Published just last year, The Summer of 1876: Outlaws, Lawmen, and Legends in the Season that Defined the American West, is a well-written, fast-moving wild wide through one of the wildest summers in American history.
Wimmer follows several stories that unfolded over that first centennial summer or the American Republic—the campaign that ended in the Battle of the Little Bighorn and Custer’s demise, the murder of Wild Bill Hickock at the Number 10 Saloon in Deadwood, South Dakota, the adventures of the James-Younger Gang culminating in their debacle in Northwood, Minnesota, the story of how Bat Masterson and Wyatt Earp laid down the law in Dodge City, Kansas, and the emergence of that great American pastime, professional baseball.
Nearly half the book focuses on the campaign to force the Sioux and Cheyenne onto reservations that summer in a brisk manner full of fun facts. He starts with Red Cloud concocting a clever strategy to force the whites to sign a treaty in 1868 granting the Sioux the Black Hills of South Dakota and a good chunk of Montana, tells of the discovery of gold in them thar hills when the federal government desperately needed more of it after the Panic of 1873, of President Grant’s reluctance to give one George Armstrong Custer the command and glory he craved, of Custer’s insufferable ego and narcissism that led to his death, of the clever strategy of Sitting Bull, and the aftermath.
Wild Bill Hickock’s adventurous life is briefly described, and throughout the book Wimmer portrays a tired man, probably suffering from PTSD, made his way to Deadwood to seek his fortune only to be murdered by a quintessential loser.
Wimmer doesn’t have as much to say about Masterson and Earp, other than they kept the drunken Texas cowboys to a low roar and mostly unshot in Dodge.
The James Gang is followed in considerable, and interesting, detail, from their time as Confederate irregulars through their Missouri train robberies to the debacle in Minnesota, and brings the staid Minnesota farmers, mostly German and Scandinavian stock who effectively stood up to them, to life.
The story of the gang’s retreat from Northfield, the capture of some, the escape of the James brothers, and their ultimate fate is written well enough to inspire some sympathy for the devils of the time.
What I liked most was the way Wimmer brought out the humanity of most of these characters, and how he thoroughly immerses both himself and the reader into the material conditions of the time and how those shaped the human beings who lived in it.
If you want a quick, fun read about one of the most interesting summers in American history, this is a great book for you.
**********************************************************************
All my posts are free, but I am a working class American staring into the scary financial abyss of retirement, so if you enjoy my work, please consider a paid subscription or a one time donation by buying me a beer.
As someone who loves Old West history,this book will be essential reading.Thanks for the tip,OB.
I might mention this to my sister, who would read this book. It sounds great, and we need to revisit the American experience in far better detail. As for my own reading, I thought I misplaced a book that I recently found, only after I started reading Whitney Web's 2-volume intensive read "One Nation, Under Blackmail" !