The book
The King of Quacks
How Curtis Howe Springer Stole the Desert, Built Zzyzx, and Sold It All as a Miracle.
In 1944 a radio preacher with no medical degree drove into the eastern Mojave, claimed a spring-fed oasis under the mining laws and named it the last word in the English language. For thirty years he sold teas, salts and miracles by mail to listeners across the country. Then the federal government came to take the desert back.
The King of Quacks is C. V. Wooster’s narrative history of Curtis Howe Springer and Zzyzx: the con, the kingdom, the court fight and the endangered fish that outlived them all. It is built on court records, contemporary journalism and the National Park Service’s own history of the site.
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About the author
C. V. Wooster is a National Board Certified Teacher, former school administrator and author of narrative histories including Searching for Bowlby, along with fiction and humor. Read more at cvwooster.com, or see the book’s catalog page at cvwooster.com/books/king-of-quacks.
More desert history from C. V. Wooster
When the Birds Go Silent is a novel of the Mojave War of 1858–1859, told from both sides of the Colorado River. Mrs. Orcutt’s Driveway is the true story of a widow at Newberry Springs, on old Route 66, whose driveway stood in the path of Interstate 40.
Further reading
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