Category: History: U.S.: L&C

Copyright/published Year: 2003 by Rutledge Hill Press

ISBN: 1401600751

Binding: Board

Few events in American history have shaped the nation like the ì Lewis and Clark Expedition. It opened the American West for ì settlement. It redrew the map of the United States. It identified ì an array of native peoples, spectacular places, fascinating ì creatures, and extraordinary flora unknown in "civilized" ì America. It defined the American nation as a land stretching from ì coast to coast_and it launched the spread of population in a ì mighty frontier migration unlike anything ever witnessed in ì America before or since.

Lewis and Clark on the Trail of Discovery contains 19 ì chapters, detailing the expedition chronologically. A "museum in ì a book," this fascinating volume contains re-creations of ì original documents such as diary entries, letters, maps, and ì sketches_all meticulously reproduced so that the reader can ì actually handle and examine them. Among the documents included in the book are:

• The actual letter of credit Jefferson wrote to Lewis
  ì
• committing the U.S. government to pay for the expedition. ì
  
• The code Thomas Jefferson provided to Lewis for sending ì secret messages.
  
• Clark's sketch of the technique some Indians used to flatten ì their heads, a sign of prestige.
  
• Clark's letter of gratitude to Sacagawea, a Shoshone teenager ì who helped the expedition.
  
• A newspaper account of the expedition's return to St. ì Louis.
  

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