Crossing the Continent 1527-1540: The Story of the First African in American History – The Epic True Adventure of Shipwreck, Survival, and Discovery

by Robert Goodwin

"...an adventure story more thrilling than Defoe or Melville could have imagined."-- The Philadelphia Inquirer   The true story of America's first great explorer and adventurer—an African slave named Esteban Dorantes Crossing the Continent  takes us on an epic journey from Africa to Europe and America as Dr. Robert Goodwin chronicles the incredible adventures of the African slave Esteban Dorantes (1500-1539), the first pioneer from the Old World to explore the entirety of the American south and the first African-born man to die in North America about whom anything is known. Goodwin's groundbreaking research in Spanish archives has led to a radical new interpretation of American history—one in which an African slave emerges as the nation's first great explorer and adventurer. Nearly three centuries before Lewis and Clark's epic trek to the Pacific coast, Esteban and three Spanish noblemen survived shipwreck, famine, disease, and Native American hostility to make the first crossing of North America in recorded history. Drawing on contemporary accounts and long-lost records, Goodwin recounts the extraordinary story of Esteban's sixteenth-century odyssey, which began in Florida and wound through what is now Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona, as far as the Gulf of California. Born in Africa and captured at a young age by slave traders, Esteban was serving his owner, a Spanish captain, when their disastrous sea voyage to the New World nearly claimed his life. Eventually he emerged as the leader of the few survivors of this expedition, guiding them on an extraordinary eight-year march westward to safety. Filled with tales of physical endurance, natural calamities, geographical wonders, strange discoveries, and Esteban's almost mystical dealings with Native Americans,  Crossing the Continent  challenges the traditional telling of our nation's early history, placing an African and his relationship with the Indians he encountered at the heart of a new historical record.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Biography, Travel, Audiobook, American History, Historical

414 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2008

Reviews

[James (JD) Dittes · Rating 2 out of 5]

While I completed the book, it didn't meet my expectations. I think Goodwin let his sources dictate the pace of this book, and it was a big mistake. That's the only rationale that can explain why the five-year trek through Texas and Northern Mexico gets less space the the slave markets and court intrigues of Seville--or that Coronado's expedition to New Mexico somehow passes with half-again the focus. The story that intrigues American readers doesn't even begin until pages 190!

Goodwin also uses the pages to settle historical scores: going into way too much detail deconstructing Cabeza da Vaca's "Shipwrecks" account and Dorantes's own accounts sourced in a private letter--or pursuing a hypothesis that Esteban hadn't died until after Coronado arrived in Zuni.

Esteban Dorantes was no doubt the most intrepid of the four Spaniards who survived shipwreck off Galveston Island and wove their way through today's Mexican-US frontier for years. He deserves credit, but this book handles that task very unevenly.

[Pierre · Rating 2 out of 5]

Only the best authors can have their readers suspend their disbelief. There is no place in Maine called Cabot Cove, dragons don't exist, and alien spaceships aren't battling in outer space.

Historians have a similar problem. They need to convince readers that what they are describing actually happened in the past. Historians normally write in heavily footnoted prose. More adventurous historians writing for a non-academic audience will try to write about their subjects in story form. Sometimes it works, and sometimes it doesn't.

Sadly, I wasn't able to 'unsuspend' my disbelief in the story. The book reads like a poorly written novel. I think my main problem was the use of the "historic narrator" voice. There is shifting between first, second and third person voices, from past to future, that made my head spin. Ugh.

[John · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not a lot of this book was actually about crossing the continent. Because it is based on information from the early 1500's a lot of it is conjecture. In those days not a lot was written down, especially nothing about the years walking from Florida to Mexico. And what was written down was not often very reliable. A few maps would have been a help too.

[Robert Downes · Rating 4 out of 5]

