Forty Years on the Frontier

by Granville Stuart, Clyde A. Milner II (Introduction), Carol A. O'Connor (Introduction)

There is no other pioneer record of this section quite like it. — American Historical Review When originally published in 1925, one reviewer called  Forty Years on the Frontier "the odyssey of a nineteenth-century Ulysses." In 1852, Granville Stuart (1834–1918) traveled with his brother and their father to the Sacramento Valley of California, where they spent five years mining for gold and served in the Rogue River War. In 1857 he and his brother started back to Iowa but were delayed by the outbreak of war between the Utah Mormons and the United States. After relocating to Montana’s Deer Lodge Valley, the Stuarts found gold, and news of their discovery sparked the first Montana gold rush in 1862. Stuart was instrumental in developing the Montana cattle industry and was a leader of the vigilantes who captured and executed numerous horse thieves in the summer of 1884. Stuart's edited reminiscences are a priceless and authentic account of pioneering, prospecting, and community building in the northern Rockies and Great Plains. 

265 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1994

Reviews

[John Hansen · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great historical memoir. Lots of detail about the land, animals and events. It allowed me to easily visualize life in 1850's -1880's Montana.

[J.R. Hardesty · Rating 4 out of 5]

Classic memoirs of an old Montana pioneer relates his adventures in California & other parts of the West and ultimately in Montana where he became one of the state's foremost cattle ranchers. Excellent read which I enjoyed very much.
For a brief biography, see the Wikipedia entry on this interesting pioneer.