Clarice E. Richards

Born Clarice Estabrook in Dayton, Ohio, in 1875, she married Jarvis Richards in 1900. According to the Denver Public Library’s archival record, she moved to her husband’s ranch in Elbert County, Colorado, before later settling in Denver in 1907, where she was active in women’s social clubs.

She is best known for A Tenderfoot Bride: Tales from an Old Ranch, a book published in the 1920s and now preserved by Project Gutenberg and the Internet Archive. The work reflects the experiences of a newcomer learning ranch life in Colorado, which gives it the feel of lived observation rather than distant romance.

That background helps explain the appeal of her writing today: it offers a personal window into western ranch life, women’s adaptation to unfamiliar places, and the everyday texture of an earlier Colorado. Even with only a limited public record readily available online, her surviving book and archival footprint suggest a writer closely connected to the world she described.