The epic tale of African slave Esteban Dorantes tells of his travails in the North American wilderness with three conquistadors lost in the disastrous 1527 expedition of Panfilo Narvaez.
Narvaez led an army of 300 men into the swamps of Florida and it was all downhill from there as they wandered through Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana and Texas. Searching for treasure, the conquistadors found mostly death from hostile Indians, disease, starvation and exposure.
A handful of survivors constructed rafts and set sail across the Gulf of Mexico, landing at present-day Galveston Island where they lived as slaves among the Karankawa Indians. By 1533 only four men were left alive, and as author Goodwin tells it, the slave Esteban took a leadership role, affording an escape from the increasingly hostile Karankawas.
Thereafter, they drifted west from tribe to tribe, throwing themselves on the mercy of Indians who were often on the brink of starvation themselves. Goodwin tells of tribes forced to rely on the most dismal of diets, including prickly pears and mesquite pods, living in abject poverty. On one occasion they encountered a tribe where the men wore no clothes and the women barely covered themselves with deerskins.
Traveling up the Rio Grande through northeast Mexico, they foursome eventually met up with Indian communities which were well established and prosperous, with fields of corn, squash, beans and a relative abundance of food. Eventually, they managed a few miraculous cures and were hailed as shamans. Esteban took to wearing shamanic feathers, bells and beads, carrying a large calabash rattle that bespoke his status as a witch doctor. By the time they eventually ran into a party of Spanish slavers, the foursome were at the head of an army of hundreds of worshipping Indians who followed them from village to village, heralding their approach.
Esteban and his companions had spent eight years wandering across what is now the southern United States. Once reunited with the Spanish in Mexico, he faced the grim situation of renewed enslavement. However, his knowledge of the Indians to the north led to an assignment to track down the fabled Seven Cities of Cibola under Coronado. In 1539, Esteban made contact with the Zuni Indians and what was perhaps considered to be the city of Cibola (actually, a humble pueblo) and was either killed, or fled his Spanish captors for a life among the Indians with four wives, depending.
It's a riveting story and Goodwin's writing is rich with imagery. At times the narrative gets bogged down as he compares three different 16th century accounts of the journey and the reading gets to be a bit of a chore; but you can't fault him for trying to get it right.
What I enjoyed most about this book was the descriptions of life among the Indians by the first Europeans (and an African) who'd ever made contact. Through sources that are 350 years old, Goodwin gives us an unvarnished vision of Indian life hundreds of years before they were overwhelmed by white settlers.

[Liz · Rating 1 out of 5]

After I made it through the forward, introduction and first chapter, I checked around online to see what others thought of this book. Several mentioned that the title was very inaccurate and that if the book had actually been what the title was about, it would have likely been a lot more interesting. Only having made it that far, I already agree. After this point in my reading of this book, I put it down and picked up the similar (and, I saw in my ramblings on the 'net, generally better rated) A Land So Strange. In the first four pages I finally understood an event that Goodwin had spent a good part of the first chapter on but had done so in a rambly, confusing way. Goodwin seems to be one of those postmodern historians who believes that the 'essence' of something is more important than the historical specifics. With almost no citations or references and, as in the event I mention, frequently a lack of interest in telling exactly where something occurred, this is not the historian nor the book for me.

Additionally, he claims in his introduction to be the first historian to have written about the man he calls Esteban, but my search for reviews of his book unintentionally showed that not only is that inaccurate, but that other historians have called him by the name he appears to have actually been known by - Estebanico. And beyond that, even in the amount of pages I read, Goodwin repeatedly does the exact same thing he haughtily accuses other historians of doing - takes history and throws a ton of speculation onto it, labelling said speculation as "must"s - Esteban "must" have been able to escape from his slavers at some particular time and place and chosen not to. The slavers "must" have been thinking this or feeling that. Etc., etc.

If you want to write a postmodern book, why not stick to writing about literature? Sure, history is somewhat subjective, but not to the degree that writing about reading a work that doesn't even claim to be based on fact would be.

[Gabriel · Rating 4 out of 5]

This deserves a proper review, but tonight I just want to say I just finishd it and really enjoyed it. Glad it was prominently displayed at North Portland Library.

Another non-ficiton re-imaging of a time and character with not nearly enough documentation on, Goodwin succeeds in providing a good context for Esteban's travels across America and Mexico (and Spain and Africa) in the eartly 1500's. What's the name of the past possible tense? It can be a little tiresome, yet the tale is worth it. He is nicely self-conscious and filling in his research experiences as part of the whole. I enjoy that sort of thing (so long as the author remains respectful of the cultures he's looking at), and Goodwin uses it to tie present pagaents and practices to Esteban's time.

Reading Rainbow veteran's summary: Did you enjoy the Cartoon Cities of Gold on Nickolodeon? Then you must read Robert Goodwin's Crossing the Continent.

[Dakota Morgan · Rating 4 out of 5]

The title and book description certainly suggest Crossing the Continent will feature a long, dangerous journey within a fast-paced adventure narrative. Not so: this is more accurately the story of the story of the first African American explorer of the American South. That is, Robert Goodwin spends a good deal of Crossing the Continent investigating sources and explaining where we get our history from.

