Utah Historical Quarterly Volume XXVI

Reviews and recent publications - 3

REVIEWS AND RECENT PUBLICATIONS Among the Mormons: Historic Accounts by Contemporary Observers. Edited by WILLIAM MULDER and A. RUSSELL MORTENSEN. (New York, Alfred A. Knopf, 1958, xiv + 482 + xiv pp., $6.75) Per capita the Mormons are probably the most written-about sect in the United States. The peculiarities of their beliefs and practices drew early attention. Their insistence that they were a chosen people not only in religion but also in business and politics called forth persecu­tion and still more publicity. Then followed the dramatic exodus to the wilds of Utah, heroic achievement in making this land productive, and a forty-year battle with the United States on the degree and condi­tions of integrating Mormondom and the nation. In the twentieth century Utah came into closer resemblance to the West as a whole, but without losing all its individuality and without shrinkage of its clientele of interested readers. The consequence is a great body of writing about the Mormons, much of it violently partisan on one side or the other, but some of it as free of distortion as was humanly possible. Perhaps it is the very abundance of this literature that explains the delay until 1958 for any attempt to assemble out of it a source-book on Mormon life and ex­perience. Among the Mormons does this job so well that it is apt to be the first reference on almost every reading list on Utah or the Mormons. 382 UTAH HISTORICAL QUARTERLY The two editors brought a wealth of experience to the task. Both earned the doctorate with studies in Mormon history. One has been editor of the Western Humanities Review, the other of the Utah His­torical Quarterly. Both have been living and breathing Mormon history for a long time and soaking it in through the pores. This familiarity with the field paid off when it came to making selection of what to include in the anthology. Expertness of a high order was needed to tie these varied bits together and make them into a book. A few writers, such as Sarah Scott and Charlotte and Martha S. H. Haven and Thomas L. Kane, are quoted more than once, but the selec­tions are cut down to reasonable brevity and a broad sampling thus is made possible. In the difficult art of providing continuity Mulder and Mortensen have shown real genius. In introducing each item they identify the writer and say enough about die dieme and setting so that the reader is ready for what follows. Usually they manage to prepare him for refer­ences and allusions as well. In a book like this it is not so important that one's favorite passage be included; the chances are that this morsel is well known and readily available. What really counts is the finding and presentation of obscure and overlooked tidbits. Among the Mormons has many such delectables drawn from newspapers and out-of-the-way periodicals, some from neglected books, and a few not previously published. Some offer hear­say testimony, but most of them were written at the scene and all but a very few were written at the time. Historians therefore do not get much of a shake, and Brigham Young is directly quoted only once and on a rather incidental matter. The only basic criticism I would offer concerns apportionment of space. The first fifteen years, the episodes from Palmyra to Nauvoo, get a full third of the book. I grant that in this period the Church was launched, the nucleus of the faithful made three major migrations, the principal leaders for the next several decades were recruited, and the Gentile world got its first impression of Mormonism. Still, a case can be made diat more than two-thirds of Mormon history was still to come - the exodus from Nauvoo and all the travail and attainment of the hundred-odd years since the transfer of headquarters of the Church to Salt Lake City. It might have been better planning to have budgeted more for the long span in Utah. For any other state, any other unit of the western population, we would be inclined to ask how much of their experience was in line REVIEWS AND RECENT PUBLICATIONS 383 with that of the rest of the West. That question can be asked about die Mormons too. The answer as accumulated in the hundred good voices heard in Among the Mormons is not in absolute unison, but it seems to say that the Mormons came nearer being unique than typical. Un­questionably they did have peculiarities traceable largely to their reli­gion and the impact of their church upon so much else, but it would be most remarkable if the peculiar elements actually outweighed all the others that were ordinary and standard for the West in general. Visi­tors and reporters, however, quite naturally played up what was dis­tinctive, and, if they overdid it, proper anthologists can hardly do other than follow diat same proportion. When it comes to the writing of the history of die Mormons, diat ground rule will not apply, and the historian, if he does his job as well as diese two anthologists have done theirs, will face up to this question whether the epic of the Mormons has been mainly peculiar or in more fundamental respects in step with that of the West. JOHN W. CAUGHEY University of California at Los Angeles The Red Hills of November. By ANDREW KARL LARSON. (Salt Lake City, Deseret News Press, 1957, xvi + 330 pp., $5.00) Andrew Karl Larson, the author of this recent history of the town, Washington, in Utah's "Dixie," is a competent and trained historian. His ancestors on both sides participated as leaders in the settlement and development of this frontier community. He was brought up in the midst of many surviving witnesses of die town's early history and was vitally influenced by their account of epic