Both cynical and self-serving, Illinois' seventh governor, Thomas Ford, also possessed an unrivaled sensitivity to the dynamics of frontier life. He reveals these and other qualities in his classic History of Illinois, which covers the state's first thirty years. Ford writes with candor of the lengthy "Hancock County difficulties" and the ouster of Mormons from the state, a considerable feat in light of his personal anti-Mormon tendencies. His lengthy treatment of the Black Hawk War and his writings on the slavery controversy in the state, the murder of Elijah Lovejoy, and the larger issues...