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White's books were popular at
a time when America was losing its vanishing wilderness. He was a keen
observer of the beauties of nature and human nature, yet could render them
in a plain-spoken style. Based on his own experience, whether writing
camping journals or Westerns, he included pithy and fun details about
cabin-building, canoeing, logging, gold-hunting, and guns and fishing and
hunting. He also interviewed people who had been involved in the fur trade,
the California gold rush and other pioneers which provided him with details
that give his novels verisimilitude. He salted in humor and sympathy for
colorful characters such as canny Indian guides and "greenhorn" campers who
carried too much gear. White also illustrated some of his books with his own
photographs, while some of his other books, were illustrated by artists,
such as the American Western painter Fernand Lungren for "The Mountains" and
"Camp and Trail". Theodore Roosevelt wrote that White was "the best man with
both pistol and rifle who ever shot" at Roosevelt's rifle range at Sagamore
Hill.
The Long Rifle (1930), Folded Hills (1932), Ranchero (1933), and Stampede
(1942) comprise The Saga of Andy Burnett, which follows a young Pennsylvania
farm boy who escapes his overbearing step father by running away to the West
with grandmother's blessing and "The Boone Gun", the original Kentucky rifle
carried by Daniel Boone. He encounters mountain man Joe Crane, who becomes
his mentor in the ways of survival in the wild. The remainder of the saga
follows Andy as he moves west, ultimately settling in California, which is
the setting of the last three books. The series incorporates actual events
and characters from the time period in the narrative. The four stories were
published as a posthumous volume, The Saga of Andy Burnett, in 1947, and
were adapted into several episodes of The Wonderful World of Disney during
1957 and 1958, starring Jerome Courtland as Andy Burnett, and Jeff York
(Mike Fink) as his friend and mentor Joe Crane. This series was in many ways
a follow-up to Disney's much more successful Davy Crockett.
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The Cabin here in pdf format |