struggles, failures, and achievements. He was an outstanding history student, particularly in research, under the late William J. Snow at Brigham Young Univer­sity. He wrote the "History of the Virgin River Valley" for his master's dissertation at the same university. In tins piece of research he dis­played an exhaustive, thorough analysis of all available source materials and a most informative, clear exposition of his interpretative conclu­sions. He has spent over a decade of research in obtaining the source materials for this present work. He is a teacher of history at Dixie College, St. George, Utah. The Red Hills of November, in spite of its poetic title, is a most mature and scholarly history of Washington from its first settlement in 384 UTAH HISTORICAL QUARTERLY November 1857 up to 1900. Its founding was planned by Brigham Young to be the nucleus of an extensive cotton-raising project along the banks of the Virgin River in southwestern Utah. The majority of its first pioneers were selected from converts of the Southern states because of their expert knowledge of cotton farming. But shortly after their arrival, a large number of Scandinavian settlers were called to this place from Sanpete County, Utah. The first eight chapters are largely concerned with the initial settle­ment and the strenuous struggle for survival in an arid region quite desolate when compared to the well-watered valleys of northern Utah. The major problems were the creation of a new community, the de­velopment of successful farming under the most adverse conditions for irrigation, and the sporadic Indian depredations upon their livestock. As inferred above, the most crucial community issue, which required over thirty years to solve, was the harnessing of the capricious waters of the Virgin River for irrigation. Time and again the dams which were so essential for raising the water to the level of the irrigation canals were washed away by river floods. Many settlers were com­pletely discouraged and left the community. But the majority, led by patient and determined leaders, endured to an ultimate triumph over the unruly river. This history also describes other economic activities, and the ecclesiastical, social, and cultural developments in this pioneer town. However, the major emphasis and the greatest amount of in­terpretative analysis is given to the story of the various economic inter­ests, institutions, and achievements. The account of the rise and decline of cotton farming is one of the major highlights of the book. The agri­cultural, industrial, and commercial aspects of the production of cotton and its textiles play a most vital role in the economy and development of the community. Washington being the central area along the Virgin River for the growing of cotton, and because it had the large three-storied "cotton factory," had many vital relationships with the Mormon farming communities along the Virgin. Although the Latter-day Saint Church was a dominant influence in the founding and organizing of the community, and its ideals were those of the early settlers, relatively small attention is given to ecclesi­astical affairs. However, the resolute courage, the sustaining faith, and the determined obedience to the will of the church authorities in the establishment of the "cotton mission" are dominant undercurrents of group and individual attitudes throughout the book. There is no at­tempt to make this history an heroic epic of dramatic crises and excit- REVIEWS AND RECENT PUBLICATIONS 385 ing frontier adventure. Actually, the struggles and crises are those of backbreaking toil, near-starvation, disease, and discouragement. There are a few exciting Indian troubles. But they were of an incidental im­portance. In the composition of this history the author exhibits a combination of scholarly research, penetrating insight, and sympathetic understand­ing relative to his subject. In spite of his intimate connections with the town, he presents his historical analysis and interpretation with great objectivity and restraint. He combines into an essential unity the many facets of the little town's history. He describes the settlers as vital human beings with frailties, eccentricities, and peculiarities as well as the more positive virtues. He gives color and personal interest to his interpretative narrative by having the early settlers speak for themselves from well-selected excerpts of early memoirs and diaries. These are only one aspect of a rich hoard of primary sources that are frequently cited. However, this large amount of excellent documentation does not detract from the history's essential unity and clarity. This is a book which will appeal to the layman as well as the scholar. There are many illustrations of important historical sites, town institutions, and leading personalities. The maps indicate with simple clarity the important geographic features. The roles of the people, as individuals, or as a group, together with their leaders, are set forth with narrative skill and graphic portrayal. The illustrative anecdotes are choice in their display of the typical experiences of people in a frontier community. RUSSEL B. SWENSEN Brigham Young University Exploring with Frimont: The Private Diaries of Charles Preuss, Cartographer for John C. FrSmont on His First, Second, and Fourth Expeditions to the Far West. Translated and edited by ERWIN G. and ELISABETH K. GUDDE. Volume XXVI, American Exploration and Travel Series. (Norman, University of Oklahoma Press, 1958, xxix + 162 pp., $3.95) Publication of the Preuss diaries brings to students of Western Americana an interesting historical "find" and one of the most fascinat­ing personal documents of its kind in recent years. Much