Desperate Passage
The Donner Party's Perilous Journey West
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Narrated by:
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Christopher Prince
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By:
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Ethan Rarick
About this listen
In late October 1846, the last wagon train of that year's westward migration stopped overnight before resuming its arduous climb over the Sierra Nevada Mountains, unaware that a fearsome storm was gathering force. After months of grueling travel, the 81 men, women and children would be trapped for a brutal winter with little food and only primitive shelter. The conclusion is known: by spring of the next year, the Donner Party was synonymous with the most harrowing extremes of human survival. But until now, the full story of what happened--and what it tells us about human nature and about America's westward expansion--remained shrouded in myth.
Drawing on fresh archeological evidence, recent research on topics ranging from survival rates to snowfall totals, and heartbreaking letters and diaries made public by descendants a century-and-a-half after the tragedy, Ethan Rarick offers an intimate portrait of the Donner party and their unimaginable ordeal: a mother who must divide her family, a little girl who shines with courage, a devoted wife who refuses to abandon her husband, a man who risks his life merely to keep his word. Rarick resists both the gruesomely sensationalist accounts of the Donner party as well as later attempts to turn the survivors into archetypal pioneer heroes. "The Donner Party," Rarick writes, "is a story of hard decisions that were neither heroic nor villainous. Often, the emigrants displayed a more realistic and typically human mixture of generosity and selfishness, an alloy born of necessity."
A fast-paced, heart-wrenching, clear-eyed narrative history, Desperate Passage casts new light on one of America's most horrific encounters between the dream of a better life and the harsh realities such dreams so often must confront.
Download the accompanying reference guide.©2009 Ethan Rarick (P)2009 Audible, Inc.Listeners also enjoyed...
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Learning about the 1,800-mile journey made by Chief Joseph and 800 Nez Perce men, women, and children from their homelands in what is now eastern Oregon to Montana is essential to understand who we are as a nation. There, only 40 miles from the Canadian border and freedom, Chief Joseph, convinced that the wounded and elders could go no farther, walked across the snowy battlefield, handed his rifle to the US military commander who had been pursuing them, and spoke his now-famous words, "From where the sun now stands, I will fight no more forever."
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Long but totally worth it
- By Mt.. Jumper on 07-24-19
By: Kent Nerburn
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Into Africa
- The Epic Adventures of Stanley and Livingstone
- By: Martin Dugard
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 11 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
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"Dr. Livingstone, I presume?" So goes the signature introduction of New York Herald star journalist Henry Morton Stanley to renowned explorer Dr. David Livingstone, who had been missing for six years in the wilds of Africa. Into Africa ushers us into the meeting of these remarkable men. In 1866, when Livingstone journeyed into the heart of the African continent in search of the Nile's source, the land was rough, unknown to Europeans, and inhabited by man-eating tribes.
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Riveting
- By Gene on 04-01-04
By: Martin Dugard
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A Wretched and Precarious Situation
- In Search of the Last Arctic Frontier
- By: David Welky
- Narrated by: Joel Richards
- Length: 15 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
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A remarkable true story of adventure, betrayal, and survival set in one of the world's most inhospitable places. In 1906, from atop a snow-swept hill in the ice fields northwest of Greenland, hundreds of miles from another human being, Commander Robert E. Peary spotted a line of mysterious peaks looming in the distance. He called this unexplored realm "Crocker Land". Scientists and explorers agreed that the world-famous explorer had discovered a new continent rising from the frozen Arctic Ocean.
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it all comes together at the end
- By Kat on 01-30-18
By: David Welky
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Blood and Thunder
- An Epic of the American West
- By: Hampton Sides
- Narrated by: Don Leslie
- Length: 20 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
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In the summer of 1846, the Army of the West marched through Santa Fe, en route to invade and occupy the Western territories claimed by Mexico. Fueled by the new ideology of “Manifest Destiny,” this land grab would lead to a decades-long battle between the United States and the Navajos, the fiercely resistant rulers of a huge swath of mountainous desert wilderness.
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Publisher's summary does not do it justice
- By Eric on 02-07-11
By: Hampton Sides
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The Age of Gold
- The California Gold Rush and the New American Dream
- By: H.W. Brands
- Narrated by: Grover Gardner
- Length: 17 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
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When gold was discovered at Sutter's Mill on the American River, it completely transformed the territory of California. Hundreds of thousands of people sped to California by any means possible, and small cities sprung up to service their needs as they sought the precious metal. By 1850, California had become a state; it had also become a symbol of where the nation was going.
