The Corpse on Boomerang Road: Telluride's War on Labor, 1899-1908

On August 8, 1907, newspapers in Telluride, Colorado, declared that the bones of William J. Barney had been recovered from a shallow grave on Boomerang Hill, thus proving the Telluride Miners' Union had butchered him in 1901. Many mine owners, newspaper editors, and Pinkerton detectives claimed the union had inaugurated a reign of terror with Barney's slaying, a nightmare of brutality that would end only when the union men and their families were driven from the region and their leaders were hanging from the gallows. The belief that the Miners' Union was a pack of assassins and its victims were numerous has endured for more than a hundred years. Yet meticulous research has revealed no reign actually existed, and the supposed victims were, in fact, alive long after their alleged murders.