extrinsic interest lies in the fact that these are the field journals of Charles Preuss (b. 1803, d. 1854), topographer and mapmaker for John C. Fremont on 386 UTAH HISTORICAL QUARTERLY his Far Western expeditions of 1842, 1843-44, and 1848-49. Preuss, con­sidered by experts the finest western cartographer of his time, kept these diaries in German script for his family. In so doing, he provided a highly personalized account which supplements, corroborates, and at times fills gaps in Fremont's polished reports of the first two explora­tions. Briefer and more sketchy, but still of interest, is Preuss's third journal, written on the disastrous and controversial midwinter attempt to cross the southern Rockies. In the first two diaries Preuss wrote many graphically descriptive passages and recorded interesting details not mentioned in Fremont's reports and memoirs, nor in the several Fremont biographies. For in­stance, Preuss noted Fremont's imaginative but unsuccessful attempt to photograph topographic features with daguerreotype camera in 1842. This effort, probably an American "first," preceded by ten years similar attempts designated "earliest known" in the late Robert Taft's authori­tative work on the pictorial history of the West. The diarist also re­ported Fremont's explosive anger in violent petty quarrels with "Kit" Carson and Preuss himself, personal details not recorded elsewhere. Utah readers will appreciate Preuss's wonder at the teeming wild life (mostly "small, good-tasting ducks and . . . plover") encountered in the lower Bear River Valley: "I have never seen so many waterbirds together. It sounds like distant thunder when they rise." (Pp. 87, 88.) Such reportorial entries are interspersed with highly subjective complaints, criticisms and emotional reactions to Preuss's experiences on the trail, and to the personalities and actions of his companions. His continually deprecating comments reveal that Preuss harbored deep resentment toward Fremont, the party leader who was ten years his junior. A proud, middle-class German, still "unassimilated" after a decade in America, the mapmaker sharply expressed his sense of alienation from the mountain-men companions he termed "rabble": "If I only had a few congenial fellows, Germans, of course, with me, we could make this monotonous prairie life agreeable enough. But so completely alone among these twenty-five people!" (P. 13.) Through such outpourings of his attitudes, prejudices and emotions in these diaries, Charles Preuss, the man, emerges from the shadowy figure of a mere historical reputation and assumes the dimensions of a recog­nizable personality a century after his death. Erwin and Elisabeth Gudde, known for previous works in West­ern Americana, have competently translated and edited these diaries, and have introduced the diarist with an excellent biographical essay. REVIEWS AND RECENT PUBLICATIONS 387 In addition to Preuss's portrait, the book includes samples of his field sketches and finished illustrations, and a sketch-map of routes of the three exploring expeditions. With gratification the reviewer notes the volume's dedication to the late Eleanor Ashby Bancroft who helped so many students of history in her long years of service at the Bancroft Library. EDWARD H. HOWES Sacramento State College The Great Diamond Hoax and Other Stirring Incidents in the Life of Asbury Harpending. Edited by JAMES H. WILKINS. (Reprint of 1913 ed., Norman, University of Oklahoma Press, 1958, xix -j- 211 pp., $2.00) This is the true story of two innocent looking prospectors who in 1871-72 perpetrated the cleverest swindle in western history on William C. Ralston, the financial genius of California, "The man who built San Francisco." The book might well have been titled "The bigger they come the harder they fall." The author, one of the victims, was no amateur in business. Before he was twenty-one years old he had made a fortune of more than a million dollars, and was a partner with Ralston in many business and mining ventures. His story, written many years after the event, is prob­ably the most amazing record of a great swindle ever written. Briefly, it concerns two ordinary appearing prospectors who brought a bag of rough diamonds for safekeeping to Ralston's bank. Naturally Ralston wanted to get in on the new find and persuaded the prospectors to sell him a half interest in the new field. After sending two expeditions to the nearly inaccessible diamond field to gather samples, after having the stones tested by Tiffany, and after the West's leading mining engi­neer had pronounced the field genuine and fabulously rich, a company was formed and stock was sold to a selected few in San Francisco. The hoax was finally exposed when a German horse wrangler dug up a diamond that had been partially cut. He showed this to Clarence King, a famous geologist working for the government, and that ended one of the most fantastic promotion schemes ever conceived. The two prospec­tors left the country with about half a million dollars, and Ralston made up the losses to stockholders. The main fault of this reprint is that the editors have not indicated the exact locale of the salted diamond mine. The author's mention of 388 UTAH HISTORICAL QUARTERLY Rawlins, Wyoming, is the only hint. However, there is another little-known book which does give the exact location. This is Outs kin Epi­sodes, by William G. Tittsworth, published in 1927. The location is a flat-topped mountain just south of Brown's Hole which ever since has been known as Diamond Mountain. Diamond Spring, where the prospectors camped, is located near the southern edge of the mountain, not too far north of Vernal. From personal knowledge of the country, this writer