Trapper at center reigning in his horse, two others trying to bolt from field – fire burning at left background, and at center being tended by two men.
After Arthur Fitzwilliam Tait American, 1819-1905 Currier & Ives offered the East Coast city-dweller the opportunity to live vicariously through their more than 80 prints of men taming the great frontier. Almost always portrayed as bearded and strong, the frontiersmen were seen as intelligent and independent. Throughout the 1860s and 1870s, the wild and often romanticized adventures of the frontiersmen were celebrated through tales of their daily life. In this dramatic scene, punctuated by the bright red color of the flames, three men and their horses battle one of the most dangerous threats to the prairie — a fire. One man works to calm the frightened horses while the others build a backfire in order to prevent the fire from burning out of control. In the background, a herd of bison, hardly visible through the smoke, stampedes away from the oncoming flames.
