From the Lawton Constitution
By James Finck, Ph.D. May 12, 2026
This past semester for my reading seminar class, we read several books about mountain men. We read several about famous mountain men like Davy Crockett, Kit Carson, Hugh Glass, and Jim Bridger.
While all these men led extraordinary lives, my personal favorite mountain man always has been Jedediah Smith (1799-1831) — and yes, I have a list of favorite mountain men.
I even tried to name both my sons Jedediah Smith Finck, but my wife nixed it both times. Too bad. All these men helped open the way for westward expansion and their lives are worth reading about, but what Smith was able to accomplish almost seems miraculous.
Published by the University of Oklahoma Press, Barton H. Barbour wrote a biography of Smith that we read for class entitled “Jedediah Smith: No Ordinary Mountain Man.”
Barbour’s claim is that Smith lived larger than life, but that his life has also been fictionalized by many. Barbour wants to set the record straight and attempts to, “depict Jedediah Smith as a not-so-simple man with human aspirations and failings who played a key historical role in the American West … to frame his life and adventures within the context of Jacksonian America and the developing Rocky Mountain fur trade, and to highlight his contributions to exploration and history.” In this task, he does an excellent job.
The distances Smith traveled on horseback and on foot alone are an amazing feat. What really astonished me was how, on each of his journeys, he always seemed to make it back for the annual rendezvous, the gathering of mountain men that he helped create, right on time. Whether he was hundreds or thousands of miles away, Smith would show up on day one like he had magically teleported himself there. (I had a student who just graduated last week who never came to class on time once, and he lived in the dorms. Smith would be in California and somehow make it to Wyoming or Utah in time for the festivities.)
Some of Smith’s greatest accomplishments included exploring South Pass and eventually opening that route to settlers moving into Oregon. He led a band of mountain men across Utah, Nevada, and then California, making him the first American to travel overland to the Pacific Coast from the East. He was the first to travel east to west across the Sierra Nevadas and the first to cross the Great Basin. Finally, he was the first to travel up the West Coast from Southern California to Oregon Territory. Along the way, he fought Native tribes and Spanish authorities, who took him prisoner once and tried to chase him out of their territory several times.
These journeys were filled with hardships. Several of his party died from thirst while crossing the desert, exhaustion, and, most often, Native attacks. On several trips, he was the sole survivor who returned to the rendezvous. Yet after all these hardships, he continued to set out again and again.
Possibly Smith’s most important contribution to American history was his skill at mapmaking. Barbour called him “a natural-born cartographer of rare talent” who “alone transposed his mental map of the entire West onto paper.” It was these maps that helped America open up the West. His marking of South Pass alone and his role in establishing the Oregon Trail alone place him among the foremost American frontier icons.
Another important aspect of the biography is its portrayal of Smith’s personality. Barbour presents him as disciplined, deeply reflective, and driven by both personal ambition and moral conviction. The book emphasizes Smith’s intelligence and leadership while also acknowledging his flaws and contradictions. This balanced portrayal helps readers understand why Smith became both an important historical figure and a legendary symbol of exploration.
One part I especially appreciate is Barbour’s reliance on Smith’s journals, letters, and contemporary records to tell the story. While he is clearly impressed with Smith’s achievements, Barbour uses primary sources to give readers insight into Smith’s life.
While other books we read this semester did an adequate job presenting the facts, I enjoyed the way Barbour’s narrative told Smith’s life more like a story, making it much more readable. The one criticism some students had was that certain sections become highly detailed, especially when discussing routes, trade politics, and historical records. It can bog down at times, but it is important information.
I also appreciate that the biography not only told the life of Smith but also served as an overall history of the fur trade and the golden age of the mountain man. Smith was set apart from many of his contemporaries in that he was highly literate and carefully recorded the events around him. Because of this, much of what we know today about mountain men comes from Smith’s journals.
Overall, “Jedediah Smith: No Ordinary Mountain Man” is an outstanding biography that combines historical scholarship with an engaging narrative. Barbour succeeds in showing why Smith remains one of the most important explorers of the American frontier. The book is highly recommended for readers interested in Western history, exploration, and early American expansion.
James Finck is a professor of American history at the University of Science and Arts of Oklahoma. He can be reached at james.finck@swoknews.com.
Historically Speaking 