A Wilderness So Immense: The Louisiana Purchase and the Destiny of America (Lewis & Clark Expedition)
by Jon Kukla
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Book Summary Information
Author: Jon KuklaEdition: Hardcover
Audio: English (Original Language); English (Unknown); English (Published)
Published: 2003-04-08
ISBN: 0375408126
Number of pages: 448
Publisher: Knopf
Book Reviews of A Wilderness So Immense: The Louisiana Purchase and the Destiny of America (Lewis & Clark Expedition)
Book Review: Quite Good
Summary: 4 Stars
By the time twenty years passed after the American evolution, the young United States, already an immense country by European standards, had yet again doubled its land mass through Thomas Jefferson's Louisianan Purchase. Within the next 16 years, again due to this purchase, it would stretch across the entire North American continent, from the Atlantic to the Pacific oceans.
The story of this land acquisition is intricate, filled with intrigue. It spans the globe including such diverse locations as Haiti, Madrid, Virginia, New York, Paris, London and New Orleans. It involved scheming, daring and negotiation between traditional contenders France, Great Britain, Spain and the United States and involved a cast of characters Hollywood could only hope for: Napoleon, Jefferson, Monroe, Livingston, Talleyrand, Jay, Wilkerson, Burr, and many, many more.
Jon Kukla does a masterful job of spinning the tale of the world's largest real estate transaction. He makes it clear that as the French Revolution, and Napoleon's empire building, rocked the Atlantic community, Spain's new world empire became increasingly vulnerable to its American and European rivals. Jefferson hoped to take Spain's territories piece by piece, while Napoleon schemed to reestablish French colonial empire in the Caribbean and North America.
Interweaving the stories of ordinary settlers and kings maneuvering on the world stage, the author depicts a world of revolutionary intrigue that transformed a small, faltering experiment in self government into a world power. And all without blood shed and for about 4 cents per acre. Exceedingly well written and with significant attention paid to key transitions and detail this is a most excellent work.
Summary of A Wilderness So Immense: The Louisiana Purchase and the Destiny of America (Lewis & Clark Expedition)
The remarkable story of the land purchase that doubled the size of our young nation, set the stage for its expansion across the continent, and confronted Americans with new challenges of ethnic and religious diversity. In a saga that stretches from Paris and Madrid to Haiti, Virginia, New York, and New Orleans, Jon Kukla shows how rivalries over the Mississippi River and its vast watershed brought France, Spain, Great Britain, and the United States to the brink of war and shaped the destiny of the new American republic. We encounter American leaders--Jefferson and Jay, Monroe and Pickering among them--clashing over the opening of the West and its implications for sectional balance of power. We see these disagreements nearly derailing the Constitutional Convention of 1787 and spawning a series of separatist conspiracies long before the dispute over slavery in the territory set the stage for the Missouri Compromise and the Civil War.Kukla makes it clear that as the French Revolution and Napoleon's empire-building rocked the Atlantic community, Spain's New World empire grew increasingly vulnerable to American and European rivals. Jefferson hoped to take Spain's territories--piece by piece,--while Napoleon schemed to reestablish a French colonial empire in the Caribbean and North America.
Interweaving the stories of ordinary settlers and imperial decision-makers, Kukla depicts a world of revolutionary intrigue that transformed a small and precarious union into a world power--all without bloodshed and for about four cents an acre.
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