believes he knows the route taken by the prospectors to reach their salted diamond field. Tittsworth, who was an early settler in Brown's Hole, states that the two men, on their trips to the location, would get off the train at various stations - Rawlins, Rock Springs, or Evanston - and hire horses locally for their "prospecting trips." Their main route appar­ently was from Rock Springs, going into Brown's Hole through Jesse Ewing Canyon, then the only trail. Crossing Green River, they pro­ceeded up Crouse Canyon to the comparatively flat top of Diamond Mountain, going almost as far south as possible, where they found Diamond Spring. In those days this was considered about as far from civilization as one could get. Billy Tittsworth happened to be in the country when Clarence King was returning from his inspection trip. He and some others back-trailed King and found the field, with evidence of extensive digging. The diamonds had been "planted" in ant hills in sandy soil. Most of them had already been dug up, but this group did find a few, proving the location. They were actually almost worthless commercial dia­monds, but since no one in America had seen rough diamonds, all the so-called experts were fooled. Since the site of this hoax was in Utah, the book will have special interest to Utah readers, especially those who are familiar with the Diamond Mountain country. _, T. CHARLES KELLY Torrey, Utah Owen Wister Out West: His Journals and Letters. Edited by FANNY KEMBLE WISTER. (Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 1958, 269 pp., $5.00) This readable book exonerates Owen Wister of much of the blame for creating the tiresome cowboy stereotype which for more than half a century has galloped through uncounted pulp magazine stories, books, movies, and TV westerns. REVIEWS AND RECENT PUBLICATIONS 389 Wister did create the original Knight in Chaps and Spurs and an array of artificial Western trappings - and also the beneficent and enlightened judge-landowner. It develops, however, that he did so under some protest and because of the demands of the reading public - or the magazine editors - of the times. Heroes just before and at the turn of the century were virtuous, and they won the hand of a pure woman in combat in which good triumphed over evil. Private journals which Wister kept of his many trips West and found in a desk drawer in 1938, fourteen years after his death, reveal that he did not believe all this romantic nonsense. In fact, he was wont to complain that "the plain talk in my Western tales published in Harper's (1893) . . . never 'got by' the blue pencil of . . . Henry Millys Alden, liberal as he was for those genteel times." Wister had been commissioned by Harper's to go West and report what he saw and heard, but soon Alden was complaining that his story was "too bloody," and Wister was retorting that you cannot recount Western adventure without blood. Harper's of those days was a far cry from the Harper's of a decade ago which published with obvious delight the devastating expose of the "phony West" with its drugstore cowboys and greedy (and exploited) modern Judge Carters. Other "censors" persuaded Wister to tone down his realistic stories of the brawling period West. On one occasion Wister watched an infuriated rancher savagely beat a spent horse until he was exhausted and then gouge out one of its eyes. He included the episode in The Virginian, but his good friend, Teddy Roosevelt, talked him out of using the eye-gouging part. The episode, as related in The Virginian and in Wister's journal reveals that the man in real life was more humanly helpless than the fictional character. In the novel, the cowboy threshed the brutal rancher. But the man who saw the actual beating recorded in his journal: "I was utterly stunned and sickened at this atrocious cruelty, and walked back to my own horse and sat down, not knowing very well what I was doing. . . ." Owen Wister Out West is the product of his daughter, Fanny Kemble Wister (Mrs. Walter Stokes) who lives in the family home­town of Philadelphia. Her Preface, Introduction, and Epilogue are delightfully done, as are the excerpts from the journals of experiences in the West between 1885 and 1900 and from his personal letters. Naturally, the book is wholly sympathetic, including the efforts to explain his namby-pamby writing. 390 UTAH HISTORICAL QUARTERLY It would be interesting to see what Wister would have done with today's "adult Western" stereotype. Wister drew most of his observations about the West from south­eastern Wyoming (and his comments about some of the early-day towns would infuriate their chambers of commerce today), but he owned and operated a small ranch in the Jackson Hole country. (By this time [about 1912] Wister, famous as a writer, and his family visited in Salt Lake City several times en route to the ranch and back to Philadelphia. Mrs. Wister and the children, including the author of this book, sometimes remained in Salt Lake for weeks at a time, usually staying at the Moxum Hotel and enjoying trips to the lake and Fort Douglas. The book covers an earlier period.) His daughter re­calls the summers spent in Wyoming with nostalgia. "When we came to the stone marking the boundary between Idaho and Wyoming, we yelled with joy," she recalls. "Every rock, every sage bush, every aspen tree was different and better because it grew in Wyoming. . . . With condescension we had looked at Utah, Montana, Idaho, but here at last was Wyoming." Take that, you "Utaphiles." _ TT T ' r ERNEST H. LINFORD Salt Lake Tribune Sovereigns of the Sage. By NELL MURBARGER. (Palm Desert, California, Desert Magazine Press, 1958, 342 pp., $6.00) Most of us who love this Great Basin and