Personally, I dug this. Historiography is oddly more satisfying to me than straight history. Tell me how we know what we know! So I very much enjoyed and Goodwin explained the Spanish sources he used to determine who did what when, and then compare those sources against the narratives written by the participants. All this to attempt to conclude decisively that Esteban (the African American of the subtitle) was actually one of the most important non-native people in the early colonization of the Americas.

The formatting of Crossing the Continent is admittedly strange, as we jump from the end of the subtitle's journey to a backstory of Esteban to a journey through sources before finally returning to the adventure narrative that most readers were probably looking for. Fortunately, Goodwin's writing is smooth, especially when it comes to describing settings. There's a lot of "no doubt" and "surely must have," but I was fine with giving Goodwin narrative license since he was so keen on explaining his source material.

At the very least, I came out of the book thinking that Esteban should be a much more key figure in our understanding of early America! I don't think I'd ever encountered him (or any of the other players here) in a history book before.

[Frode · Rating 3 out of 5]

Robert Goodwin is an historian and a pretty good writer. His book, Crossing the Continent 1527-1540, is about Esteban, the negro slave whose origin and death are mysteries. According to Goodwin, Esteban was the real leader of the four men who survived the failed expedition in Florida and walked most of their the way to Mexico. Goodwin subtitles his book, “The Story of the First African-American Explorer of the American South.”

The book is well researched and documented. It appears Mr. Goodwin reads Spanish as the bulk of the original documents are written in Spanish. The organization of the book is rather interesting. He divides the book into five parts. The first part is about the end of journey when the four men finally make contact with some Spanish slavers in upper Mexico. The second part deals with Esteban and how he likely ended up coming to America. Much of this part is informed conjecture on the author’s part.

Part three is titled “Writing History” and covers early accounts of the journey, one written by Cabeza de Vaca, one written by a contemporary historian by the name of Oviedo, and the third written by a grandson of another member of the party, Andres Dorantes, the owner of Esteban. De Vaca’s account was a book that came to be known as Shipwrecks; in Goodwin’s view, it was written to sell and is laced with sensational fictions, but it was popular in its day. Oviedo was a court chronicler of the Indies for Charles V, and his job was to document the Spanish Empire in America. He was good bureaucrat and loyal to the Crown. His perspective was much different from de Vaca’s, and he was much more objective and realistic. His book was called General and Natural History of the Indies. Andres Dorantes wrote a letter in 1539; his son Baltasar produced the Report and Proof of the Service and Merits of Baltasar Dorantes de Carranza in the 1570’s, but it was mostly about his dad, Andres. Goodwin reads and compares these documents and comments on their inconsistencies, the cultural biases of the times, and his own thinking about writing history. He spends a lot of time talking about the times and the men. It is an interesting section.

The fourth section is about the failed expedition to Florida, 1527-1536; it talks about the crossing of the Atlantic, the time the expedition spent in Cuba, and the crossing to Florida and what went on there. It chronicles the mishaps and poor decisions which led to the failures and deaths of many. A number of the expedition made it to Texas, and this short chapter covers about 5 years. Esteban seems to have adapted well and became somewhat of a shaman and was revered by the Indians; this allowed him and the other three to make their way to northern Mexico. This section ends where the first section began.

The final section is about the seven cities of gold, mythical in the sense that the Spanish blew it all out of proportion and were hoping for another Inca type empire of gold and riches to plunder. The politics of Mexico City come into play, and Esteban is picked to guide Friar Marcos de Niza north to find these cities and preach Christ to the Indians. Friar Niza and Coronado each get a chapter here. The book ends with speculation about how Esteban died. The author surmises that he was killed, but the proof is scanty.

The book was quite readable for me, but I like history. Esteban’s story could have been told in less than a third of the pages, but the background was needed to make the author’s point. As mentioned above, I think Goodwin is a good writer. I submit the following quote from his description of Seville in the 1520’s: “When Esteban entered the city through one of the many gateways that pierced the massive ramparts, he would have found himself hurled headlong into a human boiling pot. This was a quickly growing city, soon to become the riches and one of the most populous places on earth. The good and the bad, the beautiful and the ugly, all enthusiastically cam to Seville in search of something—usually money and often adventure. It was like some Vulcan’s forge where the ore of modern European life was smelted, the threshold of the New World, a social and cultural cauldron, the devil’s kitchen. And Esteban was thrown into this rich recipe as the very humblest of ingredients: a newly arrived slave.”

