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Going West
According to the WORLD BOOK ENCYCLOPEDIA, the Westward movement carried settlers across America between the 1600's and the late 1800's. This bibliography is composed of fiction in which the setting of the story (time and place) is of major importance to the plot. The purpose of such a bibliography is to encourage reading of stories which reinforce the study of the time period in the curriculum. These titles are available for checkout from Franklin's library.
Alter, J. LUKE AND THE VAN ZANDT COUNTY WAR.
A fourteen-year-old girl relates how Van Zandt County withdrew from Texas after the Civil
War.
Auch, M. JOURNEY TO NOWHERE.
In 1815, while traveling by covered wagon to settle in the wilderness of western New York,
eleven-year-old Mem experiences a flood and separation from her family.
Baker, B. THE SPIRIT IS WILLING.
Carrie rebels against the restrictions of the town and creates some excitement when she
holds a seance and sneaks into the saloon. Set in Arizona during the 1880's.
Beatty, P. BEHAVE YOURSELF, BETHANY BRANT.
A preacher's daughter with lots of curiosity and a penchant for getting into trouble has
an eventful year and a half, as all the predictions of a fortune-teller at a Texas county
fair in 1898 come true.
Beatty, P. BY CRUMBS, IT'S MINE!
While stranded in the Arizona territory in the 1880's, a thirteen-year-old girl finds
herself the owner of a traveling hotel.
Beatty, P. HAIL COLUMBIA.
Young Louisa Baines tells the story of what happened the year her aunt came to visit her
sedate family in Astoria, Oregon, in 1893.
Benchley, N. ONLY EARTH AND SKY LAST FOREVER.
Dark Elk's decision to join Crazy Horse leads to his involvement in the Battle of the
Little Big Horn in 1876 in the Montana Territory.
Brink, C. CADDIE WOODLAWN.
Caddie refuses to be "a lady," preferring instead to run wild with her brothers
on the Wisconsin prairies of the 1860's.
Butler, B. MY SISTER'S KEEPER.
In the north woods of Wisconsin following a forest fire that destroys their town in 1871,
17-year-old Mary James forms a new respect for her older sister.
Byars, B. TROUBLE RIVER.
Dewey Martin never expected that the raft he built for fun would be desperately needed the
day the Indians attacked.
Calvert, P. BIGGER.
When his father disappears near the Mexican border at the end of the Civil War,
twelve-year-old Tyler decides to go after him and bring him home, acquiring on the journey
a strange dog which he names Bigger.
Clark, A. YEAR WALK.
In 1910, a sixteen-year-old boy from the Spanish-Basque country comes to Idaho to help his
godfather herd sheep across the Northwest frontier.
Clements, B. I TELL A LIE EVERY SO OFTEN.
The misadventures of Henry, who travels up the Missouri River with his brother in the year
1848.
Conrad, P. PRAIRIE SONGS.
Louisa's life in a loving pioneer family on the Nebraska prairie is altered by the arrival
of a new doctor and his beautiful, tragically frail wife.
Cushman, K. THE BALLAD OF LUCY WHIPPLE.
In 1849, a twelve-year-old girl who calls herself Lucy is distraught when her mother moves
the family from Massachusetts to a small California mining town, where Lucy helps run a
rough boarding house and looks for comfort in books while trying to find a way to get
"home."
Donahue, M. STRAIGHT ALONG A CROOKED ROAD.
As her family travels from Vermont to settle in California in the early 1850's,
fourteen-year-old Luanna learns to accept life for what it is, no matter where.
Ferber, E. CIMARRON.
The exciting and unusual happenings surrounding the opening of Oklahoma in 1889.
Field, R. CALICO BUSH.
First published in 1931, this Newbery Honor book is the story of a young French girl
"bound-out" in service in pioneer America.
Fleischman, P. THE BORNING ROOM.
Lying at the end of her life in the room where she was born in 1851, Georgina remembers
what it was like to grow up on the Ohio frontier.
Fleischman, Sid. JIM UGLY.
The adventures of twelve-year-old Jake and Jim Ugly, his father's part-mongrel, part-wolf
dog, as they travel through the Old West trying to find out what really happened to Jake's
actor father.
Friermood, E. FOCUS THE BRIGHT LAND.
Vicky Bodkin, the only girl in a family of photographers, tries to prove her talent with
the camera while traveling with her brothers in a horse-drawn studio in the midwest in
1881.
Gregory, K. JENNY OF THE TETONS.
