The Pioneers Author:James Fenimore Cooper The Pioneers is set in a time of transition. The forests still abound with deer, passenger pigeons darken the sky, fish teem in the lakes and streams - but over the wilderness falls the ever-lengthening shadow of civilization. Natty Bumppo, the Leatherstocking, now on the threshold of old age, finds his way of life challenged as the land he has ... more »roamed for so long becomes private property, and the laws of man supplant the laws of nature. His struggle to retain his fiercely cherished freedom helps shape a drama of conflicting human values, and an unsparing, often caustic, delineation of frontier society.