Santa Fe Trail Association Award of Merit 2009 

"In Recognition of Your Significant Contributions to Trail History with the Publication of It Happened on the Santa Fe Trail."

Review from Wagon Tracks:  "This collection is highly recommended to anyone interested in Trail stories."  

Steve Glassman, It Happened on the Santa Fe Trail . Guilford , CT : Globe Pequot Press, 2008. Pp. x + 181. Maps, illustrations, bibliography, index. Paper, $12.95 + shipping. Available from Last Chance Store. http://www.lastchancestore.org/

This compilation of 29 Trail stories is based on the latest scholarship, is very accurate historically, and each story is well told and easy to read. The introduction provides a good overview of Trail history, and the episodes are tied to the larger picture.  

Topics included are Juan de Oñate (1601), Nathan Boone (1804, including Booneslick and the Booneslick Trace), Auguste Pierre Chouteau (1817, prisoner in Santa Fe), William Becknell (1821),George Sibley (1825), Jedediah Smith (1831), Bill Williams (1836), Antonio José Chávez (1843), Francis Parkman (1846), Susan Shelby Magoffin (1846), Lewis Garrard (1847), Dr. John Sappington (1849), Dr. Michael Steck (1852), Satank (1860), Bloody Bill Anderson (1862), Lydia Spencer Lane, Edward W. Wynkoop (1864), Kit Carson at Adobe Walls (1864), John M. Chivington and Sand Creek Massacre (1864), Franz Huning (1867), Johnny Roenigk (1869, railroad story), Lucien Maxwell (1870), Bat Masterson (1874), Uncle Dick Wootton (1880), Charley Parker (1899), Cimarron River Flood (1914), Kansas City Union Station Massacre (1933), La Fonda (1968), and the final chapter, “The Santa Fe Trail Lives On,” comemorates Marc Simmons’s rousing keynote address at the first symposium and gives recognition to the SFTA (of which Glassman is a member). There is a section of Trail Trivia at the end.

Each episode will appeal to readers of all ages, and the stories will cause anyone with a modicum of curiosity to want to know more (the 9-page bibliography provides direction). That is the sign of a good introductory Trail book. This collection is highly recommended to anyone interested in Trail stories.