its people and history find ourselves resenting the passage of time. Every week that goes by, we reflect - almost every day, in fact - death claims some old-timer and stills forever the stories he would have told if only someone had listened. Thus, week by week, history's sources die. If only a man had time to travel and listen before it is too late... . Well, Nell Murbarger had the time. Rather, she made it. Twelve years ago, she fled the security of a newspaper desk and started roam­ing the West, seeking out the characters who made history or who could remember something of those earlier ones who did. If nothing else, her book will help ease the consciences of a good many writers and lovers of Western history who realize that this sort of thing ought to be done and who can be grateful that someone is doing it. Sovereigns of the Sage is a book of uneven quality. This is not surprising. People are of uneven quality, too, and so are the stories they REVIEWS AND RECENT PUBLICATIONS 391 tell. Miss Murbarger simply records the stories she heard in her travels through the desert back-country, with little embellishment. Whenever she ran across a really interesting character - such as Josie Pearl, for example, the "nearly-100-years-old" prospector who still works her northern Nevada mine, alone, one hundred miles from the nearest town - her story rings with excitement and interest. Other times, she is reduced to retelling oft-told histories of various communities, without adding a great deal of knowledge or understanding. But she does cover the ground - from the crest of the Sierra to the Continental Divide, and from the Salton Sea to Flaming Gorge. Nor does time hold her prisoner; she bounces freely from pioneer days to modern dam-building and back without more than catching her breath. Utahns can be grateful that Miss Murbarger possesses a particular passion for the Great Basin country - possibly because in its emptiness, human character looms large. Most of her stories are set in the old mining camps of this area and in the little Mormon communities where progress has not erased the charm and flavor of the old days and where a few old-timers still sit in the sun with their memories. She dwells with particular affection on the old tales and the old settlers of Utah's Dixie. Sovereigns of the Sage is not documented and organized history. Miss Murbarger spent some time and effort rummaging old newspaper files and checking other sources, but much more in simply traveling and listening. But history is not made up only of duly recorded facts. Folklore, true or not, is also part of history, for it is a reflection of what men think ought to have happened, and thus is a reflection of the men themselves. History or folklore - or both - Nell Murbarger's newest book will be a welcome companion to anyone who travels the Great Basin and who has the curiosity to wonder what might have happened here yesteryear. WILLIAM B. SMART Deseret News The Bannock of Idaho. By BRIGHAM D. MADSEN. (Caldwell, Idaho, Caxton Printers, 1958, 382 pp., $5.00) It is a pleasure to welcome another significant contribution to the history of the American Indian. Each Indian tribe has a long and interesting story which is often difficult to reconstruct. The absence of adequate written records during the period prior to European contact 392 UTAH HISTORICAL QUARTERLY requires the historian to depend upon the traditions of the Indian group which grow dimmer with the death of the old people who engaged in the traditional way of life. The early sporadic contacts by non-Indians leaving a written record are often difficult to piece together into a continuous account. The reports of Indian agents to the Bureau of Indian Affairs in Washington, D.C, are often dry and repetitive. To make an interesting and accurate account from materials available is not an easy task, and Dr. Madsen is to be complimented for the con­tribution he has made. It is also difficult to be objective in dealing with an Indian tribe or in telling of their relationship with the United States. Although there is room for criticism of Bureau policy and particularly of its implementation, as well as of the mediocre individuals who frequently were appointed as Indian agents, Dr. Madsen's account makes it appar­ent that the acculturation process had by 1900 strongly affected this Indian group. One may quarrel with the Indian policy of the United States or with the way this policy has been effected, but this one hun­dred year span in the history of the Bannock Indians is evidence that acculturation, assimilation, and, to some extent, integration have oc­curred. One might add, almost to the extent that today die Bannock has practically disappeared as a separate people. The Bannock were a strong-minded, courageous, and aggressive group. The restlessness that spread throughout the Indian country as a result of the activity of the invading Europeans and of the horses, fire­arms, and trade implements that went before them caused the Bannock to leave their ancestral homeland in eastern Oregon to range over a wide area in southeastern Idaho. Their warlike attitude and the effect of their activities on neighboring Indian groups possibly achieved for the Bannocks a larger place in history than their numbers would ordi­narily warrant. However, in spite of their determination to preserve their way of life, life on the reservation under the surveillance of gov­ernment agents having army units available to quiet disturbances when they arose, plus the gradual encroachment upon the area by settlers, eventually brought about compliance and changes in life patterns. The colored frontispiece, decorated end-sheet map, and twelve drawings by Maynard Dixon