Geronimo jumping bull biography books

MHQ contributing editor Robert M. Utley is a longtime historian of the American West and author of many acclaimed books. The latest, Geronimo (Yale), is his second biography of a great American Indian fighter, following his 1993 The Lance and the Shield: The Life and Times of Sitting Bull.

Why write about Geronimo after so many years researching the West?
I did an article on Geronimo for MHQ in 1992, about the same time I was wrapping up the Sitting Bull biography.

I had intended that Lone Star Lawmen (1997), about the Texas Rangers in the 20th century, would be my last big book.

The Most Influential Life Stories of Famous Native Americans: Geronimo, Charles Eastman, Black Hawk, King Philip, Sitting Bull & Crazy Horse.

My agent insisted otherwise and suggested Geronimo.

How do Geronimo and Sitting Bull compare?
A biography of Geronimo proved a much harder undertaking, although The Lance and the Shield took four or five years to write.

For one thing, Sitting Bull lived entirely within the dictates of his culture; you could glean some sense of him by studying the culture. Geronimo lived outside his cul