Fifty Years on the Trail

The True Story of John Y. Nelson, Frontiersman, Scout, and Guide

By: John Y. Nelson

Narrated by: Matthew Erwin

Fifty Years on the Trail is the true story of John Young Nelson (1826-1903), an early frontiersman, military scout, interpreter, guide, and saloon owner. Nelson ran away from home as a young teenager to adventure in the west. He worked on farms, served as a cabin boy on a Mississippi steamer, and became an apprentice with a group of traders traveling west from Missouri.

After meeting a band of Sioux, he got himself adopted into the tribe, learned how to live off the land and became a Sioux warrior. It was Nelson who guided Brigham Young and the Mormon pioneers into Salt Lake Valley in 1847. Nelson later worked with Buffalo Bill fought and served as a sheriff in North Dakota. His exiting story provides fascinating insight into the early American west.

Public Domain (P)2020 Museum Audiobooks

Loved the book

I loved this book. The readers voice fit well with the picture of John Y. Nelson for me.

How a white man lived in the West

This memoir is a wonderful accounting of the transient nature of a white man’s non conformist life west of the Mississippi in the 1800’s. Living amongst the Native Americans and scouting for the Army.
Speed the telling up a little and the reader becomes a little more lively.

straight forward history

love the history and John's no nonsense approach to talking about his life and his experience

Not much of a storyteller… But his story

Is fascinating. I found the writing somewhat turgid... this mountain man was not a natural raconteur... and yet his experiences were remarkable… Occasionally inaccurate… His tale about the tarantula just playing wrong… But it is wonderful. First source material for the historical record.