Stewart enhance the quality of the work of the historian. This book will be of interest to the general reader of Western history as well as the scholar. S. LYMAN TYLER Brigham Young University REVIEWS AND RECENT PUBLICATIONS 393 Danger Cave. By JESSE D. JENNINGS. (Anthropological Papers, Num­ber 27. University of Utah Department of Anthropology, October, 1957, 328 pp., $6.00) Danger Cave is the report of the findings from a series of archaeo­logical excavations in western Utah. Of the three sites, Danger, Juke Box, and Raven caves, Danger was the most informative and lends its name to the report. It is located less than two miles east of Wendover, Utah. To quote from the "Setting" really a Foreword to this report the author says: "The human story inferred in this report was set in one of the most remarkable of North American environments - the desert West. The natural subsistence resources of this land are today quite sparse; the balance between success and failure in survival has always been delicate. The fact that human groups survived in this environ­ment deserves serious ecological note. Although no intensive study of this aspect of the problem is being undertaken here, the cultural data cannot be appreciated or evaluated without a modicum of information regarding the terrain and the biotic resources of the region." An inven­tory of the resources - the physiography of terrain, the flora and fauna, reptiles, birds, and mammals, follows, and the author concludes: "Without this knowledge of the present climate and resources - which has been characteristic from the beginning of human history in the region, so far as is now known - a full appreciation and understand­ing of the archaeologic data here presented would be impossible." A detailed account of the excavation procedures and problems en­countered is given of each site. "Geological Considerations," "Material Culture," "Comparisons," and "Implications" are the chapter headings which follow. Illustrations are numerous and include tables, photo­graphs, line drawings, charts, and maps. A bibliography and several Appendices conclude the report. This study has little relationship to the recorded history of Utah and the Intermountain West; yet it throws considerable light on the prehistoric role of the region. The North American Deserts. By EDMUND C. JAEGER. (Stanford, Cali­fornia, Stanford University Press, 1957, vii + 308 pp., $5.95) The five deserts of North America - the Chihuahuan, Sonoran, Navahoan, Mohavean, and the Great Basin - extend from central Mexico almost to the border of Canada. The author explains that to be 394 UTAH HISTORICAL QUARTERLY called a desert a geographical area must satisfy certain conditions as to weather, and although the five in North America have many character­istics in common, he shows that each desert has its definite individu­ality in its plant and animal life, climate, land formation, and geologic history. The author feels that the desert abounds in so many unusual things to be observed that it becomes necessary for those who are un­initiated in desert lore to learn a few of the desert's fundamental char­acteristics in order to discover the more subtle scenic aspects and the less easily seen inhabitants. Nondetailed maps give a quick view of the general desert boundaries, and the text suggests routes. To aid the reader in identifying desert inhabitants a series of line-drawings of insects, reptiles, birds, mammals, and plants identifies forms discussed in the text. Much of the phraseology of science has been avoided but scientific names have been included to provide an accurate means of identification for the serious reader and as an aid to familiarize the student with them. Blank spaces have been left alongside the names and descriptions, and it is suggested that marks be made when speci­mens have been found and recognized. In this way. the book can be a valuable aid to the student, casual traveler, or explorer. A bibliography and index are included. On the Bloody Trail of Geronimo. By LT. JOHN BIGELOW, JR. (LOS Angeles, Westernlore Press, 1958, 237 pp., $7.50) Westernlore Press has printed On the Bloody Trail of Geronimo as Volume XII in its Great West and Indian Series in a limited edition of 750 copies. It is the first published book version of the journal, writ­ten in serial form, by Lt. John Bigelow, Jr., illustrated by Remington, Hooper, McDougall, Chapin, and Hatfield, and first published in Out­ing Magazine in 1886. Written from the field in Arizona, the journal presents a picture of army life during the long-drawn-out Apache rebellion under Geronimo and his fearless sub-chiefs. It gives descrip­tions of the terrain covered, the mines, ranches, and inhabitants of the territory, and presents Bigelow's own observations on frontier life. His comments on current trends of thought relative to the attitudes of both military and civilian officials toward enlisted men reflect the trend towards better schooling, better accommodations in barracks, and better diet for army personnel. Arthur Woodward has supplied annotations to the text, the Fore­word, and the Introduction. REVIEWS AND RECENT PUBLICATIONS 395 Graphic Description of Pacific Coast Outlaws. Thrilling Exploits of Their Arch-Enemy Sheriff Harry N. Morse. By CHARLES HOWARD SHINN. (LOS Angeles, Westernlore Press, 1958, 107 pp., $5.50) Charles Howard Shinn published his original paper-bound book in the 1890's, and with annotations and an introduction by J. E. Rey­nolds, plus a useful index, Westernlore Press has reprinted it in com­plete text as number XI of its Great West and Indian Series. Brigandage in California began with the conquest of the region by Americans. Outlaws, mostly dispossessed, bitter