Landon Jones discusses the life of William Clark, and describes the dark and bloody ground of America's early West, describing how the West was won and what we gained and lost by winning it. Between 1803 and 1806, Meriwether Lewis and William Clark co-captained a fabled expedition across the vast, largely unexplored reaches of the North American continent. Lewis ended his life three years after returning to civilization, but Clark, as the highest-ranking federal official in the West, spent three decades overseeing the consequences of the historic journey, namely, Indian removal and the destruction of Native America.
Landon Jones was managing editor at *People magazine* for eight years and wrote and edited for *Life, Time, Money, and People* for thirty-seven years. He is currently vice president of the National Council of the Lewis and Clark Bicentennial. His books include *Great Expectations: America and the Baby Boom *and *The Essential Lewis and Clark*. He lives in Princeton, New Jersey.