Howard (geography, Armstrong Atlantic State Univ., Georgia) offers a history of overland roads to California. Fur trappers and mountain men were the first European Americans to traverse the mountains, deserts, and passes. Their routes laid the foundation for wagon trains, overland stages, freight wagons, and, finally, the railroads. The elevation and snow of the Sierra Nevadas created great challenges for road builders, as did politics‘both local and national. California cities vied to become terminuses, and sectional difficulties at the federal level postponed the building of a transcontinental railroad until the 1860s. With the completion of the Union Pacific in 1869, the nation was physically joined, the Western territories were secured, and the mineral wealth, agricultural lands, and seaports of California were now a part of the national system. Howard has used diaries, letters, newspapers, and official reports while also describing present conditions of many of California's first roads to produce an entertaining piece of scholarship. Recommended for all public libraries.‘Patricia Ann Owens, Wabash Valley Coll., Mt. Carmel, IL (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

This is a well-researched, entertaining, and very readable history of the evolution of early U.S. transportation across the Sierra Nevada from the first explorers to the route decisions for the transcontinental railway. With time, many of the early pathways were followed and became railroads and highways. Howard concentrates on the explorers and the decisions for specific routes while judiciously avoiding the minutiae of such events as the Donner Party. He also examines the political and economic struggles that determined what paths would be followed, whether they would be publicly or privately held, and what means of transportation would be established. The work brings to light the fight between the wagon-road toll operators and the Central Pacific to maintain control of the lucrative cross-Sierra passes and courses. By using the diaries and letters of some of the early trailblazers, Howard manages to impart to the story a very personal perspective. --Eric Robbins