Orphaned by an Indian raid while traveling West with a wagon train, fifteen-year-old
Carrie Hill is befriended by the English trapper Beaver Dick and taken to live with his
Indian wife Jenny and their five children.
Hahn, M. THE GENTLEMAN OUTLAW AND ME-ELI.
In 1887, twelve-year-old Eliza, disguised as a boy and traveling toward Colorado in search
of her missing father, falls in with a Gentleman Outlaw and joins him in his illegal
schemes.
Harte, B. BRET HARTE: STORIES OF THE EARLY WEST.
This is a collection of short stories including THE LUCK OF ROARING CAMP and sixteen other
exciting tales of mining and frontier days.
Hill, P. THE JOURNEY HOME.
Two orphan sisters in the late 1800's leave New York on the orphan train to seek a new
home in the West.
Holland, I. THE PROMISED LAND.
Orphaned by their mother's death, two Irish Catholic sisters find a home with a kind
Protestant couple on the Kansas frontier, but their new life is threatened by the
reappearance of their uncle who is determined to take them back to New York and their
"true religion."
Hudson, J. SWEETGRASS.
Living on the western Canadian prairie in the nineteenth-century, Sweetgrass, a
15-year-old Blackfoot Indian girl, saves her family from a smallpox epidemic and proves
her maturity to her father.
Irwin, H. JIM-DANDY.
Living after the Civil War on a Kansas homestead with his stern stepfather,
thirteen-year-old Caleb raises a beloved colt and becomes involved in General Custer's
raids on the Cheyenne.
Johnson, A. THE BURNING GLASS.
Fifteen-year-old Jeb leaves his family to head West on his own in the early 1800's.
Karr, K. OH, THOSE HARPER GIRLS!
Lily and her five older sisters are caught up in their father's desperate moneymaking
schemes until, one day, at his suggestion, they find themselves actually undertaking a bit
of highway robbery. Set in Texas in 1869.
Lampman, E. HALF-BREED.
Pale-Eyes, son of an Indian mother and a white father, leaves the tribe in search of his
father.
Lasky, K. BEYOND THE DIVIDE.
In 1849, a fourteen-year-old Amish girl defies convention by leaving her secure home in
Pennsylvania to accompany her father across the continent by wagon train.
Lasky, K. THE BONE WARS.
In the mid-1870's, young teenage scout Thad Longsworth, blood brother to the Sioux
visionary Black Elk, finds his destiny linked with that of three rival teams of
paleontologists searching for dinosaur bones, as the Great Plains Indians prepare to go to
war against the white man.
MacBride, R. LITTLE HOUSE ON ROCKY RIDGE.
In 1894 Laura Ingalls Wilder, her husband, and her seven-year-old daughter Rose leave the
Ingalls family in Dakota and make the long and difficult journey to Missouri to start a
new life.
McClung, R. HUGH GLASS, MOUNTAIN MAN.
A fictionalized biography of the legendary hero of the Old West, who as a fur trapper in
1823, survived an attack by a grizzly bear.
Meyer, C. WHERE THE BROKEN HEART STILL BEATS.
Having been taken as a child and raised by Comanche Indians, thirty-four-year-old Cynthia
Ann Parker is forcibly returned to her white relatives, where she longs for her Indian
life. Her only friend is her twelve-year-old cousin Lucy.
Miers, E. MARK TWAIN ON THE MISSISSIPPI.
A fictionalized biography of Mark Twain, set in Missouri in the 1840's.
Moeri, L. SAVE QUEEN OF SHEBA.
After miraculously surviving a Sioux Indian raid on the trail to Oregon, a brother and
sister set out with few provisions to find the rest of the settlers.
Moore, R. THE BREAD SISTER OF SINKING CREEK.
Fourteen-year-old Maggie Callahan, who has a special talent for making bread, struggles to
survive on the Pennsylvania frontier in the late 1700's.
Murrow, L. WEST AGAINST THE WIND.
Fourteen-year-old Abby seeks both her father and the secret of a handsome but mysterious
boy during an arduous journey by wagon train from the middle of the country to the Pacific
coast in 1850.
Nixon, J. CAUGHT IN THE ACT.
Eleven-year-old Michael Patrick Kelly from New York City is sent to a foster home, a
Missouri farm with a sadistic owner, a bullying son, and a number of secrets, one of which
may be murder. This is the second story in the Orphan Train Quartet, set in the late
1800's.
Nixon, J. A DEADLY PROMISE.
