When Laura McCutchen died in May of 1961, her son, Rhoades came back to Belle Fourche for her funeral. Afterwards, Rhoades visited his former home to clear out his mother's belongings. Apparently Rhoades didn't have much time to go through her things. He drove a dump truck up to one of the windows and threw his mother's posessions into the dump truck from the window upstairs. He then hauled her precious belongings, along with her diaries, to the local dump. At the time, Daisy Kiplinger was the "overseer" at the city landfill. She saw that Mrs. McCutchen's diaries had been left at the dump and told the city auditor, Fred Lovell, about it. Fred Lovell was Linda Wendt's father, and he mentioned the discarded diaries to his daughter, who had had Mrs. McCutchen for a teacher in high school. Linda gladly offered to preserve the rescued diaries.

A 1931 diary is the earliest diary that Linda Wendt has. From that time on, Laura McCutchen wrote in a diary every single day of her life. Through reading the diaries, it is easy to perceive Mrs. McCutchen`s character. She was an extraordinary woman who led an elaborate life as a teacher, mother, wife, friend, accomplished linguist and scholar, and world traveler.

This is a collection of Mrs. McCutchen's diary entries, word-for-word. Most of these excerpts are just small segments of what was written on that particular day, as she usually wrote at least half of a page, sometimes much more. Along with a detailed description of what she did each day, she often wrote down what she had to eat, and she almost always included a brief description of what the weather was like on that day.

Formerly the McCutchen house, but now known as the Candlelight Bed & Breakfast.