Deschutes Public Library

Mrs. Smith's Research Project on the Old West

Books: Fiction || Books: Nonfiction || Websites

Books at the Deschutes Public Libraries:

Fiction

Crew, Linda. A Heart for Any Fate
Follows headstrong, optimistic, seventeen-year-old Lovisa King and her pioneer family, three generations strong, as they make the arduous journey west with a wagon train along the Oregon Trail.

Hemphill, Helen. The Adventurous Deeds of Deadwood Jones.
Thirteen-year-old Prometheus Jones and his eleven-year-old cousin Omer flee Tennessee and join a cattle drive that will eventually take them to Texas, where Prometheus hopes his father lives, and they find adventure and face challenges as African Americans in a land still recovering from the Civil War.

Ives, David. Scrib.
In 1863, a sixteen-year-old boy nicknamed Scrib travels around the West making his living writing and delivering letters, an occupation that leads to him nearly getting killed, being jailed as a criminal, joining up with the notorious Crazy James Kincaid, and delivering a letter from President Abraham Lincoln to a Paiute Indian.

Frazier, Neta. The Stout-hearted Seven: Orphaned on the Oregon Trail.
Based on a true story, the seven Sager children lost their parents to fever on the Oregon Trail.

Lawlor, Laurie. He Will go Fearless.
With the Civil War ended and Reconstruction begun, fifteen-year-old Billy resolves to make the dangerous and challenging journey West in search of real fortune--his true father.

Wilson, Diane. Black Storm Comin'.
Twelve-year-old Colton, son of a black mother and a white father, takes a job with the Pony Express in 1860 after his father abandons the family on their California-bound wagon train, and risks his life to deliver an important letter that may affect the growing conflict between the North and South.

Back to Top

Nonfiction

Blumberg, Rhonda. The Great American Gold Rush.

Burrows, John. Lewis and Clark: blazing a trail West.

Duncan, Dayton. People of the West.

Freedman, Russell. In the Days of the Vaqueros: America's first true cowboys.

Herb, Angela. Beyond the Mississippi: early Westward expansion of the Unites States.

Kimball, Violet. Stories of Young Pioneers in Their Own Words.

Ketchum, Liza. Into a New Country: eight remarkable women of the West.

Lavender, David. Snowbound: the Tragic Story of the Donner Party.

McCarthy, Pat. Heading West: life with the pioneers; 21 activities.

Walker, Paul Robert. True Tales of the Wild West.