Daniel Boone (1734 – 1820) was the quintessential American pioneer and trailblazer. Born November 2, 1734 in a cabin near present day Reading, Pennsylvania, Daniel Boone learned the skills of a woodsman from an early age. While still a boy he hunted as an expert for game to feed his family and grew to know the risks and opportunities required for survival in the wilds of the American continent. Married to a pioneer woman, Rebecca Bryan, at the age of 22 Boone epitomized the life of the stalwart frontier father. In 1769 Boone was taken on as a guide in an expedition to establish the best overland route to Kentucky. Making their way through the Cumberland Gap into the heart of the Appalachians Boone realized that they had ventured into a paradise of a wilderness. In 1775 Boone returned with his family and established the fort and settlement of Boonesborough. When the Revolutionary War broke out Boone found himself and his family drawn into the frontier struggle when a band of Shawnee warriors, encouraged by the British to harass colonial settlements, kidnapped Boone’s daughter. Within two days Boone had caught up to the raiding party and successfully rescued the young hostages. He was later captured by the same tribe, escaped, and used the intelligence he had gather to bolster Boonesborough’s defenses against an attack by combined British and Shawnee forces. Boonesborough survived attack and a 10 day siege, impressing the Shawnee enough to cause them and subsequently the British to abandon their goal of the settlement’s destruction. After the War he traveled west after loosing all of his Kentucky property in litigation once Kentucky was admitted into the Union. He took his family deep into Spanish controlled Missouri to St. Louis. His holdings in this territory were lost once it became part of the Union as his creditors in Kentucky were intent on gaining all they could though the pursuit of renewed litigation. Daniel Boone died on September 26, 1820 at the age of 85. In 1845 the remains of Boone and his wife were moved to Kentucky to rest in the great pioneer’s “hunter’s paradise.”