The Reader's encyclopedia of the American West

Lamar, Howard R.

Reference

Thomas Y. Crowell Co.

This revision of a classic study long recognized as the most insightful and original account of the territorial period in the American Southwest will be welcomed by all readers of western history. The Far Southwest traces the history of New Mexico, Colorado, Utah, and Arizona from 1846 to 1912. Lamar analyzes the evolution of American political and economic systems to show, in particular, their impact on the racial and ethnic groups already present in the Southwest in 1846. In describing how American government and institutions such as the two-party system, trial by jury, and free schools were established in the Far Southwest, Lamar also puts into perspective both the local territorial history and the relationship between the region and the nation, particularly as regards issues of land tenure and church-state relations.
This revision to the 1966 edition includes a new introduction, substantial additions to the bibliography, and some changes to the text and notes.

The Far Southwest, 1846-1912: A Territorial History (Revised Edition)

History

Americas

University of New Mexico Press

Charlie Siringo (1855-1928) lived the quintessential life of adventure on the American frontier as a cowboy, Pinkerton detective, writer, and later as a consultant for early western films. Siringo was one of the most attractive, bold, and original characters to live and flourish in the final decades of the Wild West. Siringo's love of the cattle business and of cowboy life were so great that in 1885 he published a rollicking, picaresque account of his experiences in A Texas Cowboy, or Fifteen Years on the Hurricane Deck of a Spanish Pony--Taken From Real Life, which Will Rogers dubbed "The Cowboy's Bible." In short, Siringo was a key player in shaping the romantic image of the Wild West cowboy. 
Howard Lamar's biography deftly shares Siringo's story with historians and the general public interested in the American West. Lamar's account is structured within seventy-five pivotal years of western history, from the Civil War in Texas to Hollywood's glorification of the West in the 1920s. Siringo was not a mere observer, but a participant in major historical events including the Coeur d'Alene mining strikes of the 1890s and Big Bill Haywood's trial in 1907. Within this framework, Lamar focuses on Siringo's youthful struggles to employ his abundant athleticism and ambitions and how Siringo's varied experiences helped develop the compelling national myth of the cowboy.

Charlie Siringo's West: An Interpretive Biography

Biographies & Memoirs

Historical

Charlie Siringo (1855-1928) lived the quintessential life of adventure on the American frontier as a cowboy, Pinkerton detective, writer, and later as a consultant for early western films. Siringo was one of the most attractive, bold, and original characters to live and flourish in the final decades of the Wild West. His love of the cattle business and of cowboy life was so great that in 1885 he published A Texas Cowboy, or Fifteen Years on the Hurricane Deck of a Spanish Pony--Taken From Real Life, which Will Rogers dubbed the "Cowboy's Bible." Howard R. Lamar's biography deftly shares Siringo's story within seventy-five pivotal years of western history. Siringo was not a mere observer but a participant in major historical events including the Coeur d'Alene mining strikes of the 1890s and Big Bill Haywood's trial in 1907. Lamar focuses on Siringo's youthful struggles to employ his abundant athleticism and ambitions and how Siringo's varied experiences helped develop the compelling national myth of the cowboy.

Noted historians from the United States and Canada explore society, culture, and change in the resource-laden Pacific Northwest. Essays examine Spanish exploration of the Northern coast, traditional American Indian religion and worldview, the long-term relationship of a fragile Canadian union with its powerful southern neighbor, unique political and constitutional foundations, World War II black and white immigration, growing up Japanese-American in the 1930s-1940s, women's history, and more. Included are contributions by New Spain specialist David J. Weber, Native American expert Alvin M. Josephy Jr., political activist Gordon Hirabayashi, women's historian Susan H. Armitage, Canadian-American experts Kenneth S. Coates and Gerald Friesen, western historian Quintard Taylor, and others. Terra Northwest continues the Sherman and Mable Smith Pettyjohn Lecture Series of publications examining essential aspects of Pacific Northwest history.

Terra Northwest: Interpreting People and Place

Josephy Jr., Alvin M.

Taylor, Quintard

Armitage, Susan

Coates, Kenneth S.

Dolliver, James M

Hirabayashi, Gordon

McClelland Jr, John

Moreno, E Mark

Washington State University Press

Like the cowboy, the frontier trader has been so wrapped in myth that our understanding of who he was and what he did is largely shaped by stereotype: the Indian trader, for example - gunrunner, trader in slaves, and corrupter of the noble red man - or the mountain man, variously seen as romantic wilderness hero or degenerate white savage. Examining these and other myths, Lamar shows that early trade was, on the contrary, one of the first and most successful ways red men and white communicated, that traders were not snakes in America’s western Eden but participants in a vigorous if exploitative trade system already in existence for generations, and already in existence for generations, and that until the Rocky Mountain fur trade bypassed the Indian, tribal ways deteriorated little and both Indian and trader found their “twilight civilization” an attractive, profitable – and exciting – way of life. The trader had to know and tolerate two worlds whereas the farmer who came after had no need of the Indian. His life meant adventure, often danger, but the trader, a hunter with strong mercantile instincts played a larger role than myth allows. As Lamar makes clear, his transition from lone scavenger to merchant-developer represents in microcosm the history of the frontier. This essay was originally presented in April 1976 at Texas A&amp;M University as part of a symposium, “The American Frontier Reexamined,” one of several Centennial Academic Assemblies held in honor of the university’s hundredth year.

The Trader on the American Frontier: Myth's Victim (Volume 2) (Elma Dill Russell Spencer Series in the West and Southwest)

Business & Money

Economics

Texas A&M University Press

“Texas is not a place, it is a commotion!” exclaimed one early visitor to the state, underscoring the mobility and “get-ahead” spirit that have always characterized Texas and its people. In these thought-provoking essays, Howard R. Lamar looks specifically at the “crossings” that have characterized Texas history to see what effect these migrations to and through Texas have had on Texas, the Southwest, and links between Texas and California.Originally presented in 1986 at the University of Texas at Austin as the first George W. Littlefield Lectures in American History, these essays explore a previously neglected aspect of the western story: the influence of Texans—and other Southerners—on the character and history of the southwestern states. Lamar discusses the many efforts to establish overland trails, and later railroads, to California and how those efforts were fueled by the gold rush era of 1849–1850. He traces the influence of immigrant Texans and the flourishing southern community in California, particularly during the Civil War years. He follows the twentieth-century migration of “Okies,” whose desire to settle and resume their agricultural lifeways clashed with Californians’ preference for migrant workers. And he reveals how the discovery of oil, not only in Texas but also in California, western Canada, and Alaska, continues to link these regions.Texas has always been a place that people pass through, going either east-west or north-south. Texas Crossings explains what brought the people to Texas and what they carried away with them to California and the West.

Texas Crossings: The Lone Star State and the American Far West, 1836–1986

University of Texas Press

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