KVMR Interview with Steve Baker

Urbane host (and KVMR Program Director) interviews Richard and Terry about QONM and our multimedia presentation, California and the Civil War. Emphasis is on local themes (KVMR is located in Nevada City, the setting for the novel).

    Topics:

Why give a factual history talk to promote a novel? • Our research full of fascinating surprises. • California politics were dominated by Southern Democrats until a deadly duel between California's Chief Justice and her US Senator turned popular sentiment against the "Chivalry." • A gifted orator and a Southern general spare California from the horrors of partisan war.

The historic rivalry between Grass Valley and Nevada City flare up in a night of terror in 1865.

The inspiration for QONM: the infamous Bullion Bend Robbery near Placerville, a true Civil War incident in which a band of armed guerillas took a Wells Fargo treasure shipment and left the stage driver a receipt from the CSA.

1860's Nevada City, rich in gold and diverse in culture, truly the "Queen of the Northern Mines."