Jana Bommersbach
Jana Bommersbach is one of Arizona's most honored and respected journalists. Her career has covered every phase of the profession--newspapers, magazines, books, television--and she's won major awards in each. For her work in 1982 for the weekly newspaper New Times, she was named Arizona's Journalist of the Year. In 1997 and 1999, she was named the outstanding columnist in the country by the National City Magazine Association for her columns in Phoenix Magazine. Her debut book, The Trunk Murderess: Winnie Ruth Judd, was nominated for the prestigious Edgar Allan Poe Award by the Mystery Writers of America as one of the five outstanding non-fiction books published in the United States in 1992. It also won Arizona's only literary prize. In 2001, for her work for KTVK-TV, she won a Regional Emmy. In 2004, the Arizona Press Club awarded her its highest honor, the Distinguished Service Award. In 2005, she was an inaugural inductee into the Arizona Hall of Fame. She received a lifetime achievement award in 2006 from the Society of Professional Journalists.
Stories by Jana Bommersbach
Defender of the Black Hills
If Charmaine White Face has her way...
The Apache Cupid
It sounds so romantic: An Apache violin is meant to lure a young woman to the young man playing it.
Collecting American Outlaws
Growing up in Missouri in the 1930s, Wilbur Zink loved listening to family legends.
“Green” Ranching
Today, Sid Goodloe has a lush vista from his two-story ranch house.
Keep Up the Fight
You can stand in some spots and feel "the power of the place."
“Fight of My Life”
“Wink” Crigler grew up as a true child of the Old West-a granddaughter of pioneer ranchers in northeastern Arizona, she learned to ride a horse and respect the land on her father’s White Mountain ranch.
Extreme Western History Adventures
Imagine it's June 25, 1876-the fateful day of George Custer's ill-fated Battle at the Little Bighorn in Montana.
Ghost Town King
Why did people live here, why did they leave and what did they do while they were here?
The Sinagua Sunwatchers
When Kenneth J. Zoll and his wife Nancy retired to Sedona, Arizona, in 2004, Ken had never heard of "archaeoastronomy."
Potawatomi Trail of Death
They were simply in the way, holding land that emigrating farmers wanted as their own.