Book Notices

Anson Call and the Rocky Mountain Prophecy

By Gwen Marler Barney (Salt Lake City:CallPublishing Company,2002.xi + 418 pp.Cloth,$24.95;paper, $19.95.)

This beautifully illustrated biography of Anson Call traces the pioneer’s life from his birth in Vermont in 1810 until his death in Bountiful,Utah, in 1890.At the age of twenty-six he joined the Mormon faith in Kirtland,Ohio, and devoted the remainder of his life to his family and his church.In August 1842 Call was present at a gathering in Montrose,Iowa,where Joseph Smith proclaimed that his followers would be driven to the Rocky Mountains where they would become a mighty people.Call recorded what became known as the “Rocky Mountain Prophecy”in his journal including the promise that Call would “…go and assist in building cities from one end of the country to the other,and you shall perform as great a work as has ever been done by man…” (99).Anson Call went on to help establish Mormon settlements in Bountiful, Parowan,Fillmore,Call’s Fort,Utah;and Carson County,Nevada.

Uranium Frenzy:Saga of the Nuclear West

By Raye C.Ringholz (Logan:Utah State University Press,2002.xiii + 344 pp.Paper,$19.95.)

Originally published in 1989 under the title Uranium Frenzy: Boom and Bust on the Colorado Plateau and reviewed in the Winter 1990 issue of the Utah Historical Quarterly ,this revised and expanded edition gives a more detailed account of the 1950s uranium boom in Utah and its aftermath.Based primarily on interviews with individuals,including Charlie Steen and Mitchell Melich,involved in the uranium boom and written with an insider’s perspective, this is a highly readable account describing the adventure and excitement of uranium discovery and development while giving careful attention to the human suffering that was a direct consequence of the exposure to radioactivity and loss of health that are also a legacy of the uranium boom.

Adult Museum Programs

By Bonnie Sachatello-Sawyer,Robert A.Fellenz,Hanly Burton,Laura Gittings-Carlson,Janet Lewis-Mahony,and Walter Woolbaugh (Walnut Creek,CA:AltaMira Press,2002.vii + 209 pp.Cloth,$63.00;paper,$24.95.)

Written for museum directors,their staffs,and volunteers,this volume recognizes that while younger students are often the target audience for museum programs,adult learners constitute a unique audience and offer a unique opportunity for most museums.The authors of this useful volume address three basic questions:What are adult learners looking for? What motivates them to take a class or attend a museum-sponsored activity? What do planners and instructors need to know to maximize the experience for participants? General readers will find the book a useful tool for measuring the quality of their own experiences in visiting museums.

The Sherman Tour Journals of Colonel Richard Irving Dodge

Edited by Wayne R. Kime (Norman:University of Oklahoma Press,2002.xiv + 217 pp.Cloth,$34.95.)

This volume completes the publication by the University of Oklahoma Press of all of the Colonel Richard Irving Dodge journals known to exist.In the summer of 1883,Dodge accompanied General William Tecumseh Sherman,as his aide-de-camp,on a 10,000-mile inspection tour across the Pacific Northwest,California,and the Rocky Mountains that included a stop in Salt Lake City in September 1883.Dodge’s journal gives insight into their daily interactions,the terrain they covered,the conditions of military posts they encountered, and the still undeveloped West’s civilian communities.

Navajo Land,Navajo Culture:The Utah Experience in the Twentieth Century

By Robert S. McPherson (Norman:University of Oklahoma Press,2003.xiiv + 301 pp. Paper,$19.95.)

This important book of twelve essays on the Navajo experience in Southeastern Utah by Professor Robert S.McPherson of the College of Eastern Utah,San Juan Campus was first published in 2001 in hardback and reviewed in the Fall 2002 issue of the Utah Historical Quarterly.The University of Oklahoma Press has done students of Navajo and Utah history a great service in publishing this paperback edition.

The Sunnyside War

By FredCivish (Springville:Bonneville Books,2003.x + 366 pp. Paper,$19.95.)

Set in Carbon County,Utah during the 1922 coal miners’strike, this novel by a fourth-generation coal miner and journalist uses the major events of the strike to examine the prejudices,perspectives,and experiences of coal operators,union leaders,American and foreign-born coal miners,and families during one of Utah’s most extensive and violent labor confrontations.Of special value is an appendix that includes a list of name,dates,and mines for 1,383 coal miners who lost their lives in Utah mines from 1896 to the present.The author notes that the compilation of this list is a work in progress as more and more names are expected to be found in obscure records—especially those killed before Utah became a state in 1896.

Lost Legacy: The Mormon Office of Presiding Patriarch

By Irene M.Bates and E. Gary Smith (University of Illinois Press,2003.vii + 260 pp.Paper,$19.95.)

Originally published by the University of Illinois Press in 1996,this paperback edition makes more accessible this excellent study of the Office of Presiding Patriarch in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.The study covers the eight Presiding Patriarchs beginning with Joseph Smith,Sr.,ordained by his son,Joseph Smith,Jr.,to the office of Church Patriarch on December 18,1833,and concludes with Eldred G.Smith who served until October 1979 when the position was effectively eliminated.The authors explore the relationships and tensions between those who occupied the office of Presiding Patriarch,the only hereditary office in the LDS church,and those who were called to serve as the First Presidency and Apostles.

Following the Wrong God Home:Footloose in an American Dream

By Clive Scott Chisholm (Norman:University of Oklahoma Press,2003.406 pp.$34.95.)

As a native of Canada,and head of the Department of Communication at Utah State University before his retirement,Clive Scott Chisholm set out on foot in 1985 to follow the 1,100 mile long Mormon Pioneer Trail across Nebraska and Wyoming to Salt Lake City.More than just an interesting travel narrative,the author “…plays off the Mormon search for the dream of community against the modern search for the American dream of individuality.”

Voices of the Buffalo Soldier

By Frank N. Schubert (Albuquerque:University of New Mexico Press,2003.vi + 281 pp.Cloth,$24.95.)

Drawing on a variety of collections with documents on the African-American military experience in the West during the years between the Civil War and World War I,this volume illuminates the experiences of the soldiers through documents,letters,military records,and periodicals.Students of military history will find the accounts of soldier life interesting while students of social history will be intrigued by the interaction of the African-American soldiers with the white communities near their assigned posts and their relationships with the American Indians who were often the primary assignment for the Buffalo Soldiers.

Sand in a Whirlwind:The Paiute Indian War of 1860

By Ferol Egan with a new foreward by Richard Dillon (Reno & Las Vegas:University of Nevada Press,2003.xxi + 314 pp.Paper,$18.95.)

Often overlooked by Utah historians and other writers of early Utah history are the Indian relations on Utah’s far western frontier,now western Nevada,during the late 1850s and early 1860s.Ferol Egan’s reprint of Sand in a Whirlwind:The Paiute Indian War of 1860 (first published by the University of Nevada Press in 1972) with a new forward by Richard Dillon,describes in great detail the causes for the Paiute Indian War;actions taken by the civilian population and the military to subdue the peaceful Paiute Indians,and the eventual outcome of the war.Egan traces the life of Paiute Chief Numaga as he tried to avoid war but when forced to defend his people living near Pyramid Lake, demonstrated great skill as a military tactician.