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45 of 46 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Classic Analysis, Elegantly Written, June 6, 2004
I first read this book in graduate school in the late 1970s and despite its age--it was first published in 1953--it greatly impressed me with its depth of research, elegance of writing, and power of interpretation. I recently reread the book and although it is now more than fifty years old it remains the critical work of history on the subject. Dale Morgan should have been proud to produce such an ageless classic. "Jedediah Smith and the Opening of the West" remains essential reading on the subject.This book captures the critical elements of Smith's career. He went to the Rockies in 1822 to become a fur trapper and trader and over the next decade his efforts in that commercial activity lead to explorations that opened the region to U.S. expansion. Smith's explorations of the Rockies and Far West in the 1820s rank as some of the most significant expeditions of the nineteenth century. His skill as a frontiersman, as well as his undeniable ambition to develop a preeminent position for his company in the fur trade, combined with these expeditions to establish Smith as a heroic figure in the American West. In addition, his stoical persona and religious countenance became a role model for his fellow traders. Well told in this important book is Smith's 1824 expedition that effectively discovered South Pass, in present-day Wyoming, opening a much easier route for trappers to cross the Rockies into the Great Basin without using the Missouri River. It also meant that settlers using wagons could take an easier route along the Platte and Sweetwater Rivers, then over the mountains using South Pass, and on to Oregon or California. It made possible the great overland migrations along the Oregon Trail beginning in the 1840s. Most important, Morgan tells the story of Jedediah Smith's 1826-1827 expedition that traveled overland from the Great Basin to California and back. Undertaken to locate new trapping grounds, the expedition explored in a bull boat the Great Salt Lake and moved southward onto the Colorado Plateau. Pioneering along the Colorado River, Smith journeyed to the Mohave Desert and visited San Gabriel, California, there making contact with Spanish officials. He explored northward through the San Joaquin Valley and then turned eastward across the Sierra Mountains, the first people recorded to have crossed eastward, via the American River. By the time of Smith's return to the trappers' rendezvous the next summer, he had acquired more geographical knowledge about the Far West than any other American. Smith's last great expedition took place in 1827-1828 when he retraced his route to southern California. There he renewed contacts with officials of New Spain. He then moved northward along the American west coast, travelling by ship from San Gabriel to San Francisco, and eventually reached Fort Vancouver, the Hudson's Bay Company outpost in the Oregon territory under the command of Dr. John McLoughlin. In the summer of 1828 he returned to the Great Basin trappers' rendezvous. Once again, Smith's efforts led to the rapid expansion of geographical knowledge about the American West, but he also ascertained and gave to U.S. authorities much about the strength of Spanish and British claims on the region. In summary, Dale Morgan notes that Jedediah Smith must be credited with being the first to find and recognize the natural gateway to the Oregon country through South Pass; the first overland traveler to reach California; the first white man of record to cross the Sierra Nevada; and the first to travel overland from California to the Columbia. Unlike most other explorers of the nineteenth century, Smith's expeditions were not underwritten by the federal government but were the byproduct of efforts to further his company's fur trading business. This book provides an excellent discussion of these critical explorations, as well as an interesting window into the larger fur trade of the Rocky Mountains and the colorful cast of characters that engaged in it, such as Jim Bridger, "Broken Hand" Fitzpatrick, and Hugh Glass. It also tells of the demise of Smith, who decided in 1830 to retire from fur trade and enter the Santa Fe trade. The next spring he left Independence, Missouri, with a wagon train bound for Santa Fe, but on May 27, 1831, he was killed by Comanche Indians while searching for water for the wagon train on the Santa Fe trail. He was only 32 at the time. This is still an essential work for anyone who seeks to understand the exploration of the Trans-Mississippi West. Jedediah Smith ranks second only to Lewis and Clark as an explorer of this region and Dale L. Morgan's biography stands up remarkably well to the changing perspectives on the history of this subject in the fifty-plus years since its first publication. Highly recommended!
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