| Book Review | The Journal of American History, 92.1

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| Book Review | The Journal of American History, 92.1 | The History Cooperative

Book Review

William Clark and the Shaping of the West. By Landon Y. Jones. (New York: Hill and Wang, 2004. xii, 394 pp. $25.00, ISBN 0-8090-3041-1.)

Wilderness Journey: The Life of William Clark. By William E. Foley. (Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 2004. xvi, 326 pp. $29.95, ISBN 0-8262-1533-5.)

Until the publication of these two books, there was no modern biography of William Clark (1770–1838), soldier, explorer, journalist, map maker, appointed governor of the Missouri territory, and superintendent of Indian affairs in the Illinois territory. Although aspects of Clark's life, especially his role in the Lewis and Clark expedition, have been the subjects of extensive scholarship, the totality of his historical significance in its public and private dimensions lacked full treatment. Historians recognized Clark's importance, but they left him to the late Donald Jackson, who reputedly was working on a biography for decades. Stephen Ambrose, for example, abandoned Clark for a biography of Meriwether Lewis in deference to Jackson, who died before completing his book. The passing of Jackson and Ambrose and the anticipated celebration of the Lewis and Clark expedition's bicentennial (2003–2006) contributed to the environment in which these two biographies appear simultaneously.

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