Book Reviews

Charter for Statehood: The Story of Utah's State Constitution.

By JEAN BICKMORE WHITE (SaltLake City:University ofUtah Press, 1996 xii+154pp $29.95.)

Thiswork looks at the development of the Utah state constitution of 1895. The greater part of the study describes the 1895constitutional convention and analyzesthe document which that body produced The author, an emeritus professor of political science at Weber State University, also examines the territory's earlier efforts to gain statehood. In addition, she analyzes the changes that Utahns have made to the constitution in the century since its adoption. Throughout the study, she compares Utah's constitution to those of other western states

Her introductory chapter takes a broad look at state constitutions and finds them to be political documents that reflect the times in which they were written and the aspirations of those who drafted them. She then describes the six earlier constitutions (the first of which dated from 1849) that Utah territorial residents drafted in unsuccessful efforts to secure statehood Each of the earlier efforts at statehood foundered, largely over the issues of polygamy and the role of the Mormon church in the territory's political and economic life.

In contrast, White notes, the 1895 constitutional convention took place amid radically changed conditions. The Mormon church's formal abandonment of polygamy in 1890 and the dissolution of the exclusively Mormon People's party shortly thereafter laid the basis for the formation of viable Democratic and Republican parties in the territory These developments opened the door to statehood. The author shows that the delegates to the 1895 convention consciously took a conservative approach in drafting the constitution. Anxious to achieve statehood, they rejected experimentation and avoided controversial issues likely to generate opposition to the constitution The constitution did incorporate a provision restoring woman suffrage (women's right tovote in the territory had been eliminated by federal antipolygamy legislation), but it avoided any mention of prohibition, although the issue had considerable popular appeal.

In discussing the major features of the 1895 constitution, the author avoids anarrow, parochial perspective. She notes that some of the delegates' concerns reflected tensions common to the underdeveloped West during this era For example, the delegates wanted to encourage outside investment, and therebyspur local economic development, but they feared dominance byoutside interests.Proposals to allow the state to subsidize or furnish credit tobusiness enterprises therefore produced lengthy debate

An appendix to the work provides biographical sketches of each of the delegates to the convention Although the sketches describe the delegates individually in terms of age, national origin, occupation, educational background, business and professional activities, and political affiliation, one key indicator—religious orientation (i.e, Mormon or gentile)—is omitted. The author also outlines the changes to the constitution since its adoption. Rather surprisingly, the features of the 1895 constitution that most reflected the troubled history of Utah Territory—the prohibition of polygamy and the strictures on separation of church and state—remain intact a century later In contrast, Utahns have substantially modified much of the remainder of the document over the years, rejecting any effort to rewrite the constitution in its entirety

Charterfor Statehood is a clearly written and well-organized study that should appeal to those interested in Utah's 1895 constitution. The book is copiously illustrated with photographs of personalities, enterprises, and institutions important to the territory's development, and the text is garnished with entertaining (and occasionally acerbic) quotes from the proceedings of the convention and comment from the territorial press The reproductions of contemporary line drawings from the Salt Lake Tribune coverage of the convention are less successful, in part because a substantial number of the individuals portrayed in the drawings are not identified

HENRY WOLFINGER National Archives and Records Administration College Park, MD

Glen Canyon and the San Juan Country.

By GARY TOPPING (Moscow: University of Idaho Press, 1997. 404 pp. $39.95.)

Is Glen Canyon now nothing but a memory, a wonderland obliterated from the earth, a vision seen only in our dreams? The emotional content of Glen Canyon remembered does indeed run deep, but as Gary Topping suggests in his new book, submergence under Lake Powell has not erased the colorful history of the canyon, nor has it affected higher canyons, mesas, and lofty plateaus.

