America Legend

A constant fixture in American pop culture, the 19th century American West continues to be vividly and colorfully portrayed not just as a place but as a state of mind. In Charles River Editors' Legends of the West series, listeners can get up to speed on the lives of America's most famous frontier figures in the time it takes to finish a commute, while learning interesting facts long forgotten or never known.

The Wild West has made legends out of many men and women through the embellishment of their stories, but it was Buffalo Bill Cody who truly brought the Wild West to life. Though he had a long career, Buffalo Bill eventually became synonymous with his world-famous Wild West Show. By depicting stereotypical Western scenes, Buffalo Bill became one of the men most responsible for establishing how the public came to remember the Wild West.

Of all the colorful characters that inhabited the West during the 19th century, the man who has earned an enduring legacy as the region's quirkiest is John Henry "Doc" Holliday (1851-1887), a dentist turned professional gambler who was widely recognized as one of the fastest draws in the West. In fact, the only thing that might have been faster than the deadly gunman's draw was his violent temper, which was easily set off when Holliday was drunk. By the early 1880s, Holliday had been arrested nearly 20 times.

Space may be the final frontier, but no frontier has ever captured the American imagination like the Wild West, which still evokes images of dusty cowboys, outlaws, gunfights, gamblers, and barroom brawls over 100 years after the West was settled. A constant fixture in American pop culture, the 19th-century American West continues to be vividly and colorful portrayed not just as a place but as a state of mind.

The Wild West has made legends out of many men, but it has forged a lasting legacy for some of the frontier towns that hosted famous Western icons as well, and aside from Tombstone and Deadwood, no frontier town is better known than Dodge City, Kansas. Legends of the West: Dodge City, Kansas comprehensively covers the history of the city, profiles the people who called it home, and highlights the attractions and events that made it famous.

Nathaniel Hawthorne needs no formal introduction for any American who took a literature course in high school. It's impossible to avoid reading one of Hawthorne's classics, particularly The Scarlet Letter and The House of the Seven Gables. Hawthorne could trace his family roots back to the Puritans of the 17th-century colonies, and he was clearly qualified to produce some of America's greatest historical fiction.

In American history, there are few people as controversial or consequential as Nat Turner, who was one of millions of slaves in the South before the Civil War but ultimately led the nation's most notorious slave uprising. In August 1831, Turner led a rebellion that terrorized Virginia for several days, killing dozens of Whites and freeing slaves as his band moved from plantation to plantation.

The life of Pocahontas fulfills a specific role in American culture and history. Her short life came to symbolize the first encounters between English settlers and the local native tribes. The meaning of her name, "little plaything" or "little wanton", suggests that she was destined to be bandied about by the powers in her life. The men of the time simply assumed a young Native American girl did not deserve or even want respect.

The origins of rock music claim several founding fathers, with each perspective holding merit and directly contributing to the golden age to follow in rock music. Perhaps the first and ultimately the most successful of this category - those artistic explorers who most effectively blurred racial and political lines through their music - was Chuck Berry.

Space may be the final frontier, but no frontier has ever captured the American imagination like the Wild West, which still evokes images of dusty cowboys, outlaws, gunfights, gamblers, and barroom brawls over 100 years after the West was settled. A constant fixture in American pop culture, the 19th-century American West continues to be vividly and colorfully portrayed not just as a place but as a state of mind.

Reagan's name is still relevant in American politics today, with every politician with an R next to his or her name trying to claim Ronald Reagan's conservative mantle. In the Republican presidential nomination debates in 2011, Reagan's name was invoked an average of over five times per debate, more than every other president combined. Meanwhile, Americans of all stripes continue to debate the merits of "Reaganomics" more than 30 years after Reagan was elected.

John Adams was one of his country's seminal Founding Fathers and one of its most experienced, distinguished diplomats and politicians. Few men in American history have a record anywhere near comparable, but one of them happened to be Adams's own son, John Quincy Adams. And yet, few Americans are familiar with him aside from the fact that he was his father's son and the sixth president of the United States.

Before the United States of America even existed, the first American celebrity was Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790). In his career, Franklin was an author, printer, political theorist, politician, postmaster, scientist, musician, inventor, satirist, civic activist, statesman, and diplomat. After having his hand in all kinds of community service in Philadelphia, and inventing important devices like lightning rods, Franklin used his unique status as an international celebrity to become the colonies' best diplomat.

Jim Bowie is one of 19th century America's most famous names, even if what's known about the man is more legend than fact. Like Daniel Boone and Davy Crockett, Bowie has come to represent the pioneering spirit of the frontier, along with the masculinity, machismo, and swagger that earned him a reputation for fighting. And like any good legend, he is perhaps best remembered for his death at the Alamo than for any aspect of his life. Bowie's death and the defenders' defeat at the Alamo, did not have a decisive impact on Texas' War for Independence.

The Founding Fathers have been revered by Americans for over 200 years, celebrated for creating a new nation founded upon the loftiest ideals of democracy and meritocracy. But if the American Dream has come to represent the ability to climb the social ladder with skill and hard work, no Founding Father represented the new America more than Alexander Hamilton.

Over the course of 83 years, Paul Revere was one of the most prominent citizens in Boston, heralded for his silversmith work, his participation in the Sons of Liberty, and his service in the Massachusetts militia. Fathering 16 children by two wives, 11 of whom survived to adulthood, Revere supported his large family by doing everything from dentistry to casting church bells and engraving the most popular image of the Boston Massacre.

The name "Geronimo" evokes a number of different emotions. Those who believed in 19th century America's "Manifest Destiny" viewed Geronimo and all Native Americans as impediments to God's will for the nation. Descendants of people killed by "hostile" Natives certainly considered warriors like Geronimo to be murderers and thieves whose cultures and societies held no redeeming values.

The American cowboy came into the west to begin after a bloody civil war had ended. He worked long hours in lonely cow camps and his pay was meager, but he had grit and determination. He faced constant danger; he fought Indians and rustlers and braved swollen rivers and stampedes. And, finally, when the days of the open range were over, he rode off into the sunset. But his legacy lives on.

In all the annals of American history, it is hard if not impossible to find a figure with a more controversial legacy than Aaron Burr, one of the most reviled yet mysterious characters of the last 200 years. Today Burr is remembered almost solely for participating in the nation's most famous duel on July 11, 1804, which resulted in the death of instrumental Founding Father Alexander Hamilton, but it is often forgotten that Burr killed Hamilton while he was Thomas Jefferson's sitting vice president.

Americans have loved traveling circuses for generations, and none represents the country's love of entertainment quite like the most famous of them all, the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus. Circus promoters have long been viewed as somewhat shady hucksters, but none could top Phineas Taylor Barnum, who used a blend of traditional circus entertainment, freak show exhibits, and outright hoaxes to create "The Greatest Show on Earth".