Cover of Wilderness at Dawn: The Settling of the North American Continent

Wilderness at Dawn: The Settling of the North American Continent

by Ted Morgan · 1993

+ Want to read

This is the biggest, grandest, most sprawling epic ever told, filled with battles and hardship, courage, determination, daring voyages into the unknown, and eye-opening discoveries... From the Pulitzer Prize-winning biographer of FDR, Winston Churchill, and Somerset Maugham, Wilderness At Dawn is the sprawling, roughhouse epic of the unsung heroes, heroines, and rogues who tamed the rugged continent that became our country. Here is a masterpiece of history, research, and storytelling, the panoramic epic of the North American continent and the vast array of characters who thought they could civilize it. Concentrating on those previously ignored by "polite histories" (ordinary settlers, unknown soldiers, scalawags, pioneer women, slaves, and Native Americans), Morgan uses scenes and dialogue from actual letters, journals, and diaries to recreate the odysseys, adventures, human dramas, and inhuman suffering that shaped America. Beginning with prehistoric man's first forays across the Bering Land Bridge, Morgan unfurls a rich tapestry of lost civilizations and Indian accomplishments; ambitious explorers, would-be politicians and transplanted Europeans confronting the wilderness; scrappy newborn towns and dandified plantation societies; great river navigations and catastrophic explorations; the bloody Indian wars and the birth of the American revolution. All are here - the triumphs, tragedies, battles and intrigues from the Ice Age when Early Man roamed an empty continent to the achievement of the all-American dream of "Land for Every Man." Morgan takes us into the world of the lost Anasazi people, where inventive Indians built houses of 500 rooms, veritable "cities of stone" tucked amongthe canyon walls. He takes us into the lives of the Indians of the Southwest where a shipwrecked Spanish explorer named Cabeza de Vaca became an indentured servant (and later medicine man) to a tribe of Indian fishermen. We see the arrival of the first Jews in North America, the ha

Subject
historyhistoryMore like thisLess of this
Themes
American historyAmerican historyMore like thisLess of thishistoryhistoryMore like thisLess of this
Setting
colonial Americacolonial AmericaMore like thisLess of thisUSAUSAMore like thisLess of thisCanadaCanadaMore like thisLess of thisNorth AmericaNorth AmericaMore like thisLess of this
Audience
adult
Length
long · 544 pages

Click a tag to see books like this one that share it. Point at it (on a phone, tap it) for less of it instead.

Read it? Sign in to help tag it.

BuyAmazonGoogle Books

BorrowOpen LibraryA library near you

MoreCompare pricesHardcover

Liked Wilderness at Dawn: The Settling of the North American Continent? Here’s where I’d start.

These suit anyone who liked Wilderness at Dawn: The Settling of the North American Continent. Sign in and mark a few books for picks shaped around your own taste.

  1. Race and Revolution Gary B. Nash · 1990 Shares history, American history, nonfiction
  2. The Causes of the Civil War · 1965 Shares history, American history, nonfiction
  3. History of the United States During the Administrations of James Madison Henry Adams · 1986 Shares American history, history, nonfiction
  4. The Unraveling of America: A History of Liberalism in the 1960s Allen J. Matusow · 1984 Shares American history, history, nonfiction
See more recommendations →

“People who read Wilderness at Dawn: The Settling of the North American Continent tend to reach for these next.”

  1. Alistair Cooke's America Alistair Cooke · 1973
  2. Andrew Jackson and His Indian Wars Robert V. Remini · 2001
  3. Woman's Life in Colonial Days Carl Holliday · 1968
  4. We Still Hold These Truths: Rediscovering Our Principles, Reclaiming Our Future Matthew Spalding · 2009

“If you want more of the same (history about american history), start with these.”

  1. Colonial America: A Very Short Introduction Alan Taylor · 2012
  2. The Birth of America: From Before Columbus to the Revolution William R. Polk · 2006
  3. Between Two Worlds: How the English Became Americans Malcolm Gaskill · 2014
  4. Black Like You: Blackface, Whiteface, Insult, and Imitation in American Popular Culture John Strausbaugh · 2006

“If it was the American history that hooked you, try one of these.”

  1. American Reformers, 1815-1860, Revised Edition Ronald G. Walters · 1978
  2. American Moderns: Bohemian New York and the Creation of a New Century Christine Stansell · 2000
  3. American Connections: The Founding Fathers. Networked. James Burke · 2007
  4. The Thirteen Colonies Louis B. Wright · 2014

“These start from a similar idea, even if they go somewhere else with it.”

  1. Africa Yvonne Ayo · 1960
  2. Through the Dark Continent, Vol. 2 Henry Morton Stanley · 1878
  3. Through the Dark Continent, Vol. 1 Henry Morton Stanley · 1878
  4. The Great Race David Hill · 2012

Report a problem