Essentially, this is a synopsis of many individual and group histories centered within and near a geographical triangle that corners at Hite, Mexican Hat, and the confluence of the San Juan and Colorado Rivers Obviously, the historical players in this drama did not confine their actions to this triangle, so Topping has had to give readers sufficient background on the people involved. His method is similar to that used by C. Gregory Crampton in Standing Up Country, yet Crampton's history of the canyon country covered a much larger area but in necessarily less detail.

If there is one common thread in Topping's history, it is the difficult, dramatic encounters—even at times confrontations—between man and nature, and in this case nature is represented by a highly colorful yet extremely rugged, arid landscape where overland travel was most difficult. A raft voyage down the Colorado River through Glen Canyon was comparatively easy, but even on the river, accidents and deaths sometimes happened

Many of the stories related by Topping will be familiar to students of Glen Canyon history He, of course, writes ofJohn Wesley Powell, of Robert B Stanton, of the Dominguez-Escalante Expedition, and of the Hole-in-theRock trek. He also has researched and written about episodes and persons not so well known, such as guide and Indian trader John Wetherill, geologist Herbert E Gregory, archaeologist Neil Judd, New Yorker Charles Bernheimer, iconoclast Charles Kelly, maverick Harry Aleson, and artist Dick Sprang, as well as many others.

Potential readers may be deceived by the attractive dust jacket, which features four colorful photographs of Glen Canyon scenery. An examination of the book itself, however, reveals only a few informal black and white snapshots (all in an appendix) of historical characters—but no photographs of that spectacular landscape! As a weak apology for this obvious deficiency, Topping refers frustrated readers to other books that contain scenic photographs He is more successful in filling the void, however, when he directs his considerable writing talent to graphic descriptions of human encounters with the rugged topography, a common theme throughout the book.

Only one map is included, and it is of such small scale—showing a large area with small detail—that its usefulness to a reader is minimal.

Although Topping is almost always accurate, he follows other writers who perpetuate the prevailing misconception that building Glen Canyon Dam was a substitute for the defeated Echo Park Dam Since this reviewer was employed for many years as a public affairs officer for the Bureau of Reclamation, he has first-hand knowledge that Glen Canyon Damwas always a vital part of the Colorado River Storage Project; the project could not have been built without it Topping and others make their mistake by assuming, without checking, that Glen Canyon Dam was built solely to produce hydropower. Actually, hydropower was only a secondary purpose; the primary purpose was to create 27 million acre-feet of water storage in Lake Powell—water that could be used in drought years to meet downstream commitments of the 1922 Compact. Echo Park Dam would only have provided 6 million acre-feet of storage and could be safely eliminated.

While it is important to note Topping's lack of understanding of Glen Canyon Dam, the absence of scenic photographs, and the near-lack of maps, one should not overlook this generally well-researched and well-written volume, for it chronicles several interesting and important human stories of the Glen Canyon-San Juan region that have never appeared in any previous study.

W. L. RUSHO Salt Lake City, Utah

Battle for the Ballot: Essays on Woman Suffrage in Utah, 1870-1896.

Edited by CAROL CORNWALL MADSEN (Logan: Utah State University Press, 1997. xii + 318 pp. Cloth, $39.95; paper, $19.95.)

Carol Madsen's choice of sixteen essays of uniformly high quality, along with her clear and concise introduction, places the battle for woman suffrage in Utah in a national context while also emphasizing the unusual elements of the Utah story She thus achieves her stated purpose of drawing attention to the history of woman suffrage at the state level, specifically Utah, a subject previously ignored by scholars of suffrage Eight of the sixteen essays first appeared in Utah Historical Quarterly during the past three decades. Madsen also includes essays contemporary with the battle and others first published in BYU Studies, Dialogue, Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies, and Journalism Quarterly.

The essays well exemplify Madsen's thesis that the fight for suffrage in Utah, while sharing some characteristics of the struggle nationally and in the West, was unique, complex, and divisive, especially for Utah women.

