Scott speak of her directly, albeit there has always been in my mind a feeling that his deep and abiding respect for womankind found its first inspiration in the memory of his mother. It was the opinion of Mr. Scott's sister, Mrs. Coburn[1]—the one among his several sisters whom I knew well—that the mother left perhaps a deeper impress on the son than did the father. It was from her that he gained the elements of tenderness and sympathy which often tempered his more aggressive tendencies. I came to understand Mr. Scott's reserve respecting his mother when, after his death, I was told by his son Leslie that his father had once remarked that he could hardly think of her without tears. And indeed those of us who know how the conditions of pioneer life pressed upon womanhood, can easily conceive his motives. Whatever of hardihood and endurance was demanded of the pioneer, the requirement was multiplied as related to the pioneer's wife. For the gentler sort of womankind—and to this type by all accounts Anne Roelofson belonged—life in the wilderness was a long agony of self-sacrifice. With none of the exhilarations of the conflict with crude conditions, so powerful in their appeal to men, there had still to be suffered the same obstacles plus denial of a thousand tender impulses and a thousand deep ambitions which masculine character may never feel. To the end of his life Mr. Scott remembered—this I have from his son—that when he was fourteen years of age, and just before her death, his mother called him to a private talk and gave him admonitions for the guidance of his life which took form as the very foundation stones of his character. Anne Roelofson, as we have seen, was of German extraction, and her family still living prosperously in Illinois are worthy folk industrious, progressive, self-respecting. These qualities the mother of Mr. Scott had in eminent development. And by due inheritance they became the possession of her son.
- ↑ Catharine Amanda Coburn, associate editor The Oregonian 1888-1913. Born in Tazewell county, Illinois, November 30, 1839; died at Portland May 28, 1913. She was one of the able members of The Oregonian staff, an efficient and devoted assistant of her brother, the editor. She made strong impress upon the newspaper-reading community.
