Daniel Boone: The Life and Legend of an American Pioneer

The popular image of Daniel Boone is that of an unlettered backwoodsman, skilled hunter and Indian fighter. But evidence argues that he was reasonably well educated for his time and place, that he was a landowner, businessman and a respected leader of frontier society. Faragher, history professor at Mount Holyoke College, author of Sugar Creek: Life on the Illinois Prairie , has sifted through folklore and fact to reconstruct a realistic portrait of Boone and the expanding frontier. Except for his long hunts, Boone was surrounded by a close, extended family; his deepest loyalties were to clan and community. The final chapters examine Boone in folklore, literature and art (he was the model for James Fenimore Cooper's Natty Bumppo in Last of the Mohicans ). Boone is worthy of historical attention as a personification of the westward movement. Faragher has written an absorbing, definitive biography. Photos not seen by PW. BOMC selection. (Nov.)