A biography of the African American pioneer.

Portrays the life and adventures of the freedman, frontiersman, and fur trader who became a Crow warrior

Examines the life and career of the nineteenth-century hunter, trapper, and trader.

A biography of the trapper who served as a messenger and guide to the U.S. Army and was accepted as an honorary member of several Native American tribes.

TreeTops True Stories are exciting, motivating non-fiction books which will broaden your pupils' reading experience. They are part of a structured reading programme for juniors. In the plethora of imagery surrounding the American Wild West, we are used to the heroes of cowboy films and the stuff of legends like Dances with Wolves being portrayed exclusively as white colonisers. Here is a story of a real character who was half African-American, being born to a slave mother and white land-owning father. James Tomahawk Beckwourth has rightly been claimed as a black hero in America, and yet the first Hollywood movie about him saw him played by a white actor! He led a colourful and adventure-packed life, and this story is retold in the first person with photos and beautiful artwork of the flora and fauna of untamed America. This book is also available as part of a mixed pack of 6 different books or a class pack of 36 books of the same Oxford Reading Tree stage. Each book pack comes with a free copy of invaluable teaching notes.

James Beckwourth was a blacksmith, pioneer, mountain man, scout, and war chief in the American frontier. Can you imagine what his life must have been like? What was he like as a person? Read this book in the American Lives series to get to know James Beck

Originally published: Washington, DC: G.P.O., 1865.