Rosemary Miner

GLENS FALLS POST STAR, April 17,2008

Mystery writer incorporates history in works
by Doug Cruse

Rosemary Miner is a woman with murder on her mind. As a mystery writer, the Queensbury resident spends most of her free time plotting suspicious activies.
"I don't sit down every morning," Miner said of her writing process. "But whatever you're doing, you're carrying the story in your head." As author of "Once Upon A Time To Die For," Miner mixes history with intrigue by writing a mystery set in the Adirondacks in 1873. Her central character, Grace Wickham, is an herbal healer who inadvertently becomes a sleuth. Miner will talk about her work at 7 pm Thursday in the community room at the Crandall Public Library. During the discussion she will give a preview of the soon-to-be released "Lies and Logs to Die For," the second book in the Wickham series.
A retired teacher, Miner spent most of her life engulfed in history. Her master's thesis at Union College in Schenectady focused on the Southern antebellum pedestal figure, which denied women equal rights in the name of protecting her.
Her first published book, "Adirondack Bridgebuilder From Charleston:The Life and Times of Robert Cogdell Gilchrist" chronicled the life of a Confederate major who in 1871 built the first suspension bridge across the Hudson River.
"It was a little gem of history no one knew before," Miner said.
Although she never intended on becoming a mystery writer, the role is fitting for someone who enjoys uncovering little known facts.
"I had no intention of wirting mysteries, but I do like history. It's sort of a sneaky way of getting history across," Miner said.
Miner lived in Wevertown for 20 years, and the sleepy community seemed like an obvious setting for a book.
She said local mystery writer, Anne White, got her thinking about the new direction for her writing. "Everything out of Ane's mouth was that it would make a great place for a murder," Miner said.
So Miner took her friend's advice and started penning a mystery, one set in Wevertown in the 1870's.
"I knew that period. That was perfect for my setting for the mystery," she said.
But more important than setting -- even plot, according to Miner ---are the characters.
"I write historical cozies. There's not a lot of blood and guts. The characters are the most important part of it," she said. "It's just my personal opinion that the mystery isn't that big of a deal. It's the people I want the readers to care about."
In Wickham, Miner created a figure worthy of a series.
"She's 6 ft. tall and she has flaming red hair, which she despised as a youngster," Miner said. The author, a former redhead pulled the detail from her own life.
"I wanted my character to be striking, but she's not realy beautiful. She has an intelligent face. She's the kind of character that other people reach out to. She's ahead of her time," Miner said.
Although the second Wickham book has not yet reached the bookstore shelves, Miner already is working on a third.
"The third is going to be about Adirondack rubies," she said.
Although the book promises to be full of intrigue, history is sure to play a crucial role.
"I love the research part," she said. "Once you have all that in your head, then you sort of figure out what happens next. That's what history is. It's a story."

TIMES UNION, Albany, New York, Sunday, June 10, 2007, Section J, Travel- Books

Author turns Adirondacks into crime scene by Renate Wildermuth, special to the Times Union.

After retiring from Niskayuna High School in 1986, Rosemary Miner turned to crime. Writing crime, that is.

Her first historical murder mystery, “Once Upon a Time to Die For” (Hilliard and Harris’ 184 pages; $16.95) follows the tribulations of Gracie Wickham, the 6-foot-tall-red-haired daughter of a doctor in the Adirondacks of 1873.

After a year of medical school, Gracie returns to Wevertown and unofficially takes over her late father’s role in the community, where hide-tanning has become a growth industry. One day, the body of the tannery owner is found in a steaming tanning pit. Since the constable is out of town, the coroner asks for Gracie’s help figuring out what happened – and a sleuth is born.

“Everyone comes to her when something goes wrong,” Miner says. During a recent interview, she shows a generous smile, but is also no-nonsense, with her hair cut short and simple good hoop earrings as her only adornment.

“Death was not unusual,” Miner says, referring to the 19-century tanning industry in the Adirondacks. “It was smelly, dirty and dangerous.” After all, she says, the liquid used was made from hemlocks and acids.

Despite the gruesome death, her book is more of a historical cozy. “That means it doesn’t have gore. But it does have a body,” she says.

“I want to make history fun,” says the mother of three grown sons and grandmother to two teenagers; who taught American history for 19 years at Niskayuna.

Her background helps as she takes factual details and fits them into a bigger picture, she says. “Research is so important.”

In her books, that picture centers on Wevertown, the Warren County hamlet where she now lives and breathes life into her historical characters. Although most are made –up, some are real and had connections to upstate New York, such as Susan B. Anthony, who lived and taught in Washington County; Dr. Thomas Durant, a railroad magnate who had a home in North Creek’; and painter Winslow Homer and his brother, Charlie, who came to nearby Minerva to hunt and fish.

Contemporary artist and area resident, Jan Palmer, provided a historical sketch of Wevertown for the inside cover of the book. Palmer is perhaps best known for illustrating the Raggedy Ann and Andy series.

