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The Witch of Mansfield: The Tetched Life of Phebe Wise by Mark S. Jordan

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


This was one of my Ohioana book festival buys and it's definitely niche local Ohio history. Phebe Wise isn't anyone famous. She was more or less local color but in a way that made it a bit more interesting to me. We don't usually see average people getting biographies written about them, though maybe calling Phebe average is a disservice.

I will say the title is a bit of a click bait in a way. No one really thought of her as a witch except maybe youngsters who called the strange old lady in the ramshackle house is a witch (there's always one isn't there in rural areas? It's going to be me pretty soon). And in some ways this biography is more about the men around her than Phebe herself because they had such an effect on her life and shaped her.

Christian Wise was her father. We have no solid year of birth for Phebe but she was a younger child and in the mid 1800s that meant the role of caretaker for her aging parents would fall to her (so no marriage, no career as a teacher) with the expectations she would get the house in the end (as was customary at the time). Christian did have her trained in the classics including literature and piano (he hated her banjo playing) But he also filled her head with how much money his land/house/waterways were worth and to be wary of any man wanting to marry her because they'd be after her money. Besides she was 'too Indian looking' for anyone to be interested. (there's some speculation on that cruel statement)

Phebe fulfilled her expected role, even ending up living in much poverty as she obeyed her father's wishes, holding onto the property. However the townspeople also believed in the wealth left to her and there is a chunk of this biography dedicated to the three men who broke into the house to rob and torture her (with lifelong lasting effects)

The biggest part of the biography however is given to Jake Kastanowitz, a would be suitor turner stalker turned mentally insane. This part of the biography is absolutely bonkers and I don't want to spoil how it turned out. You have to feel very sorry for Phebe. On the other hand, you also get to see how she takes no crap from anyone.

The weirder part of this biography is given to the last man influencing Phebe's life and actually more how she influenced his. Louis Bromfield, a Pulitzer Prize winning author, met Phebe and her guard/attack horse, Scottie, when he was a young boy. They had other conversations over the years, not many, but she had such a lasting effect on him. She ended up inspiring several of his female characters. He was very open about this and every new book or short story collection was to be sent to her (and they were up to her death)

Phebe herself was interesting but in a way tragic. Once her parents passed, she started dressing in the ballgowns (Pre-Civil War) that she wasn't allowed to touch because they were too expensive. She grew her own food/had chickens which wasn't that unusual in that time period but she was also isolated on her father's farm. She didn't really have a life of her own or maybe she had exactly the life she wanted.

I had never heard of Phebe before this but I'm glad I got to know her a little.



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