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Very Enjoyable
- By Claire on 01-15-04
By: H.W. Brands
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The Children's Blizzard
- By: David Laskin
- Narrated by: Paul Woodson
- Length: 9 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
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January 12, 1888, began as an unseasonably warm morning across Nebraska, the Dakotas, and Minnesota, the weather so mild that children walked to school without coats and gloves. But that afternoon, without warning, the atmosphere suddenly, violently changed. One moment the air was calm; the next the sky exploded in a raging chaos of horizontal snow and hurricane-force winds. Temperatures plunged as an unprecedented cold front ripped through the center of the continent.
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True Account of 1888 Prairie Blizzard
- By Mary Burnight on 01-09-17
By: David Laskin
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Into the Silence
- The Great War, Mallory, and the Conquest of Everest
- By: Wade Davis
- Narrated by: Enn Reitel
- Length: 28 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
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In this magisterial work of history and adventure, based on more than a decade of prodigious research in British, Canadian, and European archives, and months in the field in Nepal and Tibet, Wade Davis vividly re-creates British climbers’ epic attempts to scale Mount Everest in the early 1920s. With new access to letters and diaries, Davis recounts the heroic efforts of George Mallory and his fellow climbers to conquer the mountain in the face of treacherous terrain and furious weather.
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He wrote exquisite Eel-agies?
- By Florence on 11-29-12
By: Wade Davis
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Theodore Roosevelt in the Badlands
- A Young Politician's Quest for Recovery in the American West
- By: Roger L. Di Silvestro
- Narrated by: Tristan Morris
- Length: 9 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
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Performance
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Story
Theodore Roosevelt in the Badlands chronicles the turbulent years Roosevelt spent as a rancher in the Badlands of Dakota Territory, following the sudden deaths on February 14, 1884, of his wife, two days after giving birth, and of his mother. Grief-stricken - and driven by doubts about his career after failed attempts as a reformer fighting political corruption -the young, Harvard-educated New York politician left his infant daughter in his sister's care and went to live on a Badlands ranch he had bought a year earlier.
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Outstanding
- By Buyce Consulting on 04-26-15
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Jedediah Smith
- No Ordinary Mountain Man
- By: Barton H. Barbour
- Narrated by: Douglas R Pratt
- Length: 10 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
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Story
Mountain man and fur trader Jedediah Smith casts a heroic shadow. He was the first Anglo-American to travel overland to California via the Southwest, and he roamed through more of the West than anyone else of his era. His adventures quickly became the stuff of legend. Using new information and sifting fact from folklore, Barton H. Barbour now offers a fresh look at this dynamic figure.
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Narrator could use a pronunciation guide
- By Ralph M. Vaga on 03-16-20
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In the Kingdom of Ice
- The Grand and Terrible Polar Voyage of the USS Jeannette
- By: Hampton Sides
- Narrated by: Arthur Morey
- Length: 17 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
In the late nineteenth century, people were obsessed by one of the last unmapped areas of the globe: The North Pole. No one knew what existed beyond the fortress of ice rimming the northern oceans. On July 8, 1879, the USS Jeannette set sail from San Francisco to cheering crowds in the grip of "Arctic Fever." The ship sailed into uncharted seas, but soon was trapped in pack ice. Two years into the harrowing voyage, the hull was breached. Amid the rush of water and the shrieks of breaking wooden boards, the crew abandoned the ship.
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Superb tale that unravels at an iceburg's pace
- By Mel on 03-19-15
By: Hampton Sides
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The Big Burn
- Teddy Roosevelt and the Fire That Saved America
- By: Timothy Egan
- Narrated by: Robertson Dean
- Length: 9 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Story
In The Worst Hard Time, Timothy Egan put the environmental disaster of the Dust Bowl at the center of a rich history, told through characters he brought to indelible life. Now he performs the same alchemy with the Big Burn, the largest-ever forest fire in America and the tragedy that cemented Teddy Roosevelt's legacy in the land.
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Mediocre
- By Mona on 11-04-20
By: Timothy Egan
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On July 12th, 1776, Captain James Cook, already lionized as the greatest explorer in British history, set off on his third voyage in his ship the HMS Resolution. Two-and-a-half years later, on a beach on the island of Hawaii, Cook was killed in a conflict with native Hawaiians. How did Cook, who was unique among captains for his respect for Indigenous peoples and cultures, come to that fatal moment? Hampton Sides’ bravura account of Cook’s last journey both wrestles with Cook’s legacy and provides a thrilling narrative of the titanic efforts and continual danger that characterized exploration.
