Lofaro (editor, The Tall Tales of Davy Crockett), a University of Tennessee professor of American studies, returns to one of his favorite subjects to repaint a portrait of the famed frontiersman with a new patina of insight, finding facts amid myths as he places Boone's life (1734–1820) in the historical context of the period. Boone, he writes, typifies Americans' "paradoxical relationship to the wilderness," which he sought "to subdue and improve and to preserve and enjoy." The phrase "may have" surfaces occasionally, but Lofaro has skillfully and authoritatively mapped the roots and routes of this wilderness wanderer who could not control his "itching foot." Beginning with Boone's Pennsylvania childhood and early years in North Carolina, the narrative continues through his long hunting expeditions, Kentucky explorations, Indian attacks, his 1756 marriage, blazing the Wilderness Road, founding Boonesborough, his escape from Shawnee Indians after months of captivity, his land claims loss and legal morass, followed by his celebrity status after John Filson's The Adventures of Daniel Boon
(1784), a "bombastic, ghost-written retelling of the pioneer's 'autobiographical' adventures," turned Boone into an international frontier hero and icon. Striding through battles and bloodshed, Boone breathes and lives in this work, lightened with humorous anecdotes and descriptions of frontier customs and traditions. Lofaro's exhaustive research is evident on every page. 12 b&w illus. (Oct.)
