tale of the lost dutchman/core works
  tale of the lost dutchman/core works
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  Garman, Robert L.
Mystery Gold of the Superstitions. 1975.
The numbered pages and text are the same in all editions except for the photograph on page 30. The Second and Third editions do add two unnumbered sections, each four pages long. The first comes at the very front of the volume and is a series of dedications. The second is added at the end and is entitled Ancdeotes(sic) About the Dutchman, wherein Garman trots out many "facts" about Walzer (sic), the Petrach (sic) clan, Julia Thomas, Dick Holmes and more.

An attractive looking pamphlet, then paperback, with good photographs. The writing is not very polished, but better than some. Garman was an observer on the scene from the 1940's to the 1970's. He makes a few interesting additions of his own to the lore and provides some interesting tidbits about mining activity in Goldfield. His telling of the Lost Dutchman tale is nothing new, one of the standard versions, most likely picked up from Herman Petrasch. More interesting are his pictures of Herman Petrasch, some taken at Petrasch's little shack on Queen Creek. It appears Garman and cronies often called on Petrasch, in fact Garman states he came by the very day Petrasch died in 1953.

This book is dedicated to Herman Petrach(sic), Travis and Robert Tumlinson, the "finders" of the stone maps (Garman knew them), and to Don Miguel Peralta. This ought to be enough to reveal the author's typically romantic point of view, despite his protestations to the contrary that he is not a lost mine hunter but a geologist and prospector. There is a picture of Bob Ward in the book.


  Doug Stewart. © 1994-2012.