Empire of Shadows: The Epic Story of Yellowstone

Empire of Shadows tells the story of how Yellowstone was conquered and established as a national park in the aftermath of the Civil War. The landscape was uninhabited, inaccessible, and surrounded by myth when efforts to explore and claim it began. George Black traces three interconnected historical strands: the drive for exploration, the Indian Wars, and the settlement of the frontier. He follows the lives of key figures who worked to reveal Yellowstone's mysteries: Lt. Gustavus Cheyney Doane, a cavalry officer; Nathaniel Langford, a former vigilante leader; scientist Ferdinand Hayden, who brought photographer William Henry Jackson and painter Thomas Moran to document the region; and Gen. Phil Sheridan, a Civil War general who orchestrated the Indian Wars and secured the park's protection under US Cavalry control. The book offers a reinterpretation of nineteenth-century Western history and the origins of America's first national park. It was a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize.