of Jemima Boone

Excellent context

Highlights the difficulty women face then and now in order to achieve their freedom; important context for those women today

I wanted to like it more than I did.

The interview with the author at the end of the book shows her excitement for the topic and reveals her reasons for researching and writing on this topic. Sadly her enthusiasm didn't translate, for me, into a gripping book. Oddly things like reading the chapter titles might have helped or some context. Why these particular characters were important in changing law would have added context. As it was, it seemed like a bunch of vignettes strung together as essays without a through- line when it was very clear from the interview that she really did want to make a point.

Well done

I reside in downtown Sioux Falls and it’s crazy fascinating to listen to its history and the beautiful buildings I pass by so frequently.

So fascinating!

This book is a beautiful and a rather fascinating trip into the late 1800s divorce history. It sucks you into the stories of these women and their divorce challenges during this time period.

I need the mini series or movie next please!

Outstanding Work

The quality of scholarship and masterful story-telling are well worthwhile ! I look forward to Ms. White’s next book:)
Benjamin Feldman
www.newyorkwanderer.com