LOUIS  L ÁMOUR     -    BUCKSKIN  RUN   1981.

Land of the free...

In this unique collection of tales, Louis L'Amour captures the frontier experience as it lives forever in the American imagination.

A young woman heads west to marry, only to find her intended fiancé the subject of dark rumors....

Vowing to stay out of trouble, a young cowhand rides to get some calico for his girlfriend's new dress. But trouble finds him when he runs afoul of two men, one of whom is a vicious murderer....

A wily old sheriff comes to arrest the last surviving member of an infamous clan. Caught in a sudden and treacherous blizzard, they make the unlikeliest of partners in a desperate struggle for survival that teaches them the true meaning of courage, honor, friendship--and justice.

These are just some of the unforgettable characters whose adventures are collected in this magnificent volume.

 

LOUIS  L ÁMOUR   -  WESTWARD  THE  TIDE  1977.

The promise was gold, a lot of it, waiting in the Big Horn Mountains. The plan was to head out with a handpicked party and nothing but the best in wagons, stock, and goods. Matt Bardoul bought in because the girl he wanted was there. But the tall, rugged man in buckskin sensed there was something wrong even before someone tried to warn him off--and someone else tried to gun him down. Sure enough, as the wagon train journeys westward, a deadly plot unfolds. Now Bardoul is the only man standing between innocent people and a brutal conspiracy of greed, lust, and cold-blooded murder.

 

LOUIS  L'AMOUR   -   COMSTOCK  LODE  1981.

It was just a godforsaken mountainside, but no place on earth was richer in silver. For a bustling, enterprising America, this was the great bonanza. The dreamers, the restless, the builders, the vultures–they were lured by the glittering promise of instant riches and survived the brutal hardships of a mining camp to raise a legendary boom town. But some sought more than wealth. Val Trevallion, a loner haunted by a violent past. Grita Redaway, a radiantly beautiful actress driven by an unfulfilled need. Two fiercely independent spirits, together they rose above the challenges of the Comstock to stake a bold claim on the future.

 

LOUIS  L'AMOUR  -   HELLER  WITH A GUN   1955.

Tom Healy was in trouble. His theatrical troupe needed to get to Alder Gulch, Montana, and the weather was turning. Andy Barker promised Tom he could get them there safely, but Tom was reluctant to trust him: he had the lives of three actresses to consider, and his personal feelings for Janice further heightened his concern. Then King Mabry showed up. Although Tom didn’t like the way he looked at Janice, he could see that Mabry made Barker uneasy. So Tom invited Mabry to join them. Tom was right to be worried, because Barker had a plan. He knew that the wagons carried something more than actors and scenery. He and his men were going to steal it any way they could. And that included murder

 

LOUIS  L'AMOUR  -  THE GAME OF DEATH  1965.

He had led the posse for miles through the desert, but now Matt Keelock was growing desperate. He was worried about Kristina. His trip to the town of Freedom for supplies had ended in a shoot-out. If caught, he would hang. Even though Kris could handle a horse and rifle as well as most men, the possibility of Oskar Neerland's finding her made Matt's blood run cold. He knew that the violent and obsessive Neerland, publicly embarrassed when Matt had stepped in and stolen Kris away, would try to kill them both if given half a chance. Matt tried to convince himself that Neerland had returned to the East. But Matt was wrong. Miles away in the town of Freedom, Oskar Neerland was accepting a new job. In his first duty as marshal, he would lead the posse that was tracking down Matt Keelock.

A hanging party rules the badlands and a lone rider races for his life. Falsely accused of back-shooting a man as he stood sipping whiskey in a saloon, Matt Keelock takes on a posse of angry men with no more backup than his smoking Colt and a sure-footed horse. It's one against many--but there's a hundred twists to every trail as the posse suddenly finds the hunters have turned into the hunted.

                    




    

LOUIS  L'AMOUR     -   THE EMPTY  LAND  1969.

On the edge of the frontier, boomtowns like Confusion sprang up overnight. Here honest men came to work the mines, while thieves, gamblers and outlaws worked on them. But in Confusion there was more at stake than law and order--the mines themselves were the target of a violent plot. Matt Coburn had cleaned up tough towns before, but he wanted no part of Confusion. Too many enemies knew he was there, too many lies had been told. Now there's only one way out of Confusion for Coburn--a path of honor that could cost him his life.

 

    

LOUIS  L'AMOUR  -  HAUNTED  MESA   1987.

The Navajo called them the Anasazi: an enigmatic race of southwestern cliff dwellers. For centuries, the sudden disappearance of this proud and noble people has baffled historians. Summoned to a dark desert plateau by a desperate letter form an old friend, renowned investigator Mike Raglan is drawn into a world of mystery, violence, and explosive revaltion. Crossing the border beyond the laws of man and nature, he will learn the astonishing legacy of the Anasazi -- but not without a price. Set in the contemporary Southwest, The Haunted Mesa draws on Louis L'Amour's extensive knowledge of Indian lore and mysticism. In this extraordinary book L'Amour tells a tale of epic adventure that takes his readers across the most extraordinary frontier they have ever encountered.

