The Best of the West: An Anthology of Classic Writing from the American West [First edition, hardback, 1991]

Language

English

Date Published
Publication Details

New York: HarperCollins Publishers

ISBN Number

0-06-016664-9

Edition Notes

This is the hardback first edition of The Best of the West: An Anthology of Classic Writing from the American West, edited by Tony Hillerman and published by HarperCollins Publishers in New York City, NY. In this anthology, Hillerman, with the aid of Jack Rittenhouse, assembles a collection of fiction and non-fiction writings about the American West. Hillerman also provides the introduction as well as commentary throughout the anthology.

  • Title Page Transcription:
    [double rule] The | BEST | of the | WEST | [rule] | An Anthology of | Classic Writing from | the American West | [rule] | Edited by | TONY HILLERMAN | [double rule] | [publisher's device] HarperCollinsPublishers
  • Contents:
    [i] half title The Best of the West, [ii] blank, [iii] title page, [iv] copyright, v-xii Contents, xiii-xvi Introduction, 1-526 text, 527-528 copyright acknowledgments
  • Table of Contents:
    Introduction xiii
    Part 1: In the Beginning . . .
    1. New Mexico's Myster Stone by Dixie L. Perkins
    2. The Message in the Bottle by George Winship
    3. Drake's Brass Plaque by James D. Hart
    4. The Real Manila Galleon
    5. The Long Way Home by Meriwether Lewis
    6. The Stone Thoen Found by Frank Thompson
    7. Boulders Taller than the Great Tower of Seville by Garcia Lopez de Cardenas
    8. "The Most Sublime Spectacle on Earth" by John Wesley Powell
    9. Fifty Leagues of Silver by Fray Alonso de Benevides
    10. Captain José Zúñiga's Report
    11. Are We Prisoners of War? by Zebulon Montgomery Pike
    12. The Russians in California by William A. Slacum
    Part 2: The Original Westerners
    13. Ishi, The Last One Left Alive by Theodora Kroeber
    14. The Man Who Killed the Deer by Frank Waters
    15. The Pacifist Warrior by Jack Schaefer
    16. The Way to Rainy Mountain by N. Scott Momaday
    17. Colter's Run by H.M. Chittenden
    18. "Can You Blot Out Those Stars?" by Myron Angel
    19. "I will Fight No More Forever"
    Part 3: The Navajos
    20. The Murder of Narbona by Franc Johnson Newcomb
    21. Barboncito's Plea
    22. The Hogan by Gladys Reichard
    23. Laughing Boy by Oliver La Farge
    24. The Death of Old Man Hat by Walter Dyk
    Part 4: The Hispanos
    25. The Muleteers by Max Morehead
    26. Brother's of the Light by Marta Weigle
    27. Blessing the Animals by John A. Lomax
    28. Ramona by Helen Hunt Jackson
    29. A Santa Fe Fandango by George Frederick Ruxton
    Part 5: Frontier Life
    30. The Burning Bush by A.W. Whipple
    31. A Twenty-Dollar Christmas Ball by Alexander Kelly McClure
    32. Christmas in Round Valley by John Wesley Clampitt
    33. "A Rather Pretentious Sod House" by Everett Dick
    34. "Quite Discouraged and Impatient for His Death . . ." by George Yount
    35. The Bashful Trapper by Jacob Fowler
    36. "And the Skies Are Not Cloudy All Day" by Alan Bosworth
    37. The $175,000 Sack of Flour
    38. How Americans Get Ahead by William Shepherd
    39. J.C. Penney's First Day by Norman Beasley
    40. Wolf Willow by Wallace Stegner
    41. The Melting Pot by Robert Laxalt
    42. Basques in Nevada by Robert Laxalt
    43. Nails and Whiskey by Alexander Toponce
    44. Death Valley Scotty's Story by Ealanor Jordan Houston
    45. Burial Customs at Fort Pierre by Thaddeus Culbertson
    Part 6: Cowboys
    46. The Harvard Cowboy by Richard Trimble
    47. The Spree at the End of the Trail
    48. Charlie Siringo's Flirtation by Charlie Siringo
    49. "I Threw My Timid Friend a Bisquit" by Theodore Baughman
    50. The Cowboy Strike by David Dary
    51. The First Rodeos by Charles Nordhoff
    52. The Chuck Wagon by Eugene Manlove Rhodes
    53. When You Call Me That, Smile! by Owen Wister
    Part 7: Tall Tales and Practical Jokes
    54. The Traveling Stones, and Other Such Affairs by Duncan Emrich
    55. The First Jumping Frog
    56. How Trout Survive Mountain Winters
    57. "I Am Not Aware That Anyone Has Been Born Lately" by J. Ross Browne
    58. I Paint the Truth Just as It Is by J. Ross Browne
    59. The Buffalo Corral and Milking Pen by James Stevens
    60. The Greasewood Golf Course by Dick Wick Hall
    61. The Badger Fight by Bill Oden
    62. "Anything That Will Make Money"
    Part 8: Characters
    63. "Genial if Rambunctious" by Marthy "Calamity" Jane Cannary
    64. How the Ski Came to Snow Country by Robert Laxalt
