Inspiration Behind the Writing of THE MOLLYS B. Part 1
the mystery and the magic
People ask what inspired my writing of “The Molly’s B.” The incident with Molly the heifer executing (forgive the pun – perverse, for sure, but for some reason makes me chuckle) her grand escape from the slaughterhouse in Great Falls, Montana occurred in 2006. That was a busy year for me; I was taking care of my elderly parents, working full-time, and just getting through each day. I remember reading the article about her valiant escape in the Great Falls Tribune. I was mostly amused by it but also inspired by this bovine’s determination. I cut it out of the newspaper, added it to a folder I’d been keeping for years about animals, and then forgot about it.
Photo Credit: Staff Photographer Robin Loznak, Great Falls Tribune/Associated Press Archives
Eight years later Molly made the news again. This time she was being moved to an animal sanctuary in the Helena valley. The article provided a recap of her escapade (hilarious again in its retelling) and proceeded to tell readers about what she’d been doing in the intervening years. Molly had been a resident of two farm animal sanctuaries that had had to close, so her new home in 2014 became The Last Best Place for Animals. The story once again tickled my funny bone, so for my own amusement, I cut the article out of the newspaper, filed it away, and proceeded to forget about it.
By this time, my parents had both died, I was no longer working full time, and I was engaged in learning the craft of writing children’s books. Always on the lookout for story ideas, I visited my folder about animals where I had stumbled across the newspaper articles about Molly. I remember thinking what fun it would be to write her story, but how? A cow escaping from a slaughterhouse? For children?
Fast forward another eight years: it was November. My husband and I were flying home from New York City, and I was as sick as sick could be - the kind of embarrassing sick that had me using the motion sickness bag. And in that weird, brain-fogged, “please let me die” place, I was touched by magic, and THE MOLLYS B. landed in my lap.
Photo Credit: Denver Public Library Special Collections, [X-21691]
Molly the bovine was named after the famous, original unsinkable “Molly” - Margaret Tobin Brown. An indomitable force in her day for her many humanitarian and feminist activities, Margaret was also famous for having survived the sinking of the RMS Titanic in 1912. Her natural buoyancy led to her being nicknamed “Molly” years later when a play was written about her life.
When Molly the bovine was recaptured and returned to the meat packing plant, the manager, Del Morris, didn’t have the heart to return her to the slaughter pens. Her gumption to overcome her fate spoke to him. He secured her freedom and named her “Molly” after the original because in addition to the heifer’s encounters with moving objects (cars, trucks, and a train), she had also survived an ordeal with water – a fast-moving ride down the Missouri River. Here was another indomitable, buoyant female.
In my flulike stupor, the text started unfurling. With thoughts racing, I dictated the text to my husband, who patiently let me interrupt his reading each time I leaned over with a fresh line. I clearly saw the two Mollys, their stories told side-by-side in parallel format. Separated by a century, I focused on them surviving a single, shared experience, and how both, from places of determination and inner strength, fought to save their lives. And succeeded!
I wrote the first draft of THE MOLLYS B. in four brain-addled hours, but it’s evident that the desire to tell this story had been germinating a long time - eighteen years! Success, yes? No. Because even though I had my first draft down on paper and the fun of lots of research to look forward to, I also had a problem.
