Category: Resources

Death Valley (Images of America)

Posted on by
Death Valley (Images of America ) - Author: Robert P. Palazzo
Death Valley (Images of America ) – Author: Robert P. Palazzo

Death Valley, its harsh and rugged landscape established a national monument in 1933 and named a national park in 1994, has long held a fascination for visitors, even before it became tourist friendly. Shortly after the first visit of nonnative inhabitants, a party of forty-niners looking for a shortcut to the goldfields of California crossed this land with tragic results, inadvertently giving the valley its moniker. Despite the immense suffering in their midst, prospectors began exploring the area looking for mineral wealth. Boomtowns formed, prospered, and died all within a few years, most disappearing completely into the desert. Adding to Death Valley’s mystique was the shameless self-promotion of Death Valley Scotty, which lasted for a period spanning more than 50 years.

About the Author

Robert P. Palazzo, Death Valley scholar and lifetime member of the area’s natural history association, evokes here in vintage imagery a stark, barren, desolate wasteland that gradually became one of the West’s most iconic destinations. Tapping his extensive private collection of rare photographs, Palazzo shows Death Valley’s geological features, notable personalities, industries, mysteries, and tourism. Though the area has changed little over the last 150 years, the harsh conditions have erased much of the evidence of human occupation. That rare visual record is preserved in these pages.

Book Summary

TitleDeath Valley (Images of America)
AuthorRobert P. Palazzo
PublisherArcadia Publishing
Pages130 Pages

Southeastern Arizona Mining Towns

Posted on by
Southeastern Arizona Mining Towns - Images of America - Author William Ascarza
Southeastern Arizona Mining Towns – Images of America – Author William Ascarza

Southeastern Arizona has one of the most diverse mining localities in the state. Towns such as Bisbee, Clifton, Globe, Miami, Ray, Silverbell, and Superior have earned reputations as premier metal producers that are most notably known for their copper. Other mining towns that have made their marks in the region include Dos Cabezas, Gleeson, Harshaw District, Helvetia, Patagonia District, Pearce, Ruby, and Tombstone. Mining in southeastern Arizona has significantly influenced the development of mines in northern Sonora, Mexico. The foundation of Mexico’s largest copper mine in Cananea was financed by American capital, specifically under the direction of miners and investors from southeastern Arizona. Overall, the process of mining has established the economy of southeastern Arizona, making it a viable source of copper-related minerals in the 21st century’s global market.

About the Author

Auther of Southeastern Arizona Mining Towns, William Ascarza writes the Arizona Star column Mine Tales about Arizona mining history. An entrepreneur, historian, researcher and travel guide, Ascarza is author of five books, including Zenith on the Horizon: An Encyclopedic Look at the Tucson Mountains from A to Z and Tucson Mountains, Sentinel to the North: Exploring the Tortolita Mountains.

Tombstone (Images of America)

Posted on by
Tombstone (Images of America) - Author: Jane Eppinga
Tombstone (Images of America) – Author: Jane Eppinga

Tombstone sits less than 100 miles from the Mexico border in the middle of the picturesque Arizona desert and also squarely at the heart of America’s Old West. Silver was discovered nearby in 1878, and with that strike, Tombstone was created. It soon grew to be a town of over 10,000 of the most infamous outlaws, cowboys, lawmen, prostitutes, and varmints the Wild West has ever seen. The gunfight at the O.K. Corral made Wyatt Earp and John Henry “Doc” Holliday legendary and secured Tombstone’s reputation as “The Town Too Tough to Die.” In this volume, more than 200 striking images and informative captions tell the stories of the heroes and villains of Tombstone, the saloons and brothels they visited, the movies they inspired, and Boot Hill, the well-known cemetery where many were buried.

About the author

Writing credentials include over 200 articles for both popular and professional publications. For four years I produced all material for the Arizona Sheriff Magazine. My writing credentials include more than 200 articles for both popular and professional publications covering a broad spectrum of children’s fiction, travel, personal profiles, biology, construction, food, and public relation pieces. My books include a biography of Henry Ossian Flipper, West Point’s First Black Graduate, Arizona Twilight Tales, and books in Arcadia Publishing’s Images of America series focusing on Arizona towns including Tucson, Nogales, Apache Junction and Tombstone. She writes regularly for Biology Digest a quarterly publication for high school science teachers. In 2009, Globe Pequot published my book. They Made Their Mark: An Illustrated History of the Society of Woman Geographers. That same year she made a presentation on the Society of Woman Geographers at the 10th International Congress of Women in Madrid, Spain.

