I’m honored to have been invited once again to the Fayetteville (AR) Public Library for a book discussion and signing of Deadly Ties, the first in the Waterside Kennels mystery series. If you’re in the area, please join me from 2-4 p.m. on Sunday, October 11^th. This presentation will explore the art of blending fact, fiction, and folklore when writing a regional mystery series, with a focus on the Ozarks where I’ve set my books.

In honor of that event, I’ll be running posts through the month about the Ozark legends and folklore which inspired my series. You’ll also find stories and information about dogs—after all, this is dogmysteries.com! At the end of the month, I’ll share a teaser from Dangerous Deeds, the next in the Waterside Kennels mystery series.

Even better—through the end of October, I’m running a special giveaway here on my site. Leave a comment and you’re automatically entered into a drawing for a 3-for-1 Deadly Ties package prize: a Kindle edition of the book, the audiobook (narrated by the top-ranked voiceover artist Robin Rowan), and a signed paperback. Keep for yourself or give as gifts! You’re welcome to comment as often as you like from now through October 31^st; every comment equals one entry for the drawing. On November 1^st the winner will be selected at random and announced here, so stay tuned!

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Being a total research geek, I loved digging through the archives for stories about the region, and was thrilled to have regional historians like Phillip Steele share their knowledge with me. In addition to helping me sort through stories, Mr. Steele kindly introduced me to others, including some whose families settled here a century ago. One of the stories I came across repeatedly involved the famous Yocum Dollar. I should note there seem to be almost as many variations in spelling of Yocum as there are versions of the tale!

I first came across the Yocum Dollar in a 1985 article published in the White River Valley Historical Quarterly whose author, Lynn Morrow, suggested that “for the past 150 years various folk legends about silver have circulated in the Ozarks of Missouri and Arkansas.” Morrow notes:

Beliefs in secret mines and buried treasures form a substantial part of the folklore of the Ozarks and the Ouachita Mountains….From the 1880’s to the Depression, regional newspapers reported numerous silver and gold “discoveries”; and the “Legend of the Indian Mine” in Arkansas’ Boone County tells of a mine which contained “such an abundance of silver that the Indians shod their horses with it.” Petroglyphs in Ozark caves have been reported to be codes for the location of gold and silver bullion, and as late as 1882 a family owned business—the Yocum Silver Mine Corporation—purchased a clam-shell crane with a six-ton bucket and a bulldozer to dig out the “famous Yocum mine.”

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Another version of the Yocum Dollar story comes from the genealogical records of H. Ronald Gines and Wanda Lee (Brink) Gines. While I haven’t yet discovered their connection to the Yocums, their narrative, like Morrow’s, refers to a government agent’s description of an “outlaw character” named Solomon Yocum who devised a plan involving Indians, liquor, and silver:

When the Delaware Indians established themselves along this tributary of the White river, the Yoakum’s soon learned that they were recipients of a federal annuity of about $4,000 in silver species. By the 1820’s, some of the Yocums (including Solomon) had found a way to obtain some of that silver. They made potent peach brandy to use as trading material. Providing Indians with liquor was illegal, so, according to Mr. Morrow, the Yocums felt it wise to “launder” their profits by melting down the federal silver and recasting it as the famed “Yocum Dollar.” Creating new coinage was not yet an illegal act. To cover their activities, they claimed the silver came from a mine they had found; later, when the Delaware left the area along with their annuity, the mine entrance was supposedly blocked by a cave-in. It has never been found.

Making peach brandy, while perhaps providing Solomon and the Yochums a bit of local, short lived infamy in connection with their Indian “clientele”, somewhat pales on a historical note compared with the most popular bit of Yoachum, and Ozark history. While some may take slight exception in referring to the Yocum silver dollar as history, and not strictly as mere “legend”, enough has been told, and written about it to qualify it as a true icon of Ozark history. Perhaps no other legend, (as we might as well refer to it), in American history has yielded a more profitable return than that of the Yocum dollar. An entire industry, theme park Silver Dollar City, and its off shoots have now “mined” the legend for what must surely be billions of dollars.

Many people have searched away countless hours, days, months, and even years looking for the source of the legend, the famed Lost Yoachum Silver Mine. Some people believe that it is a canard, or hoax, the typical tale told often by the evening fire, usually with the sure knowledge of someone who knows someone that once saw one of the dollars, or the molds that made them, or knew of someone that knew of someone that had a map. Enough interest has been raised at various times to attract persons schooled in geology, mining, and formations, and reports of a professional nature seem to suggest that there is very little likelihood of silver being found in an quantity and quality to justify believing that a mine actually existed.

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Stories of the Yocum Dollar persist to this day, as evidenced by a 2006 post by Tom Maringer in the ‘US Coins Forum at Cointalk.com. Details included in the post and many of the comments match other accounts. One comment in particular sums up many of the tales I heard myself while visiting with families across the region:

Many people in that area believe wholeheartedly in the Yocum Dollar legend. In fact, I was taken to task by an elderly Yocum descendant for my analysis of the legend… and was told in no uncertain terms that her uncle actually had one, and as a child she’d seen it. But of course she couldn’t remember exactly what it looked like, and nobody in the family knows what happened to it after he died! Sound familiar?

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Thanks to the success of Silver Dollar City, the legend of the Yocum Dollar is alive and well today. I’ve adapted the stories I’ve collected for use in the series and hope readers enjoy the tales as much as I did. Tune in next time for an excerpt from Deadly Ties which tells the tale of the Yocum Dollar as it’s known among the storytellers inhabiting my fictional Hogan County, Arkansas.