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Detailed story of third voyage
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The definitive, personal account of the deadliest season in the history of Everest by the acclaimed journalist and author of Into the Wild. Read by the author. Also, hear a Fresh Air interview with Krakauer conducted shortly after his ordeal.
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Audio version RUINED with new narrator!
- By Shannon Ellis on 02-06-16
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What listeners say about Desperate Passage
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Rebeka
- 01-12-12
Desperate for sure!
What did you love best about Desperate Passage?
I cannot say enough about this book. What an incredible story. One of the best things about this book is that there is quite a bit of psychological insight to the mindset of these people.
I highly recommend this book.
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- Diane C. Soule
- 08-18-15
Wow
Couldn't stop listening and I never write reviews! The story was very easy to follow even with many differs characters involved.
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- 8dove8
- 02-05-13
Horror...suspenseful...but ultimately inspiring
What other book might you compare Desperate Passage to and why?
Many true artic and sea survival stories...but much closer to home and more powerful...
Was there a moment in the book that particularly moved you?
Several...but I won't spoil the story...
Any additional comments?
Well worth the listen...interesting history of American exploration and expansion westward...with details of daily life and personal accounts from journals, diaries, and letters... a fascinating look back into the past...
It made me imagine..." what if...???"
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- Angell.Dillon
- 04-04-22
loads of information
a unique and honest perspective of an infamous American tragedy. The author weaves the tale from the onset of the adventure and culminates in a reflective pondering of the trials of humanity.
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- P. Sullivan
- 03-04-24
Outstanding
I have read many books on the Donner party. This one is so riveting and full of things we didn’t know. Outstanding.
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- AJ
- 08-19-15
You Think You Know The Story But You Don't!
Wow! I bought this book on sale and waited months to listen to it because a) I thought I knew the story already (pioneers caught in the dead of winter with no food forced to partake in cannibalism blah blah blah) and b) I thought it might be kind of boring but I couldn't have more wrong! One day I ran out of books to listen to and found this one in my library so I decided to give it a try and all I can say is WOW! This book is brilliantly written, the details have been thoroughly researched and the narrator is excellent! I found this story so engaging I did not want to turn it off! After it was over I told EVERYONE I knew about it!
The story itself is probably one of the most difficult I've ever listened to and yet it tells of a part of history I feel every person should know. Descriptions of the suffering and pain these people endured is in depth and not for the faint at heart however it's also so much more than just about the gore! So much more than JUST cannibalism and that is saying a lot!
This book made me appreciate my life, made me not want to complain or stress out over stupid things but above all this book gave me an excellent perspective on not only how much suffering, neglect & pain one can endure but how truly STRONG the human spirit is and how the will to live can turn a simple human into a super human!
This book is incredible! If you're hesitant to buy it just remember this is not the story you read in high school. You may think you already know this story but until you listen to this book you really don't!
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1 person found this helpful
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Performance
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- LifetimeRoad
- 11-05-12
Sorry, couldn't enjoy this
Would you say that listening to this book was time well-spent? Why or why not?
Not really. I would have much rather enjoyed another more captivating book.
Would you ever listen to anything by Ethan Rarick again?
Possibly. Depends.
How could the performance have been better?
The narrator sounds like a dad scolding his 10 year old son up in the bedroom. The tone could be expressed by the phrase " How many times have I told you not to etc., etc, etc, "
Did Desperate Passage inspire you to do anything?
No.
Any additional comments?
I appreciate the research put into Desperate Passage but it could have been written in a more concise manner, and certainly could have had a better narrator.
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- Stephen
- 02-12-13
Fascinating, entertaining
Would you listen to Desperate Passage again? Why?
Yes, because so much is missed with the first listen.
What did you like best about this story?
Love history.
What does Christopher Prince bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?
Expression
Did you have an extreme reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?
No, Thank you.
Any additional comments?
No, Thank you.
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- Nicole
- 05-09-13
VERY INTERESTING
Any additional comments?
This book taught me a lot about this time era of the pioneers and the harsh stuff these people went through. Amazing what they did and has made me very greatful I haven't had to travel on foot and live through the conditions they had too.
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- vakdevi
- 02-20-21
Excellent
The tale opens up a view of the overland emigrant that shows their fallibility and strength. Not ghoulish, but showing the depth of emotions and conflicts of the travelers. Well worth reading.
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