I have become fascinated with Captain John Smith's exploits, his personal courage, his good character and wise decision making to the point that I feel he is the best of the best. He is a true American hero. Besides having a big part in founding this country, he had a vision that no others had of a land with potential for freedom and liberty. He wrote about America's potential.
A good website to read about Smith is www.CaptainJohnSmith.US
It is best to read Captain John Smith's original writings instead of biographies because there are too many biographies produced by authors that distort events of Smith out of ignorance.
It certainly did not hurt his reputation that he was saved by the beautiful Indian Princess Pocahontas did it !
But Smith had been aided by other women in his life before Pocahontas.
For fun, you might try to get a copy of Smith's map of Virginia and his map of New England and note the effort it must have taken to make such accurate maps. Note on his map of Virginia the giants he met. He had a large picture of the giant Indian with notation under. In his writings, he notes that they were so big their voice sounded like it came out of a cave and on one fellow, he measured a calf muscle of 3/4 yard around (their rest of their bodies were like per).
Captain John Smith was a simple man who wished to do good.