TY  - BOOK
AU  - Wallis,Michael
TI  - The best land under heaven: the Donner Party in the age of Manifest Destiny 
SN  - 9780871407696
PY  - 2017///]
CY  - New York
PB  - Liveright Publishing Corporation, a division of W.W. Norton & Company
KW  - Donner Party
KW  - Pioneers
KW  - California
KW  - History
KW  - 19th century
KW  - West (U.S.)
KW  - Overland journeys to the Pacific
KW  - Frontier and pioneer life
KW  - Sierra Nevada (Calif. and Nev.)
N1  - Includes bibliographical references and index; Introduction: 1846 -- Prologue: Donner Lake, June 6, 1918 -- Call of the West -- A migrating people -- The best land under heaven -- Gray gold -- Snake heads -- California dreaming -- The bold plunge -- Wagons ho! April 1846 -- Farewell, April 14-15, 1846 -- Independence bound, April 15-May 10, 1846 -- The journey -- Queen city of the trails, May 10-12, 1846 -- Indian country, May 12-18, 1846 -- Soldier Creek, May 19, 1846 -- The others, May 20, 1846 -- People of the south wind, May 21-24, 1846 -- Alcove Spring, May 25-29, 1846 -- The rhetoric of fear, May 30-June 2, 1846 -- Ebb and flow, June 3-7, 1846 -- On the Platte, June 8-10, 1846 -- Life goes on, June 10-15, 1846 -- A letter from Tamzene Donner, June 16, 1846 -- The promised land -- Change of command, June 16-19, 1846 -- Chasing mirages, June 19-25, 1846 -- Sage advice, June 26-27, 1846 -- A sense of urgency, June 28-July 12, 1846 -- Parting of the ways, July 13-19, 1846 -- The Donner party, July 20-28, 1846 -- Betrayed, July 28-31, 1846 -- The Hastings cutoff, August 1-22, 1846 -- The fearful long drive, August 23-September 10, 1846 -- Race against time, September 11-October 4, 1846 -- Blood rage, October 5-20, 1846 -- Perseverance, October 21-30, 1846 -- Out of time -- Snowbound, November 1846 -- Desperate times, desperate measures, November-December 1846 -- The forlorn hope, December 1846 -- Camp of death, December 1846 -- The starving time, January 1847 -- In dire straits, January-February 1847 -- Man on a mission, January-February 1847 -- To the rescue, February 1847 -- The first relief -- The second relief -- The third relief -- The fourth relief -- Aftermath
N2  - An account of the 1846 Donner-Reed expedition reveals the true events surrounding the tragedy, profiling the adventurous characters who shaped the group and how various interpersonal factors led to their harrowing experiences; "In the eerily warm spring of 1846, George Donner placed this advertisement in a local newspaper as he and a restless caravan prepared for what they hoped would be the most rewarding journey of a lifetime. But in eagerly pursuing what would a century later become known as the "American dream," this optimistic-yet-motley crew of emigrants was met with a chilling nightmare; in the following months, their jingoistic excitement would be replaced by desperate cries for help that would fall silent in the deadly snow-covered mountains of the Sierra Nevada. We know these early pioneers as the Donner Party, a name that has elicited horror since the late 1840s. Now, celebrated historian Michael Wallis--beloved for his myth-busting portraits of legendary American figures--continues his life's work of parsing fact from fiction to tell the true story of one of the most embroidered sagas in Western history..."--Jacket
ER  -