Crossing the Continent 1527-1540: The Story of the First African-American Explorer of the American South

Nearly three centuries before Lewis and Clark’s epic trek to the Pacific coast, an African slave named Esteban Dorantes became America’s first great explorer and adventurer—the first pioneer from the Old World to explore the entirety of the American South. Shipwrecked off the Florida coast, Esteban guided a small band of survivors on an incredible, eight-year-long journey westward—enduring famine, disease, and Native American hostility as the company made their way across what is now Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona, traveling as far as the Gulf of California.

Drawing on contemporary accounts, long-lost records, and Dr. Robert Goodwin’s groundbreaking research in Spanish archives, Crossing the Continent is a riveting true story of physical endurance, natural calamities, geographical wonders, and strange discoveries—a remarkable chronicle that offers a radical new interpretation of American history.