The amazing story of Amanda Olson killing the man that "done her wrong" illustrates two conflicting facets of women's status in the 19th century.
The first is obvious from the Deseret News' extensive reporting of the shooting and her acquittal. She pleaded not guilty because of temporary insanity, reflecting the belief that "good" women, from respectable families, just could not commit murder if they were in their right minds.
That attitude toward women tended to place them on pedestals.
Most historians think the playground jingle has it right: "Lizzie Borden took an ax and gave her mother 40 whacks; when she saw what she had done, she gave her father 41." But Borden was found not guilty of the 1892 murder of her parents, probably because jurors thought a woman just couldn't do something that horrendous.
While most members of "the fair sex" were portrayed as superior souls, at the same time women were marginalized.
Research into what happened to Amanda Olson bears out the idea that, except for the occasional moment in the glare of the spotlight as happened with Olson, American women went about their daily lives nearly invisible to the world of commerce and politics. At the time of the shooting, September 1890, Amanda Olson lived with her father, mother and sister on C Street. Although her father was an obscure workman, he shows up here and there in the historical record. He was in the 1889, 1890, 1896 and 1898 Salt Lake directories, listed at first as connected with a grocery store and then with Sandberg Furniture Co. He was a carpenter and a "wood turner."
During the 1880 Census, the family lived on Mountain Street. It consisted of the parents and two children. Strangely, Amanda is listed not as Amanda but as Charlotte. But it is clearly the same person. Records of the 1890 Census were lost in a fire.
By 1900, Amanda had left home. Those remaining were the parents and sons, Anton and Conrad E.. The father died on April 9, 1903, at the family's home at age 64 of "apoplexy" (stroke), according to his death certificate.
But what of Amanda? The only clue readily available was an index notation in the LDS Church Family History Library. In 1892, in Salt Lake City, she married a man named, like her father, John Olson (although this man apparently did not have the middle initial F).
The logical place to search for information about Amanda and her husband are the official copies of marriage licenses maintained by the Salt Lake County clerk. But in microfilm, these voluminous documents are difficult to read, with their severely slanting handwriting and the fading of ink caused by the passage of more than a century. However, the couple registered their marriage with the LDS Church on Aug. 13, 1930, and the index indicates they were sealed in the rites of the church. Both signed the registration, showing they were alive at the time. Other than this brief notation, the public record is silent about Amanda Olson's later life.
Deseret News staff writer Jeannine Garrett also contributed to this article.
You can reach Joe Bauman by e-mail at bau@desnews.com