Liza Jane, the Girl Miner; or, The Iron-Nerved Sport

This issue of Beadle and Adams' Weekly from May 15, 1883, features the first installment of "Liza Jane, the Girl Miner; or, The Iron-Nerved Sport" by Edward L. Wheeler, author of the Deadwood Dick and Rosebud Rob series. The frontier adventure follows parson Jim Priggins's encounter with the independent young miner 'Liza Jane in remote Dragon Gulch, where she works her gold claim alone. Priggins seeks his uncle, Colonel Henry Wetherill, whose daughter Theo is being married that evening to a Californian named Clinton Carmen. 'Liza Jane agrees to guide Priggins to the wedding on two conditions: she may explore the Wetherill mansion unseen during the ceremony, and Priggins himself must perform the marriage rite. She also describes the gulch's legendary haunting—"Don Dragon," a winged creature bearing a ghostly white-robed rider, which has resisted all bullets. As a storm approaches, 'Liza Jane summons her white horse via whistle to depart for the evening's events.