Ledyard: In Search of the First American Explorer

Ledyard: In Search of the First American Explorer

For decades after his death in 1789, John Ledyard was celebrated as the greatest explorer America had ever produced. A veteran of Captain Cookâ€™s final voyage, he walked across nearly all of Russia and suggested to his friend Thomas Jefferson that traversing the American continent was feasibleâ€”inspiring the Lewis and Clark expedition. When he died he was preparing to venture into Africa. Once as famous as the Founding Fathers whom he had befriended and beguiled, the â€œAmerican traveler,â€ as Ledyard was called, fell into obscurity over the years, reduced to becoming a footÂnoted reference in Moby Dick.
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Bill Gifford reenacted Ledyardâ€™s 1773 escape from Dartmouth College in a canoe and followed Ledyardâ€™s trail down the length of the Lena River in Siberia. In Ledyard he reveals the man in the legend, bringing back an American original and giving us a story that until now has not been fully told.

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