You never know where you can find unexpected book pleasures.

Someone passed along a 1997 book “Across Colorado, Recipes and recollections.”

I am a cooking savage but the Colorado Historical Society had some tidbits I had never heard before.

We always hear about items being taken from third world countries and carried off to Europe or America.

In 1891 Baron Gustaf Nordenskjold visited Mesa Verde and collected 600 Anasazi artifacts to take to Sweden. The sheriff couldn’t stop him because there was no law against it.

Today the Colorado artifacts are in the National Museum of Helsinki in Finland.

Two other funny bits among many good one’s in this book.

One involved Leadville, Colorado’s icebox. Doc Holliday after visiting said Leadville has two seasons, 10 months of winter and two months of late fall.

Finally, Silverton is another famously cold place. One winter night someone froze to death in town. Meanwhile at the hotel, with pretty bad heating, someone walked in a found all the guests gathered around a stove in the lobby the next morning.

The guy said someone froze to death overnight. The quip back from one guest, Which room was he in?”