These were the valiant

Here is the flavor, the romance, the very essence of old New Mexico captured in a series of profiles of men and women who, like Kit Carson, "led the way" and helped to develop the New Mexico of today. This is a nostalgic look at the past that will help New Mexicans to understand the present, as well as to enjoy remembered adventures of other days. Across the pages of this informal history march the great and near-great of yesteryear...Kit Carson the scout; St. Vrain, the trader-trapper; Bishop Lamy, General Kearny, Sam Watrous, the tree-planting trader; The Hermit of Hermit's Peak, Granny Brackett, Mother Magdelen and the Miraculous Staircase, the Romeros of Romerville, and many more--some well-remembered, some forgotten, except by their families or an obscure footnote in a volume of history. Ann Nolan Clark in a beautiful writing for which she is so well known to New Mexicans brings to sparkling life little known episodes in the lives of pioneers of northern New Mexico.