Print and non-print resources for the study of the plains states in grades K-8.

Great Plains Literature is an exploration of influential literature of the Plains region in both the United States and Canada. It reflects the destruction of the culture of the first people who lived there, the attempts of settlers to conquer the land, and the tragic losses and successes of settlement that are still shaping our modern world of environmental threat, ethnic and racial hostilities, declining rural communities, and growing urban populations. In addition to featuring writers such as Ole Edvart Rölvaag, Willa Cather, and John Neihardt, who address the epic stories of the past, Great Plains Literature also includes contemporary writers such as Louis Erdrich, Kent Haruf, Ted Kooser, Rilla Askew, N. Scott Momaday, and Margaret Laurence. This literature encompasses a history of courage and violence, aggrandizement and aggression, triumph and terror. It can help readers understand better how today's threats to the environment, clashes with Native people, struggling small towns, and rural migration to the cities reflect the same forces that were important in the past.

The art of discovering cultural and natural treasures in everyday landscapes

A Depression-era Appalachian farm wife is branded as a witch by her fundamentalist husband when she bonds with a USDA agent who has traveled to the North Carolina mountains to instruct regional families on how to modernize their homes and farms.

In May 1995, with nothing but a backpack and a vague sense of disquiet, Patrick Dobson left his home and a steady if deadening job in Kansas City, Missouri. Over the next two and a half months he made his way to Helena, Montana, letting chance encounters guide him to a deeper sense of who he was and where he was going. His chronicle of this journey charts his experiences with the seldom-seen people of the small towns, the far-flung outposts, and the Great Plains that make up "our America."

James R. Mead, explorer, naturalist, and plainsman, came to Kansas Territory in 1859. He hunted buffalo, built trading posts in Towanda, on the Ninnescah River near Clearwater, and came to Wichita in 1870. He was responsible for bringing the cattle drives to Wichita, and was a good friend of Jesse Chisholm, Kit Carson, Buffalo Bill Mathewson, and Chief Satanta. Mead was a state senator and president of the Kansas State Historical Society. His writings encompass the territorial days through the march of civilization, and give a firsthand account of buffalo, Native Americans, and the honor of the early settlers.