Modern Chivalry: Containing the Adventures of Captain John Farrago and Teague O'Regan, His Servant

The first known Pittsburgh novel, and one of the first American novels, is a satirical ramble about John Farrago, a sort of Don Quixote on the new nation's Western frontier. On a whim, John leaves his farm outside of Pittsburgh with his witless, Sancho-Panza-like Irish sidekick, Teague O'Regan, "to ride about the world a little" and "see how things were going on here and there," and "observe human nature."

Hugh Henry Brackenridge (1748-1816), born in Campbeltown, Scotland and educated at the College of New Jersey (now Princeton University), was a writer, lawyer, judge, and justice of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania. Brackenridge founded both Pittsburgh Academy and the Pittsburgh Gazette, now the University of Pittsburgh and Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, respectively.