Book Review: The Last Heir: The Triumphs and Tragedies of Two Montana Families by Bill Vaughn

In The Last Heir: The Triumphs and Tragedies of Two Montana Families, writer Bill Vaughn paints an intriguing picture of the Burkes and the Herrins families’ intertwining histories in Montana's upper Missouri River Valley from the late nineteenth century to today. By doing so, Vaughn highlights American, and portions of western, history through the eyes and experiences of two families, the professional Burkes and the ranching Herrins, whose family tree lines eventually meet, creating the author's wife. Using a journalistic methodology of research and writing, the author employs existing documentation (e.g., newspaper articles and court judgments) and oral history stories—largely from two people (i.e., his spouse, Kitty Herrin, and her mother, Molly Catherine Burke Herrin)—as his main sources. It is not clear whether other current family descendants were consulted in the book's writing.

Vaughn's attention-grabbing writing style will engage a public audience, nearly immediately drawing readers in with Paramount Global's television series (2018–present) Yellowstone-like theatrics of shady Montana politics, nepotism, and “friends” favoritism. Here is a historical drama of go-getters: daring individuals and families whose actions and motivations—including but not limited to pride, ambition, aggression, fighting, violence, and court cases—often mirrored one another. Within the Burkes and Herrins, are substantial “kingdoms”—whether professional or agricultural—started generations back, slowly built up and quickly lost with boom and bust cycles, with an increasing family imperative of the importance, and burden, of maintaining and defending the kingdom. Depicted are “typical” rural “strong” families characterized by a hard-working ethos and inability to talk about and acknowledge mental health needs, seeing those with such “struggles” as “weak.” Readers will detect theme manifestations from popular culture standards: books like Sandoz's Old Jules (Little, Brown, and Company 1935) and Steinbeck's Of Mice and Men (Covici Friede 1937); books and film adaptations such as Maclean's A River Runs Through It (University of Chicago Press 1976, Columbia Pictures 1992), Harrison's Legends of the Fall (Delacorte Press 1979, TriStar Pictures 1994), and Paine's Open Range (Walker & Co 1990, Touchstone Pictures 2003); and television series like Dallas (CBS Broadcasting Inc. 1978–1991) and Yellowstone.

The book illuminates intersections of Burke and Herrin family history with local (e.g., Army Corps of Engineers and Missouri River damming projects), national (e.g., whitecapping, Social Security Act, Campfire Girls, World War II Homefront efforts), and international (e.g., western world baseball, World War I, Great Depression) history. Those versed in the historical geography of the Great Plains will see familiar themes of boom/bust cycles of economics and towns in the late 1800s and early 1900s; white Booster optimism; shady railroad advertisements enticing settlers to immigrate; newspaper editors versus politicians; and Carnegie grants. Finally, those acquainted with the Midwest and Great Plains will recognize many surnames (e.g., Hoffman).

There are certainly many strengths to the book. Not just male but female biographies are included. The use of a genealogy tree diagram at the beginning is incredibly helpful for reference. This visual depiction quickly shows where, when, and who—connections and differences in the family tree. The powerful tool allows a reader to both situate themself before diving into the work and later also to refer back to while reading. Vaughn's word choice commendably often shirks old narratives (e.g., “…Acts gave away federal land stolen from the tribes… defeated by the U.S. Army and impoverished by the decimation of the bison…” (7)).

Perhaps the work's greatest strengths are Vaughn's writing style and ability to situate local, family details into larger context. His narrative is colorful and engaging. For instance, one highlighted person “…was the recipient of an unsigned, typewritten letter the last line of which read: ‘May Satan give you your just desert and here's hoping your life will be very short-lived’ (27).” In places, the book is quite the page turner. The narrative's drama frequently sucks in the reader, making them emotionally involved: on one page the reader loves a “character,” on the next page, the reader quickly hates the same “character.” Irony, humor, and the unexpected also capture the reader's attention. For context of 1919 economics, a list of prices going down, for example, includes that of wool, wheat, potatoes, and… cocaine (101)! Indeed, the author frequently succeeds in making portions of the book an enjoyable read.

The Last Heir highlights Vaughn's skill in situating local, family details into larger context of local, national, and international history. He knows the upper Missouri River valley area and places it well in his writing. This in-depth expertise educates even those who have been to or live in the area. To compensate for those not familiar with the region, the author's narrative often attempts to capture and situate readers’ attention, for example, by connecting local occurrences to historically larger themes with which many might be familiar. These often come in the form of popular culture references, like that of Gary Cooper (82).

