Frontiersman: Early Years on the Frontier, 1786-1811 Student Assignment Before this lesson, have students complete the Student Reading and view the Video Clip from The History Channel documentary, Boone and Crockett: The Hunter Heroes, in the corresponding Students Section of this Web site. Classroom Activity People on the American frontier relied on the environment to provide them with such essentials as food, shelter and clothing. Have your students determine what role the environment played in providing Crockett's clothes and the accessories for his flintlock rifle. Have students look closely at the painting of Crockett by John Gadsby Chapman, which is to the right and on the corresponding Students page. Ask them to create a chart (like the one below) identifying each item of clothing and each accessory depicted in the painting. Have them determine the source of the item and the way that the item was acquired. View and print the corresponding Classroom Worksheet. ITEM SOURCE METHOD OF ACQUIRING example: coonskin cap raccoon skin hunting or trapping hat felt/wool sheering sheep shirt linen growing/harvesting flax fringed pants/coat deer skin hunting deer moccasins deer skin hunting deer boots leather slaughtering cattle hunting bag leather/deer skin slaughtering cattle/hunting deer powder horn cow horn slaughtering cattle Discussion Discuss what an analysis of Crockett's clothing and rifle accessories reveals about daily life on the frontier in the 18th century. What can an analysis of your students' clothing and accessories reveal about life in the 21st century? Email the Experts After this lesson, ask students to submit questions that they would like to ask the experts. Their questions might be about a specific event, legend, or artifact. Before, during, or immediately after the live Webcast, Email the Experts the most thoughtful or most frequently asked questions. Extended Activities What did David Crockett look like? This is a difficult question to answer with absolute certainty. Since he died a decade before the invention of the daguerreotype, there is no photographic record of the famous frontier hero. The several contemporary paintings of Crockett that survive depict him differently. However, there are a few 19th-century descriptions of what David Crockett looked like. 1. Have your students read the following two descriptions of Crockett, which were written by different authors, some 50 years apart. Ask students to compare and contrast these descriptions with paintings of Crockett, including one by John Badsby Chapman and one by John Nava. Ask students to consider which painting best reflects the two written descriptions. The Cincinnati Mirror and Western Gazette of Literature and Science, Feb. 21, 1835 "This was col. Crockett-...he was about six feet high-stoutly built-his hands and feet were particularly small for a man of his appearance and character...His complexion was swarthy; his cheek bones high; his nose large, and designed to favor an Indian's. His hair was long, dark and curly-looking, rather uncombed than carefully attended to." John L. Jacobs, Nov. 22, 1884 (recollection) "He was about six feet high, weighed about two hundred pounds, had no surplus flesh, broad shouldered, stood erect, was a man of great physical strength, of fine appearance, his cheeks mantled with a rosy hue, eyes vivacious, and in form, had no superior." 2. Ask students to compare and contrast the images of three actors who have played Crockett on the stage and on the silver screen - James Hackett (Star of The Lion of the West, a play based on Crockett's life, which debuted in 1831), Frank Mayo (Davy Crockett in the play Davy Crockett: Or, Be Sure You're Right, Then Go Ahead, which debuted in 1872), and Fess Parker (Davy Crockett in Disney's 1955 motion picture, Davy Crockett, King of the Wild Frontier). Which image seems most unrealistic? Have students create a visual or written description of what an actor playing Crockett today might look like. 3. Have students visit Geneology.com to see Crockett's family tree. Students can draw their own family trees.		Standards TEKS for Social Studies: 6th Grade: 4C; 7A; 21A-E; 22A-E 7th Grade: 21A-C, F, and G; 22A-D 8th Grade: 6B, 12A; 30A-G National Standards for U.S. History: Historical Thinking Standards 1A, E, G; 2A-E, H; 3B, D-G; 4C-D for Era 4, Standard 2E These items are part of Sunrise in His Pocket: The Life, Legend and Legacy of Davy Crockett, Temporary Exhibit at The Bob Bullock Texas State History Museum, March 2 - August 18, 2002.
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