Hafen, LeRoy R. Colorado: The Story of a Western Commonwealth. Denver, Colorado: The Peerless Publishing Company, 1933. First Edition. [7811]
Dark green cloth with gilt titles, 6 1/2 x 9 1/2 inches, paste outline of removed bookplate inside front, signed by Irving Stone on the ffep, ffep weakly attached. 328 clean pp., many illustrations from photographs, tight. Good. Hardcover.
This copy signed on the ffep by Irving Stone (1903-1989), American author of popular historical biographies. His best-known works are perhaps Lust for Life (1934) and The Agony and the Ecstasy (1961), both of which were made into popular movies.
No. 944 in Adams, The Rampaging Herd: A Bibliography of Books and Pamphlets on Men and Events in the Cattle Industry.
The author made wonderful use of archival photos and historic documents to write this history.
LeRoy Reuben Hafen (1893-1985), b. Bunkerville, Nevada; d. Palm Desert, California. Hafen was a historian of the American West and for many years professor of history at Brigham Young University. He was for thirty years (1924-1954) the Colorado State Historian, during which time he was also director of the Colorado State Museum and editor of the Colorado Magazine. A prolific writer and editor, he played a key role in the production of works on the Rocky Mountains, Mountain Men, Colorado Indians, the Fur Trade, &c.