Out Here on Our Own: An Oral History of an American Boomtown

J.J. Anselmi’s Out Here on Our Own tells the story of Rock Springs, Wyoming, a mining boomtown with a history of brutal racial violence, widespread addiction, prostitution, and a staggeringly high per-capita suicide rate—yet a place that has proved remarkably resilient. Anselmi stitches together an array of original interviews with people who’ve seen those things firsthand, tracing the boom-bust trajectory of a town known for its corruption, vice, and violence. Amid such horrors as the mass...