[David · Rating 5 out of 5]

The book’s subtitle is quite accurate, although “American South” is misleading. Esteban the Spanish-speaking African traveled along the Gulf coast from the Florida panhandle to Texas, and then spent the rest of his life in the American Southwest and Mexico. He was one of a foursome who were the first non-Native Americans to cross the North American continent. Goodwin convincingly argues that he was the leader of the group and the one responsible for their survival. Lewis and Clark’s journey was a cakewalk compared to his.
The story starts about 1500 in West Africa, then to North Africa, then on to Spain, the Caribbean, Florida, Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, NW Mexico, and Mexico City. From Mexico City, Esteban the slave returned to America, and forged the way in advance of Coronado’s famous expedition up into Arizona, New Mexico, Oklahoma and Kansas. He ended up alone in Zuni, New Mexico, most likely the first non-Native American that the Zuni had ever seen. He may have died there, or perhaps not. Read the book to delve this mystery.
I found the book very intriguing and well written, but sometimes frustrating. Goodwin devotes half of his account to the details of his historiography, including his personal travels over the past 20 years. He seems most concerned to build his case in the face of objections. The book could be presented as the class notes of a history course in some North American university. The advantage of that is that it is very educational. The disadvantage is that the story is very disjointed. Most readers, like me, will be awed by the incredible ethnic diversity of the Native Americans that Esteban meets along the way. Oh what cultural riches we have lost by extinguishing all of these peoples!
I'm surprised that this book has not been made into a movie.

[Becky · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an interesting perspective on encounters between Native Americans and the Spanish explorers and conquistadores from Florida westward. I knew very little of this history before reading this book. The author makes a well-researched case that one of the "Spaniards," Esteban, was actually born in Africa and ended up as a Spanish slave. He convinces me that many of the contemporaneous accounts, especially the one most often cited in previous historical accounts, are tall tales meant to aggrandize individual adventurers needing to impress the Spanish court. The author, in my opinion, may be reading a little too much into the obscure sources he found, but he still paints a picture of a black man who was able to lead Spaniards to safety, from Florida across the southern border of what is now the United States and to the administrative capital in Mexico City. Esteban also had a great facility to find Indian allies along the way. A great deal of the book details the author's extensive research in old Spanish archives and Indian oral traditions. I found the tale of his research to be fascinating too and the ambiguity of his ultimate conclusions entirely realistic.

[Hunter · Rating 1 out of 5]

The two goals of this book are to 1. tell the story of four survivors (Esteban, Cabeza de Vaca, Dorantes, and Castillo) of a Spanish shipwreck, specifically by comparing two key primary sources (Shipwrecks by Cabeza de Vaca and the history of expedition by Oviedo which was heavily influenced by Dorantes) and highlighting their differences, and 2. use every disagreement between the sources to suggest that Esteban was the primary actor during all ambiguous events. The premise is not all bad, but many of the nods towards Esteban being the leader in certain situations are not supported by logic or intuition. This degrades both Esteban and the reader as the author's attempts become increasingly far-fetched the further the book drags on.

This is one of the worst paced books I have ever read - the author does not begin to tell the "story" referenced in the title until over halfway through the work. He makes explicit his opinions on American Indian culture as "a life of noble savagery" (ch. 17). Finally, the prose is poor and repetitive with a disjointed flow. I only finished this book because I wanted to know how the story ended.

[Ramiro Guerra · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was told by my Texas History teachers that the homie Cabeza De Vaca was this brave hero who survived a shipwreck, became a shaman and led his lost band of brothers through hostile Indian territory.

Along the way, he somehow found ways to speak to tribes of nomadic peoples.


But the argument in this fine book was that it was actually a slave named Esteban Dorantes who was the leader. But of course, the aristocrat took credit for all of the slaves’ work, even while all were exiled in the unknown wilderness of previously unexplored America...

Sounds like a common theme, ay?

[L. · Rating 2 out of 5]

I'm familiar with the story of four Westerners roughing it in the American Southwest, and there is a potentially interesting story here about Esteban. The problem mainly rests on author Robert Goodwin's writing style, which leaves much to be desired. He's reading between the lines with an electron microscope in an attempt to make a mountain out of a mole hill. Maybe Esteban was the leader of the pack. Maybe he was a giant piece of garbage. Maybe he was a little of both. We just don't have enough information and Goodwin really hasn't found anything more.