Kathryn L. MacKay further drives home these points in her trenchant foreword and useful chronology. The territorial legislature gave Utah women the vote in 1870,enfranchising 17,179 of them, many times the number enfranchised by Wyoming in 1869 But, incredibly, Utah's non-Mormon women were willing to give up suffrage in order to win the war against polygamy. In 1878, when gentile women in Utah organized to repeal woman suffrage with the goal of defeating polygamy, Emmeline B Wells wrote, "We never thought that women could rise up against women It will be 'diamond cut diamond,' rest assured" (25) The 1882 Edmunds Act, which disfranchised all polygamous men and women, and the 1887 Edmunds-Tucker Act, which disfranchised allwomen in Utah territory, galvanized Mormon women to regain the vote.

There was division among Mormon women as well as a chasm between Mormon and gentile women. Beverly Beeton reveals the competition for suffrage leadership between Emmeline B. Wells, editor of the Women's Exponent, and Charlotte Ives Cobb Godbe Kirby, fourth wife of William Godbe Joan Iversen recounts ironic alliances among Mormons, gentiles, and apostates. Faithful Mormons were aligned with the "radical" National Woman Suffrage Association led by Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony, while the apostate Godbeites were allied with the "respectable" American Woman Suffrage Association led by Lucy Stone On the national level, differing views about suffrage for Mormon polygamists exacerbated the schism between the NWSA and the AWSA.

As well as being divisive at a local and national level, the battle for suffrage in Utah was complex and unique due, in part, to the triangular dynamics among suffrage, polygamy, and statehood Beeton suggests Mormon women and the NWSA were "pawns" in the campaign for statehood waged by the Mormon male leadership against the federal government. Mormon women as "pawns" echoes the nineteenth-century cartoon image of Mormon women as dupes and slaves, described by Gary and Carol Bunker. In contrast, Lola Van Wagenen proposes that Mormon women were "well prepared in 1870 to assume an active political role in their communities" and were "activists in their own behalf (61). But, as Jill Derr explains, Mormon women did not think of themselves as autonomous. Rather, they believed themselves "stewards" or "helpmeets to the priesthood" in turning "the tide of man's degeneracy". (83)

Despite polarizing differences, Mormon women and their gentile sisters, locally and nationally, shared characteristics. Most believed, as Jean Bickmore White points out, women's votes would "purify politics and reform the world" (296) Indeed, Iversen asserts Mormon women embraced the "ideology of Victorian domesticity" which elevated "woman's status within the ideal Victorian home, without challenging patriarchal authority" (168).

By choosing thought-provoking essays with a variety of viewpoints and including her own insightful analysis, Madsen succeeds in her goal to raise "questions among women that are still reverberating" (25) Furthermore, her inclusion of a refreshing firsthand account, the diary entries of Ruth May Fox for 1895, edited by Linda Thatcher, gives the reader an opportunity to apply the aforesaid theories to one woman in the thick of the battle Juggling pressing "home duties," Fox worked tirelessly for woman suffrage when it became the most bitterly disputed issue at the Utah state constitutional convention Was she a pawn, an activist in her own behalf, a good steward, a political idealist, or the ideal Victorian? Read this book and decide for yourself!

EDWINA Jo SNOW Honolulu, Hawaii

Worth Their Salt: Notable but Often Unnoted Women of Utah.

Edited by COLLEEN WHITLEY. (Logan: Utah State University Press, 1996. Cloth, $37.95; paper, $19.95.)

Recently, in the year of the Mormon wagon trains, a very curious thing happened less than a mile from the Salt Lake Temple Recessed inside a deep knothole high up in a very ancient tree, the shadowy figure of a weeping Virgin Mary appeared. Hearing of the apparition, my daughter and I decided to check out what has become a sacred shrine for many Hispanic immigrants now living in the fair state of Utah We found the tree surrounded with candles, flowers, and some rosaries My daughter bravely climbed the ladder to peer into the large, hollow knothole. Tacked alongside the figure were pictures of Mary which enhanced the resemblance of the silhouette in the tree. While we respectfully watched, whole families piled from vans to join previous worshipers praying and chanting in front of the curious edifice We were duly impressed and excited and agreed proudly, "Utah is not a one-note state."