While the characters in “Once Upon a Time to Die For” are fictional, Miner has borrowed from real people to create them. Grace Wickham, for instance, has the freckles of Miner’s college roommate. Her first name and personality were inspired by Miner’s former neighbor and friend, Gracie Harrington, one of two elderly sisters who lived in Wevertown.

“I milked them for memorable stories,” Miner admits.

Miner’s later husband was a doctor and provided her with much of the knowledge she needed for the book, from information on occipital bones to strabismus.

More mayhem

Although Miner’s novel was just recently published, she’s already under contract for a second in a series that will continue to play out in Wevertown with the same characters -- including Gracie, who will remain a central figure. The background for murder will change, however, from the tanneries to the just-as-dangerous log drives in her second book. Her third will investigate mayhem in the garnet-mining industry.

Miner has a bachelor’s degree in early childhood education from the State University of New York Colleges at Plattsburgh and a master’s degree in American studies from Union College in Schenectady. She began writing for her high school and college newspapers. After her retirement and move to Wevertown, she turned to nonfiction.

She wrote articles in The Chronicle (Glens Falls), The Christian Science Monitor and The Historical Appreciation Society. The first book she wrote was a biography, “Adirondack Bridgebuilder From Charleston: The Life and Times of Robert Cogdell Gilchrist” published in 1993 by North Country Books.

Her focus changed, however, when she met mystery writer, Anne White, in a writing class led by Pulitzer Prize-winner Oscar Hijuelos at the Lake George Arts Project. Miner had recently published an article called “Tannery Row” in Adirondack Life magazine. “That would be a good place for a murder,” she recalls White saying...

Miner began her novel shortly thereafter in a workshop led by author Bibi Wein, sponsored by the Adirondack Center For Writing.

She has been a member of Sisters in Crime, an international women mystery writers group, for five years and belongs to the local Albany chapter formed last October in Glenmont called Mavens of Mayhem. She travels more than 70 miles to attend meetings.

When the interview turns to the question of whodunit in “Once Upon a Time to Die For,” Miner gives a strict look that her former Niskayuna students might recognize and says, “You never tell!”

Oh, well. Readers will have to buy the book to find out.

And who says crime doesn’t pay?


Renate Wildermurth is a freelance writer living in North Creek.

Mystery Scene, Volume 23. Issue 2. Spring 2007, Whole issue, Number 99

ON BEING LED TO MURDER
By Rosemary Miner

My good friend, mystery writer, Anne White, has a habit of saying, “That would be a good place for a murder!” So when she saw my article for Adirondack Life about tanneries in the 19th century, you can guess wheat she said. And in the first chapter of my first mystery, Once Upon A Time To Die For, a body is discovered in a steaming tannery vat.

Anne and I met in a writing class with Pulitzer prize winner Oscar Hijuelos as our instructor. Oscar told us to take a few minutes and write down a surprising moment we had experienced. I thought he would ask us to develop it for homework. Instead he told us to give it to the person on your right (that was Anne), who would take it home and turn it into a story. Our friendship began that night and it wasn’t long before I discovered Anne had an interest in mysteries.

Once Upon A Time To Die For is set in the Adirondack hamlet where I live, in 1873, when it is just awakening to tourism with new inns and hotels. The tannery gave Irish immigrants jobs and a roof over their head.

My amateur sleuth, Grace Wickham, is recently back from a year of medical school. She supports herself as an herbalist, and if asked, calls herself an Herbal Doctor interested in preventive medicine. She writes for a local newspaper, which brings her a small income. Many of her patients pay her with homegrown food, or fish and venison in a sort of barter system. Her father was the local doctor for years, and Grace is seen as taking his place, which is why she’s called to the local tannery after an accident.

I want the reader to imagine how dark and dismal the tannery looks after workers have gone home and Grace, six feet tall with fiery red hair, stands surveying the equipment in eerie silence, while shadows hang on the wall like bats. The manager hands her a lantern and she walks across the slippery floor between the many steaming tanning vats connected by a series of pipes. And there’s the body!

Within minutes, my amateur sleuth is joined by a half dozen men stomping into the room and peering down at the body. This is my opportunity to set up suspects and motives, for the men who gather all have a reason to dislike or hate the dead man.

The hotel owner, Ambrose Baldoon, arrives with the others. Baldoon’s hotel sits on the corner across from the general store, and a few doors from Grace’s house. He’s one of the few men taller than Grace’s six feet.

Luckily for me, there were several historical figures in the area at the time the story happens and I take advantage of them. Winslow Homer was painting water colors while staying in the Adirondacks and one of Grace’s suspects works as a guide for him. One of Grace’s friends is Susan B. Anthony, who lived and taught in nearby Washington County. After being arrested for voting in the 1872 election, she is traveling the country lecturing for women’s rights. I use some of Anthony’s own words in her correspondence with Grace, who agrees with Susan that, “a woman should have her own purse.”

Back to Anne. We don’t barter plots but we do talk about writing whenever we get together. This historical dozy is dedicated “To Anne, who led me to crime.”