Long Day's Journey: The Steamboat and Stagecoach Era in the Northern West [Hardcover]

Carlos Arnaldo Schwantes (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 1999

In "Long Day's Journey" Carlos Schwantes gathers historical photographs, advertisements, posters, and contemporary accounts to recreate one of the most colorful periods in the American West. He traces the rapidly evolving saga of miners and settlers struggling to get from here to there in the days before railroads reached the West, trying to establish methods of transportation and communication between the eastern United States and the new territories that became Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Montana, and Wyoming - first by sea, around continents, then by land and water routes across America.Many of the enduring images and myths of the West derive from this era: the Pony Express, mule trains and plodding ox-team freighters, the picturesque side-wheelers and stern-wheelers that churned along the rivers, the colorful Concord stagecoaches drawn by four or six jingling, fleet horses. Schwantes describes in detail the technology of pre-industrial modes of transportation. He explains the economics that linked the birth and death of western towns and cities, the business history of entrepreneurs and stagecoach and steamboat companies, and the challenges facing passengers and employees on the stages and steamers of the northern West. Integrating more than 200 historical photographs and other illustrations with vivid contemporary accounts, Schwantes presents a fascinating history of Americans forging the first working connections between the West and the rest of America - connections that the railroads would soon smooth and strengthen. His book "Railroad Signatures across the Pacific Northwest" detailed that story; here he tells of the people and animals and equipment supplanted by the twin ribbons of steel. Carlos Arnaldo Schwantes is director of the Institute for Pacific Northwest Studies and professor of history at the University of Idaho. His book "Railroad Signatures across the Pacific Northwest" received the Pacific Northwest Booksellers Association Book Award and the Railroad History Book Award. Among his many other publications are "Radical Heritage: Labor, Socialism, and Reform in Washington and British Columbia", "Coxy's Army: An American Odyssey", and "The Pacific Northwest: An Interpretive History".

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Schwantes takes readers inside bouncing coaches as they rattled over broken terrain, up steep and slippery slopes, and down twisting ravines across Montana, Oregon and Washington and into the staterooms and on the open-air decks of the thrashing side-wheelers and sternwheelers of the Columbia and Missouri rivers. This is popular history at its best, written by a scholar who knows his subject from the driver's box to the quarter deck." William Lang, Portland State University "All in all, the reach of Schwantes' book is so wide that it is very much like a general history - an outstanding general history - of the Northern West for the period form the 1840s to the 1890s." Richard M. Brown, University of Oregon

About the Author

Carlos Arnaldo Schwantes is director of the Institute for Pacific Northwest Studies and professor of history at the University of Idaho. His book RAILROAD SIGNATURES ACROSS THE PACIFIC NORTHWEST received the Pacific Northwest Booksellers Association Book Award and the Railroad History Book Award.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 408 pages
• Publisher: Univ of Washington Pr; First Edition edition (October 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0295976918
• ISBN-13: 978-0295976914
• Product Dimensions: 10.8 x 10.2 x 1.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 5.1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,062,944 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Long Day's Journey: The Steamboat and Stagecoach era, March 4, 2009

By 

LuAnn Zettle "Owner of Arrow Book Co.,Fleur-d... (Michigan) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Long Day's Journey: The Steamboat and Stagecoach Era in the Northern West (Hardcover)

While researching Michigan Ghost Towns, left from the lumbering era in Ogemaw County, I found little information about the stagecoach lines that connected the small lumbering towns in an era before telegraph, telephone and railroad spurs. What was it like to ride in a stagecoach from one little rustic town through the wilds and woods to another? Sure I had riden in a replica stagecoach, but how real was that ride when I was a kid? Afterall, it was over an asphalt parking lot? How real could that be? But I remembered the size and shape and interior. The small windows with a rolled up canvas blind. It was suffocating hot that day and as any eight year old I was dressed in shorts and summer top, what would it have been like for females of the eralier era?
Amazon to the rescue! I purchased this book strictly as a research reference. However, it soon became an interesting read as well as research material on traveling by stagecoach and steamboats. Thanks to this book I was able to recreate in words the travel conditions of an era long long past that most people will never physically experience.
An added plus, the pictures, illustrations and ads are excellent quality.

1 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great Book on History, June 8, 2008

By 

George Primbs "Book Hunter" (Washington D.C.) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Long Day's Journey: The Steamboat and Stagecoach Era in the Northern West (Hardcover)

The book has a great variety of historical pictures. You get the real flavor of the old west. You understand how many settlers earned their money and how they settled in the old west.

It is a beautifully crafted large book.
The book is nicely bound and features heavy glossy pages