Sarah risks her life to clear her murdered father's name and expose big time criminal
activity in the lawless mining town of Leadville. Set in the late 1800's.
Nixon, J. A FAMILY APART.
When their mother can no longer support them, six siblings are sent by the Children's Aid
Society of New York City to live with farm families in Missouri in 1860. This is the first
story in the Orphan Train Quartet.
Nixon, J. IN THE FACE OF DANGER.
Deeply unhappy about her family's separation because of poverty, Megan gradually finds
contentment and purpose in her new home on the Kansas prairie with a kind and loving
adopted family. This is the third story in the Orphan Train Quartet.
O'Dell, S. STREAMS TO THE RIVER, RIVER TO THE SEA.
A young Indian woman, accompanied by her infant and cruel husband, experiences joy and
heartbreak when she joins the Lewis and Clark Expedition seeking a way to the Pacific. A
fictionalized story of Sacagawea.
O'Dell, S. THUNDER ROLLING IN THE MOUNTAINS.
In the late nineteenth century, a young Nez Perce girl relates how her people were driven
off their land by the U.S. Army and forced to retreat north until their eventual
surrender.
Paulsen, G. CALL ME FRANCIS TUCKET.
Having separated from the one-armed trapper who taught him how to survive in the
wilderness of the Old West, fifteen-year-old Francis gets lost and continues to have
adventures involving dangerous men and a friendly mule. Set in 1849.
Paulsen, G. MR. TUCKET.
In 1848, while on a wagon train headed for Oregon, fourteen-year-old Francis Tucket is
kidnapped by Pawnee Indians and then falls in with a one-armed trapper who teaches him how
to live in the wild.
Paulsen, G. TUCKET'S RIDE.
When fifteen-year-old Francis and two younger children lose their way in the wilderness of
the Southwest, they face capture during the Mexican War.
Rinaldi, A. THE SECOND BEND IN THE RIVER.
In 1798 Rebecca, a young settler in the Ohio territory, meets the Shawnee called Tecumseh
and later develops a deep friendship with him.
Sauerwein, L. THE WAY HOME.
A collection of six short stories capturing moments in the American West, between 1853 and
1992.
Schellie, D. ME, CHOLAY & CO.
In 1850, seventeen-year-old Joshua Thane finds himself in command of a band of six Apache
children with fifty miles of Arizona desert to cross and a party of murderous white men in
pursuit.
Steele, W. TOMAHAWK BORDER.
A sixteen-year-old boy runs away to join the Virginia rangers. Set in the 1700's.
Taylor, T. WALKING UP A RAINBOW.
In 1852, a fourteen-year-old orphan and her elderly guardian, accompanied by a tough
drover and his crew, take several thousand sheep from Iowa to California, returning by
ship through the Panama Canal, to raise money to save the girl's home from a villainous
debt collector.
Veglahn, N. FOLLOW THE GOLDEN GOOSE.
Based on real events, this is the story of fourteen-year-old Neb Walters and his father
who join a wagon train traveling slowly West.
Wallace, B. BUFFALO GAL.
Fifteen-year-old Amanda's refined life in 1904 San Franciso is disrupted when she
grudgingly accompanies her mother to the Oklahoma Territory on a crusade to save the
buffalo.
Wilder, L. THESE HAPPY GOLDEN YEARS.
Laura teaches school for the first time in this, the eighth book of the "Little
House" series.
Wisler, G. CALEB'S CHOICE.
While living in Texas in 1858, fourteen-year-old Caleb faces a dilemma in deciding whether
or not to assist fugutive slaves in their run for freedom.
Wisler, G. JERICHO'S JOURNEY.
As his family makes the long and difficult journey from Tennessee to their new home in
Texas in 1852, twelve-year-old Jericho Wetherby, teased by his sister and brothers about
his size, learns there are many ways to grow.
Wisler, G. THE RAID.
When his little brother is carried off by raiding Comanches, fourteen-year-old Lige
disguises himself as an Indian and joins a former slave in a bold rescue attempt.
Wisler, G. WINTER OF THE WOLF.
In charge of the family's Texas homestead during the Civil War, fourteen-year-old
T.J.
saves the life of a Comanche boy during an Indian raid and they subsequently hunt a large,
silver wolf purported to be the devil.
Wister, O. THE VIRGINIAN: A HORSEMAN OF THE PLAINS.
The classic tale of a Western horseman set in Wyoming in the late 1800's.
