Stephen Grace previous employment has ranged from deckhand on Mississippi riverboats to neuropsychological research assistant to whitewater rafting guide. He has led numerous trips, including snowboarding adventures for at-risk youth and a volunteer project in China for college students. A resident of Colorado, he divides his free time between Denver's museums and its mountains. His first novel, Under Cottonwoods (The Lyons Press, 2004), was a Book Sense 76 selection. He is currently at work on a new novel.

• (1) Preface (2) Acknowledgements (3) The Pikes Peak Gold Rush, 1859(4) The Rise of Judge Lynch, 1859 (5) The Founding of a Frontier Mint, 1860 (6) Gilpin’s Gamble to Save the Union, 1862 (7) The Great Fire, 1863 (8) The Great Flood, 1864 (9) The Sand Creek Massacre, 1864 (10) A Race to Build a Railroad: The Iron Horse Arrives, 1870 (11) The Hop Street Riot, 1880 (12) Building a House of Mirrors: The Prostitution Boom, 1889 (13) The Silver Panic, 1893 (14) The Great Blizzard, 1913 (15) The Epidemic, 1918 (16) The Denver Mint Robbery, 1922 (17) The Rise of the Ku Klux Klan, 1925 (18) Constructing Moffat’s Dream: The Quest to Link to the West, 1927 (19) Water for a Thirsty City: A Small Tunnel Pioneers the Way for Big Growth, 1936 (20) Wine Barrels Save Winter Park: The Development of Denver’s Ski Industry, 1938 (21) The Creation of Red Rocks: A Natural Amphitheatre Rocks the World, 1941 (22) Jazz and “A Certain Racy Wild Smack”: Denver Feels the Beat—1947 (23) Saving Molly Brown: Women Lead the Way for Historic Preservation, 1970 (24) The Blast Heard Round the City, 1973 (25) The Event That Didn’t Happen: The Odd Case of the Almost Olympics, 1976 (26) The Great Airport Gamble, 1989 (27) If You Build It, They Will Come: The Baseball Boom in LoDo, 1995 (28) A Potpourri of Denver Facts (29) Bibliography (30) About the Author