I had much the same feeling of awe after reading through this collection of untold stories of unique and talented Utah women What a variety of lives and cultures are represented within these pages! We meet a nun, a worldfamous actress, politicians, and a Paristrained artist. We are also exposed to the problems of members of minority ethnic groups such as an Apache-born Indian called "Chipeta";Jane Manning James, a black Mormon pioneer; Keniko Muramatsu Terasawa, a modest Japanese bride who became a significant publishing voice for first- and second-generation Japanese immigrants; and Esther Rosenblatt Landa, an esteemed Jewish leader who admitted that growing up in Salt Lake City did not adequately prepare her for the horror of the Holocaust of World War II. When Esther realized the extent of the persecution, she became one of the most powerful voices in America for peace and for a Jewish homeland in Israel.

Best of all were the stories of Utah midwives: pioneer Patty Bartlett Sessions and Georgia Lathourgis Mageras, the latter working tirelessly to save the babies of frightened immigrant women whose husbands worked in the coal and copper mines These medical wonders with their magic touch were surely the forerunners of the wonderful women doctors who recently managed to deliver septuplets and keep them all alive.

Many of the essays were published in some form at an earlier time, and it is incredible to see them all come together in such an accessible and attractive format. Most were written by a professional writer or historian. As a longtime consultant of the Family History Library trained to work with primary US, Canadian, and LDS materials, I was impressed with the careful documentation by the individual authors.

Each story is complete and stands on its own. It is impossible to select a favorite, for each subject is different, which of course was the goal of the collection Definitely, all of the women affected Utah life in a major way.

Of the artists and writers, it would be nice to see samples of their paintings or prose.

This is a fun book to include on one's personal library shelf to continuously enjoy and acknowledge the heroic Utah women I must add a warning, however; do not read it all in one sitting. I did, and I soon realized I had my ladies mentally mixed up, with (for example) club woman Eliza Kirley Royle living in Elizabeth McCune's mansion with a Mary Teasdale painting hung above the fireplace. Nevertheless, I have already read the book twice and eagerly look forward to a sequel.

LYNN WATKINS JORGENSEN Sandy, Utah

David E. Jackson: Field Captain of the Rocky Mountain Fur Trade.

By VIVIAN LINFORD TALBOT (Jackson, Wyo.:Jackson Hole Historical Society and Museum, 1996 138 pp Paper, $5.95.)

Jackson Hole, Wyoming, remains one of America's most spectacular scenic areas However, David E Jackson, whose name graces several places near the Tetons, remains virtually unknown Vivian Talbot's book strives to bring greater recognition to a man she contends represents "the enterprising spirit that brought the lands of the far western frontier" into the United States (p. 10).

Jackson joined William Ashley on his historic quest for fur-trade profits in the Rocky Mountains during the early 1820s While Ashley grew wealthy, men such as Jackson, Jedediah Smith, and William Sublette made names for themselves as mountain men. After Smith, Jackson, and Sublette bought Ashley out, Jackson emerged as an important partner and field captain, consistently keeping the company fiscally sound with his trapping skills Ancillary experiences to the trade, such as exploration, contact with Indians, and the romance associated with their wilderness sojourn helped create the enduring image of these men as heroic leaders of Manifest Destiny. They symbolized the rugged individualism once thought so crucial to nineteenth-century expansion.

Within this context, Talbot explores Jackson's early years, his experience as a fur trade partner, and his subsequent life as a failed entrepreneur. She posits that the man for whom one of America's most popular vacation areas was named "has remained the most enigmatic of all the prominent members" of the Rocky Mountain fur trade (p 9) Furthermore, she insists that his exploits have received scant scholarly attention because insufficient documentation "has given the false impression that he was less heroic than his colleagues and companions" (p. 10). She endeavors to place Jackson in his proper place within the pageant of American history.

