Western historian Dary (Entrepreneurs of the Old West, 1986, etc.)
turns his attention to the leisure activities of the region, from
the first white explorers to move westward to the coming of the
radio. Many readers might be surprised to find that the likes of
Lewis and Clark or the homesteaders even had spare time to pass.
But, in fact, there are records - journals, letters, diaries,
memoirs - documenting a multitude of leisure activities enjoyed in
the Old West. Dary begins his chronicle with the journals of Lewis
and Clark and Zebulon Pike, volumes that show us men fiddling,
dancing, and commingling with friendly Native Americans for sport,
commerce, and sex. From there, he moves breezily to the mountain
men, Native Americans, soldiers and their womenfolk, homesteading
families, and inhabitants of the prairie and mining towns. There is
seemingly no logic to the book's structure; for example, Dary jumps
directly from the mountain men in the 1830s to a chapter on the
Indians that draws heavily and unevenly on journals of the 1870s
and '80s. The decision to build the narrative around localities
rather than activities results in a myriad of repetition -
gambling, for example, is discussed in almost every chapter - but
with little attempt to unite the material. And the heavy reliance
on primary sources results in unfortunate side effects. First, the
text is only as interesting or representative as Dary's choice of
diary or journal; second, much recent research is neglected, and a
larger social historical picture is slighted. A great
disappointment, particularly coming from the author of the
excellent Cowboy Culture (1981). (Kirkus Reviews)
"Pioneering Americans of the nineteenth century did not merely rush
for gold, lust for land, and thrust aside the West's original
inhabitants. These mountain men, cowboys, homesteaders, and cavalry
troopers played nearly as hard as they worked, exploiting to the
hilt what little leisure they could steal from their labors. Nor
did they only carouse-drink, gamble, and womanize-as the West's
fiction might suggest. They were spectators at bull and bear fights
in California; actors in amateur theatricals in Army garrisons; and
participants in communal barn raisings and quilting bees on the
prairie. This is a delightful look at a very neglected aspect of
the story of westering Americans."-Richard H. Dillon, author of
Meriwether Lewis, Fool's Gold, and The Legend of Grizzly Adams.
"The men on Lewis and Clark's 1804 expedition square-danced to
fiddle music. Cowboys' leisure pursuits included singing,
storytelling, dominoes, reading, and foot races. U.S. Army soldiers
played the newfangled game of baseball and even enjoyed debating
and attending concerts. Dary's irresistible narrative recreates
card games on Mississippi steamboats, New Orleans balls, frontier
campfires and cafe-theatres, Santa Fe saloons, and Wyoming bicycle
clubs and mineral spas, and it charts the emergence of a middle
class that came to disapprove of prostitution, gambling, drinking,
bear-baiting, and buffalo-hunting. An engaging
chronicle."-Publishers Weekly. "As David Dary proves in this
pleasurable book, the Old West was not all trouble and toil. Much
is to be learned here-from mountain men and Indians to cowboys and
homesteaders-about how to have fun, no matter the
circumstances."-Dee Brown, author of Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee.
"This lively and good-humored narrative takes the reader on a
journey to a time before pleasure ruled lives, a time when fun was
where you found it and was what you did when you had time."-Dallas
Morning News. "This delightful volume describes activities ranging
from the simple and the homespun to the bawdy and
elaborate."-Booklist. "A treasury of the colorful characters who
spent their brief hour on that wild and woolly stage."-Kansas City
Star.
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