Dedicated to Samuel Clemens, who “promised never to let dull facts get in the way of telling a true story,” this rousing mix of fact and fancy fleshes out the lives and adventures of several half-legendary harbingers of the Westward Expansion. Glass (Bewildered for Three Days, 2000, etc.) pairs dappled scenes of buckskin-clad roughnecks battling bear, bad weather, and bands of eagle-feather-wearing Indians with narrative accounts of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, the growth and decline of the fur trade, and selected individual exploits of the likes of John Colter, Jim Bridger, Mike Fink, and Jim Beckwourth. Admitting that he “adjusted a few particulars” in his retellings, the author downplays but doesn’t ignore the, as he phrases it, “less than tender sensibilities” of these men toward animals, native peoples, and each other, giving young readers a rare chance to cross back and forth over the boundary between historical fact and—that other kind. (maps, bibliography, author’s note) (Nonfiction/folklore. 8-10)
