Merciless Eden: A River of No Return wilderness homestead, both beautiful and brutal, and the history of the pioneers who sought to tame this Merciless Eden

Many sought to carve an existence from the unforgiving wilds of Idaho’s Salmon River Canyon, giving their lives in quest of sanctuary from the growing demands of industrial America. All failed until Joe Zaunmiller, a son of German immigrants, marshaled his pioneer skills to share the bounty of the wilderness with others. A restless hellcat from Texas, fleeing the law and an outlaw husband, barges into this Eden on the river to make it her own. Perched on the bleeding edge between civilization and the wild, Campbell’s Ferry Ranch witnesses the battle over where America will stop development and preserve this vestige of paradise for generations to come. In the long and fascinating history of the Salmon River land on which Campbell’s Ferry sits, men and women have been lured, coaxed and persuaded to claim it and tame it. One by one, these strong, wily and dedicated souls have fallen in love with it, then lost the battle, and sometimes their minds, trying to survive it. Now comes Doug Tims, passionate river-runner and outfitter, and Phyllis Tims, retired fine arts dean and dancer, who have figured out that the best and perhaps only way to preserve Campbell’s Ferry is to reach deep into its past, to study it, learn it and understand it. And oh, what enthralling stories and secrets they uncover along the way. Here, in Merciless Eden, are those dramatic, funny and remarkable stories, some of them literally from the graves of their Campbell’s Ferry forbears. Hank Klibanoff, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Race Beat: The Press, the Civil Rights Struggle, and the Awakening of a Nation