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Xerox University Microfilms 300 North Zeeb Road Ann Arbor, Michigan 4S106 76-24,548 ALTHERR, Thomas Lawson, 1948- "THE BEST OF ALL BREATHING": HUNTING AS A MODE OF ENVIRONMENTAL PERCEPTION IN AMERICAN LITERATURE AND THOUGHT FROM JAMES FENIMORE COOPER TO NORMAN MAILER. The Ohio State University, Ph.D., 1976 History, United States Xerox University Microfilms, Ann Arbor, Michigan48ioe "THE BEST OF ALL BREATHING"* HUNTING AS A MODE OF ENVIRONMENTAL PERCEPTION IN AMERICAN LITERATURE AND THOUGHT FROM JAMES FENIMORE COOPER TO NORMAN MAILER * DISSERTATION Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate School of The Ohio State University By Thomas Lawson Altherr, B.A., M.A. The Ohio State University 1976 Reading Committee: Approved By Dr, William D. Andrews Dr, Bradley Chapin Advise Dr. Peter C. Hoffer Department of History To My Wife, Janet Weir Altherr, My Very Uncommon Loon ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I would like to give sincerest thanks to the following persons, all of whom greatly aided me in completing this dissertation* first to Dr. Peter C. Hoffer, who supported the idea from the inception, and offered many "beneficial style and contents suggestions, to Dr, Bradley Chapin, Dept, of History and Dr. William D. Andrews, for serving on my reading committee, to Dr. Merton L. Dillon, Dept, of History, for invaluable suggestions on slave-hunting sources, to Dr. Allen R. Millett, for information and dialectical dis cussion on Custer, to Dr. John C. Burnham, Dept, of History, for psychological commentary on the project, and intellectual stimulation in the early stages, to Dr. Daniel R, Barnes, Dept, of English, for many long, exciting discussions on the topic of frontier experience and literature, Dr, William T. Hamilton, Dept, of English, Otterbein College, for very intriguing suggestions about folklore, to Dr. Mary E. Voung, Dept, of History, University of Rochester, who during her tenure here at Ohio State, encouraged my historical quirks and eccentricities, to Dr. Edward N. Saveth, Dept, of History, SUNY College at Fredonia, and Dr. Eugene Bianco, formerly of the Dept, of English, SUNY College at Fredonia, iii for introducing me to American Studies and encouraging my interests in that direction, and to Mr. Richard Aquila, Dr. Peter Lloyd, Mr. Steven Gietschier, and Dr. Michael Quigley, for frequent and stimulating discussions on the place and history of hunting in America. My fondest appreciation goes out to my family, to my brothers, Douglas, Paul, and James, who lent much moral support to the project during rough times, to my parents, Henry and Georgianna, who likewise stood behind me all the way, and the photograph of whom, standing next to the 1930's car and holding rifle and shotgun partially inspired this study, to my father especially, who took us early to the Western New York woods and taught me when and when not to hunt, and to my daughter, Tersa Lynn, and my wife, Janet Weir Altherr, who both breathed and lived this study nearly as much as I did. Thanks to them all! Thomas Lawson Altherr Columbus, Ohio 1 June 1976 iv VITA April 26, 194-8...... Born - Buffalo, New York 197 0 ................. B.A. State University of New York College at Fredonia, Fredonia, New York 197 1 ................. M.A. The Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio 1970-1974 -........... University Fellow, The Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio 1971-1973* 1974—1975 Teaching Associate, Department of History, The Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio 1974— 1975........... Teaching Associate, Department of Humanities. The Ohio State Uni versity, Columbus, Ohio PUBLICATIONS Abstract of "The Hunter-Naturalist and the Development of the Code of Gamesmanship," Proceedings of the North American Society for Sport History, (1975)* PP. FIELDS OF STUDY Major Field: American Intellectual History, Dr, Peter Hoffer Studies in American Social and Economic History, Dr. Mary E. Young Studies in the History of Science. Dr, John C, Burnham Studies in American Literature, Dr. Daniel R, Barnes Studies in Creative Writing. Dr. Robert Canzoneri v TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGMENTS........................................... iii VITA ....................................................... v INTRODUCTION ............................................. 1 PROLOGUE I. "Wasty Ways”: Natty Bumppo's Ecological Consciousness in James Fenimore Cooper's Leatherstocking Novels........................ 15 PART I: The Savage Urge to Hunt in Nineteenth- Century America................................. 44 II. "Feasting and Fasting": Hunting and Hunters in Washington Irving's A Tour on the Prairies........................................ 48 III. "Go Ahead!": David Crockett and the Failure of Ecological Consciousness................. 62 IV. "It War an Unhuntahle Bar": Bear-Hunting and the "Big Bear" Southwestern Humorists....... 75 V. "Drunk with the Chase": The Savage Hunting Impulse in Francis Parkman's The Oregon Trail and Herman Melville's Moby-Dick 77 ....... 98 VI. "Chaplain to the Hunters": Henry David Thoreau's Ambivalence toward Hunting........ 113 VII. "We've Got 'Em on the Run, Boys!": Hunting Slaves and Indians as Animals............... 143 VIII. "Always Aims and Shoots to Kill": "Buffalo Bill" Cody and the Ritual Dramatization of Hunting in the West........................ 177 IX. "The Heart of Things Primordial": Hunting as Atavism in Jack London's The Call of the Wild and The Sea-Wolf......................... 189 vi TRANSITION X. "All Hunters Should Be Nature Lovers": Theodore Roosevelt and the Emergence of the American Hunter-Naturalist Ideal......... 205 PART II: The Last Hunt: Hunting Tradition and Receding Wilderness in Twentieth-Century America........................................ 221 XI. "The Lost Good Country": Hunting Tradition and Receding Wilderness in Ernest Heming way's Nick Adams Stories..................... 224 XII. "The Best of All Breathing": The Wilderness Career of Isaac McCaslin in William Faulkner's "The Old People," "The Bear," and "Delta Autumn".................. 240 XIII. "It War Some": Hunting Tradition and Receding Wilderness in Five Represent ative Western Regionalist Novels........... 266 XIV. "Mallards and Messerschmitts": American Hunting Magazines and the War Effort during World War II......................... 293 EPILOGUE XV. "Going-for the Grizzer": Hunting in Norman Mailer's Why Are We in Vietnam?.......... 309 BIBLIOGRAPHY............................................. 325 vii INTRODUCTION In early September, 1975* Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS) broadcast a special program about sport-hunting titled "The Guns of Autumn." The program included footage of some hunters shooting bears that they had fed only three days previously, scenes of other animal shootings, and interviews with various hunters, who were largely inarticulate on the screen. Contrary to announced intentions of objectivity, the show displayed a distinct anti-hunting bias. Neglecting unfortunately any of the mythic, anthropological, social, and ecological aspects of sport-hunting, "The Guns of Autumn" pictured hunting as the sadistic and profitable frivolity of social degenerates who chant the rhetoric of the National Rifle Association. At CBS's request and of their own will, thousands of hunters and many hunters' groups, and many non hunters such as this writer, wrote and protested what they considered a gross distortion of present-day hunting in America. CBS ran a sequel in late September, 1975t titled "Echoes of the Guns of Autumn." This sequel showed dis gusted hunters watching the original program and featured panel discussions by opposing