This volume represents an expanded version of the author's master's thesis. Talbot deserves credit for her exhaustive efforts to trace and document the mysterious life of Jackson. However, her perspective appears rooted in an earlier historiographical era Decades ago, historians began to move beyond examining American history through the lens of Frederick Jackson Turner's thesis which viewed trappers as the vanguard in the process of intrepid European Americans subduing the virgin wilderness to establish the country's borders and character. In addition, current historians generally attempt to use neutral terms to portray minorities Talbot describes Jackson's death in this manner: " David Edward Jackson died in the company of a faithful Negro slave in a rented room ... " (p. 13). Many will find the characterization "faithful Negro" troubling.

This book suffers from other problems. Talbot succumbs to the temptation to champion her subject uncritically As a result of the uneven documentation of Jackson's life, her narrative is full of speculation concerning his whereabouts, experiences, and achievements. She relies too heavily on the biased family history, Keeping the Lamp of Remembrance Lighted, by Elmer Jackson Finally, in light of the fact that in 1993 John C.Jackson published a 241-page biography of David Jackson, Shadow on the Tetons, one must ask if this figure warranted another volume.

JOHN W HEATON Arizona State University

Overland: The California Emigrant Trail of 1841-1870.

By GREG MACGREGOR (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1996 xvi +168 pp Cloth, $75.00; paper, $37.50.)

The purpose of this large (11- by 9inch) book is to publish a series of eighty-three black-and-white photos taken by the photographer/author during the previous fifteen years of his career. The decision to use black-andwhite photos is fortunate for admirers of "pure" photographic documentation Colors along the California Trail are sometimes subtle to bleak The landscape images in this book are breathtakingly beautiful due to the combination of expert photography and emotionally charged scenery The images are enhanced by contemporary diary excerpts, adding to the pathos of Mr MacGregor's photography He composes his photos in a way that is reminiscent of Diane Aubus's photography of human subjects in the 1950s and '60s—that is to say, with warts and all.

MacGregor says he started wondering about the road through Nevada while driving east from California, then he grew curious as to why and how this road came to be in such inhospitable country. His opinion improved with knowledge acquired from people like Tom Hunt of the Oregon-California Trails Association (OCTA) OCTA is an organization dedicated to emigrant trail preservation, a field not often studied by academic history writers Trail buffs, or "rut nuts," as some of them like to say when declaring their passion for trails, are more inclined to be found on the trail or looking for it in an old beat-up vehicle, dirty in appearance and usually, but not always, four-wheel drive These people do not mind driving for days on unpaved roads or roadless ground in search of a rut or a final resting place of the first or last wagon train.

The book also has five maps to help readers keep track of where we are as we turn each page In a way, the book title, with its inclusive dates, makes the maps a bit misleading. The 1841 California-bound party led by John Bidwell and John Bartleson traveled with a group headed for Oregon When the trail turned northwest and left the Bear River near Soda Springs in southeast Idaho, the Bidwell party, without a map or guide, continued down the Bear River to its mouth at the Great Salt Lake They then turned west to go around the north end of the lake and found spring water to sustain them along the south side of the Raft River Mountains and the east side of the Pilot Range. Their ignorance of paths through the land was mitigated by their good luck at finding water The map shows none of the California Trail followed by the 1841 Bidwell party through what is today the state of Utah. No one else followed this trail to California again, but one might be led to believe from the map that the Bidwell trail went on through Idaho.

In 1846, Lansford W Hastings tried to establish a cutoff around the south end of the Great Salt Lake, but he instead laid a trap for the unwary Donner-Reed party of that year. Their struggle to cross the Wasatch Mountains and the Great Salt Lake Desert led to a greater struggle in the high Sierra of Nevada-California in late October, and many died from the early snow The so- called Hastings Cutoff was used extensively, but more people favored the trail around the north end of the lake, sometimes called the Salt Lake Cutoff, established by Samuel Hensley in 1848. This route took travelers to the north side of the Raft River Mountains into Thousand Springs Valley and the headwaters of the Humbolt River.

