James Fenimore Cooper

The Crater; Or, Vulcan's Peak James Fenimore Cooper

James Fenimore Cooper was born in Burlington, New Jersey in 1789 to William Cooper and Elizabeth (Fenimore) Cooper, the eleventh of 12 children, half of whom died during infancy or childhood. Shortly after James' first birthday, his family moved to Cooperstown, New York, a community founded by his father on a large piece of land which he had bought for development. Later, his father was elected to the United States Congress as a representative from Otsego County. Their town was in a central area of New York along the headwaters of the Susquehanna River that had previously been patented to Colonel George Croghan by the Province of New York in 1769. Coghan mortgaged the land before the Revolution and after the war part of the tract was sold at public auction to William Cooper and his partner Andrew Craig. By 1788, William Cooper had selected and surveyed the site where Cooperstown would be established. He erected a home on the shore of Otsego lake and moved his family there in the autumn of 1790. Several years later he began construction of the mansion that became known as Otsego Hall, completed in 1799 when James was tenThe Crater, or Vulcan's Peak: a Tale of the Pacific is a novel by James Fenimore Cooper first published in 1847. Cooper incorporated knowledge of ship construction he had acquired while working as a U. S. Navy midshipman in the 1810s. From merely surviving the loss of his shipmates and the embayment of his ship within The Reef, protagonist and role-model Mark Woolston goes on to thrive by his own industry. Following a regional volcanic upheaval which raises new land, he founds a similarly industrious and thriving colony after escaping from, then returning to, The Reef. The outnumbered colonists must defend their new homes and possessions against natives who covet the new land.