''Across the Wide Missouri, With an Account of the Discovery of the Miller Collection'' is a 1947 book by American historian
Bernard DeVoto
Bernard Augustine DeVoto (January 11, 1897 – November 13, 1955) was an American historian, conservationist, essayist, columnist, teacher, editor, and reviewer. He was the author of a series of Pulitzer-Prize-winning popular histories of the Ame ...
. It is the second volume of a trilogy that includes ''The Year of Decision'' (1942) and ''The Course of Empire'' (1952).
Description
''Across the Wide Missouri'' is a history of the Rocky Mountain
fur trade
The fur trade is a worldwide industry dealing in the acquisition and sale of animal fur. Since the establishment of a world fur market in the early modern period, furs of boreal, polar and cold temperate mammalian animals have been the mos ...
in the
American West
The Western United States (also called the American West, the Far West, and the West) is the region comprising the westernmost states of the United States. As American settlement in the U.S. expanded westward, the meaning of the term ''the Wes ...
in the Upper Missouri River basin during its peak in the 1830s. It focuses on the Rocky Mountain Fur Company (RMFC), which competed with
John Jacob Astor
John Jacob Astor (born Johann Jakob Astor; July 17, 1763 – March 29, 1848) was a German-American businessman, merchant, real estate mogul, and investor who made his fortune mainly in a fur trade monopoly, by smuggling opium into China, and ...
's American Fur Company and the
Hudson's Bay Company
The Hudson's Bay Company (HBC; french: Compagnie de la Baie d'Hudson) is a Canadian retail business group. A fur trading business for much of its existence, HBC now owns and operates retail stores in Canada. The company's namesake business div ...
by setting up an annual summer trade rendezvous supplied by overland wagon train in a different mountain valley every year instead of using fixed trading posts. The chronology is sometimes confusing, but the book contains a lively if somewhat romanticized portrayal of the way of life of the individual trappers known as Mountain Men, who were the RMFC's main suppliers and customers, with less attention given to the organized "brigades" of American Fur. There is a lot about the economics of the trade, including the inability of many free trappers to get out of debt to the fur companies who both bought their furs and sold them their supplies. There is also a certain amount of political intrigue over the
Oregon boundary dispute
The Oregon boundary dispute or the Oregon Question was a 19th-century territorial dispute over the political division of the Pacific Northwest of North America between several nations that had competing territorial and commercial aspirations in ...
, with the novel depicting the several nations who had competing ambitions over present-day
Oregon
Oregon () is a U.S. state, state in the Pacific Northwest region of the Western United States. The Columbia River delineates much of Oregon's northern boundary with Washington (state), Washington, while the Snake River delineates much of it ...
.
The book is well researched and documented, using original sources from the people involved, such as personal diaries, letters, journals, notes, and conversational accounts. Devoto’s opinions on the cultures of the various Native American tribes and their relations with the Mountain Men are based on these sources, and may not meet current standards of political correctness, but he does not corrupt history by cutting “his trail through an undergrowth of twentieth century ideas projected backward, usually with indignation.” (P298) He portrays the trappers' attitudes toward race and gender as they were, without judgment, including the practical necessity for the independent trapper to purchase a Native American wife from her family to help make camp and process pelts, a common transaction also practiced by the Native American tribes themselves.
DeVoto points out that the RMFC pioneered overland wagon transport across the Great Plains, and that the knowledge of the interior West gained by the Mountain Men played an essential role in the overland migrations to California and Oregon in the 1840s, with many of the former trappers working as scouts and guides after the fur trade collapsed due to over-hunting of beaver and changes in fashion.
Reception
The book was awarded the
Pulitzer Prize for History
The Pulitzer Prize for History, administered by Columbia University, is one of the seven American Pulitzer Prizes that are annually awarded for Letters, Drama, and Music. It has been presented since 1917 for a distinguished book about the history ...
in 1948
and was adapted as
an eponymous 1951 film starring
Clark Gable
William Clark Gable (February 1, 1901November 16, 1960) was an American film actor, often referred to as "The King of Hollywood". He had roles in more than 60 motion pictures in multiple genres during a career that lasted 37 years, three decades ...
.
References
History books about the American Old West
1947 non-fiction books
Pulitzer Prize for History-winning works
Fur trade
Non-fiction books adapted into films
Houghton Mifflin books
Bancroft Prize-winning works
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