Book Summary

NameTombstone (Images of America)
AuthorJane Eppinga
PublisherArcadia Publishing
Pages128 Pages

Bodie: Good Times & Bad

Posted on by
Bodie, Good Time and Bad - Author Nicholas Clapp
Bodie, Good Time and Bad – Author Nicholas Clapp

Author Nicholas Clapp and photographer Will Furman portray Bodie in both vivid words and stunning photography—a town that had two sides, aptly described in an 1870s account…On the eve of her family’s departure for booming Bodie, a little girl was said to have gathered her dolls, that they might join her as she knelt by her bed, her prayer concluding with a somber…“Goodbye, God; we are going to Bodie!” Word was that the camp was hard-bitten, desperado-ridden.Getting wind of the girl’s farewell to the Almighty, The Weekly Bodie Standard reported that, oh no, that wasn’t what the she had mind. Not at all. Someone had gotten the punctuation wrong. What she surely said was…“Good, by God, we are going to Bodie!” There were, in fact, two Bodies. On one hand, it was “a fearfully and wonderfully bad place” stalked by shootist in black swallow-tailed coats. On the other hand, it was a town of hard-working pioneers who dressed their little girls in starched white frocks and met adversity with charity and good cheer. As he passed through, Mark Twain mused that in Bodie virtue versus vice made for exciting times, and he’d have it no other way. He was to add, “It was a plain wonder how man carried on under such circumstances.”

About The Author

Award-winning documentary filmmaker and author Nicholas Clapp has studied, filmed, and written the deserts of the world. With a master’s degree in cinema from the University of Southern California, his first professional break came when he produced and directed The Great Mojave Desert, a one-hour special for CBS and the National Geographic Society. He has won over 70 major film awards for his documentary work.

Book Summary

TitleBodie: Good Times & Bad
AuthorNicholaw Clapp
PublisherSunbelt Publishing
Pages112 Pages

References

Aurora, Nevada 1860-1960: Mining Camp, Frontier City, Ghost Town

Posted on by
Aurora Nevada Mining Camp

This expanded Second Edition of Aurora, Nevada 1860-1960 chronicles the history of one of Nevada’s earliest and most important mining boomtowns. It is a reference-oriented book, which includes hundreds of edited and annotated newspaper clippings and other firsthand accounts about Aurora’s buildings, businesses, major mines, social life, Paiute citizens, ghost town days, and final destruction over the entire length of its century-long history. This new edition has 98 additional pages with a new section on violence at Aurora during 1863 and 1864, more information about the Daly gang, complete directories for the boom years 1864, 1880, and 1915, and an annotated list of residents from 1861-1864 and 1880. The book now includes 14 maps and over 200 photographs.

Author’s Note

A “Second Edition” (ISBN 978-1979848862) and newer hardcover “Second Color Edition” (ISBN 979-8507081967) of this book are now available on Amazon., Despite a century of history, and the valiant efforts of all those who believed the town would last forever, Aurora, Nevada, is now and forevermore a “Colossal Wreck” slowly returning to its beginnings-a sagebrush and pinyon pine covered valley home to jackrabbits and a few ghosts from the past. While Aurora is gone, its historical record remains, thus providing us the opportunity to reconstruct the town and its society if only in our imagination. Most historical accounts about Aurora have focused on the town during its early 1860s mining boom. However, Aurora’s rich and colorful history deserves a closer look. This new reference-oriented publication includes hundreds of edited and annotated newspaper clippings and other firsthand accounts about Aurora’s buildings, businesses, major mines, social life, Paiute citizens, ghost town days, and final destruction over the entire length of its century-long history. It also includes directories for the boom years 1864, 1880, and 1915, as well as 6 maps and over 150 photographs, many of which are “then and now” comparisons of the same view., Author’s Note: This book is the original edition but there is also a new revised and expanded “Second Edition” (search ISBN 978-1979848862) of this book now available on Amazon for the same price on a different Amazon page. The Second Edition has 98 additional pages that include 50 new photographs, 6 more maps, an expanded 1864 directory, and a new list of Aurora residents from 1861-1864.

Book Summary

TitleAurora, Nevada 1860-1960: Mining Camp, Frontier City, Ghost Town (Second Edition)
Author Clifford Alpheus Shaw
PublisherCreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform 
Edition2nd Edition
Pages488 Pages