Fourteen Mind-Boggling Tales from the Badger State Was Joe Davis, Civil War veteran and Menominee Indian, really the son of Confederate president Jefferson Davis?  What really happened the night that banker H. C. Mead was murdered inside the Exchange Bank of Waupaca?  Did a flying saucer really land in Joe Simonton’s yard, and did the aliens aboard ask for a jug of water and serve him pancakes?  From pirate ships to pancakes from outer space, Myths and Mysteries of Wisconsin makes history fun and pulls back the curtain on some of the state’s most fascinating and compelling stories.

“Most Wisconsin history books cover important highlights, but somehow they miss the stories of headless bankers, the part-time Santa visited by a saucer from space, and the Wisconsin pirate who killed a man. With a piano. You can’t make that stuff up, but Michael Bie didn’t have to because these tales of molls and mobsters, murders and mysteries are all a part of Wisconsin’s past, and our history is richer for their telling.”
—Dennis McCann, former Milwaukee Journal Sentinel columnist; author of Badger Boneyards: The Eternal Rest of the Story

Michael Bie, a Green Bay native, was formally educated at UW-Stevens Point and informally educated at the Upper Wisconsin River Yacht Club, Stevens Point; Del's Bar, La Crosse; and The Joynt, Eau Claire. As a freelance writer, he has multiple magazine and newspaper credits to his name. He can usually be found pursuing an interest in all things Wisconsin. Bie even spent several summers crisscrossing the state by bicycle until he realized that motor vehicles provided the same service in a fraction of the time. Occasionally he considers taking his bike out of storage.