The Wild West: History, Myth & The Making of America

On 14 May 1804, the personal secretary President Thomas Jefferson, one Capt. Meriwether Lewis, and a companion, William Clark, led a thirty-three-man expedition to the new lands of Louisiana, purchased from Napoleon the previous year. 8,000 miles (13,000 km) and two years later, after rafting up the Missouri and crossing the Rocky Mountains, they reached the far side of the world, the Pacific Ocean. Almost in the footsteps of Lewis and Clark followed a hardy breed who ventured fearlessly into th