Astorian Adventure: The Journal of Alfred Seton, 1811-15

Seton, an 18-year-old from an impoverished New York family, recounts his adventures in the fur trade working as a clerk for John Jacob Astor's Pacific Fur Company. During his tenure, Seton traveled to Mexico, Alaska and the Pacific Northwest where Astor's fur-trading outpost, Astoria (in present-day Oregon), would eventually play a more important part in bolstering the U.S.'s claim to the Oregon Territory than it did in furthering its founder's fortunes. Seton, who as Jones ( George Washington ) points out ``was certainly something of a snob,'' would spend months at sea weathering Cape Horn storms, then again endure bitter weather trekking and canoeing to trading posts in the Northwest on expeditions that were often challenged by ``Savages.'' Washington Irving used Seton's journal in writing his 1836 history, Astoria , but the journal itself, with its frequent textual gaps and uneven literary quality, is of greater documentary than general interest. (Dec.)