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Book Review of The Contested Plains: Indians, Goldseekers, the Rush to Colorado

The Contested Plains: Indians, Goldseekers,  the Rush to Colorado
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I had to read this book for a senior college history course and found it very interesting! Elliott West does an excellent job of linking the larger history of the region to the Gold Rush times and of giving Native Americans a place in the larger context. This book is fairly sparse on gold rush details: it goes into the founding of Denver and the general timeline of the gold rush but does not include a ton of detail. I found this book to be academic and informative, but also thought-provoking, well-balanced, and even amusing at times.