The Contested Plains: Indians, Goldseekers, & the Rush to Colorado, by Elliott West. (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1998. Pp.422.)

Abstract

Many modern United States travelers, much to the chagrin of the Kansas department of tourism, are used to viewing Kansas as a place to drive through on the way to somewhere else. And so it was, author Elliott West skillfully relates in <em>The Contested Plains: Indians, Goldseekers, & the Rush to Colorado</em>, in the mid-nineteenth century. Prior to the Colorado gold rush of 1858 the "ocean of land" separating east and west was simply the "Great American Desert," a haven for Indians and other "items" of curious interest, but of little perceived worth.