Two hundred years ago Lewis and Clark, two men shaped by Jefferson's Enlightenment ideas, encountered an Indian world they only partly understood. Lewis and Clark: Across the Divide expands and transforms their familiar story by fully exploring--for the first time--the cultural landscapes the expedition traversed. Carolyn Gilman draws from 50 different lending institutions to reassemble for the first and likely the last time the authentic artifacts of Lewis and Clark's journey across then-Indian lands. The result is a breathtaking new view of both the equipment the expedition used and the color, complexity, and diversity of the cultures they encountered. Because of the fragility of artifacts, the book documents more fully than the exhibition itself the equipment Lewis and Clark carried and the rich diversity of what was collected in this historic encounter of two worlds.
