Patricia Nelson Limerick 
The Legacy of Conquest: The Unbroken Past of the American West [EPUB ebook] 

‘Limerick is one of the most engaging historians writing today.’ –Richard White

The ‘settling’ of the American West has been perceived throughout the world as a series of quaint, violent, and romantic adventures. But in fact, Patricia Nelson Limerick argues, the West has a history grounded primarily in economic reality; in hardheaded questions of profit, loss, competition, and consolidation. Here she interprets the stories and the characters in a new way: the trappers, traders, Indians, farmers, oilmen, cowboys, and sheriffs of the Old West ‘meant business’ in more ways than one, and their descendents mean business today.

About the author

Patricia Nelson Limerick is a professor of history and chair of the Center of the American West at the University of Colorado at Boulder.