Let this book introduce you to the old-timers of San Juan County, Colorado. They are a colourful lot of characters -- miners, barmaids, men in search of fortune, and brave pioneers -- who have been around since the Gold Rush and are still going about their business. During the early 1800s, people from around the world left their homelands, said goodbye to their sweethearts, and flocked to America with gold fever. Along with their belongings, the brought native folklore. Tommyknockers sprang from Cornish gripsacks. Banshees and leprechauns slipped out of Irish satchels. Poltergeists and kobolds escaped German trunks, and domoviks squeezed out of Russian apron pockets. Some of these souls continue to search for their fortune, and others will not rest in peace until being reunited with their lost lovers from a land faraway. Tommyknockers are still working the mines up around the Old Hundred properties, watching out for the living miners and forewarning them of life-threatening cave-ins. Outside Virginius, you might hear the soul-soothing music of Scotty, a Highland piper, who was discovered frozen to death in the snow. These tales and more from the San Juan weave a unique tapestry, matching the mystery and majesty of the mountains.
A native of Florida, MaryJoy Martin moved to Colorado in 1958 and was educated in Denver. As an investigative journalist with a background in history and the criminal sciences, she has been writing about the state's mysteries for thirty years. Her books include the popular "Twilight Dwellers: Ghosts, Gases, and Goblins of Colorado," and the recent award-winning, "The Corpse on Boomerang Road: Telluride's War on Labor 1899-1908". An extensive traveler, she has written articles on a wide range of subjects for state and national magazines and newspapers.
For 20 years she has written a humor column for the "San Juan Horseshoe," a parody periodical that also features her digital art. Her dozens of pseudonyms for that publication are an ongoing art-form in themselves, leaving readers guessing -- and Martin wondering -- who she is sometimes. "Just call me 'Empress of Aliases,'" she says from behind a frog mask.
Her serious and scholarly work has solved 100-year-old crimes, changing what was accepted as historical fact. Some reviewers have called her a "tenacious investigator" and a "dedicated researcher," but Martin says her determination to hunt down the last scrap of a story is "obsession." She seeks primary materials and documentable evidence with the focus of a bloodhound, spending weeks and months lost in dusty court record rooms, state archives, or special library collections. She has a deep affinity for archivists, extolling them as the "guardians of our heritage."
"Some archivists deserve monuments in their honor for their expertise and patience and willingness to always assist," Martin says, "especially William W. LeFevre at the Archives of Labor and Urban Affairs, Walter P. Reuther Library, Wayne State University; David M. Hays at the Archives of the Norlin Library, University of Colorado at Boulder; and Leslie C. Shores at the American Heritage Center, University of Wyoming. "I have to say I absolutely love these people and admire the work they, and others like them, do in preserving our history. I have never met an archivist I didn't like."
Martin is a member of the Colorado Historical Society and has contributed to the preservation of the state's labor history, including having Ft. Peabody added to the National Register of Historic Places -- for further information go to this link: http://www.tellurideminersmemorial.coyotekiva.org/peabody.html
She is also an award-winning artist and photographer whose work is included in collections throughout the U.S.A., Scotland, England, and France. She created many of the portraits for "The Corpse on Boomerang Road," using scratched and blurred printouts from old microfilmed newspaper photos as her models.
Her heart belongs to the wilderness where she spends her free time relaxing on the edge of remote cliffs or singing with legions of coyotes and marmots.
