Betty Macdonald

SUMMARY. — The daughter of a mining engineer who trained her to be self-reliant, BETTY MACDONALD was born in 1908 and spent her childhood in some of the more rugged spots of this hemisphere — in Mexico, Idaho, and Montana. She entered the University of Washington expecting to major in art. But instead she fell in love and married. Bob, her husband, was fired with the idea of opening a chicken ranch on the Northwest Coast, and by pooling their wedding presents, their savings, and a small legacy, he and Betty scraped together $1500, enough to purchase forty acres, a six-room log house, a barn, two small chicken houses, twelve pullets, and, as spring came on, ten cartons, each carton containing one hundred baby chicks.

BETTY MACDONALD was born in Boulder, Colorado, in 1908. The daughter of a mining engineer, she lived all over the place — in Mexico City, then in Idaho, then in Butte, Montana, and finally in Seattle, where she came to rest long enough to do her schooling. She graduated from the Roosevelt High School and entered the University of Washington, intending to major in art. Instead, she fell in love and married. She was nineteen, Bob was thirtyone. With a capital investment of $450 they elected to become chicken farmers on the Northwest Coast. Betty had learned resourcefulness from her engineering father, but what she knew about chickens could be stuffed into an average-sized thimble. So her story begins.