Book: Images of America: Black Rock Desert
My book, "Images of America: Black Rock Desert", was released on November 11, 2013. Orders may be placed with your local bookseller, via Arcadia, or Amazon. In Gerlach, I'm hoping that the Friends of the Black Rock High Rock on-line store, Bruno's and the Empire Store will soon be carrying the book. In Cedarville, Michael Sykes will have copies after November 16 at Floating Island Books.
My initial idea with the book was that interesting people have been doing interesting things out on the Black Rock Desert for a long time.
Doing the book was a wonderful, though somewhat exhausting process. I was in contact with a number of people who helped me quite a bit. In the end, I used the Friends of the Black Rock/High Rock Wiki as a repository for my notes.
All author proceeds will be donated to the Gerlach Senior Citizens Center. In addition, I'm donating $3 for each book that I give away or sell.
Michael Sykes at Floating Island Books in Cedarville has graciously written a foreword.
Arcadia Publishing has a catalog of over 8,500 titles of local history books. One of their recent books is "Washoe County," by Joyce M. Cox.
Below is the table of contents for "Images of America: Black Rock Desert":
1 Prehistory and Pioneers
2 The 20’s: Hollywood comes to the Black Rock
3 Ranches, Mines, and Towns
4 1950’s: The Automobile Comes to the Black Rock
5 The 60’s: and 70’s: New Art forms for an Old Landform
6 The 80’s: The Black Rock as an Artistic Medium
Events
I had a number of events for the book including a worldwide release party at Bev's Miner's Club in Gerlach on November 16, 2013, a book signing at Michael Sykes book store in Cedarville on November 23 and a party at Jon Sarriugarte's shop on December 2.
I'll probably do a signing in Reno at some point in the future.
On December 10, 2013, I mailed books to my contributors. Please contact me if I promised you a book and you did not get one.
On December 13, 2013, John Law blogged about the book! (Thanks John!)
(Photo by Basil Glew-Galloway)
Errata
Below are a list of mistakes in the book.
* Page 26: Henry Lind photo of Pahute Mountain that includes text by Lind. When Lind wrote the text in 1941, it was thought that Clapper was buried at Clapper Canyon. However, Clapper's partial skeleton was found in 1990 in a canyon to the south of Clapper Canyon and later reburied near Susanville. (Credit: Andy Mark, author of Stories of the Humboldt Wagon Road)
* Page 57: Deep Hole is west of Gerlach, not east. (credit: Gary Horton)
* Page 58 & 59: Both images say that they are from 1910 and are photos of James Raser, this cannot be, as the man in the image at the bottom of p. 58 does not have as large a belly as the man on the top of p. 59. (credit: Gary Horton)
** The image on the bottom of p. 58 is washoe497 from the Nevada Historical Society. The photocopy of the image in the index binder says "Washoe Ranch James Raser feeding his pet deer". The year 1910 is not mentioned and presumably is incorrect.
** The image at the top of p. 59 is wa-6252 from the Nevada Historical Society. The photocopy of the image in the index binder says "Jim Raser - At Petrified Forest". The rest of the text is difficult to read, but my copy says "c. 1910"
** Oddie Van Norman's article "I Rode For Gerlach" has a photo from "around 1915" on p. 29 that shows Jim Raser on the left with a cane. This man matches the man pictured in the top of p. 59.
* Page 61: Donnelly Mountain is located north of Gerlach, not west and 10 miles east of Leadville, not north. (credit: Gary Horton)
Contact
Contact me at cxbrooks@gmail.com.
(Last update: April 2, 2014)