Pacific Destiny: The Three-Century Journey to the Oregon Country

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Macmillan, 2002 M06 29 - 480 páginas
The Oregon Country!

For a century that fabled place, lying somewhere beyond the Rocky Mountains at the farthest reaches of the continent galvanized the American people.

Its riches, in furs, timber, fish, and fecund soil for farming, awakened the avarice of nations. Spain, Great Britain, Russia, and the United States all vied for this trackless Eden of the pacific littoral, and not until the 1840s did the Americans claim it once and for all.

In these pages are the explorations of the fierce Scots who scaled the mountains and mapped the rivers of the Oregon country before the time of Lewis and Clark; the imperial fiefdom created for profit and Britannia by the fur-trading ventures of the Hudson's Bay Company; John Jacob Astor's ill-fated experiment on the Columbia River; the mountain men who risked their lives in Indian country in pursuit of beaver furs; and the arrival of the missionaries and pioneers of the Oregon Trail.

This is the Spur Award-winning story for best historical non-fiction, told by a distinguished chronicler of nineteenth century America. A story of the clashing of empires, coveting the matchless wealth of the Pacific Northwest-the story of The Oregon Country.
 

Contenido

Maps
18
1
27
The River of the West
37
3
43
Pro Pelle Cutem
73
5
80
The Voyage of the Tonquin
89
6
105
Spies
271
Champoeg
292
Sapling Grove
302
Jumping
319
19
337
20
349
The Parallel
373
23
392

7
121
8
139
9
156
14
249

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Acerca del autor (2002)

Born in Illinois, the son of a career army sergeant, Dale L. Walker is a journalism graduate of the University of Texas at El Paso whose 20 books reflect his varied historical interests: military and Western history, 19th century "Golden Age" journalism, biography, and Jack London studies. Among his books are Januarius Macgahan: The Life and Times of an American War Correspondent; Legends and Lies: Great Mysteries of the American West; The Boys of '98; Theodore Roosevelt and the Rough Riders; Bear Flag Rising: The Conquest of California; Pacific Destiny; and Eldorado: The California Gold Rush. He is a four-time winner of the Spur Award from Western Writers of America, the Owen Wister Award for life achievement in the history and literature of the American West, and many other awards, and is a member of the prestigious Texas Institute of Letters. Walker, who lives in El Paso, Texas, with his wife of 43 years, Alice McCord, has been involved in virtually every aspect of the book business. He has served as a university press director, newspaper book page editor, magazine editor, fiction editor for Forge Books, book columnist and reviewer, and has written historical books, magazine work, and fiction.

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