One of the books for sale at the Historical Society bookstore is The Sea Captain's Odyssey by Marvin Shepherd. Although a biography, the fact that the subject of the book, Hans H. Buhne, lived such an adventurous life means that the book reads almost like an historical novel. Shepherd is, however, a very reliable historian.  His thoroughly researched and documented book makes use of recorded reminiscences and documents  from a number of sources. Every chapter in Buhne's life is presented along with the historical context of the time and is filled with sidebars that are biographical sketches of notable individuals that he interacted with in his eventful life.  The many historic maps and photographs are a valuable addition, as are the thorough end notes.

       We begin with a brief historical and genealogical  background of Buhne and Fleasburg, Denmark where he was born to a family of business people and ship owners. He first went to sea at age 17, and after sailing on several whaling and commercial ships (surviving one shipwreck), he caught "gold fever" in San Francisco and did a stint in the mines before real illness took him back to San Francisco and involvement in the effort to find reported north coast bays. Hence his service as Second Mate on the "Laura Virginia", during the "discovery' of Humboldt Bay,

       The saga unfolds with the settlement of bay side towns, interactions with the indigenous Wiyot, establishing pack train routes to the inland mines, founding a successful dairy ranch, and using his ship piloting skills to begin a career of guiding ships through the perilous bay entrance.  And then there came building lumber mills, founding a bank, getting into the Mattole oil boom, investing in gold mines, involvement in ship wreck rescues, starting a hardware company, constructing many Eureka buildings including the elegant Buhne Mansion, getting married and starting a socially prominent family, building railroads and ships, investment in various entrepreneurial projects including a hotel, and even surviving an Indian arrow in his chest. 

       In short, there wasn't any activity in early Humboldt County that Buhne wasn't involved in.  Reading this entertainingly written book is almost a crash course in Humboldt history.  Well worth the investment.