Friedrich Gerstäcker (1816 -1872,) was a German traveler and author. He chronicled his travels through to the United States where he spent time Arkansas in the late 1830s and early 1840s. His published stories described his myriad experiences including working on a steamboat on the Arkansas River, traveling from Texas to Canada, and hunting in the unfamiliar landscapes in between. His travel diaries and novels were widely read in Europe and the United States. These descriptions of backwoods life and customs in his books continue to serve valuable resources for researchers today.

The color-plate illustrations on exhibit are reproductions from an 1873 printing of Wild Sports in the Far West. That book and the others seen here are just some of the many books written by Friedrich Gerstäcker available to patrons in Special Collections.