Sign-In
Cart
Aspen Odyssey: A Long Strange Trip...
Paperback
Publisher: Dorrance Publishing Co.
Published: Jun 6 2025
Pages: 298
Weight: 0.88
Height: 0.62 Width: 6.00 Depth: 9.00
Language: English
Seeking to escape the insanity that plagued the nation in the late sixties, Spencer F. Schiffer and his young wife fled New York as soon as he graduated law school in 1971 to spend a winter ski-bumming in Aspen while trying to figure out what to do with their lives. By what he describes as simple twists of fate, he ended up practicing law in Aspen with clients ranging from drug smugglers to Donald Trump. Among them was Aspen's largest landowner in 1981, Hans Cantrup. When Cantrup was forced into bankruptcy in 1983, it set off an unlikely chain of events that were the catalyst for dramatic changes, not only to Aspen's complexion, but to its very core, its heart and soul.
Cantrup's properties were purchased out of bankruptcy by the owner of a Texas savings and loan using the bank's funds, lost the properties in foreclosure, and ended up in prison. Enter Donald Trump, who made a deal with the foreclosing bank to purchase a prime parcel at the base of Aspen Mountain to build a hotel, contingent on the bank getting title at the end of the foreclosure process, but the bank never got title. At the very last hour for redemption of the properties under Colorado law, an unknown developer from D.C., Mohamed Hadid, wired over forty-two-million dollars to the Public Trustee and redeemed all the properties through a lien he purchased from a bank owned by Adnan Khashoggi, the notorious arms dealer of Iran-Contra fame. Adding intrigue, the source of Hadid's funds was the SAAR Foundation, a charitable organization later investigated for money laundering and funding terrorist organizations, including Al-Qaeda, and was dissolved just prior to 9/11. Ironically, Hadid lost the properties to members of the Saudi royal family, who then became Aspen's largest landowners.
The story is a page-turner, filled with ironies and fascinating anecdotes about Aspen in the seventies and eighties, including the unsolved car bomb murder of notorious local cocaine smuggler Steven Grabow in 1986.
About the Author
Spencer F. Schiffer practiced law in Aspen and the Roaring Fork Valley from 1971 until retiring in 2016. He served as Chairman of the City of Aspen Planning and Zoning Commission from 1973 to 1975 and vice president of the Aspen School Board from 1990 to 1995. He earned his undergraduate degree from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania and his law degree from St. John's University. He is the proud father of two daughters and two grandchildren, and now lives in Carbondale, Colorado with his wife and dog. He spends most of his time playing golf, riding his bike, skiing, and writing.
Also in
Biographies General
Bluesland: Portraits of Thirteen Major American Blues Masters
Toby Byron (ED.)
Pete Welding (ED.)
Hardcover
Karl Popper - The Formative Years, 1902 1945: Politics and Philosophy in Interwar Vienna
Hacohen, Malachi Haim
Hardcover
The Children of Athena: Greek Intellectuals in the Age of Rome: 150 Bc0-400 AD
Freeman, Charles
Hardcover
Make It a Double: From Wretched to Wondrous: Tales of One Woman's Lifelong Discovery of Whisky
Sackier, Shelley
Hardcover
The Code Breaker: Jennifer Doudna, Gene Editing, and the Future of the Human Race
Isaacson, Walter
Hardcover
An Enemy Such as This: Larry Casuse and the Fight for Native Liberation in One Family on Two Continents Over Three Centuries
Correia, David
Hardcover
Agents of Chaos: Thomas King Forçade, High Times, and the Paranoid End of the 1970s
Howe, Sean
Hardcover
Better Living Through Birding: Notes from a Black Man in the Natural World
Cooper, Christian
Hardcover
The Secret Life of the Savoy: Glamour and Intrigue at the World's Most Famous Hotel
Williams, Olivia
Paperback
The Badger: The Life of Bernard Hinault and the Legacy of French Cycling
Fotheringham, William
Paperback
Florence Kelley and the Nation's Work: The Rise of Womens Political Culture, 1830-1900
Sklar, Kathryn Kish
Paperback
The Devil's Diary: Alfred Rosenberg and the Stolen Secrets of the Third Reich
Kinney, David
Wittman, Robert K.
Paperback
Living with a Wild God: A Nonbeliever's Search for the Truth about Everything
Ehrenreich, Barbara
Paperback
Seafaring Women: Adventures of Pirate Queens, Female Stowaways, and Sailors' Wives
Cordingly, David
Paperback
The Butcher, the Embezzler, and the Fall Guy: A Family Memoir of Scandal and Greed in the Meat Industry
Cherington, Gretchen
Paperback
My Own Devices: True Stories from the Road on Music, Science, and Senseless Love
Dessa Wander
Hardcover
Nobody's Girl: A Memoir of Surviving Abuse and Fighting for Justice
Giuffre, Virginia Roberts
Hardcover
How to Be Okay When Nothing Is Okay: Tips and Tricks That Kept Me Alive, Happy, and Creative in Spite of Myself
Lawson, Jenny
Hardcover
Family of Spies: A World War II Story of Nazi Espionage, Betrayal, and the Secret History Behind Pearl Harbor
Kuehn, Christine
Hardcover
Dangerous, Dirty, Violent, and Young: A Fugitive Family in the Revolutionary Underground
Dohrn, Zayd Ayers
Hardcover
A Walk in the Park: The True Story of a Spectacular Misadventure in the Grand Canyon
Fedarko, Kevin
Paperback
Catch the Devil: A True Story of Murder, Deception, and Injustice on the Gulf Coast
Colloff, Pamela
Hardcover