Mountain Man Skills: Hunting, Trapping, Woodwork, and More

by Stephen Vincent Brennan

Crafts and Skills of the Mountain Man is a fascinating, practical guide to the skills that have made the mountain men famous worldwide as outdoorsmen and craftsmen. Readers can replicate outdoor living by trying a hand at making rafts and canoes, constructing tools, and living off the land.

Learn key skills

Building a strong fire.
Learning to hunt and butcher your meals.
Creating a safe and solid shelter.
And much more!

Whether you’re an avid outdoorsman or a novice hiker, Crafts and Skills of the Mountain Man is your handbook to not only surviving outdoors, but flourishing. The style of the mountain man is unique and popular, especially among young people, historians, and those with a special interest in living off the land. The mountain man has been successful outdoors for ages, and now you can too with the skills, tips, and tricks included in this handy manual.

Skyhorse Publishing is proud to publish a broad range of books for hunters and firearms enthusiasts. We publish books about shotguns, rifles, handguns, target shooting, gun collecting, self-defense, archery, ammunition, knives, gunsmithing, gun repair, and wilderness survival. We publish books on deer hunting, big game hunting, small game hunting, wing shooting, turkey hunting, deer stands, duck blinds, bowhunting, wing shooting, hunting dogs, and more. While not every title we publish becomes a New York Times bestseller or a national bestseller, we are committed to publishing books on subjects that are sometimes overlooked by other publishers and to authors whose work might not otherwise find a home.

Genres: Survival

264 pages, Kindle Edition

First published July 21, 2015

About the author

Stephen Brennan is the co-author of The Adventurous Boy's Handbook and The Adventurous Girl's Handbook, and editor of The Best Pirate Stories Ever Told and The Best Sailing Stories Ever Told. He has worked as a circus clown, teacher, cabaret artist, actor, director, shepherd, and playwright. He lives in New York City and Woodstock, New York.

Reviews

[Daniel Hardy · Rating 1 out of 5]

Opening with an intro of what seems to be a retitled 1800s era accounting of these "mountain men," (without clarifying that the initial several pages were an intro, were written +150 years ago etc), I repeatedly checked that the book was indeed written in 2015, as the language the author chose as a representation of his book, our first look at this world, repeatedly juxtaposes unrelentingly murderous "Indians" with the "bold and adventurous" mountain  "men of spirit"

It felt important to the author to include quotes from the original, which itself quotes other text, explaining how the "Indians" enjoy robbing these (implied innocent) trappers as the "Arab" does in the desert.  I have repeatedly gone back and forth several times about continuing to attempt to read this book in light of the author not making it clear upfront (OR EVER) that he doesn't endorse this view, despite selecting these specific passages to describe life in these days.  I wanted to continue to see if there was some redemption or explanation after the fact- there were huge parts of this public domain accounting that weren't overtly racist and did a much better job explaining the life and existence of the mountain men in question than the questionable passages that were intentionally included.   There was no acknowledgement or explanation given, so I'll let the author's choice here stand on it's own.  


Further into the book it appears that it's not written by the author but a complication of (entirely uncited) period explanations of mountain skills, Interspaced with similarly retitled period accounts as the intro.  While it's clear by the language that an overwhelming percentage of the content is not recently written (take a pint of flour...) 

Similarly, the images appear to be period linocut reproductions, without citation as to their origination. 

I scrolled to the end in the hopes that at least there would be citations for the large swathes of pages of retitled works that were attributed to alternate authors (from Brennan), and not even these were cited by their actual names.  There is, however, two very brief paragraphs about modern day mountain men that do seem to be written by by someone recently.  

I gave up at around 50%.   I would recommend this book to someone who is okay overlooking intentionally selected racist passages, and is interested in reading about these skills, as they were used 200 years ago, from uncited authors of that time.  It is clearly a plagiarized anthology of historical nonfiction, masquerading as a new book written in 2015 (by which I mean, a book with substantial new content from 2015).

[Elwin Kline · Rating 2 out of 5]

Probably not quite what you would expect based off of its title. Not great, but not bad either. A unique read in the survival book genre.

To my surprise about 20% of this book is about watercraft assembly and maintenance. This is book 5 of 5 out of a little personal challenge with myself to read five books on a particular subject, being survival in this case. None of the other four books went over anything nearly in depth about canoes, log rafts, even so much as to discuss "ships" that even support having a cabin and tall masts to harness the wind to travel. Definitely was not expecting that with a title of "Mountain Man Skills."

Additionally, unique information that was not covered much in the other books I read was the detail involving footwear. I suppose the other books imagined you would have boots/shoes on and they would last you the duration of your survival experience. This book however goes into great detail (even down to establishing measurements, materials required, etc.) of various footwear to construct such as snowshoes and what most would refer to as moccasins.

Other notable highlights for sure was the log cabin construction chapter and the knots section.

The coverage on wildlife, plants, weather, fire, medical, water, trapping, etc... were pretty shallow and weak in comparison to other survival books I've read by a long shot. The food section in this book was very poor and unpractical. There was a recommendation of bringing a "spice kit" with you as you venture in the field, because salt, pepper, and chili flakes will help moral when trying to survival. I think this is out of scope and opens the floodgates to a hundred other comfort of life items that don't believe belong in a "Mountain Man" survival book. They even mentioned having milk on hand to make items such as pancakes and biscuits..... what? Totally impractical.

With all that said, the watercraft, knots, log cabin, and footwear sections are good enough to bump this up a few stars. If I could, I would give this a decimal star rating of a 2.5, but instead of rounding up... this book earned a round down.

I would not recommend this book as a survival one-stop shop for someone looking to become more prepared for survival in the wilderness.

I would however recommend this book if you wanted to learn more about the topics mentioned about above and use this as supplemental material as you already have a basic foundation of all the other general survival necessities.

[David · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not what I was expecting. I wanted something a little more practical and written from a modern perspective. This is a a bit like an early 19th century survival manual with a few modern touches and more about techniques of the past than being a modern mountain man.

I though there was surprising amount of space devoted to cooking and recipes. Eating is really important and good food is good for morale, but not what I was looking for.

There is also a lot of space devoted to trapping and the habits of various fur bearing beasts. Slightly interesting, but I am fairly sure trapping most of the creatures listed is either illegal or so constrained as to be unavailable to the hobbyist woodsman.

[Joseph Carrabis · Rating 3 out of 5]

i read ~20 pages in and asked myself who this book's audience was. The graphics and language made me think it was a juvenile reader - probably something associated with scouting, Camp Fire Girls (are they still around?), something like that - and then learned the author most often writes to that audience.
It read like something an adult would have students read. Either that or it was written for a less literate audience in the earlier years of North American colonization. Interesting, yes, not terribly informative or explanatory, definitely. I hoped it would be a resource and no, it doesn't even make it into that.
Good for youngsters, perhaps parents and their kids while camping, and not a serious adult read (my opinion).

[Clint · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very Enjoyable

A good overall look at the lives of the mountain men. Very affordable price for the kindle version. Glad I tried it.

[Bettina · Rating 3 out of 5]

Expected more. Even from a vintage title.

[Beth · Rating 5 out of 5]

Full of useful & interesting info w/colorful drawings.