I need to thank my dear friends Paul and Jacki Kleinheksel for all their help and encouragement in writing this book. They shared their love of Holland and Hope College with me, as well as their wonderful library of books on Holland’s history. I’m grateful for excellent local historians such as Robert Swierenga and Randall Vande Water who made the task of researching this novel so much easier. Thanks also to Ted VanderVeen for loaning me his invaluable book of Dutch immigrant memories, inspiring the idea for Geesje’s memoir.
Paul and Jacki Kleinheksel also introduced me to the fascinating work of the Michigan Shipwreck Research Associates. Books by underwater researchers Craig Rich and Valerie VanHeest helped me bring Lake Michigan’s sometimes tragic history to life. The account of the Phoenix disaster in 1847 is a true story. So is the sinking of the Ironsides; however, I took the liberty of moving the date of that shipwreck forward four years to better fit the chronology of my story. The Ironsides actually sank off the coast of Grand Haven, Michigan, on September 15, 1873.
All that remains of the grand Hotel Ottawa is a historical marker near the shore of Black Lake—now known as Lake Macatawa. The splendid hotel burned to the ground in a fire in 1923 and was never rebuilt. The story of the fire that destroyed the Jenison Park Hotel, mentioned in my novel, is true. That hotel burned on the night of July 24, 1897. Tragically, fire also destroyed most of the city of Holland on October 7, 1871, the same weekend as the Great Chicago Fire. Hope College’s oldest building, Van Vleck Hall, was spared—and became my dormitory when I attended Hope College nearly one hundred years later.