The blog
Field notes from the last word
Long-form, sourced stories from the history of Zzyzx, quack medicine and the eastern Mojave. Every article ends with its sources.
5 min read
How Do You Pronounce Zzyzx? The Story Behind the Last Word in the Atlas
Zzyzx is pronounced ZY-zix. Here is why a radio preacher invented the name in 1944, how it got onto maps, and when the federal government made it official.
5 min read
Antediluvian Tea, Re-Hib and Mo-Hair: What Was Actually in Curtis Springer's Cures
Curtis Howe Springer sold tins and tonics by radio for decades. Here is what he claimed, and what the AMA, state investigators and his own employees said was really inside.
5 min read
221 Stations and a Microphone: How Curtis Springer Built a Radio Health Empire
At his peak, Curtis Howe Springer's program ran on 221 U.S. stations and 102 abroad. How a radio evangelist turned airtime, a newsletter and a free bus into a desert empire.
7 min read
The 1872 Mining Law Loophole: How One Man Ran a Resort on Federal Mining Claims for 30 Years
Curtis Springer built a hotel, chapel and airstrip on mining claims. How the General Mining Act of 1872 let him stay for three decades, and what the federal court record says ended it.
5 min read
April 11, 1974: The Day the Government Closed Zzyzx
After a decade of federal litigation, Curtis Howe Springer was removed from Zzyzx on April 11, 1974. What led up to that morning, what happened after, and why the buildings survived.
4 min read
The Mohave Tui Chub: The Little Fish That Outlasted the King of Quacks
The only fish native to the Mojave River nearly vanished. Its last pure populations held on at Zzyzx, including in the lake Curtis Springer dug for his resort.
4 min read
Visiting Zzyzx Today: A Practical Guide to Lake Tuendae and Soda Springs
How to visit Zzyzx off I-15, what you can and can't see, the Lake Tuendae trail, rules, heat safety, birding and nearby stops in Mojave National Preserve.
4 min read
From Quack Resort to Field Station: The CSU Desert Studies Center at Zzyzx
How Curtis Springer's health resort became a California State University field station in 1976, and what scientists and students do at Zzyzx today.
4 min read
Soda Springs Before Springer: Ten Thousand Years at the End of the Mojave River
Long before it was Zzyzx, Soda Springs was an ancient lakeshore, a Mohave and Chemehuevi water source, an 1860s Army redoubt and a stop on the Tonopah & Tidewater Railroad.
5 min read
The Fake File: How the AMA's Bureau of Investigation Tracked Quacks Like Springer
Decades before the FDA policed health ads, a small AMA office kept a "Fake File" on nostrum peddlers. Here is how it worked and what it said about Curtis Howe Springer.
5 min read
Goat Glands, Border Blasters and Cancer Paste: Springer's Rivals in the Golden Age of Radio Quackery
John R. Brinkley, Norman Baker and Harry Hoxsey built medical empires on the airwaves before Curtis Springer. How their stories compare, and why Springer outlasted them all.
5 min read
Why Miracle Cures Work on Us: What Doc Springer Understood About the Mind
Springer's customers weren't fools. Placebo responses, regression to the mean, testimonials and trust all made his teas and crystals feel like they worked. The same tricks still sell today.
Be first to read it
The King of Quacks by C. V. Wooster is the true story of the radio preacher who claimed a desert, named it the last word in the dictionary and sold it all as a miracle.
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