The book's value rests in the quality of the images An introduction by Walter Truett Anderson helps get us started on the trail in Missouri, but the photo images carry us on to California.

JAY HAYMOND Utah State Historical Society

A Rendezvous Reader: Tall, Tangled, and True Tales of the Mountain Men, 1805-1850.

Edith by JAMES H. MAGUIRE, PETER WILD, and DONALD BARCLAY. (Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 1997 xvi + 348 pp Cloth, $59.95; paper, $19.95.)

Fact is often stranger than fiction, and when the two are intertwined by a skilled storyteller they can become the stuff of legend, folklore, and oftrepeated tales Perhaps no other group of westerners took greater pride in their yarn-spinning skill and their unashamed embellishment of facts than did the mountain men To be fully accepted into the fraternity you had to survive Indian fights, make do without provisions, be able to whip your weight in wild cats, and tell a tall tale so convincingly to the greenhorns that they not only believed you but repeated the story to the next crop of newcomers You had fully arrived when you were dubbed with OZ'prefacing your name or mountain moniker This usually had nothing to do with age but rather seasoning in mountain lore and story-telling ability. Not that mountain men ever out-and-out lied; that would be hypocrisy, which all true mountain men hated But with dozens of tall tales circulating around the mountains, some true, some based on truth and greatly embellished with each telling, and some tall tales—the feats of strength, fights with Indians, wild animal encounters, and unexplained phenomena—these stories of the mountain men provide plenty of source material a century and a half later for editors Maguire, Wild, and Barclay.

Where possible the stories were taken directly from journals, newspapers, and other primary sources These stories capture the romance and hardship of the era The book is divided into twelve sections, including Famous Trappers, Indians, Critics of the Fur Trade, Animals, and Farewell to the Mountain Man Life. The stories are carefully chosen to educate and enlighten readers on mountain man lifestyle, relationships, craft, hardships, humor, and prowess.

Skillfully added prose of explanation, interpretation, and editorial comment preface each section and story to assist the reader in placing a context. The stories themselves transport the reader to greater understanding than what a mere discerning of the academic history of the era could ever disclose; they impart color, humor, and rustic homily of this highly romanticized era. In the editors' words lies perhaps the best summation: "We have created a book that is neither a history nor a treatise on the fur trade Rather, it is a celebration of facts and fantasies so tightly interwoven that even the most dedicated scholars of the mountain man can't always distinguish the two."

JOHN D BARTON Utah State University Uintah Basin Branch Campus

A Mine of Her Own: Women Prospectors in the American West, 1850-1950.

By SALLY ZANJANI (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1997 xii + 375 pp $32.50.)

When most people think of prospectors or Nevada, two stereotypes come to mind First, the prospector is a small, bent, gray-haired man trudging over the mountains with a burro Second, Nevada is an undesirable and uninhabitable desert wasteland In A Mine of Her Own, Sally Zanjani skillfully refutes both myths. Through an entertaining narrative, she shows that women have supported themselves in mining for over 150 years. Many of these women also chose to live in Nevada at least part of the time because they enjoyed the solitude and the area's rough beauty These facts may seem startling, because few academics have acknowledged women's contributions to mining until now. Also, until twenty-five years ago, few colleges or universities offered courses in women's history, and litde was published on this topic.

