{"product_id":"the-old-iron-road-an-epic-of-rails-roads-and-the-urge-to-go-west-paperback-softback-9781496230485","title":"The Old Iron Road; An Epic of Rails, Roads, and the Urge to Go West (Paperback \/ softback) 9781496230485","description":"\u003cfont face=\"Georgia\"\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cfont size=\"6\"\u003eThe Old Iron Road\u003c\/font\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\r\n\u003cfont size=\"5\"\u003eAn Epic of Rails, Roads, and the Urge to Go West\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cfont size=\"4\"\u003eDavid Haward Bain (Author)\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cfont size=\"3\"\u003e9781496230485\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cfont size=\"3\"\u003ePaperback \/ softback, published 1 September 2022\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cfont size=\"3\"\u003e470 pages, 39 photographs, 1 map, index\u003cbr\u003e23.4 x 15.6 x 1.5 cm, 0.666 kg\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\u003cp align=\"justify\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cfont size=\"3\"\u003e\u003cdiv\u003e“[Bain’s] wholly winning book can be approached (and enjoyed) as history, memoir, and travelogue of the highest order. . . . Ambitious, magisterial, intimate, and engaging. . . . I was often reminded of such charming and idiosyncratic books as William Least Heat-Moon’s \u003ci\u003eBlue Highways\u003c\/i\u003e and Reyner Banham’s \u003ci\u003eScenes in America Deserta\u003c\/i\u003e. Both of these books sent me on quests to see what the authors had seen and described so beguilingly, and I felt the same urge on page after page of \u003ci\u003eThe Old Iron Road\u003c\/i\u003e.”-Jonathan Kirsch, \u003ci\u003eLos Angeles Times\u003c\/i\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e \u003cdiv\u003e“A very personal and warm account-no dry history here-of a journey of the heart that concludes on a poignant note.”-\u003ci\u003eChicago Tribune\u003c\/i\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e \u003cdiv\u003e“A picaresque race across the country. . . . In \u003ci\u003eThe Old Iron Road\u003c\/i\u003e, the dead seem to rise up to greet [Bain] as he goes, and the living save their best stories for him. . . . It is impossible to cross this country by land without being changed by the experience. \u003ci\u003eThe Old Iron Road\u003c\/i\u003e captures this fact vividly, in as many different forms as Bain can find room for in its pages.”––Verlyn Klinkenborg, \u003ci\u003eNew York Times Book Review\u003c\/i\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e \u003cdiv\u003e“Bain bypasses a facile sentimentality for a more complex portrait of the American West.”-\u003ci\u003ePublishers Weekly\u003c\/i\u003e, starred review\u003c\/div\u003e \u003cdiv\u003e“What a terrific read! \u003ci\u003eThe Old Iron Road\u003c\/i\u003e is an elegant combination of riveting storytelling, modern travelogue, and impeccable history. By taking his family across America retracing the route of the first transcontinental railroad, award-winning prose stylist David Haward Bain rediscovered the glory days of the railroad. Ghosts abound, including John FrÉmont, Butch Cassidy, and Ulysses S. Grant.”-Douglas Brinkley, author of \u003ci\u003eWheels for the World\u003c\/i\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e \u003cdiv\u003e“Highly recommended. . . . Historic accounts of particular people and places along the way make for lively and interesting reading, along with Bain’s entertaining descriptions of and reflections on modern events and sights. Scout’s Rest Ranch at North Platte, Nebraska, offers him the opportunity to discuss ‘Buffalo Bill’ Cody, while Elko, Nevada, brings out Bing Crosby’s connection with the town. The overall effect is a modern exploration of the American West and its development of a sense of place in the tradition of Charles Kuralt and Bill Moyers.”-\u003ci\u003eLibrary Journal\u003c\/i\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e \u003cdiv\u003e“The here-today-gone-tomorrow impermanence of life in the old American west pervades David Bain’s history of the penetration of the country’s last frontier. Everything there has changed in the two-hundred years since Captain Meriwether Lewis and Lieutenant William Clark left St. Louis on 14th May 1804 to explore an overland route to the Pacific. The 15m buffalo that roamed the range are gone. . . . Too many Indian peoples, once proud and free, now eke out lives of wretched humiliation on reservations. But melancholy over these sad departures is balanced by admiration for the deeds of the pioneers. They endured unimaginable hardships in turning a wilderness into one of the most prosperous places on earth.”-\u003ci\u003eThe Economist\u003c\/i\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e \u003cdiv\u003e“Well done! \u003ci\u003eThe Old Iron Road\u003c\/i\u003e is a fine and honorable addition to the growing first-class literature of the American land.”-William Least Heat-Moon, author of \u003ci\u003eBlue Highways\u003c\/i\u003e and \u003ci\u003eRiver Horse\u003c\/i\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e \u003cdiv\u003e“This book is a gem.”––\u003ci\u003eNewsday \u003c\/i\u003e(Long Island, NY)\u003c\/div\u003e \u003cdiv\u003e“One of the season’s best.”-\u003ci\u003eUSA Today\u003c\/i\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp align=\"justify\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cfont size=\"3\"\u003eIn the summer of 2000 David Haward Bain and his family left their home in Vermont and headed west in search of America’s past. Spiritually, their journey began on a Kansas trail where the author’s grandmother was born in a covered wagon in 1889. Between the Missouri River and the Golden Gate, they retraced the entire route of the first transcontinental railroad and large stretches of the Oregon and California trails, and the equally colorful old Lincoln Highway. Following vanished iron rails and wagon wheel ruts, bumping down backroads and main streets, they discovered the deep, restless, uniquely American spirit of adventure that connects our past to our present.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e A superb writer and an exacting researcher, Bain conjures up a marvelous sense of coming unstuck in time as he lingers in the ghost towns and battlegrounds, prairies and river ports, trainyards, museums, deserts, and diners that line his cruise west to California. Bain encounters a fascinating cast of characters, both historic and contemporary, as well as memories of his grandparents and the journeys that shaped his own heritage.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Writing in the tradition of William Least Heat-Moon and Ian Frazier, and with an engaging warmth and a deep grasp of history all his own, Bain has fashioned a quintessentially American journey.\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\u003c\/font\u003e","brand":"Bison Books","offers":[{"title":"Brand New","offer_id":52600017387800,"sku":"9781496230485","price":18.69,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"url":"https:\/\/freshlyprintedbooks.co.uk\/products\/the-old-iron-road-an-epic-of-rails-roads-and-the-urge-to-go-west-paperback-softback-9781496230485","provider":"Freshly Printed Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}