Montana Books

W. C. Tuttle is a well-known western author but his autobiography surpasses his fiction. It is still an action-adventure but laced with humor much in the same vein as Mark Twain, a kind of self-deprecating tone that will have you chuckling softly, guffawing, and remembering similar episodes from your own childhood. Very worthwhile trying to find a copy.

Fantastic!!! WOW! What a great treasure for fans of the "Treasure State'
I was hoping that the letter "M" would have more to do with the various "M's" on Montana college campuses, but Myrna Loy is also one of my favorite classic Hollywood stars.
Can't wait to read it to my daughter!

This book is definately one of the best romance novels I have read in a long time. It was among the fist I've read, but no book has toped it. It is written in a way thay captures your heart and makes you live the life of the characters.

Even in the middle of a Montana blizzard, love can warm the heart. With her biological clock ticking loudly enough to wake her from sleep, the midwife heroine realizes it's time to start a family with or without a husband. When her former husband hears she's going to inteview prospective fathers, he adds mayhem to her logical, well thought out plans. Filled with humor as well as romance, this is an excellent read

This is a beautifully printed book of black and white photographs. Jay Dusard's foreword is fabulous.

Dorothy Johnson created what are perhaps the greatest short stories of the American West ever to be written. Her work has been compared by Time magazine to Mark Twain and Bret Harte. Her brilliant, spare style compares favorably to the best of Hemingway's short fiction. Three of her short stories were made into successful movies, one of which (The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance) is a Western classic. Yet instead of standing high in the pantheon of American writers she is all but forgotten, with much of her best work out of print and unavailable, as is the fate of this outstanding collection of tales, `Indian Country'.
Johnson had many virtues as a writer. She researched her topic and got the details right. She had a spare style that used an economy of words to say exactly and only what needed to be said. While she avoided sentimentality, she cut straight and deep to the heart of the matter, always revealing the humanity in all of her characters and never treating them as clichés. All of these virtues are prominently on display in this volume.
The eleven tales in `Indian Country' represent some of Johnson's very best work. Two of these stories (The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance and A Man Called Horse) were made into movie. All of them deal with the people and the reality behind the clichés and the legends of the West. Five of these stories, (Flames on the Frontier, The Unbeliever, War Shirt, Journey to the Fort, and A Man Called Horse) deal with a subject that Dorothy Johnson may have captured better than any other writer - whites living among the Indians, either from choice, or as captives, and the effect this had on them, the Natives they lived with, and the families that they left behind. In The Prairie Kid and Beyond the Frontier, Johnson shows how incidents that might be spun into legend evolved from the simple toughness that was required for survival among frontier settlers. Scars of Honor and Laugh in the Face of Danger are tales of aged people who time has passed by but who still cherish secret memories from their Wild West youth. Warrior's Exile is built around a theme that is often prominent in Johnson's stories - the importance of an Indian's visions and medicine to his life and status within the tribe. And The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance is the ultimate tale of the less than noble truth that could often lie behind the heroic legends that grew out of the West.
Each of the eleven tales in `Indian Country' is brilliantly crafted, and several of them are simply unforgettable. This is a collection that you will come back to and read again many times. I consider this collection to be more valuable than are many histories of the American West for the information it contains on frontier and native cultures, and give it my very highest of recommendations; not only for those with an interest in the American West, but for all who appreciate beautifully written short stories.

Theo Logos

sweet looking photos and touches on everything from his days at Notre Dame to the 49ers to the Chiefs to his sports cards and joe montana memorbilia and shows tons of stats. awsome book. there are two versions though. this one, and a paper back edition, althought you can't tell until you open the paper back book and look at the pages. regardless, a great book for Montana fans.

Mark H. Brown and W. R. Felton wrote two well-researched accounts of the photographs of Laton Alton Huffman (1854-1931): "The Frontier Years" in 1955 and "Before Barbed Wire" in 1956. Both books are delightful reading, providing rare insights into the stories behind Huffman's superb photos and the daily life of old west pioneers before the arrival of railroads and wire fences.

The books contain rare and fascinating visual documentation of the American west. The earlier book, "The Frontier Years," focuses on the soldiers, Indians, buffalo hunters and early inhabitants of eastern Montana. The second book, "Before Barbed Wire," is probably the single best collection of photos capturing life of life of early ranchers on the open range. With the "eye of an artist and the perspective of a historian," Huffman accurately preserved the American west of an earlier time.

Huffman came to Montana Territory in December, 1878, as post-photographer at Fort Keogh, near the current Miles City. This military fort was established two years earlier in 1876, after the stunning Indian annihilation of all of Custer's troops at the Battle of the Little Big Horn. From this primitive headquarters, General Nelson Miles lead the final campaigns against the Sioux and Northern Cheyenne Indians.

Huffman started photographing the soldiers, the buffalo hunters, and soon the gamblers, the drinkers, the bounty hunters and others in and near Milestown. Huffman became friends with area Indians, and his clear and well composed Indian portraits rank among the very best in American history. Huffman's interest expanded to include area ranchers and their homes and environment.

His early photographs were taken with a bulky, home-built camera that used fragile glass plate negatives. Huffman's preservation of the early years of frontier life reflected his love for the rugged inhabitants and their land.

Authors Felton and Brown visited Miles City, Montana, in the winter of 1950-51 and had photographer Jack Coffrin print pictures from Huffman's negatives. These photographs later became the illustrations for "The Frontier Years" and "Before Barbed Wire." Each book contains stories of a bygone era documented by 125 superb photographs. Note: The quality of the photographs is a wee bit sharper in the original volumes published by Henry Holt than in the reprint editions from Bramhall House.

I used this book when my friends and I hiked in the Grand Teton National Park. It was such a good guide to let us know where to find the trailheads and what to expect on the hikes. We all had a good time!

The entire series of Falcon Guides: THE BEST EASY DAY HIKES xxxxx are a delight to read and then follow. For those with a minimal amount of time to see vistas, canyons, and other scenery in parks and other areas of the country you can really experience a good variety of the locale by taking any of the hikes in these books.

I have about a dozen of these books, mostly of the western US and have referenced all of them in my hiking plannings. They are pocket size which makes them easy to carry with you and easy to read an understand.