Surviving in the uncivilized mining camps was a day-to-day struggle for most of the women living in those makeshift communities of the late 1890s and early 1900s. The stories included in Colorado Mountain Women convey many of their experiences. They battled extreme weather conditions, isolation that could drive a person mad, disease that often took their children from them, poverty and starvation, and primitive living conditions. All the stories are fictional, but all are based on women's actual experiences. The West could not have progressed and prospered without the strength, courage, and determination of such women.