Freedom From the Ashes
From History Haven She was fifteen when they sold her — just a girl with dirt on her cheeks and fear in her eyes, traded like whiskey to the Red Lantern Saloon. The men there called her “sweetheart,” but their words were knives. Nights blurred into one another, the smoke thick, the music cruel. She learned early that smiles could be armor, silence could be a weapon, and dreams were a dangerous thing to keep. But one night, while the storm clawed at the windows and the piano played its last note, Nora climbed the stairs, looked out over the muddy street below, and made her choice. She jumped. They said she broke her arm in the fall, but she didn’t stop running. Through rain, through hunger, through men who thought they could catch her again. Somewhere along the plains, she found work in a kitchen, then a stable, then a boardinghouse. Every dollar she earned went into a tin box, hidden beneath a floorboard. She taught herself to read from old newspapers and to shoot from a farmer w...