Heart-warming and at times hilarious Western adventures are juxtaposed with gritty and emotionally wrenching moments such as Custer’s 1868 attack on Chief Black Kettle’s Cheyenne camp at Washita.
Long’s gifted ear for the true vernacular of the time and his detailed descriptions of the Old West place the reader right in the middle of the action on a journey to the Civil War era and to the far-flung outposts of the Old West.
As chapter one begins, Rasmussen takes us back to June 1865 when the Gold Rush was in full swing, as Captain Phillip La Mar, in the wheelhouse of his stern-wheel riverboat, Jupiter, enters the day's events in the logbook. His major concern is that three crewmen have cholera—the deadly scourge of the riverboats that ply the Missouri River, carrying freight and passengers destined for Fort Benton (Montana) and the goldfields beyond.
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