Fist in the Wilderness

by David Lavender

Book Overview

The story of the American fur trade has been told many times from different viewpoints, but David Lavender was the first to place it within the overall contest for empire between Britain and the United States. Rather than offering a simple hagiography of men like Jedediah Smith, Kit Carson, Jim Bridger and other legendary trappers, Lavender relates the story of men such as John Jacob Astor and Ramsay Crooks who competed with Britain's Hudson's Bay...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0803279760
• ISBN13: 9780803279766
• Release Date: May 1998
• Publisher: University of Nebraska Press
• Length: 498 Pages
• Weight: 1.05 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.1" x 6.1" x 9.1"

Customer Reviews

A Wow!

Without a doubt, this is the finest book I have read about the American fur trade. It is the biography of Ramsey Crooks, John Jacob Astor's primary field agent, and his amazing participation in the early years of America's post colonial participation of this business. If you read about Astor and the fur trade, the literature seems to focus on Astor's Astoria in 1811 and then jumps 25 years to 1830, when fur expeditions began embarking from St. Louis focused on the Rocky Mountain trade. Entering the romance of the Mountain Man, one is left with the impression that the mountain trade and the fur trade are synonymous. No so. The fur trade began in the 1650s and lasted until the 1840s. It was one of the key economic drivers behind the exploration and settlement of North America. It launched wars, set today's international boundary between the United States and Canada and was truly a global endeavor. This is a segment of that story, from 1803 until the business was supplanted by Chinese silk in the 1840s. It is a story of the middle days of this business when the focus centered on Minnesota's Boundary Waters, Wisconsin's Prairie du Chien and Michigan's Mackinac Island, i.e., the time in the fur trade that seriously predates the fabled Mountain Man. It is wonderfully well written and presents some of the very early history of Detroit, Chicago, Minnesota, Wisconsin and Michigan prior to the time when whites fought Indians for territorial control. Much went on here and we meet characters that are the stuff of legend: William Clark, Tecumseh, Zebulon Pike, James Wilkinson, Manuel Lisa, the Chouteaus, etc., etc., too many, far too many movers and shakers to list here. Let me just say that Lavender's story is smack in the middle of the overall struggle between the United States and Britain for control of the North American continent. It is the story of John Jacob Astor's American Fur Company in competition with Britain's Hudson Bay Company, a most integral part of early US economic history. It was a competition waged deep within the heart of the country when US and British law was at times nonexistent and at other times diametrically opposed. It gives the reader a visceral understanding for early US, western, hatred for the British and for the British unending efforts to obfuscate the terms and conditions of the Treaty of Paris. An empire was at stake and so too was unbridled wealth.

INCREDIBLE WORK!!! EXCELLENT WRITING!!

Lavender is Incredibly dynamic as a Writer and sheds so much illuminating grace on the REAL Fur Trade of Americas 1800's! The Copy I received was BEAUTIFUL And had an amazing dust jacket and newspaper clippings!! I am so thankful and this copy is going to be treasured by all generations to come in America!! With Lavender's excellent work, the History of our American Nation is being expanded and enjoyed greater and greater each year!!!

challenging

I would argue with the previous reviewer and call this book "challenging" rather than monotonous; of course it depends on the level of your interest in the subject...for me, it approaches the passionate...the author uses what might be called the "immersion" method of historical writing which can indeed be exhausting; this is not a book to be read in huge swatches; rather,a few pages at a time must be digested thoroughly...it requires a commitment of time and concentration, and should be read steadily from start to finish...you wouldn't want to put it down for weeks and then try to pick it up again. This book rewards effort; the reader will leave it with a vast knowledge of this arcane subject and most likely, a feeling of gratitude for a huge lesson in North American geography. It's amazing to find out how little you know about the latter subject until you start reading a book like this....also recommended, the author's ONE MAN'S WEST, a lively and fascinating chronicle of early mining and ranching adventures.