Paul Andrew Hutton’s “Undiscovered Country: Triumph, Tragedy and the Shaping of the American West” is a sweeping history covering centuries and thousands of miles, starting before the American Revolution when the “West” was what’s now considered pretty far East.
Peter Cozzen’s “Deadwood: Gold, Guns and Greed in the American West” provides plenty of broad scope historical perspective about the American economy and displacement of Native Americans, but the book has a much narrower focus than Hutton’s, zeroing in on one town and what its struggles to establish a civil society reveal about the larger country.
But both authors emphasize the personal to make their larger points. Hutton weaves through the century by telling the stories of Daniel Boone, Red Eagle, Davy Crockett, Mangas Coloradas, Kit Carson, Sitting Bull and “Buffalo Bill” Cody.
Cozzens features Seth Bullock, Al Swearengen, Wild Bill Hickok, Calamity Jane, Jack Langrishe and others who’d also been brought to vivid life in David Milch’s HBO masterpiece, “Deadwood,” although he features others and also does more than the series to tell the story of the Native peoples whose land the gold rush was on.
Cozzen’s rave review of Hutton’s book for the Wall Street Journal boosted it onto the bestseller lists, and the two recently did a joint presentation at the Buffalo Bill Center in Cody, Wyoming. They also did a joint video interview to discuss their books. It has been edited for length and clarity.
Q. What did you hope your books would illuminate about America today?
Hutton: The story of the West is the story of America and the first great epic of American history. It gave us an identity as a people. Frederick Jackson Turner said it’s what made American society so exceptional – he wasn’t saying it was better than everyone else, just different.
Looking at both Native and pioneer lives gives us a sense of where we came from. That’s essential in a democratic republic.
I tried to stay away from guilt and from triumphalism. I’m a big believer in the U.S.A., and obviously, I think the development of the American West is essential to our rise as a great power, which is a wonderful thing since we defeated fascism and communism in the 20th century. So to me it is a positive story and it’s a heroic tale – but at the same time, it’s leavened by the stark tragedy that goes along with that. It’s the birth of a nation, and birth is painful.
Cozzens: I hoped to use Deadwood as a microcosm for what happens when greed and avarice are allowed to run rampant without any constraints of the law; it was not only a lawless town, but intrinsically a lawless enterprise subject to no federal and territorial laws. This is an opportunity for people to see how their fellow Americans behaved when their taste for profit-making was allowed to run rampant.
Q. How much do you think our sense of America today still derives from the West and expansion? If some of that derives from myths, is that problematic – especially since that triumphalism often feels like a guiding spirit for some?
Hutton: There’s nothing inherently wrong with triumphalism or pride in country, but we need to be clear-eyed about it. We can take pride from those moments that uplift us, but temper it with the tragic lives of those who weren’t part of that story. Now, with the current administration, I can’t believe I’m hearing terms like “manifest destiny” again, and the president is talking about taking territory. You can see that as coming out of the American spirit and as misguided.
Cozzens: It’s great to celebrate the American West and the triumph of our success, as long as it’s levied with the realization of the injustices that we did commit toward the American Indians. And that’s a very complex subject. But in Deadwood, they were all trespassers on land that had been granted to the Indians by treaty. That fit the prevailing attitude throughout the United States, but it can’t be ignored, so even for the finest characters like Seth Bullock, who emerged from the book as a personal hero for me, you can’t erase that reality.
Q. Paul, your book notes that Boone, Crockett, Carson, and Cody, all related to the Native Americans, sometimes even as they were fighting them.
Hutton: It was the politicians thinking about economics who called the shots on the treatment of Native peoples and the treaties. Crockett sacrifices his political career on this altar, believing he has more of a common interest with these Native people who live off the land and are one with the land than the politicians. There are forces in the East bent on destroying both the pioneer farmers and the Indians. What they care about are more slaves, more cotton, more money – and it doesn’t matter whether you’re a banker in Boston or a plantation owner in Tennessee. It’s America. Our whole system is based on greed.
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Cozzens: The majority of generals in the West were also quite sympathetic with the plight of the American Indians and that their way of life was ending, but they were at odds with what Washington wanted.
Q. For 150 years, Davey Crockett and Daniel Boone were American icons. But you could argue that now Seth Bullock and Al Swearengen are more famous because of “Deadwood.” What’s gained and lost as these things shift throughout history?
Cozzens: I think more is lost than gained, which is probably not a smart thing for me to say because I want to sell books. The series “Deadwood” is great, but for people to assume the show encapsulated what the entire West was like is a mistake. Bullock and Swearengen are entertaining, and they do represent the best and the worst of America, but these men were not as important as Crockett or Boone in our history.
Hutton: I’m a big fan of movies and television and have written about them and taught classes about them my whole career. And, boy, do they have power. We’re in a little Western boom right now with the success of Taylor Sheridan’s “Yellowstone” and all the spinoffs and several films. Our books benefit from that, but I also think it’s good for the country because I think that the Western spirit is a positive one, and God knows we could use a little positivity in the United States these days.