Vaughn's details will educate many readers, for example, on the World War II period. Not only does he talk about family members being “Rosie the Riveters,” but he also precisely describes the work “C” grade riveters did, their uniforms, and how their work differed from other female warplane factory workers like mechanics. Some readers, like this one whose grandfather worked on visual deception in western Europe during World War II, might especially learn even more about American domestic camouflage of war effort buildings in order to throw off enemies. Where three of the Burke women worked in Seattle,

Further “traditional” gender roles changed as part of the Homefront's efforts. Some men had to put aside their machoism and fear of homosexuality in order to prove their nationalism and patriotism. For example, because wool garments were in such high demand for Allied efforts, there were male knitting campaigns.

In addition to these occasional insights, Vaughn also provides some intriguing arguments. In the building of the Fort Peck dam, for instance, he maintains that the construction was not just as advertised for Missouri River flooding control, navigation improvement, and hydro-electricity. He notes,

The writing style also educates by utilizing parenetical descriptions within the narrative's body. Varying in length from two words to many sentences, these come after a word, phrase, or concept (e.g., “Normal” school (17)) that might not be commonly known to provide explanations, definitions, exclamations, and/or further insights. Illustrations of cultural value shifts and intersections of race and class can be manifested, for instance, educating the reader on details once “commonly” and/or “locally” “known” but not so much in contemporary mainstream western societies.

While these parenthetical explanations are frequently useful and educational, there is a difficult balance between their uses’ strengths and weaknesses. Sometimes, arguably, the parenthetical descriptions were too long and/or apparently unnecessary in detail, distracting from the narrative's flow and interrupting the reader's attention. For example, after talking about high schools family members attended, a following parenthetical explanation cheers briefly for that school's mascot (e.g., “Go Warriors!” (37)); such a tactic could be important for locals and family members, but it might also be distracting and excluding to most readers outside the area.

Debatably there are other shortcomings and opportunities where the work might be strengthened. In our current world situation, it is especially glaring when a proofreader misses taking out “the” before “Ukraine” (66). Though female biographies were included, given the high frequency of female population in the family lines featured, the work might have been further strengthened representatively by including more substantial female stories. However, speculatively perhaps this was not possible since the sources may not exist or the females’ lives were not as well documented as the males’.

At a few points, some of the details of history seemed a bit over glorified and might have needed fact-checking by published literature. For instance, the jovial romantic description of town location founding in Montana in the late nineteenth century seems at odds with much scholarship, causing a scholarly reader to wish for source citation. Indeed, because of its journalistic writing style, the work might be especially difficult for academic readers leaving them wanting more citations. Sources are sometimes unclear, with the narrative occasionally going many paragraphs without reference to a source, leaving the reader wondering exactly where the information came from—family oral and/or written histories passed down? One of the interviews of current living family members that the author mentions at the beginning of the book?

While the book is mostly an engaging page turner, occasionally the narrative stalls in keeping a reader's attention. At times, there are long, detailed informational discussions that interrupt flow and questionably are not significant to the story. While this may be interesting material in documenting two families’ histories, it might not be necessary in a book for public consumption. Perhaps this is the author's effort to tell the whole story as much as possible given existing documentation. Nevertheless, some readers may not see the importance of these lengthy details and lose attention. Another minor location where the narrative stalls is the placement of Map 2: in the middle of a dramatic, exciting narrative, the reader is forced to skip over the map on the next two pages in a hurry in order to resume the narrative and find out what happens next. A simple move of the two-pages-spread map a few pages before or after would remedy this minor issue.

Some aspects of the maps’ visibility might have been strengthened by utilizing the eye of a formally trained cartographer. While the gray shading of Map 1's font and Map 2's imagery is fun, a darker color should have been utilized as to increase contrast from the background and, thus, improving readability. Visual legibility also could be improved on Map 1 by, where some toponyms are located close together, decreasing their font size.

Readers of the Journal of Family History will find that The Last Heir: The Triumphs and Tragedies of Two Montana Families is a book meant for a general audience. It is not an academic work. The author neither argues anything substantially new to forward academic understanding nor articulates holes in knowledge identifying needs for future research. But general audiences and academics alike will find Vaughn's writing style engaging with gems of intrigue. Other than general readership, book sellers with buyers in Montana that are interested in local history—such as tourist shops, libraries, and general bookstores—as well as local high school history classrooms might find great use of the work. Further, universities the world over, which have courses that cover elements of American West history and/or family history, would benefit from incorporating the book. Overall, Vaughn's The Last Heir is an enjoyable read: one that skillfully intertwines local family history with larger contexts, one that is a moving homage to his in-laws’ legacy.