A life wild and perilous
Subtitle: mountain men and the paths to the Pacific
By: Robert M. Utley.
Edition: 1st ed.
Publisher: Henry Holt and Co.
Published: 1997
Place of publication: New York
Language: eng
Number of pages: 392
Subjects: Frontier and pioneer life -- West (U.S.); Pioneers -- West (U.S.) -- Biography; Trappers -- West (U.S.) -- Biography; Fur traders -- West (U.S.) -- Biography; Fur trade -- West (U.S.) -- History; Overland journeys to the Pacific; West (U.S.) -- History -- To 1848; West (U.S.) -- Discovery and exploration
Genres: Biography.
Description: Early in the nineteenth century, the mountain men emerged as a small but distinctive group whose knowledge and experience of the Trans-Mississippi West extended the national consciousness to continental dimensions.

Though Lewis and Clark blazed a narrow corridor of geographical reality in 1803-1805, the West remained largely terra incognita until trappers and traders such as Jim Bridger, Kit Carson, Tom Fitzpatrick, and Jedediah Smith opened paths through the snow-choked mountain wilderness of the American West. Collectively, they came to know every stream, mountain crag, canyon cataract, waterless stretch of plain, refuge of game, and Indian hideout.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (p. [297]-313) and index.
"A John Macrae book."