Josh Green

Book is fantasticly interesting and telling from a man of the time (mid 19th century) on his views of the west and Americas future once the interior was developed. Much of the claims are wildy exaggerated but that is typical of the time (such as the claim that no region of earth was more suited for dense population than the intermontane west, which he claimed was even more fertile and abundant for agriculture than the mississippi basin, and that was forever warm in the day and cool during night but never too much so either way). He makes the west out to be an incredible place, this book largely inspired me to learn more about the western United States. An early geopolitician, he also mentions navigable rivers and the largely unified mississippi basin being very unique compared to the disparate river systems of Europe and Asia.