Re: MtMan-List: Reading Material

["John L. Allen" <jlallen@snet.net>]

Steve,

To Matt Despain's fine list of good reading material, I would add as
recommended reading: Robert Utley, A LIFE WILD AND PERILOUS (a recent work
that provides details on the role of mountain men in opening the West to
other travelers, government explorers, etc.); Dale Morgan and Eleanor Harris
(eds.), THE ROCKY MOUNTAIN JOURNALS OF WILLIAM MARSHALL ANDERSON (1834
travels in the Rockies with fur trappers); anything else written by or
edited by Dale Morgan; Richard Mackie, TRADING BEYOND THE MOUNTAINS (a
recent work on the trader-explorers of the HBC in Canada and intermountain
American West); Rufus Sage, ROCKY MOUNTAIN LIFE (travels with fur trappers
in the Forties); David Coyner, THE LOST TRAPPERS (fascinating account of
probably-fictitious travels before Ashley). Get a catalog from University of
Nebraska Press; their Bison books reprints (paperback) are cheap and inlcude
many of the better primary sources (journals, etc.).

Happy reading.

John Logan Allen

Dr. John L. Allen
21 Thomas Drive
Storrs, CT 06268
860/487-1346
jlallen@snet.net


-----Original Message-----
From: S.M.Despain-1 <sdespain@ou.edu>
To: hist_text@lists.xmission.com <hist_text@lists.xmission.com>
Date: Wednesday, October 21, 1998 4:15 PM
Subject: Re: MtMan-List: Reading Material


>SWcushing@aol.com wrote:
>>
>> Ho the list.
>> I am planning, already, for a long wet winter here in the NW and would
like a
>> list of the top five "must read" books on Mountain Men and the Fur Trade.
I've
>> read Bridger, Osborne Russell, Bonneville, Playboy, Meek, and Parkman to
>> mention a few.... Will be interesting to see how the "top five" develops.
>> Steve
>>
>
>
>Steve:
>
>Books on the mountian men I would recomend.
>
> For short biography see LeRoy Hafen and Harvey L. Carter two books by
>Nebraska Press derived from Hafen's Mountian Man and the Fur Trade (10
>vols.). Also I did one with the Hafen series but focusing on the
>Southwest fur trade titled Fur Trappers and Traders of the Far Southwest
>by Utah State University Press.  Janet Lecompt has recently done one of
>this ilk on just French fur men in the Far West.
> Other works would be Fred Gowans, Rocky Mountain Rendezvous; David J.
>Weber, The Taos Trappers; Dale Morgan, Jedediah Smith and the Opening of
>the West is the best biography in my opinion; the next best would be
>Harvey L. Carter, Dear Old Kit. Stay away from anything Stanley Vestal
>wrote, too much fillagree.
>
>These are just off the top of my head, good reading.
>
>Matt Despain
>