Traversing and Taming Treacherous Terrain

Today, people enjoy the convenience of Colorado’s roads without realizing that beneath lie the original Ute and Spanish trails, mountain men’s pathways, and early military wagon roads. The cultural landscape of western Colorado has undergone immense changes since the mid-sixteenth century. The rapid advancement of transportation technology has enabled the conquest of complex climate zones and challenging regional topography. Early western Colorado inhabitants once migrated on footpaths that followed the path of least resistance, traversing lush meadow corridors between rugged mountain ranges, paralleling the river bottoms, and enjoying the welcome shade of cool canyon trails in the high desert. The early Ute people, Spanish explorers, mountain men, and U.S. topographical engineers developed resourceful ways to make travel less strenuous and cover greater distances. Historian David P. Bailey chronicles their early treks, which paved the way for the first major thoroughfare through western Colorado.

Ghostly reverberations pulse for eternity in the most haunted crime scenes in Chicago.

The rat-a-tat of machine guns echoes at the site of Al Capone's St. Valentine's Day Massacre. The ghost of Louisa Luetgert makes the occasional appearance on the grounds of the old Luetgert Sausage and Packing Company—her husband, the “Sausage King,” cooked her down in a vat of meat tenderizer in 1897. Ghostly screams ring out and dogs get their hackles up at the site of serial killer H.H. Holmes's “Murder Castle” on West 63rd Street. Hundreds died at the Iroquois Theatre fire in 1903—inspectors had overlooked violations that made the venue on West Randolph Street a veritable tinderbox. Today, passersby are greeted by cold spots and pleas for help from the long-dead and perpetually tortured. The City with Broad Shoulders is burdened by souls whose lives were stolen and are seemingly in pursuit of justice and comfort—or perhaps vengeance. Author Eva Pilch guides readers on a citywide tour of the most haunted crime scenes in Chicago.

The Huguenot heritage in the United States cannot be overstated. In the latter part of the sixteenth century, France was plunged into a series of religious wars. In 1589, Henry of Navarre became Henry IV of France, but peace was not achieved until he issued the Edict of Nantes in 1598, which recognized the Huguenots’ right to worship in the towns they controlled. While Henry IV lived, the financial and military security of the country was ensured. After his assassination in 1610, it ceased.

Religious persecution resumed, and in 1685, Louis XIV revoked the Edict of Nantes, and many French Protestants fled. Of the estimated 180,000 Huguenot refugees, approximately 3,000 crossed the Atlantic. This book is about their descendants and their influence on the development of the American republic and the rights enshrined in the U.S. Constitution.

The Huguenot Church in Charleston, a national landmark, is the last Huguenot church in America.