Summer 1854, somewhere on the high plains of the Oregon Trail:

Louise Graehl and her husband George had left the old country to journey to their new home in the American West. They had many adventures out on the trail. Once, for instance, they were caught in a stampede. Their oxen ran crazily across the rough ground, dragging the heavy laden wagon with little effort. The helpless family was bounced and tossed about the wagon in terror. When the team finally stopped, the family was more than glad to walk back to camp. Louise, with a little girl in one arm and a baby in the other, began walking back to camp through the tall prairie grass.

“There were snakes among the grass,” Louise said, “which frightened me very much.”

They made it to camp safely, though they were late for supper.

But somewhere across those open and desolate spaces, George became so ill that he was unable to drive the team or even walk. He was reduced to riding in the wagon with the small children. This left Louise to drive the oxen. She described that [it] was “a pretty hard job to help driving through a long summer day with a baby in my arms and another at my side crying to be carried too.” Nonetheless, Louise pressed on.

Late one evening just at dusk, Louise’s wagon was lagging behind the rest of the train when suddenly the yoke broke, that device which secured her oxen to the wagon. Well, the oxen promptly ran off to the camp which was about two miles away leaving Louise’s wagon stranded in the middle of the road in the middle of nowhere - just as darkness closed in. And as the darkness gathered around, so did the wolves gather about the wagon.

“I could not light a fire,” Louise said, “for I had no materials, so I sat on the front seat holding my axe in my hands ready to try to defend myself and dear ones from the wolves who were howling around. … I waited until midnight when some brothers came for us. They made a big fire to scare the wolves away and we slept by turn until morning.”

You know - my friends, there is something about a young mother out in the middle of nowhere surrounded by howling wolves in the dark of night defending her family with nothing more than an axe that kindles the imagination, humbles me, and inspires me.

Truly, we never know what we can do until adversity demands it of us.