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Paul Sharp's book, Whoop- Up Country is based on the Whoop-Up trail that started at Fort Benton, Montana, and ended at Fort Macleod, Alberta. The book starts out with explaining what the purpose of the trail is, and how it has changed over time. When the trail was first created, "...the trail symbolized the economic, social, and cultural ties that for many years defied a politically inspired division of the northern plains." Now days, it is used as one of the major international highways. Next, Sharp focuses on the climate and the fur traders of this area. He then explains how different Canada was compared to Americans dealing with the trail. One example of this is that the Canadian government was worried about what was happening to the traders along the trail, so they established a police force just for that area. Later in the book, Sharp talks about how Fort Benton was the Chicago of the plains. What he meant by this was that everything was based out of Fort Benton, and the attitude of the citizens was very high. He then explains how the attitudes changed, as fur trading declined. He talks about the life on the plains and how people would travel. One of the most common methods was by traveling in a team of wagons. Overall, his book talks about life in the high plains, and what it was like to travel, and to work with the Indians, not just economically, but also in terms of surviving.
The part that I liked the best was when they were talking about trading with the Indians, and how they would trick them, especially when the Indians bought whiskey, the traders would mix their own cheap version. I also liked when they talked about the life in Fort Benton, and comparing to Chicago. I feel that the book was not any more interesting than Webb's, and there were a lot of times when I had to stop and really think about what was going on in the book, as it was kind of confusing. I do think that the book provides an insight on what life was like as a trader and how they dealt with the Indians, and comparing the two countries. The book also opened my eyes on how much Montana played an important role in the U.S. economy. I don't really have any questions about the book; it just was not that interesting to me.