[Esoteric Grimoire · Rating 5 out of 5]

A superb and rollicking tale of the African slave, guide, native shaman, and conquistador known to history simply as Esteban. Esteban is credited in Robert Goodwin's tale with being the first Westerner to enter the American Southwest. Goodwin does an excellent job of stringing together disparate sources: Native American oral traditions, and Spanish historical documents. The author even takes the time to document his travels through the Southwest, Mexico and Seville to find the documentation. All in all a great story and well told.

[Jack Shirley · Rating 3 out of 5]

Have completed 2 books on the subject. Brutal Journey, Paul Schneider. A land so strange, A Resendez. and listened to a 4 hour translation of Cabeza De Vaca's own account. by Fanny Bandelier. This book Crossing the Continent is better then the reviews. I am currently reading it. As far as Cabeza De Vaca's own account, Well he was onsite, and the authors were not. They, as so many have, can only read their own opinions in to the story. But they are talented writers and I enjoyed reading their books.

[Craig Fiebig · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fantastic story about both the history and the process of its discovery well worth the investigation. Who really crossed the continent, under what circumstances, what were the motivations and who lead the effort are all addressed in this excellent book. Recommended for anyone interested in early American, pre-colonial history.

[Kristin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Definitely a time period and story I am not familiar with but will pursue more on this tale.

The best part was as the author described the research he did and the need to "read in between the lines" - what was written and what was omitted. Fascinating.

I listened to it on my commute. Highly recommend.

[Richard R., Martin · Rating 1 out of 5]

I only got about 20% through the book before I gave up. This could have been a good book; a story that should be told, but the book starts when the lost party is discovered and their interrogation by the Spanish. We don't know the people, the circumstances, what they did or who they are. Maybe a good editor could have made this a book worth reading.

[Ken A · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed this book because it gives a little bit of a different view of the history of what we now know as North America. I read "On Savage Shores: How Indigenous Americans Discovered Europe" by Caroline Dodds Pennock shortly afterwards and got the same vibe.

[Mark Dresher · Rating 5 out of 5]

Interesting history and facts.

[Jbondandrews · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very interesting account of Esteban's life. Hope to read about Juan Garrido.

[Mary · Rating 3 out of 5]

I listened to the audio version and was constantly frustrated by blatant mispronunciations. And, while there are inclusions of color to round out the storytelling, it often lapses into storytelling about being a historian in archival research. Some serious readers may find those diversions a huge waste of time. Not for historians, I think, but those new to the subject and not particular about scholarship.

[J. · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent and thoroughly fascinating book. Extraordinarily well documented - the author goes to such lengths and so fully and effectively documents the book from original sources dating back to the 1500s using the General Archive of the Indies in Seville, Spain that in fact he calls into question not just much of the history of the time but the thesis of his own book in my mind. Using ship logs and manifests, official correspondence between government, church, military officials, and official court records, as well as personal correspondence and books written or commissioned by certain explorers, of their exploits at time, the author pieces together a fun and exciting narrative.

Still many of the fanciful tales told by these folks like burning bushes in the desert, the seven cities of gold many claimed to have found, healing and resurrection of dead Indians and the like by missionaries and explorers cause me to question everything. In fairness the author does as well.

Still my longstanding curiosity about Esteban de Dorantes was fairly well satisfied. Clearly he existed was an explorer in America with others apparently ranging from Florida to Texas into Mexico and up into New Mexico and Arizona is clear. The actual nature of his exploits I believe remain mysterious - I feel much the same about the Spanish Conquistadors generally now. Part soldiers, part missionaries, part soldiers of fortune, and slave traders with myriad motivations I believe it's difficult to tell what's exactly true. As an example, many priests, explorers, and soldiers would simply claim things and cities for the crown that they never visited.

In the end the book raises more questions than it resolves with the circumstances surrounding the death of Esteban supposedly at the hands of the Zuni's shrouded in mystery. The author provides information that leaves the reader to several conclusions - including the very real possibility that Esteban didn't die at all and integrated with an Indian Tribe and lived happily ever after. One manuscript found in Mexico even attributes him as having four wives and names his surviving son.

