dual personalities

“Part of the forces that sent Sam trudging across the white prairies was love of life, a gladness for health and youth that filled him as Mozart’s gayest music filled him; and part of it was his belief that the earth on which he walked had been designed by the greatest of artists, and that if a man had the courage and fortitude not to fail it, it would not fail him. In Sam’s rough mountain-man philosophy those persons who became the wards of sadness and melancholy had never summoned for use and trial more than a part of what they had in them, and so had failed themselves and their Creator. If it was a part of the inscrutable plan that he was to live through this ordeal, and again cover the bones of wife and child with mountain lilies, the strength was lying in him, waiting, and he had only to call on it- all of it- and use it, without flinching or whimpering. If he showed himself to be a worthy piece in the Great Architect’s edifice he would live; in Sam’s philosophy that was about all there was to it.”

–Vardis Fisher, Mountain Man

While reading through my pile of 1940s New Yorker magazines, I read a review of a novel by Vardis Fisher. This reminded me of the movie Jeremiah Johnson (1972) which is based on another Vardis Fisher novel, Mountain Man, which I had always meant to read. So I checked out Mountain Man (published in 1965) from my flyover university and have been reading it.

The story follows the life of Sam Minard (and various other fur-trappers) and his relations with the Crow and Blackfoot tribes in and around 1846. Two of the three central characters were suggested by actual people: Kate Bowden (i.e. Jane Morgan) who went crazy after killing with an ax the four Indians who had slaughtered her family on the Musselshell: secondly, Samson Minard (i.e. John Johnston- the “Crow-killer”). It is an action-packed tale, full of detail and interesting facts about the Wyoming-Montana-Idaho territory. Our mountain man hero is apt to wax eloquent on many subjects, such as which animal mothers will fight to the death to protect their children (wolf, wolverine,  bobcat, badger, bear, grouse, avocet, horned lark) and which will not (buffalo, elk). Sam is also quite a spiritual being:

Reading nature, for Sam, was like reading the Bible; in both, the will of the Creator was plain.

He is educated, well read and likes to sing. What’s not to like?

It should be noted that the book has very little in common with the movie, however, and they must be enjoyed separately. I have no idea why the screenwriter strayed so far from the book, but he did. I guess they felt the need to lighten up on the Indians and make them more palatable to the movie-going audience. Whatever.

Our great-great grandfather, John Simpson Hough, was a good friend of “Uncle Dick” Wooten

Richens Lacey Wooten

and Kit Carson,

who are both referred to in the book. Although no mountain man himself, John Hough was a great admirer of the breed. Family legend says that Kit Carson died in the Hough’s house in Boggsville (and not in Fort Lyon per Wikipedia). At least one of his daughters (Terasina) lived with and was raised by the Houghs for several years. When he knew Dick and Kit, they were both old men, and I’m sure John Hough enjoyed listening to their tales of the early days. In that, I am like him.

What are you reading?