Book Review: The Santa Fe Trail

Title: The Santa Fe Trail

Author: Samuel Hopkins Adams

Publisher: Random House

Date: 1951

ISBN: none

Length: 181 pages

Illustrations: maps and drawings by Lee J. Ames

Quote: “The Santa Fe Trail is wiped out. It is doubtful whether a single one of the original landmarks could be found.”

The gold in California distracted attention from Santa Fe in the later half of the nineteenth century. For a time, though, Santa Fe was the goal of explorers and traders, and the Santa Fe Trail was long and dangerous enough to suit anybody. Using the few old records that survived, Adams reconstructs the first few journeys after the Trail was named. The old records documented plenty of battles and life-and-death struggles as explorers—mostly reckless young men, as nobody else thought the danger was worth the possible profit—looked for water sources that might have dried up or shortcuts that might not be usable. Laws were enforced by the leaders of parties. When different parties met they never knew in advance whether the others wanted to trade or to fight; men of English, Spanish, or American descent were equally interested in fair trades when they had goods to trade, equally desperate when low on food or water, and equally bad-tempered if they felt they had been cheated…and, though the nominally Christian English and Spanish types tried to deny it, about equally likely to rob and raid if they lacked goods to trade. Though perhaps partial to the English (or just able to read more of their records), Adams tries to be fair.

Written for grades four through six, this book was part of a series marketed to schools in the mid-twentieth century. I remember appreciating the lifelike, though not accurately colored, drawings in all of the books and the lively narrative in some. The Santa Fe Trail offered plenty of material for lively narrative. It should appeal to adults who collect “westerns” if they’ve not read it before, even though, except for little things like imagining a conversation to explain how now-obsolete words were used, Adams generally sticks to facts. It certainly used to appeal to fifth and sixth grade students who had finished their in-class assignments; some kids might even want to read it at home.