I don't recommend the book unless one has a more than usual fascination with Esteban and or a fascination with Spanish colonial America which I do. Still this author's coverage of even that I found highly unorthodox but thoughtful. I'm prompted to read more as many of the
Conquistadors were Africans and he extensively treats Spanish enslavement and use of African slaves in Mexico which is unusual. Books I've read mention it but provide no detail. Many of the African Conquistadors stayed in Mexico as they had more freedom and better lives in the frontier than back in Spain.

Fascinating book - I loved it but gave if four stars because I view it as esoteric and narrow in appeal - but for those fortunate few an excellent read.

[Ardene · Rating 3 out of 5]

I found the content of this book interesting but uneven. It covers the story of a Spanish expedition to "Florida" - the southern part of what is now the US, focusing on Esteban Dorantes, an African slave who was part of the expedition.

300 men were stranded on the western coast of the Florida peninsula in the 1530s. They attempted to follow the coastline to meet up with Spanish ships on the Mexican gulf. In the process all but three of them died, and 8 years these later these 3 men ran across some Spanish conquistadors in Mexico. The survivors had eventually acclimated to the climate and cultures of the natives and become revered medicine men that traveled the continent.

Because the documentary evidence for what happened is scant (the written testimony of the survivors, given in Mexico, as well as a letter from one Spanish survivor and a book published by the 2nd Spanish survivor), the author does a lot of speculating about where Esteban originated, and what his thoughts and feelings might have been. Of course the author's speculations are based in what he knows of the European slave trade in Africa, and what he knows of Spanish culture in Seville at the time the expedition sailed, and I don't question that bit. I remain a bit suspicious of his guesses at Esteban's thoughts and feelings, since there is no direct testimony from him in the record - he could be accurate, but it feels like he's reaching - I think it's very hard to put ourselves in to the mindset of someone who lived that many centuries ago.

I accept the author's claim that these were the first Europeans on record to almost cross the North American continent (they made it into the Arizona/New Mexico area, but not to the Pacific Coast). But I question the author calling Esteban the first African American, since I'm pretty sure there were African slaves in the Caribbean at this time. Perhaps he was the first African to reach North America (or the first one to arrive and leave a historical record.) And you can call him an American if you want since he lived in North America the rest of his life.

The rest - that he was the leader of the 3 survivors, that he more easily acclimated to Native American mores because his African culture and Native American culture were more similar than the Europeans, is perhaps a reasonable argument, but not a conclusive one in my book since there isn't enough evidence. It could be true, I just don't think there is enough evidence to say definitively that it is.

[Shayla · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was my first time reading a non-fiction book that wasn't required for school.

It was interesting because I didn't know the story of Esteban or these Spanish "explorers." But what became clear is that there is so much about Esteban that really isn't known, and never will be. The Spanish weren't interested in giving a slave too much credit, so their historical accounts aren't to be trusted. And the Native Mexican and American account isn't even written down and who knows if the oral history is truly to be trusted, because of Spanish influence or misinterpretation by anthropologists and historians.

Goodwin had to fill in so many details with imagination and speculation, when what I really wanted were more facts.

[Jim Bronec · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a well written account of what is considered the first African born person (Esteban) to cross the southern part of the United States. The writer used documentation written by the Spaniards who traveled and owned Esteban. This made the story much more from their point of view and didn't give a lot to directly attribute to Esteban. Of course the white people are telling the history. But the author does the best he can of trying to tell it from Esteban's point of view.

[Jared · Rating 3 out of 5]

I could not get enough of the story of Estaban and traveling from Tampa to Mexico City. I had recently read 1493 and One Vast Winter Count that provided a number of insights into the story of Estaban that helped with understanding the context. Still this is an important story, first time truly told from Estaban's perspective.

[Daniel Farabaugh · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a good book. The author does a good job establishing the fact that some of the sources are unreliable and there is some level of guesswork. He looks between the lines but is clear when is making an educated guess. AT times it is a little to involved in the author's life and he speculates about what Esteban was feeling. But, overall, interesting.

[Dee · Rating 5 out of 5]

The first crossing of North America in recorded history was undertaken by one Estoban -- one of the greatest explorers-- dating back before the pilgrims. He was also one of the first African American explorers. He traveled with his Spanish masters. This is a long overdue account of his life and of the history surrounding the Spanish presence in the new world.

[Barbara · Rating 3 out of 5]

An historical account of the Spanish explorers in the 1500s. Estiban was a Black slave who accompanied four survivors of a wrecked ship. It's an interesting account of Portugese slave trade in the 1500s and of one man's heroic life with the Spanish explorers.