A Navy veteran, a painter, and a friend of the Sioux, 45 year old Joseph Knowles decided to live off the land. From 1913 to 1916, Knowles's dispatches to newspapers—written in charcoal on pieces of birch bark—offered accounts of bear clubbing and quiet contemplation. As Jim Motavalli details, these articles left many readers fearing modernization. Part adventure story, part cultural investigation, this narrative asks two fundamental questions: Was Knowles making it up? And why is the answer still so vital to the American psyche?