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The World of Georic 1989-Present

Saturday, May 29, 2021

(Review) Watching Over Yellowstone

Unlike the regular Historical Wargaming buffs, I eschew studies in the bigger historical periods.  I read enough ACW and WW2 in high school and Napoleonics aren't my thing.  I much prefer the smaller campaigns, the less well-known events that impact society in different ways than the sledgehammer military events:  Lettow-Vorbeck in German East Africa.  The Samoan Civil Wars.  The Battle of Yellowstone.  

For over thirty years, the United States Cavalry were the caretakers and administrators of Yellowstone National Park.    In those early days, the soldiers maintained the park, aided and tried to control the growing tourism to the regions, and dealt illegal poaching and other operations that snuck over the boundary.  It was a different type of assignment compared to any other, stateside, and produced a unique set of challenges to the enlisted men and officers alike. 

In Watching Over Yellowstone, Thomas C Rust does not try to rehash the story, as it is already available.  Rather, he delves deep within the collected letters of enlisted personnel and civilians living near the park, entrusted to the Yellowstone National Park Archives, piecing together the how the men overcame loneliness, remoteness, and far too many opportunities for largely unsupervised shenanigans and hijinks, and far, far worse.    

Using the soldiers' letters personalizes them, and makes the reader seek out more interpretation and empathy as they are charged with desertion, drunkenness, and dereliction of duty. I'm still questioning how much of things were the overwhelming depression and loneliness that being so remorte does to a person, but at the same time, learning how much it took to walk to civilization (with a train station) and board a train, I'm beginning to question the mental sate of the men.  

The book is also chock full of new pictures detailing the Park during the US Cavalry's management.  If I do ever return to my Battle of Yellowstone game, I have considerably more source material for the table than I had before.

Watching Over Yellowstone is definitely worth 4 out of 5 gnomes.

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