New York Almanack

History, Natural History & the Arts

James Fenimore Cooper

A World of Pigeons: A Champlain Valley Pigeon Roost, ca. 1785

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Depiction of a passenger pigeon hunting in northern Louisiana by Smith Bennett, 1875The wild passenger pigeon (Ectopistes migratorius) was once the most abundant bird in North America, numbering perhaps as many as 5 billion individuals. It migrated in enormous flocks on a constant search for food and shelter. They were hunted on a massive scale and sold as cheap commercial food until the last wild pigeon was shot in Ohio in 1900.

In Chainbearer, a novel set after the American Revolution in about 1785 in Upstate New York, James Fenimore Cooper gives this account of a passenger pigeon roost of millions of birds in the Champlain Valley: [Read more…] about A World of Pigeons: A Champlain Valley Pigeon Roost, ca. 1785

The Lake George Trip That Inspired ‘Last of the Mohicans’

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A watercolor of Lake George, painted by Captain Joshua Rowley Watson, an English traveler who visited Lake George a few years before James Fenimore CooperJames Fenimore Cooper’s knowledge of the French and Indian War may have been sketchy, but he was interested enough in its history to contemplate a visit to Lake George, which he finally did with a party of Englishmen in August, 1824.

Lord Edward Stanley (1799-1869), who would later become the 14th Earl of Derby and thrice Great Britain’s Prime Minister during the reign of Queen Victoria, was the leader of that party. His account of the visit to Lake George was committed to his journals, portions of which were published in 1930 in a limited edition of fifty copies commissioned by his grandson. [Read more…] about The Lake George Trip That Inspired ‘Last of the Mohicans’

Lincoln, Bryant, and Cooper: An Arbor Day Story

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An oak tree at the Edgewood Preserve (Peter Ward, 2024)There is a map drawn on the inside cover of an old book. On its handwritten pages, the book tells the story of the earliest days of Brentwood’s schools; the schools of a hamlet in the middle of Long Island, some forty miles from New York City.

On the map we see part of the first school, an octagonal building erected among the pine barrens more than a century and a half ago. Across from it, along the fence at the edge of the school yard are three circles. Each is labeled: Abraham Lincoln, William Cullen Bryant, and J. Fennimore Cooper. What do these names mean? [Read more…] about Lincoln, Bryant, and Cooper: An Arbor Day Story

“Locusts of the East”: The Yankee Invasion of New York

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Anthony Finley (1784 – 1836) 1827 Map of New YorkNew York by 1820 was becoming a “colony from New England” to use the phrase of President Timothy Dwight of Yale. The “Puritan Pope,” as he was some­ times called, estimated that 60 to 67 percent of the people of New York had originated in the “land of steady habits.”

The few thousand Puritans who had established a new Zion around Boston in the 1630s were a remarkably energetic, prolific, and self-assertive people. The thin soils on the hilly lands, the harsh winters, and the stern theology of John Calvin created a distinct community spirit and shaped a unique character. [Read more…] about “Locusts of the East”: The Yankee Invasion of New York

1820s Literary Rivalry: Manhattan Versus Boston

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Francis Guy's "Tontine Coffee House" (with flag on top), 1797On November 2, 1820, the city of New York‘s Chamber of Commerce placed an advertisement in the Commercial Advertiser and other newspapers inviting merchant clerks to meet in Tontine Coffee House at 82 Wall Street and discuss forming of an organization that would be similar to Boston’s Mercantile Library (founded earlier that same year).

Nearly two hundred and fifty young men responded to the notice and joined the meeting which led to the creation of Manhattan’s Mercantile Library Association. [Read more…] about 1820s Literary Rivalry: Manhattan Versus Boston

Fenimore Cooper’s Literary Offences

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Detail of a portrait of James Fenimore Cooper by John Wesley Jarvis (1822)What follows is a humorous essay by Mark Twain (1835 – 1910), written in 1895 as satire and literary criticism of the work of James Fenimore Cooper (1789 – 1851). Not included here are quotes from Yale University’s Thomas Lounsbury (1838 – 1915), Columbia University’s James Brander Matthews (1852 – 1929); and English novelist and playwright Wilkie Collins (1824 – 1889) which preceded the essay and raved about Cooper as a great novelist. Note that some of the language reproduced here is offensive.

It seems to me that it was far from right for the Professor of English Literature in Yale, the Professor of English Literature in Columbia, and Wilkie Collins to deliver opinions on Cooper’s literature without having read some of it. It would have been much more decorous to keep silent and let persons talk who have read Cooper.

Cooper’s art has some defects. In one place in Deerslayer, and in the restricted space of two-thirds of a page, Cooper has scored 114 offences against literary art out of a possible 115. It breaks the record.

There are nineteen rules governing literary art in the domain of romantic fiction—some say twenty-two. In Deerslayer Cooper violated eighteen of them. [Read more…] about Fenimore Cooper’s Literary Offences

Lake George Battlefield, More Than Just A Setting for Cooper’s ‘Last of the Mohicans’

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A scene from the film The Last of the Mohicans (1992)In February 1826 one of America’s seminal works of historical fiction, James Fenimore Cooper‘s The Last of the Mohicans, was first published.  Last of the Mohicans has also been adapted to film at least eight times, most recently in 1992 starring Daniel Day-Lewis and Madeleine Stowe. The novel is one of five Cooper wrote that make up the Leatherstocking Tales series, all of them set in Upstate New York between the years 1740 and 1804. [Read more…] about Lake George Battlefield, More Than Just A Setting for Cooper’s ‘Last of the Mohicans’

James Fenimore Cooper: Who is the Real Natty Bumppo?

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a new york minute in history podcastThe latest episode of A New York Minute In History podcast explores the mystery of who is the inspiration for Natty Bumppo, one of the most recognizable characters from James Fenimore Cooper’s Leatherstocking Tales series of novels.

Bumppo was described by Cooper as a rugged frontiersman who dressed in tanned leather and was a skilled hunter and scout. His character was famously ridiculed by Mark Twain. [Read more…] about James Fenimore Cooper: Who is the Real Natty Bumppo?

Cooper’s Cave: America’s First Roadside Attraction

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19th century tourists visiting Cooper’s CaveJames Fenimore Cooper’s knowledge of the French and Indian War may have been sketchy, but he was interested enough in its history to contemplate  a visit to Lake George, which he finally did with a party of Englishmen in August, 1824.

Lord Edward Stanley,  who would later become the 14th Earl of Derby and  Great Britain’s Prime Minister during the reign of Queen Victoria, was a member of the party. As they crossed the Hudson River at Glens Falls on the return trip to Saratoga, Stanley noted in his journal, “Cooper… was much struck with the scenery which he had not before seen; and exclaimed, ‘I must place one of my old Indians here.” [Read more…] about Cooper’s Cave: America’s First Roadside Attraction

Last of the Mohicans: Fiction Trumps History

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First edition Last of the mohicansIn early February 1826, Carey & Lea, one of the nation’s most prominent and successful publishers, announced the publication of James Fenimore Cooper’s The Last of the Mohicans: A Narrative of 1757. Cooper was already a best-selling author, widely hailed for presenting non-stop, exciting adventures set in the wilderness, wartime, or other bracing settings. Carey & Lea, hoping that his new book would do as well as his previous ones, had paid the author a $5,000 advance.

They were not to be disappointed. The Last of the Mohicans was an instant best-seller, reprinted many times, made into movies a number of times, and became one of the most important books in American literary history. [Read more…] about Last of the Mohicans: Fiction Trumps History

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