 

QUANAH  PARKER.

COMANCHE LAST LEADER.

In 1836, a 9-year-old pioneer girl named Cynthia Ann Parker was kidnapped during a Comanche raid in North Texas. She was strapped onto the back of a horse and taken north, back into the Plains where the powerful American Indian tribe lived.

Parker became a ward of the chief and later, a full member of the Comanches. She eventually married a highly respected Comanche chief and gave birth to three children, including Quanah — who would grow up to become the last and greatest Comanche leader.

He was reputed to be ruthless, clever, and fearless in battle.

If you go back through Comanche history, you see that they were the ones who stopped the Spanish from coming North," he explains. "Why did the French stop coming west from Louisiana? Comanches. ... Here was why the West Coast and the East Coast settled before the middle of the country. Here was why there was basically a 40-year wait before you could develop the state of Texas or before other Plain states could be developed.

Quanah Parker led Comanche raids against American villages and troops in the 1860s and 1870s, opposing American expansion into Comanche territory. However, he saw that further struggle was pointless and began negotiating with the US government.

Also Comanche had an integral role in preventing — and then opening up — the American West to white settlers.

Quanah Parker led the Comanche tribe until his death in 1911. He is recognized today as a Native American resistance hero and a symbol of the ongoing struggle for Native American rights and recognition. The Quanah Parker Society, which seeks to preserve Comanche history and culture, carries on his legacy.

CROOKED HAND.

PAWNEE CHIEF.

 Crooked Hand, a Pawnee, gained notoriety as the “greatest warrior in the tribe,” anthropologist George Bird Grinnell reported. His son, Dog Chief, went on to serve as a U.S

They say they came from the southwest or south to their Great Plains homes long before living memory.  Evidence says that the Pawnees resided in the Central Plains region for centuries before the historical period.  The Pawnees lived in elevated river terraces and bluff sites along fifty-mile stretch of the Loup and Platte Rivers.  There they gathered wild foods, grew squash, pumpkins, beans, and corn.  They also hunted buffalo on annual hunts.

         Pawnee hunters first saw horses in the late seventeenth or early eighteenth centuries.  When settlers came from Europe, they began trading and giving gifts to the Indians for land to make North America bigger.  The Pawnee leaders met with major U.S. leaders and began so called treaties and agreements that eventually ended up with Pawnee tribes on reservations.  To escape these reservations the warriors joined the United States army as scouts.  They fought against their enemies, the Sioux  , Cheyenne,  Arapahos, Delawares,Comanches, Apaches, and the Kiowas in the 1860s and 1870s.  

 

RAIN IN THE FACE.

The noted Sioux warrior, Rain-in-the-Face, whose name once carried terror to every part of the frontier, died at his home on the Standing Rock reserve in North Dakota on  September 14, 1905.

“I had been on many warpaths but was not especially successful until about the time the Sioux began to fight with the white man. One of the most daring attacks that we ever made was at Fort Totten, North Dakota, in the summer of 1866.

“Hohay, the Assiniboine captive of Sitting Bull, was the leader in this raid. Wapaypay, the Fearless Bear, who was afterward hanged at Yankton, was the bravest man among us. He dared Hohay to make the charge. Hohay accepted the challenge, and in turn dared the other to ride with him through the agency and right under the walls of the fort, which was well garrisoned and strong.

“Wapaypay and I in those days called each other ‘brother-friend.’ It was a life two years later we attacked a fort west of the Black Hills [Fort Phil Kearny, Wyoming].  It was there we killed one hundred soldiers.” [The military reports say eighty men, under the command of Captain Fetterman — not one left alive to tell the tale!]  “Nearly every band of the Sioux Nation was represented in that fight — Red Cloud, Spotted Tail, Crazy Horse, Sitting Bull, Big Foot, and all our great chiefs were there. Of course, such men as I were then comparatively unknown.  However, there were many noted young warriors, among them Sword, the younger Young-Man-Afraid, American Horse [afterward chief], Crow King, and others.

 

ONE  BULL.

Born 1853 Tȟatȟáŋka Waŋžíla

Died 1947.

One Bull was adopted by Sitting Bull in 1857 at the age of four His mother was Sitting Bull's sister Good Feather  his father was Makes Room and his brother was White Bull.

One Bull participated in Battle of the Little Bighorn in 1876. He arrived with his horse and Sitting Bull's. He rode his mother to safety and then joined the fight. Sitting Bull told him, "Fear nothing. Go straight in". One Bull recounted having killed several fleeing troopers in the battle.[8]:94, 96 He wore his uncle's shield during the Battle of Little Bighorn.[citation needed] One Bull joined his uncle in fleeing to Canada following the Battle of the Little Bighorn in 1876.

