From 1540 to the turn of the twentieth century, here are the real stories behind the legends by the explorers, American Indians, outlaws, lawmen, scouts, soldiers, frontiersmen, miners, fur traders, and cowboys who lived and witnessed them. Within these pages Lewis and Clark record their remarkable journey to the Pacific; Davy Crockett recounts his adventures in the wilderness; General George A. Custer writes about his scout Wild Bill Hickok; Two Moon gives his eyewitness account of the Battle of Little Big Horn; Pat F. Garrett tells how he killed Billy the Kid; J. D. Borthwick describes the Gold Rush; Mark Twain celebrates the Pony Express; and the voices of Coronado, Kit Carson, Buffalo Bill Cody, Geronimo, Calamity Jane, Washington Irving, Francis Parkman, Horace Greeley, John Muir, and many more convey their frontier experiences. With maps and nearly a hundred illustrations by Frederick Remington, George Catlin, Albert Bierstadt, and others, this unique anthology is a monumental mosaic of life, death, and glory in the American West.