Spanish natives, moved to the mountains, to prey on the miners, the towns, and the stage­coaches. They hated the gringos - the pushing avaricious strangers who had usurped their homeland. In bands, and singly, the bandidos spread terror throughout the countryside. This book is concerned with the true exploits of Harry N. Morse, Sheriff of Alameda County, Cali­fornia, and contains rare items on the banditry of California's early days. It not only tells the story of one of the most remarkable law enforcement characters of the West, but is also a source document on the exploits of such Pacific Coast outlaws as Joaquin Murieta, Tiburcio Vasquez, Narcisco Ponce, Procopio or "Red Dick," and other merciless gunmen of those exciting early times in California. Buckjk}n and Spurs. A Gallery of Frontier Rogues and Heroes. By GLENN SHIRLEY. (New York, Hastings House, 1958,191 pp., $4.50) Author Glenn Shirley has been a member of the Stillwater, Okla­homa, Police Department since 1936, and for several years he served as captain of the Bureau of Identification. At present he is Criminal Deputy in the Payne County, Oklahoma, Sheriff's Office. His interest in law enforcement problems in the West has led him to do intensive research, and he has written and published several books, including Law West of Fort Smith and Pawnee Bill, in addition to many articles on criminal identification in technical journals and popular magazines. The stories in Bucksk}n an^ Spurs read like the wildest inventions of the dime novelists, but are true, based on the author's research. Por­traits of a dozen frontier characters-villains and heroes-are sketched, but the author has chosen some of the less well-known rather than the over-exploited frontier characters of radio and TV fame. 396 UTAH HISTORICAL QUARTERLY The Autobiography of the West: Personal Narratives of the Discovery and Settlement of the American West. Compiled and Annotated by Oscar Lewis. (New York, Henry Holt and Co., 1958) The Blackjeet, Raiders of the Northwestern Plains. By JOHN C. EWERS. (Norman, University of Oklahoma Press, 1958) The Fancher Train. By AMELIA BEAN. (New York, Doubleday and Co., 1958) The Federal Lands: Their Use and Management. By MARION CLAW-SON and BURNELL HELD. (Baltimore, The Johns Hopkins Univer­sity Press, 1957) First Through the Grand Canyon. By R. E. LINGENFELTER. Early Cali­fornia Travel Series XLV. (Los Angeles, Glen Dawson, 1958) From Wilderness to Statehood: A History of Montana, 1805-1900. By JAMES MCCLELLAN HAMILTON. Edited by MERRILL G. BURLINGAME. (Portland, Binfords and Mort, 1957) The Frontier in Perspective. Edited by WALKER D. WYMAN and CLIF­TON B. KROEBER. (Madison, University of Wisconsin Press, 1957) The Gentle Tamers: Women in the Old Wild West. By DEE BROWN. (New York, G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1958) Historic Sites in San Bernardino County. A Preliminary Report. By ARDA M. HAENSZEL. (San Bernardino, San Bernardino County Museum Association, 1957) James Pierson Beckwourth, 1856-1866, An Enigmatic Figure of the West: A History of the Latter Years of His Life. By NOLIE MUMEY. (Denver, The Old West Publishing Co., 1957) A Journal of the Voyages and Travels of a Corps of Discovery, Under the Command of Capt. Lewis and Capt. Clarkje of the Army of the United States, from the Mouth of The River Missouri Through the Interior Parts of North America to the Pacific Ocean, During the Years 1804, 1805, and 1806 . . . By PATRICK GASS. (Reprint of original 1810 ed., Minneapolis, Ross & Haines, Inc., 1958) REVIEWS AND RECENT PUBLICATIONS 397 Natural History of a Wasatch Spring. By CLAUDE T. BARNES. (Salt Lake City, The Ralton Co., 1957) Natural History of a Wasatch Summer. By CLAUDE T. BARNES. (Salt Lake City, The Ralton Co., 1957) Over the Salt La\e Trail in the Fall of '49. By WILLIAM B. LORTON. (Los Angeles, Privately printed, 1957) Pageant of the Pioneers. By CLARENCE S. JACKSON. (Minden, Nebraska, Harold Warp Pioneer Village, 1958) Stories of Arizona Copper Mines: The Big Low-Grades and the Bonanzas. (Phoenix, Arizona Department of Mineral Resources, 1957) Traveler in the Wilderness. By CID RICKETTS SUMNER. (New York, Harper and Brothers, 1957) The Travels of Jaimie McPheeters. By ROBERT LEWIS TAYLOR. (New York, Doubleday and Co., 1958) RAY ALLEN BILLINGTON, " H OW the Frontier Shaped the American Character," American Heritage, April, 1958. LELAND HARGRAVE CREER, "Mormon Towns in the Region of the Colo­rado" (Glen Canyon Series No. 3), Anthropological Papers, Num­ber 32, University of Utah, May, 1958. , "The Activities of Jacob Hamblin in the Region of the Colorado" (Glen Canyon Series No. 4), ibid., Number 33. DEAC DUSHARME, "Man's Conquest of the Colorado," Arizona High­ways, June, 1958. NAURICE R. KOONCE, "Flying the Colorado," ibid. JONREED LAURITZEN, "They Braved the Wild, Wild River," ibid. 398 UTAH HISTORICAL QUARTERLY CHARLES C. NIEHUIS, "River Playground," ibid. L. F. WYLIE, "Glen Canyon Dam," ibid. NOLIE MUMEY, "Black Beard, Ceran St. Vrain, Frontiersman, Indian Trader, Territorial and Political Leader, and Pioneer Business­man," Denver Westerners Roundup, January, 1958. , "Writers of Western History" (Josiah Gregg, M.D.), ibid. , "Writers of Western History" (Thomas Jefferson Farn-ham, 1804-1848), ibid., February, 1958. , "Writers of Western History" (Asa Shinn Mercer), ibid., March, 1958. DOROTHY O. REA, "Prominence Comes to Promontory," Church News [Deseret News], March 1,1958. , "Utah's First Scientist Laid Foundation for Modern Studies [Orson Pratt]," ibid., March 29,1958. "Exploring one of Utah's Unknown Areas," ibid., April 26, 1958. "Pipe Spring, A National Monument," ibid., May 17,1958. HAROLD LUNDSTROM, "Lonely Grave of a Pioneer Mother [Rebecca B. Winters]," ibid., July 19,1958. JOSEF AND JOYCE MUENCH, "Lee's Ferry," Desert Magazine, April, 1958. BARBARA HAMMEN, "Night in Gateway Canyon [southeastern Utah]," ibid., May, 1958. HARRY C. JAMES, "We Would Protect Desert Plant Life," ibid. NELL MURBARGER, "Opalite at the Silver Cloud [Nevada Desert]," ibid., April, 1958. -, "When the Brass Band Played at Taylor . . . [Nevada]," ibid., May, 1958. REVIEWS AND RECENT PUBLICATIONS 399 , "The Seven Troughs Bonanza," ibid., June, 1958. 