Review: Loved this book about a colorful rogue of American history
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 11 9, 2012
One of the most colorful, intriguing, and notorious men of 19th and 20th century America is a man named Walter Edward Perry Scott, who became known as Death Valley Scotty. At the age of 11, he left home to ranch with his two brothers in Nevada until he joined Buffalo Bill Cody's Wild West Show as a performer. When he met and fell in love with Miss Ella Milius, they moved to Colorado to begin a gold mining operation. When it failed, Scotty tried to return to the Wild West Show, but they turned him away.It was then that Scotty turned to being a con man, and therein came his successes. He conned a New York business man into investing in a fake gold mine. Using the newspapers to gain notoriety and fuel speculation, he kept his investors on the hook with lies. When they began to doubt him and they demanded to see the gold as proof, the bag of gold was supposedly stolen. Thousands of dollars were lost in the investment.Scotty kept his notoriety sparked when he claimed he could break the cross country train speed record and successfully broke the record by mere minutes, earning him coverage on all the front pages of the newspapers at the time.Scotty continued with numerous other mining cons, never confessing or admitting his falsehoods. Soon, to keep up his charades, he began stealing from other mines to prove he had the ore to prove his story. He landed in jail because he was sued by his creditors based on his outrageous claims of wealth and mining. He even built a huge castle in Death Valley on land disputed not to be owned by him.I had never heard of Death Valley Scotty, but by the time I finished reading the novel, I gained a strong understanding of the man, his passion for life, and his bold character. Robert Carter's Novel about Scotty's life brings to life the motivations and dreams of this colorful historical figure. Sticking close to the facts and highly researched, Carter's fascination for Scotty highlights every page. The book is detailed and well written, and although many of Scotty's activities are definitely criminal, Carter balances this by showing us what motivates and drives this infamous character, giving the reader lots to sympathize with. I definitely recommend this book to lovers of American History.