New Mexico's Royal Road: Trade and Travel on the Chihuahua Trail Review

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(More customer reviews)This book enlightens the reader to major enconimic forces influencing the history of New Mexico while telling the story of the development of the Camino Real through New Mexico and into the United States.

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The arrival of Missourian William Becknell's party at Santa Fé in 1821 ushered in the era of the annual "Santa Fé trade" between the United States and the Mexican settlements to the south and opened the famous route known as the Santa Fé Trail. Of even greater significance, but largely overlooked today, is the fact that it also opened a road from the United States connecting with a major Mexican high way, for Santa Fé was the terminus of the 1,600-mile Camino Real, the "King's Highway," stretching southward to Chihuahua and the interior cities of Mexico.

Over this Royal Road between Santa Fe and Chihuahua lumbered the caravans of the Santa Fe traders, who exchanged American dry goods and hardware for Mexican silver and mules. Over it, too, traveled Colonel Doniphan's Missouri Volunteers, bent on establishing the boundary of Texas at the Río Grande. Indeed, without this main artery of travel, the history of both the United States and Mexico might have been vastly different. This book tells the exciting story of the Chihuahua Trail, of the volume and value of the frontier commerce, its peculiar trade practices, the risks of the road, and the government controls exercised by both countries. But, more than that, it tells of the traders themselves and their influence on the government and citizenry of New Mexico, an influence strong enough to destroy that province's will to resist when the Mexican War broke out in 1846, and of their role in the war and their importance in making New Mexico into an American territory.

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Frontier Kentucky Review

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(More customer reviews)"Frontier Kentucky" is one of those books one might not expect a lot from: small, short, and apparently written for young readers. Having just read a couple of top quality histories (the 2005 Pulitzer Prize for history's ("Washington's Crossing" by David Hackett Fischer, and "Cavalryman Of A Lost Cause: A Biography of J. E. B. Stuart" by Jeffry D. Wert) and having started "Almost A Miracle: The American Victory In The War of Independence" by John Ferling, I was in need of a break for some lighter reading.
I found Rice's book to be far more than just met the eye. While it is, indeed, lighter reading compared to the others I mentioned, it is still good reading. "Frontier Kentucky" is a part of The Kentucky Bicentennial Bookshelf, a series of small books about Kentucky history and personalities. Having read several other more detailed books on Kentucky history, I enjoyed the summarizing, fly-over survey that characterizes this book. It is not strong on detail, leaves out many parts of stories, does not venture very deeply into some of the why's and wherefore's, but does serve to tie events together in a way that a deeply detailed presentation cannot do.
The one real weakness I found in this book (which I bought at a library sale for only 25 cents) is the appalling lack of maps. Other than the one on the inner face page, there are only three maps in the whole 132 pages. Plus, owing to the size of the book, 5" X 8", I literally had to employ a magnifying glass to read the map print. It does have 8 pages of pictures and portraits which add interest, but 8 pages of maps would have been far more preferable to this reader.
Rice has, I think, fulfilled his goal: to present Kentucky's rich history from its beginning in the early to middle 1600's up to 1783, the end of the American Revolution, in a simple, readable and interesting way. He will appeal, possibly, mostly to young readers, and wanna-be historians like me who enjoy the occasional historical survey to tie the host of details together in a memorable way. Having read Rice's efforts, I feel that I understand the big picture better than before.
Four stars for interest and readability. Good maps would have added the other star.

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" Otis Rice tells the dramatic story of how the first state beyond the mountains came into being. Kentucky dates its settled history from the founding of Harrodsburg in 1774 and of Boonesborough in 1775. But the drama of frontier Kentucky had its beginnings a full century before the arrival of James Harrod and Daniel Boone. The early history of the Bluegrass state is a colorful and significant chapter in the expansion of the American frontier. Rice traces the development of Kentucky through the end of the Revolutionary War. He deals with four major themes: the great imperial rivalry between England and France in the mid-eighteenth century for control of the Ohio Valley; the struggle of white settlers to possess lands claimed by the Indians and the liquidation of Indian rights through treaties and bloody conflicts; the importance of the land, the role of the speculator, and the progress of settlement; the conquest of a wilderness bountiful in its riches but exacting in its demands and the planting of political, social, and cultural institutions. Included are maps that show the changing boundaries of Kentucky as it moved toward statehood.

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Women and the Law of Property in Early America (Studies in Legal History) Review

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(More customer reviews)I read this book to learn what records might exist for a divorce and dower in connection with genealogy research. It is extremely thorough and detailed for the several states Salmon researched. It was very enlightening about the legal status of women, especially how their situations varied state to state. Some readers may find the book a rough go--the law can be a very dry subject. As an attorney myself, I appreciated the hair splitting differences she presented. I found even the notes and extensive bibliography useful for locating other materials to read.

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In this first comprehensive study of women's property rights in early America, Marylynn Salmon discusses the effect of formal rules of law on women's lives.By focusing on such areas such as conveyancing, contracts, divorce, separate estates, and widows' provisions, Salmon presents a full picture of women's legal rights from 1750 to 1830.
Salmon shows that the law assumes women would remain dependent and subservient after marriage.She documents the legal rights of women prior to the Revolution and traces a gradual but steady extension of the ability of wives to own and control property during the decades following the Revolution.The forces of change in colonial and early national law were various, but Salmon believes ideological considerations were just as important as economic ones.
Women did not all fare equally under the law.In this illuminating survey of the jurisdictions of Connecticut, Massachusetts, New York, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, and South Carolina, Salmon shows regional variations in the law that affected women's autonomous control over property.She demonstrates the importance of understanding the effects of formal law on women' s lives in order to analyze the wider social context of women's experience.

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