1958. -, "White Man's Medicine in Monument Valley," ibid., July, , "Museum Where 'Ideas' are More Important Than ' T h i n g s ' . . . , " ibid., August, 1958. NORMAN B. WILTSEY, "When Riches Come to the Navajo . . . ," ibid. CRISTIE FREED, paintings by V. Douglas Snow, "Music in the Rockies," Ford Times, June, 1958. MARJORIE NELSON SHEFFIELD, paintings by V. Douglas Snow, "Tuba City, Arizona," ibid., July, 1958. ANDREW F. ROLLIE, "Robert Glass Cleland, 1885-1957," Historical So­ciety of Southern California Quarterly, March, 1958. RAMONA W. CANNON and BOYD O. HATCH, "Mormon Pioneering . . . It Didn't End in '47," Instructor, July, 1958. "They Too Are Pioneers [Hopi and Navajo Indians]," ibid. NINO FABIANO, "II Mormonismo E Lo Stato Teocratic Dell' Utah," Le Vie Del Mondo, Anno XIX, Numero 10, Ottobre, 1957. RUTH DEETTE SIMPSON, "The Coyote in Southwestern Indian Tradi­tion," Masterkey, March-April, 1958. VOLNEY H. JONES, "Death of James H. Miller, Agent to the Navaho," ibid., May-June, 1958. "The Grand Teton - Jackson Hole Country," Special Issue, Minnesota Naturalist, No. 2,1957. DAVID S. BOYER, "Huntington Library, California Treasure House," National Geographic Magazine, February, 1958. WELDON F. HEALD, "Wheeler Peak and its Glacier," Nevada Highways and Parks, No. 1, 1958. 400 UTAH HISTORICAL QUARTERLY "Aging Monuments to Mormon Pioneers in Nevada . . . the Old Houses at Bunkerville," ibid. SHIRLEY NEWCOMB KELSEY, "The Santo Nino of Zuni," New Mexico Magazine, July, 1958. STUART B. MOCKFORD, "Janson Lee's Peoria Speech," Oregon Historical Quarterly, March, 1958. AUGUST C. BOLINO, "The Role of Mining in the Economic Develop­ment of Idaho Territory," ibid., June, 1958. "Slade Is N o More," Part I, Overland News, March, 1958. "Slade Of The Overland," Part II, ibid., April, 1958. RALPH C. TAYLOR, "Mormon Settlement on the Arkansas," ibid., July- August, 1958. DAVID E. MILLER, "The Donner Road through the Great Salt Lake Desert," Pacific Historical Review, February, 1958. RICHARD D. POLL, "The Political Reconstruction of Utah Territory, 1866-1890," ibid., May, 1958. FREDERICK A. MARK, "Idaho . . . Fur Trader Crossroads," Pacific North-westerner, Spring, 1958. FRANK P. DONOVAN, JR., "Harry Bedwell - Railroad Raconteur," Palimpsest, May, 1958. HORACE S. HASKELL, "Flowering Plants in Glen Canyon Late Summer Aspect," Plateau, July, 1958. WILLIAM C. MILLER and DAVID A. BRETERNITZ, "1958 Navajo Canyon Survey Preliminary Report," ibid. "When Mormons Destroyed Fort Bridger," Pony Express, April, 1958. STAN RASMUSSEN, "Adventure in the Glen Canyon of the Colorado," Reclamation Era, May, 1958. REVIEWS AND RECENT PUBLICATIONS 401 KENNETH T. GREEN, "We Remember Kirtland Temple," Saints' Herald, March 24, 1958. EDWIN ROBERT FISHBURN, "Come to Historic Nauvoo," ibid., May 19, 1958. WALTER N. JOHNSON, "The Restoration of Nauvoo Homes," ibid. E. L. KELLEY, "Neighbors' Estimate of Joseph Smith III," ibid., June 2, 1958. NEIL M. CLARK, "Giant of the Colorado," Saturday Evening Post, April 5, 1958. ANDREW HAMILTON, "They Find Baubles in the Dust" [Rock hunters, photographs of Valley of the Goblins in Utah], ibid., May 31, 1958. "Fort Lemhi and the Salmon River" (A letter from Dell Adams), SUP News, February, 1958. JESSE D. JENNINGS, "Proposed Escalante River Inspection Trek," ibid. WALTER A. KERR, "Huntsville, Small Town with Great Appreciation," ibid. RICHARD D. POLL, "Thomas L. Kane and the Peaceful Settlement of the 'Utah War,'" ibid. DAVID E. MILLER, "San Juan Hill," ibid., May, 1958. HORACE A. SORENSEN, "Promontory Summit! Is it Enough?" ibid. , "Washington Report - Log of a Successful Visit" [for fur­thering Golden Spike Monument], ibid., June, 1958. HAROLD H. JENSON, "First Pioneer Celebration in Utah," ibid. BERNICE GIBBS ANDERSON, "Massacre at the City of Rocks, Almo Creek, Idaho Territory, 1861," ibid. 402 UTAH HISTORICAL QUARTERLY -, "Page of History at Connor Springs, Box Elder County," ibid., July, 1958. IVAN J. BARRETT, "Romance of Cotton in Utah's Dixie," ibid. "Glen Canyon . . . from the Moving Highway of the Colorado," Sun­set, March, 1958. MARION MACINNIS and FLORENCE RANDALL, "The Mill That Won the West" [The Holladay Windmill], Think, February, 1958. "Permanent Art from the Shifting Sands" [Indian sand painting], ibid. SETH P. EVANS, "Utah's Cattle Industry," Utah Economic and Business Review, April, 1958. REED W. BAILEY, "Living in Harmony with Nature," Utah Educational Review, May, 1958. ART THOMAS, "Management of our Public Lands: For all of the P e o p l e ? " ^ . , May, 1958. T. L. BROADBENT, "Hans Besenstiel: Immigrant Satirist," Western Humanities Review, Spring, 1958. FRANK JONAS, "Possibilities in Research in Western Politics," Western Political Quarterly, June, 1958. "The Peril of the American West" (Robert West Howard Charges that TV and Movie Falsifications of Western History Become Tools of Anti-American Propoganda), Westerners Brand Book, March, 1958. "Singing Wires in the Wilderness" (David H. Rush of Western Union Tells of the Building of Telegraph Lines that Completed Coast-to- Coast Communication), ibid., May, 1958. MATT CLOHISY, "Lucien Bonaparte Maxwell, Prince of the Wilderness," Westerners New Yor\ Posse Brand Boo\, Number One, 1958.