Adventurers & Explorers Books

Colorado Snow Observer "Where are you going?" was the question asked me one snowy winter day. After hearing that I was off on a camping-trip, to be gone several days, and that the place where I intended to camp was in deep snow on the upper slopes of the Rockies, the questioners laughed heartily. Knowing me, some questioners realized that I was in earnest, and all that they could say in the... more...

CHAPTER ONE GOING WEST Father and mother settled on the Kansas prairie in the early fifties. At that time Kansas was the frontier. Near neighbors were twenty miles or more apart. There was no railroad; no stages supplied the vast unsettled region. A few supplies were freighted by wagon. However, little was needed from civilized sources, for the frontier teemed with game. Myriads of prairie chickens... more...

CHAPTER I. Early Discoveries in the Fifteenth Century. LEGENDS OF THE SEA. Modern familiarity with navigation renders it difficult for us to appreciate adequately the greatness of the enterprise which was undertaken by the discoverers of the New World. Seen by the light of science and of experience, the ocean, if it has some real terrors, has no imaginary ones. But it was quite otherwise in the... more...

CHAPTER I. The family of Daniel Boone—His grandfather emigrates to America, and settles in Bucks County, Pennsylvania—Family of Daniel Boone's father—Account of Exeter, the birth-place of Boone—Birth of Daniel Boone—Religion of his family—Boone's boyhood—Goes to school—Anecdote—Summary termination of his schooling. The immediate ancestors and near relations of the American... more...

CHAPTER I. YOUTH. Walter Raleigh was born, so Camden and an anonymous astrologer combine to assure us, in 1552. The place was Hayes Barton, a farmstead in the parish of East Budleigh, in Devonshire, then belonging to his father; it passed out of the family, and in 1584 Sir Walter attempted to buy it back. 'For the natural disposition I have to the place, being born in that house, I had rather seat... more...

PREFACE When I first broached the matter of writing his autobiography to John H. Cady, two things had struck me particularly. One was that of all the literature about Arizona there was little that attempted to give a straight, chronological and intimate description of events that occurred during the early life of the Territory, and, second, that of all the men I knew, Cady was best fitted, by reason of... more...

CHAPTER I. — THE OLD HOMESTEAD IN IOWA. A PLEASANT, roomy farm-house, set in the sunlight against a background of cool, green wood and mottled meadow—this is the picture that my earliest memories frame for me. To this home my parents, Isaac and Mary Cody, had moved soon after their marriage. The place was known as the Scott farm, and was situated in Scott County, Iowa, near the historic little town... more...

CHAPTER I. Kit Carson's Youth—His Visit to New Mexico—Acts as Interpreter and inVarious Other Employments—Joins a Party of Trappers and Engages in aFight with Indians—Visits the Sacramento Valley. "Kit Carson," the most famous hunter, scout and guide ever known in this country, was a native of Kentucky, the scene of the principal exploits of Daniel Boone, Simon Kenton, the Wetzel... more...

INTRODUCTION. There were two cousins Von der Trenck, who were barons descended from an ancient house in East Prussia, and were adventurous soldiers, to whom, as to the adventurous, there were adventures that lost nothing in the telling, for they were told by the authors’ most admiring friends—themselves.  Franz, the elder, was born in 1711, the son of an Austrian general; and Frederick, whose... more...

I F ever a compelling Fate set its grip upon a man and drove him to an accomplishment beside his purpose and outside his thought, it was when Henry Hudson—having headed his ship upon an ordered course northeastward—directly traversed his orders by fetching that compass to the southwestward which ended by bringing him into what now is Hudson's River, and which led on quickly to the founding of... more...