The most honored book ever released by the University of Illinois Press, The Plains Across was the result of more than a decade's work by its author. Here, on the occasion of the 150th anniversary of the opening of the Oregon Trail, is a paperback reissue that includes the notes, bibliography, and illustrations contained in the 1979 cloth edition.

"America was to me a sort of promised land; 'westward the march of empire holds its way'; the race is for the moment to the young; what has been and what is we imperfectly and obscurely know; what is to be yet lies beyond the flight of our imaginations. . . " Robert Louis Stevenson, The Amateur Emigrant Across the Plains with Other Memories and Essays (1892) by Robert Louis Stevenson is the second book in a trilogy that began with The Amateur Emigrant and ended with The Silverado Squatters and in which the author described his travels in the United States. Each of the 12 chapters is a self-contained essay that discusses a particular aspect of what Stevenson observed as he traveled by train from New York to California. They give a fascinating view of what travel was in the late Victorian period from the perspective of a Scottish visitor.

The Sager orphans (sometimes referred to as Sager children) were the children of Naomi and Henry Sager. In April 1844 Henry Sager and his family took part in the great westward migration and started their journey along the Oregon Trail. During their journey both Naomi and Henry Sager lost their lives and left their seven children orphaned. Later adopted by Marcus and Narcissa Whitman, missionaries in what is now Washington, the children were orphaned a second time, when both their new parents were killed during the Whitman massacre in November 1847. Catherine (1835-1910), the eldest of the Sager girls, married Clark Pringle, a Methodist minister and bore him 8 children. They lived in Spokane, Washington. About 1860, ten years after her arrival in Oregon, she wrote a first-hand account of their journey across the plains and their life with the Whitmans. This account today is regarded as one of the most authentic accounts of the American westward migration. She hoped to earn enough money to set up an orphanage in the memory of Narcissa Whitman. She never found a publisher. Catherine died on August 10, 1910, at the age of seventy-five.

On April 30, 1849, Sarah Bayliss Royce, along with her husband, Josiah, and their daughter, Mary, left her home in Tipton, Iowa, and headed for California in a covered wagon. Along the way, she kept a diary which, nearly thirty years later, served as the basis for a memoir she titled Across the Plains. That book has been freshly transcribed by Jennifer Dawes Adkison from RoyceÕs original handwritten document, and this new edition is faithful to the original, restoring several passages that were omitted from the previous edition. In a new introduction Adkison reveals Across the Plains to be far more than a simple narrative of one pioneer womanÕs journey west. She explains that Royce wrote the book at the request of her son, Josiah Royce, a well-known professor of philosophy at Harvard University with motives of his own. She crafted the narrative that her son wanted: an argument for spiritual faith and fortitude as foundational to CaliforniaÕs history. Yet the narrative itself, in addition to offering a window into a world that has long lacked close documentation, gives us the opportunity to study the ways in which nineteenth-century western women asserted this primacy of faith and crafted their experience into stories with larger cultural and social resonance. Scholars have long used Across the Plains to mold and support an iconic image of the resolute pioneer woman. However, until now no one has considered RoyceÕs own self-conscious creation of this persona. Readers will discover that in many ways, Sarah RoyceÕs careful construction of this cultural portrait deepens our respect for her and our delight in her travels, travails, and triumphs.

National Bestseller Most travelers only fly over the Great Plains--but Ian Frazier, ever the intrepid and wide-eyed wanderer, is not your average traveler. A hilarious and fascinating look at the great middle of our nation. With his unique blend of intrepidity, tongue-in-cheek humor, and wide-eyed wonder, Ian Frazier takes us on a journey of more than 25,000 miles up and down and across the vast and myth-inspiring Great Plains. A travelogue, a work of scholarship, and a western adventure, Great Plains takes us from the site of Sitting Bull's cabin, to an abandoned house once terrorized by Bonnie and Clyde, to the scene of the murders chronicled in Truman Capote's In Cold Blood. It is an expedition that reveals the heart of the American West.

Ayla, the heroine first introduced in The Clan of the Cave Bear, is known and loved by millions of readers. Now, in The Plains of Passage, Ayla’s story continues. Ayla and Jondalar set out on horseback across the windswept grasslands of Ice Age Europe. To the hunter-gatherers of their world--who have never seen tame animals--Ayla and Jondalar appear enigmatic and frightening. The mystery surrounding the woman, who speaks with a strange accent and talks to animals with their own sounds, is heightened by her uncanny control of a large, powerful wolf. The tall, yellow-haired man who rides by her side is also held in awe, not only for the magnificent stallion he commands, but also for his skill as a crafter of stone tools, and for the new weapon he devises, the spear-thrower. In the course of their cross-continental odyssey, Ayla and Jondalar encounter both savage enemies and brave friends. Together they learn that the vast and unknown world can be difficult and treacherous, but breathtakingly beautiful and enlightening as well. All the pain and pleasure bring them closer to their ultimate destination, for the orphaned Ayla and the wandering Jondalar must reach that place on earth they can call home. As sweeping and spectacular as the land she creates, Jean M. Auel’s The Plains of Passage is an astonishing novel of discovery, danger, and love, a triumph for one of the world’s most original and popular authors. This eBook includes the full text of the novel plus the following additional content: • An Earth’s Children® series sampler including free chapters from the other books in Jean M. Auel’s bestselling series • A Q&A with the author about the Earth’s Children® series