    65. The Emperor of California by Josua Norton
    66. Schlatter the Healer by Agnes Morely Cleaveland
    67. Law West of the Pecos by C.L. Sonnichsen
    68. How Phoenix Got Its Name by Lawrence Clark Powell
    69. Uncle Dick Wootton by Agnes Morely Cleaveland
    70. Culture Comes to Virginia City by R.D. Miller
    Part 9: The Mines
    71. Gold Only Waiting to Be Gathered Up by Paul Horgan
    72. "Something Shining int h Bottom of the Ditch" by James W. Marshall
    73. "Men Living Like Coyotes" by J. Ross Browne
    74. Sutro's Tunnel
    75. Growing Up in Bonanza Town by John Taylor Walford
    76. Boyhood at the Chloride Flat by James K. Hastings
    77. The Sun River Stampede by Robert Vaughan
    78. The Post-Hole Banks by J. Frank Dobie
    79. There's Gems in Them Thar Hills by Randall Henderson
    Part 10: Women
    80. "A Pretty Hoorah Place" by Nannie Alderson
    81. Now the Prairie Life Begins! by Susan Shelby Magoffin
    82. The Pregnant Private by William Gilpin
    83. Great Western, the Army's Amazon by Arthur Woodward
    84. Doing the Washing by Eleanor McGovern
    85. "A Ball Put in Your Carcass" by Caroline Nichols Churchill
    86. Rags to Riches to Rags by Robert Laxalt
    87. And from Rags to Riches to Starvation by Marshall Sprague
    88. Biscuits, Coffee and Beans by Annie D. Tallent
    89. Greasy Meals, Infested with Lazy Flies by Isabella Bird
    90. Contempt of Court by Ellen Jack
    91. Goldfield Booms by Anne Ellis
    Part 11: Law and Disorder
    92. Missed Four Thousand Times by Elfego Baca
    93. The Marquis de Peralta
    94. "It Began with Wrong and Outrage" by Eugene Manlove Rhodes
    95. The Real Billy the Kid by Howard Bryan
    96. Billy's Alive, and So Is Jesse by C.L. Sonnichsen
    97. That Famous Shootout at the O.K. Corral
    98. The Soldier of Fortune by Thompson M. Turner
    99. "No Complaint Was Made Against Him" by Thompson M. Turner
    100. Taking Politics Seriously by Ralph Emerson Twitchell
    101. The Hanging Windmill by Howard Bryan
    102. More Action at the Hanging Windmill by Howard Bryan
    103. The Johnson County War by T.A. Larson
    Part 12: Travel
    104. Over the Oregon Trail by Bernard DeVoto
    105. Thus the First Mail Was Brought on Camels by Edward F. Beale
    106. Aubry's Great Ride by J. Frank Dobie
    107. "Without Any Thing to Eat but the Dead" by Virginia Reed
    108. "Goodbye, Death Valley"
    109. "Fifteen-Hundred Hats Were Lost Yearly" by Raphael Pumpelly
    110. The Great Wagon-Train Swindle by William Miles
    111. Horace Greeley's Wild Ride by Artemus Ward
    112. What the Travel Agent Doesn't Tell You by H.M. Chittenden
    113. Cold Feet
    114. A Revolver Is an Admirable Tool . . . by Sir Richard Burton
    115. The Desert Traveler's Kit by Joseph P. Allyn
    116. How Exquisitely Pleasant, How Cosy and Delightful! by James Rusling
    117. The Race for Raton Pass by James Marshall
    118. The Continent is Joined by Theodore H. Hittell
    119. They Do Not Drink, Fight, or Strike by Charles Nordhoff
    120. The Rawhide Railroad by George Estes
    121. 185 Miles in Fifteen Hours and Twenty Minutes by Alexander Majors
    122. Finally, Behind the Wheel! by Upton Sinclair
    123. Steinbeck's Highway 66 by John Steinbeck
    Part 13: The Military
    124. The Last Word from the Alamo by William Travis
    125. The Mormon Battalion by Jame Ferguson
    126. "We Have Come Amongst You" by Stephn Watts Kearny
    127. Paddy Graydon's Civil War
    128. Custers Last Letter Home by George Armstrong Custer
    129. Mrs. Custer Hears the News by Elizabeth Custer
    Part 14: The Western Way With Words
    130. "José Maria Martín! Stand Up!"
    131. "Stand Up, Ye Son-of-a-Bitch" by Walker Dixson Grisso
    132. Why Wilderness? by Ed Abbey
    133. "The Dirty Nincompoop Who Edits That Journal"
    134. "To The World!!" by James W. Nesmith
    135. "I Ask: What Is Life?" by Herman W. Knickerbocker
    Part 15: Fiction
    136. The Rules of the Game by Charles Lummis
    137. The Outcasts of Poker Flats by Bret Harte
    138. The Bride Comes to Yellow Sky by Stephen Crane
    139. Cabin Fever by Dorothy Scarborough
    140. Honey in the Horn by H.L. Davis
    141. "It Must Be Something Exciting" by Wallace Stegner
    142. McTeague by Frank Norris
  • Physical Attributes:
    • Format: Hardback, 24 x 16 cm.
    • Binding: Blue boards with maroon cloth spine. The title, editor and publisher are printed in gold on the spine.
    • Collation: [i]-xvi 1-526 527-528
    • Price: $25.00 USD, $33.00 CAN
Bibliography
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