 

BRAVE  BUFFALO  BULL.

Brave Buffalo was born c. 1713 in Hunkpapa on the Great Plains to the Hunkpapa Sioux tribe of Native Americans, and he was well-known for his ferocity in fighting against Spain and rival native tribes, including the Crow and Comanche. 

Brave Buffalo served as the war leader of the tribe in his later years during the 1770s and 1780s, serving on the ruling council of the tribe.

SIOUX  WARRIORS.

 

CHIEF  PONTIAC - Ottawa Chief.

Chief Pontiac, called Obwandiyag by his people, was a great leader of the Ottawa tribe and became famous for organizing Pontiac’s Rebellion (1763–1766). Following the British victory in the French and Indian War, Chief Pontiac organized his and other tribes in the Great Lakes area to rebel against the intrusion on their lands.

Chief Pontiac was assassinated by a Peoria Indian on April 20, 1769. To avenge Pontiac’s death, the Ottawa Indians killed many Peoria Indians.

Siege of Fort Detroit in 1763 by the Ottawa warriors. 

 
Chief Gall – Aggressive Sioux Leader

Chief Gall was one of the most aggressive leaders of the Sioux nation in their last stand for freedom.

When ” Buffalo Bill ” successfully launched his first show, he made every effort to secure both Sitting Bull and Gall for his leading attractions. The military was in complete accord with him in this, for they still had grave suspicions of these two leaders. While Sitting Bull reluctantly agreed, Gall haughtily said: “I am not an animal to be exhibited before the crowd,” and retired to his teepee

 Dull Knife – Northern Cheyenne Chief

The life of Dull Knife, the Cheyenne Chief, is a true hero tale. Simple, child-like yet manful, and devoid of selfish aims, or love of gain, he is a pattern for heroes of any race.

He died in 1883 and was buried on high ground near his home.

            

MANUELITO

died in 1893.

A principal Navajo war chief, Manuelito was born near Bears Ears Peak in southeastern Utah in about 1818 the Navajo gave him the name Hashkeh Naabaah, meaning ″Angry Warrior″.

 

 

AMERICAN HORSE.

One of the wittiest and shrewdest of the Sioux chiefs was American Horse, who succeeded to the name and position of an uncle, killed in the battle of Slim Buttes in 1876.

SIOUX  WARRIORS.

 OSCEOLA . 

Born in 1804 - Died on January 30, 1838

Osceola, the most well-known leader of the Seminole Indians, was born in 1804, in a Creek town near Tallassee, present-day Tuskegee, Alabama. His Creek mother, Polly Copinger, was married to Englishman William Powell.

 

COCHISE :   Died on june 8, 1874.              

One of the most famous Apache leaders to resist Westward Expansion by white settlers was Cochise of the Chiricahua Apache. Cochise was known to his people as A-da-tli-chi, meaning hardwood, and lived in the area that is now the northern Mexican region of Sonora, as well as New Mexico and Arizona. These lands had long been home to the Apache until the Europeans arrived.

 

CHIEF VICTORIO

Born on the Black Range of New Mexico around 1825, Victorio was raised as a member of the Chihenne Apache.

The warrior Victorio, one of the greatest Apache military strategists of all time, dies on October 15, 1880, in the Tres Castillos Mountains south of El Paso, Texas.

Known as Bidu-ya or Beduiat to his Apache people, Victorio was a warrior and chief of the Chihenne band of the Chiricahua Apache in what is now New Mexico.

Victorio grew up during a period of intense hostility between the native Apache Native Americans of the southwest and encroaching Mexican and American settlers. Determined to resist the loss of his homeland, Victorio began leading his small band of warriors on a long series of devastating raids against Mexican and American settlers and their communities in the 1850s.

In April 1880, Victorio was said to have led his band in the Alma Massacre, where several settlers’ homes were raided and several people killed. As a result, U.S. Army troops were sent out in force from Fort Bayard, New Mexico, to capture Victorio and his band. The soldiers outpaced Victorio to the water holes in the Sierra Diablo Mountains, and after two unsuccessful attempts to reach water, the Apache retreated into Mexico.

On October 14, 1880, Victorio and his warrios were surprised by hired Mexican sculp hunters who killed Victorio and his warriors. Only women and children survived  and were held prisoners in Chihuahua City for the next several years.

 POINT OF THE  4 CORNERS

UTAH -COLORADO-ARIZONA-NEW MEXICO 

WHERE  THE  ANASAZI -HOPI  and NAVAJO  lived.

INDIAN TRIBES MAP.
 

 

    

SIOUX WARRIORS.

 

ILLINOIS   1820 -today CHICAGO area.