This entire series is a wonderful way to learn history or teach it to adolescents. I find today's generations seem to recall more when they learn through other people (pop songs, celebrity gossip, etc.), so what better way to teach history than through someone else's perspective? Yes, "authentic" diaries would be "better", but would the language really hold the modern student's attention? Did the diary writer know what WOULD be important in the context of history? Probably not.

This book is the story of Jedediah Barstow a traveler on the Oregon Trail. His parents and his sister all die when they are on the trail and he is givin a choice of turning around and heading back or going forward. He says that he doesn't have anything left where he is from and Oregon is the place that his parents wanted him to be so he keeps going. The author of this book takes different peoples journals and put them togethere to make a story out of it. This book doesn't relly have much fighting in it but there are people that die. Jedediah goes throught things that most people his age don't have do go through. At the end of the book they reach Oregon and most of the people that were with them at the beginning of the book are there at the end because not many people died unless there was an accident of some kind. He sees buffalo, indians, and bears like he always always said he would. The book is actually telling you what he did from day to day. There are some days that he misses because he doesn't do anything that day or it was just boring.If he did tell us all that he did than it would be at least five times as long as it is. It was a good book and it think that anyone that likes history would like this book. ( )

In his 1845 diary, thirteen year old Jedediah Barstow, an orphan, describes his wagontrain journey to Oregan, in which he confronts rivers and sandy plains, bears and rattlesnakes, and the challenges of living with his fellow travelers. Includes historical notes.