Ledyard: In Search of the First American Explorer
by Bill Gifford
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Book Summary Information
Author: Bill GiffordEdition: Hardcover
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 2007-02-05
ISBN: 0151012180
Number of pages: 352
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Book Reviews of Ledyard: In Search of the First American Explorer
Book Review: THIS IS ONE YOU WILL BE HAPPY YOU READ. VERY WELL WRITTEN!
Summary: 5 Stars
This was another of those works that I found difficult to put down once I began reading the first page. I have always been aware of John Ledyard, having stumbled across is name in other works, but actually knew little of him or his exploits. This work changed that.
As the author so well points out, not many have heard the name John Ledyard recently. As a bit of a test, I asked three advanced high school history classes if anyone could give me an idea of who he was and what he did. Not one answer did I get. What a pity. The young Ledyard, shortly after dropping out of Dartmouth (have you ever noticed how many great men of note have dropped from Dartmouth and gone ahead and led quite interesting lives?), and began his restless wondering that did not cease until his death at the early age of 37 in a sort of pest hole in Cairo, Egypt, from an apparent over zealous self-medication overdose of one of those medications which were more poison than anything. In his years of wondering that he did, he was on the crew, acting as a Royal Marine, of Captain Cooks' third voyage. He drifted from the United States to Europe and then travel well into Siberia, alone, until he was arrested as a spy by the agents of Catherine the Great. His plans were to take a trading ship, sail to the North American Continent and walk from the west coast to the east, doing what Lewis and Clark did about fifteen years later, but going in the opposite direction and completely alone with no support staff what-so-ever. Did I mention that Ledyard was a bit of a dreamer? He was on his way to explore Africa, again alone, when he met his untimely death. The fact that Ledyard failed to complete most, if not all of his goals, has cast a bit of a shadow over his accomplishments over the years, which is a pity, because for sheer human effort, he did accomplish more than most. He certainly inspired many explorers of the next generation and beyond. Keep in mind that through all of his travel, he was all most completely without funds, being on the edge of complete poverty to the point of starvation many times.
Bill Gifford has done a wonderful job with this one and given us another great popular history which is quite readable and insightful. This cannot have been an easy task as most of the needed documentation concerning Ledyard has long been lost, destroyed or completely changed and altered by his contemporaries and family. Much like Sir. Richard Burton's wife, it seems his family was not all that thrilled about some of the things he addressed in his letters. A pity, but this was rather common practice in that day and time. The author followed the path Ledyard took across Siberia, actually spent times sailing on a reproduction of Cooks Ship and has explored much of the New England country side where Ledyard got his start. His writing style is quite smooth and each page is a wealth of information. In this case I have to admire the author almost as much as Ledyard, scraping together all these facts could not have been an easy job. The author has also given us a very nice picture of what life was like in those times and this is always interesting. This is not a scholarly work, although the research is good, and I don't feel it was intended to be. It is a very detailed and readable popular biography about a little known, but very interesting character out of our history. I felt much richer for having read it. Thank you Mr. Gifford!
I do highly recommend this one.
Don Blankenship
Summary of Ledyard: In Search of the First American Explorer
For decades after his death in 1789, John Ledyard was celebrated as the greatest explorer America had ever produced. A veteran of Captain Cook?s final voyage, he walked across nearly all of Russia and suggested to his friend Thomas Jefferson that traversing the American continent was feasible—inspiring the Lewis and Clark expedition. When he died he was preparing to venture into Africa. Once as famous as the Founding Fathers whom he had befriended and beguiled, the “American traveler,? as Ledyard was called, fell into obscurity over the years, reduced to becoming a footnoted reference in Moby Dick.
Bill Gifford reenacted Ledyard?s 1773 escape from Dartmouth College in a canoe and followed Ledyard?s trail down the length of the Lena River in Siberia. In Ledyard he reveals the man in the legend, bringing back an American original and giving us a story that until now has not been fully told.
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