The Life And Adventures Of James P Beckwourth

Portrays the life and adventures of the freedman, frontiersman, and fur trader who became a Crow warrior

Thousands of black cowpunchers drove cattle up the Chisholm Trail after the Civil War, but only Nat Love wrote about his experiences. Born to slaves in Davidson County, Tennessee, the newly freed Love struck out for Kansas after the war. He was fifteen and already endowed with a reckless and romantic readiness. In wide-open Dodge City he joined up with an outfit from the Texas Panhandle to begin a career riding the range and fighting Indians, outlaws, and the elements. Years later he would say, "I had an unusually adventurous life". That was rare understatement. More characteristic was Love's claim: "I carry the marks of fourteen bullet wounds on different parts of my body, most any one of which would be sufficient to kill an ordinary man, but I am not even crippled". In 1876 a virtuoso rodeo performance in Deadwood, Dakota Territory, won him the moniker of Deadwood Dick. He became known as DD all over the West, entering into dime novels as a mysteriously dark and heroic presence. This vivid autobiography includes encounters with Bat Masterson and Billy the Kid, a soon-after view of the Custer battlefield, and a successful courtship. Love left the range in 1890, the year of the official closing of the frontier. Then, as a Pullman train conductor he traveled his old trails, and those good times bring his story to a satisfying end.

"'Judge' Howard Potter, one of the most respected and influential citizens of a suburban town outside of Philadelphia, lies dead after a long and wearying illness. He is survived by the five people who knew him best and whose lives were deeply influenced by him. . . .Through the thoughts and reminiscences of these five very different people Mr. Morris tells his story. . . . [His] writing is occasionally obscure but always absorbing. He does not, like so many writers, hover omnisciently over his characters. He prefers to project himself into their innermost and very human thoughts and emotions, leaving the reader to draw his own conclusions. . . . Mr. Morris writes with wit, taste, and refreshing originality."--William Murray, Saturday Review. "Mr. Morris is a master of the exact phrase, the homely illuminating detail, and it is no accident that he is an excellent photographer. . . . His writing is simple, but his method is as complete as his subject matter, so he uses the multiple flashback, the melting of past into present."--E.M. Scott, New York Herald-Tribune Book Review. "A thoroughly satisfying novel"--Commonweal. "A most rewarding book"--Kirkus. "His finest novel to date"--San Francisco Chronicle. "With this novel he has clearly, and for the first time, ascended into literature"--New York Times Book Review. One of the most distinguished American authors, Wright Morris (1910-1988) wrote thirty-three books including The Field of Vision, which won the National Book Award.