The dry, rocky landscape that confronted 55 year-old Morris as she stepped off the stage at South Pass City appeared startlingly different from the fertile landscape she had known in Illinois and New York. Instead, her new home at in elevation meant scratching out a living in a barren gulch at the mouth of canyon near the Continental Divide. The Morrises settled into a 24 foot by 26 foot (7 × 9 m) log cabin with a sod roof that Esther's oldest son had purchased.