Rare Book Monthly
Book Catalogue Reviews - May - 2005 Issue
More From The American West From Arthur H. Clark
Tom Custer (standing) along with brother General George, and George's wife Elizabeth.
Frederick Remington was one of the greatest artists of the American West. His drawings captured the land in the days before the West itself was captured. Item 36 is Done in the Open, published in 1902, and consisting of Remington's drawings and verses by Owen Wister and others. This is a first edition, first issue of this large (elephant folio) book. $300.
Item 52 is an interesting biography, Miles Goodyear: First Citizen of Utah; Trapper, Trader and California Pioneer, by Charles Kelly and Maurice Howe. I don't know whether Goodyear was actually the first, but he was certainly one of the earliest white settlers of Utah, having set up shop before the Mormons arrived. An orphan, Goodyear traveled west with the Whitman-Spaulding missionary party in 1836 at the age of 19. However, he would leave the party to head off into the Rocky Mountains alone as a trapper. He was one of the "mountain men" of the era, and participated in the famed rendezvous of 1843. However, by then he had already married the daughter of a Ute chief and had two children. It was time to settle down. He began building a fort, "Fort Buenaventura," along the Weber River in what is now Ogden, Utah, in 1845. He planned it to be a base for trappers and others, as well as serving emigrants. When the Mormons first began to arrive, he encouraged them to settle along the Weber River, but they opted for Salt Lake City. In 1847, the Mormon High Council negotiated a purchase of Goodyear's fort for a price of $1,950. The settlement became known as Brownsville and then Ogden. Goodyear moved on to California. He became involved in trading, and then discovered gold. Unfortunately, he never had much chance to enjoy it, becoming ill and dying in 1849 at the age of 32. Goodyear's Utah home has since been reconstructed and can be seen in Fort Buenaventura State Park in Ogden. Kelly and Howe's book was privately printed in 1937, and this copy is number 3 of a limited edition of 350, inscribed to Hoffman Birney (the western writer?) by Kelly. $350.
Item 87 is a reprint of A.S. Mercer's The Banditti of the Plains: or the Cattlemen's Invasion of Wyoming in 1892 - "The Crowning Infamy of the Ages." This is the story of Wyoming's "Johnson County War." In the 1880s, much of northeastern Wyoming was open range, used primarily by large cattle barons for running their herds. However, homesteaders, many former ranch hands, began settling the area around Buffalo and forming their own small herds. Some of them formed their herds by picking up young, unbranded cattle that had strayed from the large roaming herds. The large cattle owners were not pleased, and in 1892 sent a mission to the area to deal with the rustlers. They recruited a couple dozens hired guns from Texas to kill and run off the rustlers, expecting most people in the area would be sympathetic. They were wrong. At their first stop, a small rural cabin, they killed two of their enemy. However, one managed to hole up most of the day, before being burned out. Meanwhile, the cattlemen's activities were spotted by others, who sounded the warning in Buffalo. The tables were quickly turned, and it was the cattlemen who found themselves surrounded. However, the cattlemen had friends in high places, including not only Wyoming's political leaders, but President Benjamin Harrison. Federal troops were sent out to protect them, and while many were arrested, no one was ever convicted in this episode. Most were simply allowed to return home. Mercer's book was first published in 1894, but that edition is rare, many copies apparently having been suppressed by the cattle interests unflatteringly portrayed. This is a 1935 reprint of the book published by San Francisco's famed Grabhorn Press. $122.50