While most nineteenth-century American women focused their lives around their family or the men in their lives, some refused to follow convention. One of the atypical paths women followed was prospecting. Even though some ladies cooked, kept house, mended , and nursed the sick, they also scoured the hillsides and streambeds looking for minerals Once the "ledge" or "float" was identified, like their male counterparts, they set everything else aside and used all the tools of the trade to collect the ores. It has been said that most of these ladies could swing a pick and muck out a mine with the best of them. To date, Zanjani has traced the lives of seventy-seven women prospectors through records in California, Baja California, Nevada, Idaho, Utah, Colorado, Arizona, New Mexico, Alaska, Canada, and Mexico Sadly, she realizes there were probably scores of others who have fallen through the cracks, as no records exist to document their existence. Considering Brigham Young's attitude about mining gold or silver, it is also no surprise that few Utah women were miners before or after the turn of the century No true believer would risk her salvation looking for riches when her prophet advised his people to cultivate the land instead Thus, the few Utah women who became prospectors were generally non-Mormons.

Through fascinating stories of women such asJosie Earp, Wyatt's wife, Zanjani illustrates that many of the women prospectors met a certain profile. Few had children, and those that did boarded them out, put them in orphanages, took them into the field— ignoring the need for an education—or moved to small towns where a school was available A surprising number were widowed or divorced; an unusual number were older women, and many who married more than once picked men who were much younger Many of the women also became excellent marksmen to protect themselves and their claims, but a few, such as Nellie Cashmen, had such a rapport with their male peers that guns were unnecessary Nellie also earned the reputation of an angel in every camp she worked for her numerous good deeds and efforts to help others. One man even defended her honor as a cook and threatened to kill a miner who complained about the food she had served him.

Manywomen prospectors were single, but a good number were married or worked with male partners By contrast, few women worked with other women Ironically, two of Utah's lady prospectors were picnicking and working together when they found silver in Bingham Canyon in 1863. Both were wives of General Connor's soldiers who were then stationed at Ft. Douglas. Some have downplayed their accomplishment, claiming it was accidental, but California records show that at least one of the women was an experienced prospector After Mrs Reid's and Mrs Burlingam's success, a group of nine military wives surveyed another part of Bingham Canyon and recorded the Women's Lode in May 1864. Following these strikes and others in nearby canyons, it was just a matter of time before Utah had a gold and silver rush Thousands flocked to Utah, and soon claims were recorded in many of the Wasatch and Oquirrh canyons in Salt Lake, Tooele, and Summit counties Eventually, claims would also be staked in other canyons in central and southern Utah.

Some of the women, likeJosie Pearl and Anna Rechel, were as honest as the daywas long and could be trusted implicitly. They may have exaggerated about their claims, but theywere loved because they were kind, generous souls. Others, like Mary Grantz and Dr Frances Williams, were criticized for promoting claims or towns that did not exist They also took money from family members and then spent it on themselves.

Before becoming prospectors, some women had worked in mining camps as actresses or saloon girls or served as cooks and boardinghouse managers, but none were domestics or housewives. A few professional women also joined the ranks, as at least one was a teacher, another a doctor, and one was a newspaper editor Others such as Anna Rechel may have had little education, but were well-informed Anna called the governor of Nevada more than once to offer her unsolicited opinion on the state's problems. She could also hold her own in any debate on current events. Without city life's distractions, she read a lot and listened to the radio when it became available

Where fortunes were concerned, most made little money, but those who struck it rich did not try to become society figures like Molly Brown, Baby Doe Tabor, or Ellie Bowers Instead some gambled their riches away, went on drinking binges, or indulged in spending sprees like their male counterparts. A few, such as Mary Grantz and Dr. Frances Williams, spent part of their money investing in mines that did not pay Very few, such as Belle Butler, had the foresight to save for retirement Despite her thrift Belle was also known for her philanthropy and was called the "Mother of Nevada."

Despite its pure entertainment value, Ms. Zanjani's book would appeal to academics and history buffs alike. It has an extensive bibliography of oral interviews, magazine articles, and books to give it credibility While it would be nice if it had more annotated footnotes to provide the "rest of the story," the author has carefully documented her research Her style is also a plus; the story flows well and her vocabulary is impressive. In conclusion, this is an informative book about a litde-known group of fun, colorful women. I hope every Utah and American history teacher has access to it.

JUDY DYKMAN Granite School District Salt Lake City, Utah