Jedediah Smith
No Ordinary Mountain Man
by Barton Barbour
University of Oklahoma Press, Norman, Oklahoma 2009

Oklahoma Western Biographies
6" x 9" Hardcover, 290 Pages

He was the first Anglo-American to travel overland to California via the southwest and roamed through more of the West than anyone of his era. His adventures quickly became the stuff of legend. Using new information and sifting fact from folklore, Barton H. Barbour now offers a fresh look at this dynamic figure.

Barbour tells how a youthful Smith was influenced by notable men who were his family‘s neighbors, including a member of the Lewis and Clark expedition. When he was twenty-three, hard times leavened with wanderlust set him on the road west. Barbour delves into Smith’s journals to a greater extent than previous scholars and teases out compelling insights into the trader’s itineraries and personality. Use of an important letter Smith wrote late in life deepens the author’s perspective on the legendary trapper.

Through Smith’s own voice, this larger-than-life hero is shown to be a man concerned with business obligations and his comrades’ welfare, and even a person who yearned for his childhood. Barbour also takes a hard look at Smith’s view of American Indians, Mexicans in California, and Hudson’s Bay Company competitors and evaluates his dealings with these groups in the fur trade.

Dozens of monuments commemorate Smith today. This readable book marks another, giving modern readers new insight into the character and remarkable achievements of one of the West’s most complex characters.

Barton H. Barbour is Associate Professor of History at Boise State University and the author of Fort Union and the Upper Missouri Fur Trade.