The Nile on eBay FREE SHIPPING UK WIDE Legends and Tales of the American West by Richard Erdoes
More than 130 colorful stories of the pioneers, cowboys, outlaws, gamblers, prospectors, and lawmen who settled the wild west and created a uniquely American folk mythology.
FORMATPaperback LANGUAGEEnglish CONDITIONBrand New Publisher Description
From Davy Crockett, Wild Bill Hickok, and Calamity Jane to Paul Bunyan, Pecos Bill, and Frank and Jesse James, here are more than 130 colorful stories of the pioneers, cowboys, outlaws, gamblers, prospectors, and lawmen who settled the wild west, creating a uniquely American hero and an enduringly fascinating folk mythology.In this wonderfully boisterous treasury of tall tales, everyone and everything is larger than life and bragging is elevated into an art form.Many of these stories are of real people and real events; more than a few, however, grew taller and funnier as they made their rounds from wagon train to campfire to rodeo to miners' quarters.But even if it is far from established that Daniel Boone and Davy Crockett were able to kill three men with one bullet or subdue ferocious grizzly bears with their fists, they come vividly to life here as beloved characters who have become part of the fabric of the American imagination.With black-and whiteillustrations throughoutPart of the Pantheon Fairy Tale and Folklore Library
Author Biography
Richard Erdoes is co-editor of American Indian Myths and Legends and the author of, among many other books, Lakota Woman; Lame Deer, Seeker of Visions; and Saloons of the Old West.He lives in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
Table of Contents
It Ain't Necessarily So / xiiiForeword / xvChapter 1 — Ohio Fever / 3The Devil and Major Stobo / 5The Cheater Cheated / 9The Wild Hunt / 12Dreams / 14The Skeleton Hand / 15The Wild Hunter of the Juniata / 23The Consequences of Not Letting a Man Have His Drink / 28The Laughing Head / 31Chapter 2 — The Long Hunters / 35Tarzan Boone / 37Swallowing a Scalping Knife / 42That's John's Gun! / 43A Clever Runner / 44A Damn Good Jump / 45The Warrior Woman / 49The Corcondyle Head / 51Chapter 3 — Backwoodsmen / 55The Irrepressible Backwoodsman and Original Humorist / 57Grinning the Bark Off a Tree / 60Davy Crockett on the Stump / 61The Drinks Are on Me, Gentlemen / 61Gouging the Critter / 62Jim Bowie and His Big Knife / 63Won't You Light, Stranger? / 69Ohio Poem / 70Chapter 4 — Ring-Tailed Roarers of the Western Waters / 71A Shooting Match / 75Did Such a Helliferocious Man Ever Live? / 77Like Father, Like Daughter / 80She Fought Her Weigh in She-B'ars / 81He Crowed and Flapped His Wings / 83A Fight Between Keelboatmen Averted / 84Stranger, Is This a Free Fight? / 85The Screaming Head / 85Stopping Drinking for Good / 89Chapter 5 — Mountain Men / 91Little Big Man / 95Kit Carson and the Grizzlies / 100Run for Your Life, White Man! / 103Old Solitaire / 109Pegleg Smith and Headless Harry / 121Mind the Time We Took Pawnee Topknots? / 127Lover Boy of the Prairies / 128Putrefactions / 135The Injin Killed Me Dead / 137Heaven According to Old Gabe / 139Damn Good Shootin' / 141Uncle Joe the Humorist / 146Ba'tiste's Nightmare / 147Song of the Voyageur / 150Chapter 6 — Timber! / 151Paul Bunyan and His Little Blue Ox / 153Paul Bunyan Helps to Build a Railroad / 157Kidnapped