A Handsome Pioneer

Standing 6'2" and weighing 200 pounds, Joseph Walker was remarkably handsome, but it was his kindness, modesty, courtesy, elegance, and wilderness skills that gained him his reputation.

Joe was a peacemaker who lived with Indians and had the rapport to address any injustice he saw between the white man and the Indian.

In describing Walker, historian John McBride said, "His dress was a marvel of adaption to his business - rich and simple, buckskin throughout.  A loose fitting coat and pants, richly ornamented with threads of silver and gold wire made by hand, a broad sombrero to keep off the sun.  Mounted on a noble looking roan horse of Spanish blood, on a Mexican saddle, with spurs whose rowels were 6" in diameter of polished steel plated with gold at his heels, with a rifle across his saddle bow...he seemed born to rule the wild spirits around him without effort and they acknowledged him as their leader without controversy."

Walker never publish his memoirs or commented in interviews, and although he did keep an exact journal for some years, he lived a decent, principled life which only men of great strength and confidence can sustain.  Walker had a distaste for what we now call "tabloid or sensational journalism"

Next time - back to the 1700s West Virginia where it all began...