The whole idea of mail-order brides originates on the American wild-west frontier of the mid-1800s. Men were moving west in search of work, land and even gold. Most met with enough success to settle down and stay. But the one thing missing was the opportunity to marry and raise a family. Very few women lived out west. The only hope of a lonely man was to attract a woman from the eastern states to the more rustic and adventurous life of the west. So men wrote letters to churches and published personal ads in magazines and newspapers. In reply, interested women – Like Maggie Bredan’s ‘Twice Promised’ Olson sisters, would write back with photographs and information about themselves.

Although hundreds of thousands of white women did travel west, they were practically all married as it was thought unsuitable for women to go west alone. One chronicler of the American west, Mari Sandoz, recounted that the shortage of marriageable was so severe that, inNebraska, "a man had to marry anything that got off the train." The balance was further upset by The American Civil war. So many men were killed that, by 1865, there was an estimated 30,000 single women and war widows in the eastern states. Newspapers began matchmaking or "matrimonial columns" of paid advertisements and photographs. A typical example read:

"A young lady residing in one of the small towns inCentral New Yorkis desirous of opening a correspondence with some young man in the West, with a view to a matrimonial engagement... she is about 24 years of age, possesses a good moral character... is tolerably well-educated, and thoroughly versed in the mysteries of housekeeping."

The ads weren’t all placed by women. Men sought wives more frequently than women looked for husbands. While the ad above is more about what the wife-to-be has to offer, this husband-in-prospect writes more about his own demands:

"A Bachelor of 40, good appearance and substantial means, wants a wife. She must be under 30, amiable, and musical."

It took about four weeks for letters to go from east to west and not everyone was literate enough to carry on a long distance courtship. Illiterate men dictated letters to typists who, for a fee, would improve the wording of their overtures. Men and women could easily misrepresent their physical attributes, status, or finances. The 1911 Wahpeton Times reports on a New York girl for whom, on seeing the face of her intended on arrival in Buford, North Dakota, "the spell was immediately broken".

By the twentieth century, matchmaking for profit had arrived and today there are more than 200 internet companies connecting men and women around the world, and charging for their services. For those fortunate enough not to need their help, the mail-order bride business is mocked as an act of desperation or pilloried as synonymous with trafficking and enslavement. Yet it remains that many are unable to meet suitable partners, and Christians are no different in this respect. The loneliness and need to be loved, endured by the fictional characters of Maggie Brendan’s 'Deeply Devoted' and 'Twice Promised', is serious and real in our churches today. Finding a partner is not easy. And for some it’s the deepest grief of their life. I’m not proposing that we all become matchmakers in our churches. I am suggesting that we all need to be a little more sympathetic and understanding of those in our fellowships who endure the single life through no desire of their own. – Les Ellison.