by a Flea / 162Thunder Bay / 167Chapter 7 — Gold! Gold! Gold! / 171Tommy-Knockers / 173It Had a Light Where Its Heart Ought to Have Been / 177He Ate All the Democrats of Hinsdale County / 180A Golden-Haired Fellow / 184Treasures of Various Kinds / 185The Missing Chest / 190Chapter 8 — Git Along Little Dogies / 195The Saga of Pecos Bill / 197The Taming of Pecos Bill's Gal Sue / 203Coyote Makes a Texas Cowboy / 209The Heart-Shaped Mark / 212The Skeleton Bride / 215Western Jack and the Cornstalk / 217Better Move That Drat Thing! / 219Being Afoot in Roswell / 220Outstunk the Skunk / 220Chapter 9 — They Died with Their Boots On / 221No-Head Joaquín and Three-Fingered Jack / 225The Headless Horseman of the Mother Lode / 232El Keed / 235El Chivato / 241He Rose from the Grave / 244A Whale of a Fellow with a Gun / 248The King of the Pistoleers / 255A Western Duel / 263The Nuptials of Dangerous Davis / 264Killing Off the James Boys / 266Theme and Variations / 267The Winchester Ghosts / 272Chapter 10 — Bucking the Tiger / 277A Hard Head / 279Indians Can Play Poker / 281Jim Bowie Takes a Hand / 282The Curly-Headed Little Boy / 284Shall We Have a Drop? / 287Colonel Tubbs Strikes It Rich / 289Good for Our Entire Assets / 294The One-Eyed Gambler / 295Chapter 11 — Lady Wildcats of the Plains / 297Born Before Her Time / 299How Old Calam Got Her Name / 301Calamity Jane Meets a Long-Lost Lover / 305Chapter 12 — The Man Who Never Was / 309Deadwood Dick / 311Deadwood Dick and the Grizzly / 312Deadwood Dick to the Rescue / 315Chapter 13 — An' That's My Roolin' / 321The Law West of the Pecos / 323Ah Ling's Hommyside / 325Fining the Deceased / 328The Hanging of Carlos Robles / 330Roy Bean's Pet Bear / 332Judge Barker, Old Zim, and the One-Eyed Mule / 335El Cuatro de Julio / 337A Drink's Worth of Punishment / 337Chapter 14 — Sky Pilots / 339Preachin' One Can Understand / 341The Parable of the Prodigal Son / 345Lissen to the Heavenly Poker Player! / 347Hear What the Great Herd Book Says! / 349A Funeral Oration / 349A Black Hills Sermon / 350Chapter 15 — Critters / 353The Valley of Headless Men / 355A loup-Garou, or a Windigo, or Maybe a Carcajou / 359The Call of the Wild / 365The Windigo / 369The Great White Stallion of the West / 370Until Judgment Day / 373El Diablo Negro / 376Snake Yarns / 381A Rolling Snake Gathers No Moss / 383The White Snakes / 385A Pair of Fine Boots / 386The Young Man Who Wanted to Be Snakebit / 389The Peg-Leg Cat / 391Chapter 16 — Mostly Lies / 393Somebody in My Bed / 395The Weather / 397It Gets Mighty Cold Around Here / 398Texican Liars / 400Chapter 17 — Miracles, Saints, and Witches / 401The Three Lost Daughters / 403The Two Witches / 405The Owl Witch / 406San Isidro and the Angel / 407A Riddle / 409The Many-Times-Killed Young Man / 411The Caveman of the Hermit Peaks / 416The Miracles of Chimayo / 420The Miraculous Staircase / 424The Hitchhiker / 427Source Notes / 431Bibliography / 441
Review
"You'll never find a better guide than Richard Erdoes to lead you through the mosaic of the American frontier. The whole pack of our legendary past is crammed into this treasure box. —Dee Brown, author of Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee
Review Quote
"You'll never find a better guide than Richard Erdoes to lead you through the mosaic of the American frontier.
