{"product_id":"grit-and-gold-the-death-valley-jayhawkers-of-1849-9781943859771","title":"Grit and Gold: The Death Valley Jayhawkers of 1849","description":"No other Western settlement story is more famous than the Donner Party's ill-fated journey through the Sierra Nevada Mountains. But a few years later and several hundred miles south, another group faced a similar situation just as perilous. Scrupulously researched and documented, \u003ci\u003eGrit and Gold\u003c\/i\u003e tells the story of the Death Valley Jayhawkers of 1849 and the young men who traveled by wagon and foot from Iowa to the California gold rush. The Jayhawkers' journey took them through the then uncharted and unnamed hottest, driest, lowest spot in the continent--now aptly known as Death Valley. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e After leaving Salt Lake City to break a road south to the Pacific Coast that would eliminate crossing the snowy Sierra Nevada, the party veered off the Old Spanish Trail in southern Utah to follow a mountaineer's map portraying a bogus trail that claimed to cut months and hundreds of miles off their route to the gold country. With winter coming, however, they found themselves hopelessly lost in the mountains and dry valleys of southern Nevada and California. Abandoning everything but the shirts on their backs and the few oxen that became their pitiful meals, they turned their dreams of gold to hopes of survival. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e Utilizing William Lorton's 1849 diary of the trek from Illinois to southern Utah, the reminiscences of the Jayhawkers themselves, the keen memory of famed pioneer William Lewis Manly, and the almost daily diary of Sheldon Young, Johnson paints a lively but accurate portrait of guts, grit, and determination.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eBinding Type:\u003c\/b\u003e Hardcover\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublisher:\u003c\/b\u003e University of Nevada Press\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublished:\u003c\/b\u003e 11\/01\/2018\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN:\u003c\/b\u003e 9781943859771\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePages:\u003c\/b\u003e 288\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eWeight:\u003c\/b\u003e 1.70lbs\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eSize:\u003c\/b\u003e 10.20h x 7.20w x 0.90d\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eReview Citations: \u003c\/strong\u003e\u003ci\u003eChoice\u003c\/i\u003e 05\/01\/2019\u003cbr\u003e","brand":"Jean Johnson","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":53195169366197,"sku":"9781943859771","price":29.71,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0473\/0804\/6492\/files\/9781943859771.jpg?v=1788273275","url":"https:\/\/pastforward.org\/products\/grit-and-gold-the-death-valley-jayhawkers-of-1849-9781943859771","provider":"Past Forward","version":"1.0","type":"link"}