Excerpt from Book
THE CHEATER CHEATED Traders to the Indians are part of the early West''s folklore. On the whole they were a sorry lot. As an eighteenth-century writer put it: The English manner of carrying on the Indian trade is this: the regular traders undertake twice of oftener each year journeys to the Indian villages, their Packhorses laden with Strowds, match coats, hats, looking-glasses, beads and bracelets of glass, knives, and all manner of Gawdy Toys and Knacks for children, as well as guns, flint, Powder, and Lead, and cags of potent Rum to be watered when they arrive to the Indian country. When there these traders live with the Indians, selling them goods in prospect of the season''s fur catch and often keeping one or more squaws as wives and are trusted by their neighbours for they are content or two or three centum profit . . . Other traders there are who frequently creep into the Woods with spirituous liquor and cheating trifles, after the Indian hunting camps, in the Winter season, and putting down several Cags before them, make them drunk selling their liquor at ten times its value, as the Indians will sell even their wearing shirt for inebriating liquors . . . These Traders are the most vicious and abandoned Wretches of our Nation, a set of Mean Dishonest mercenary Fellows . . . they even debauch the Indians'' young women, and even their wives, when the husbands are from home or drunk. But here is a tale of the cheater cheated. There was a Nipissing chief called the Red Owl, a mighty hunter and trapper, who brought enough meat to his wigwam to support several wives. His adobe was always filled with the choicest pelts of otter, beaver, fox, mink, and weasel. There also was a trader, Smith, or Miller, or, possibly, Cooper. Well, whatever his name, he was a mean liar and cheat who would have sold his own mother''s soul to the devil for two pieces of eight. One day this thieving swindler came to the Red Owl''s wigwam, pointing to a stack of prime beaver plews, saying, "I''ll have those." "What you gimme for them?" "How about this keg of whiskey, Chief? Strong as lightning." "No whiskey," said the Red Owl, who could not be bamboozled by an offer of rattlesnake piss. "Tell you what I''ll do for you, Chief," said the trader, handing the Red Owl a small bag of coarse-grained powder. "I''m in a giving mood today. I''ll swap this for you beavers," "This little powder for big heap pelts?" "These are seed grains, Chief. You plant ''em in the soil and grow bushels of grains like these. You''ll never need to swap for powder again." "Let''s smoke calumet. You smoke''em calumet, you cannot tell a lie." "Sure, Chief, let''s smoke." They smoked the pipe and this Smith, or Miller, or Cooper, went off with the furs whistling a merry tune. The Red Owl planted the powder grains. He cared for them tenderly. He watered them every day. But no plants heavy with powder grains every came up. A year later the same transfer came to the Red Owl''s wigwam. He had so many tricks up his sleeve that he had forgotten the one he played on this chief. He spread his wares. "I take''um gun, lead, looking glass, two bags of beads, bolt red stuff, bolt blue stuff, coat with gold lace." "Fine, fine, Chief," said the trader, rubbing his hands. "Now for all that stuff I want so and so much beaver, silver fox, red fox, ermine, otter, and musquash." "Me not have''um pelts. Took on one more wife. Young, plump, very active. No time for trapping. Come back in twelve moons. The Red Owl five mighty heap of pelts, beaver, silver fox, red fox, ermine, otter, and musquash." "Let''s smoke the calumet, Chief. When you smoke the calumet, you can''t lie. Right?" "Let''s smoke," said the Red Owl. Another year went by. Again this Smith, or Miller, or, possibly, Cooper appeared at the lodge: "Here I am, Chief, let''s have those furs you promised me." "No furs for you!" "What, you cheating, thieving red devil? Not furs?" "No furs!" "You miserable red varmint, you helliferous savage, you promised. We smoked the calumet!" "No furs!" "Damn you, you painted godless heathen! Hand over the furs! Hellfire and brimstone! You promised!" "White man," said the Red Owl, grinning broadly, "you gave me bad of black powder, bag so little, like this. Told me to plant''um grain. Watch powder bushes grow. Tell chief never again gottum swap pelts for powder. Grains grow slow. Very slow. Come back sometime when bushes heavy with powder grains. Then chief pay with big heap beaver, silver fox, red fox, ermine and musquash." "Damn your eyes!" said the trader. And that''s how the cheater was cheated.
Details ISBN0375702660 Pages 464 Language English ISBN-10 0375702660 ISBN-13 9780375702662 Media Book Format Paperback Year 1998 Author Richard Erdoes Place of Publication New York Country of Publication United States Edition New edition Short Title LEGENDS & TALES OF THE AMER WE DOI 10.1604/9780375702662 UK Release Date 1998-09-01 AU Release Date 1998-09-01 NZ Release Date 1998-09-01 US Release Date 1998-09-01 Imprint Random House USA Inc Publisher Random House USA Inc Series The Pantheon Fairy Tale and Folklore Library Publication Date 1998-09-01 DEWEY 398.20978 Illustrations B & W DRAWINGS THROUGHOUT Audience General We've got this
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