HEMATITE AND TALES of streets paved with gold drew boatloads of Europeans to the Marquette Iron Range in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula in the late 1800s—including my ancestors. The rugged terrain and savage winters of their new home on the “mountain of iron” threatened their survival, yet they had no chance of returning to The Old County—and they knew it. Some left, but the hardy ones stayed, threw up mining camps and drove mineshafts deep into the granite. They raised families—built churches, railroads, and schools—they created a river of iron that cascaded out of the wilderness. Then the Great Depression struck in 1929 and the river of iron dwindled to a trickle. Without means of support the iron miners and their families persevered against a destroyed economy and fierce winters. This is a tale of how my family survived those tough times. It tells of simple things like collecting water, chopping firewood, and slaughtering hogs, but it is also a template for raising and educating a family on challenging terrain in the midst of poverty.

Born in a farmhouse built by their father in Michigan, Blanche Brown and Janet Rodda are the children of Swedish parents. Over the years their lives sometimes crisscrossed, often separated by many miles, but their values never varied from their teaching of their early childhood.

The Ozarks carried into battle no valorous history: it's only traditions were those of the Army as a whole.

Life in a Small Town: Memoirs of Roy Forslund recounts the story of author LeRoy R. Forslund's life in Iron River, Wisconsin, a small town of only a few hundred residents. With vivid imagery, he tells of the hardship of living in the Great Depression from 1930 to 1940, World War II, and the post-war years. Forslund was born in 1929 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. In 1931, his family moved to Iron River. Although he's lived most of his adult life in the neighboring city of Superior, Forslund has never forgotten his hometown of Iron River-and he never will. In addition to his beloved hometown, Forslund talks of his family and life as he knew it back then, living in an uninsulated farmhouse during the cold winters, using catalogs and magazines as toilet tissue, and wearing homemade clothes and going barefoot in the summer. Forslund married Gert Farry in 1960 and they were blessed with three children: Christopher, Mary, and Jack. Life in a Small Town chronicles his life from 1929 through 2007 and his memories from Iron River-still a good place to hail from!

Scenic rural communities across the nation and around the world have been transformed as they have shifted away from extractive industries such as agriculture, mining, and forestry and toward recreation-based development relying on tourism, vacation homes, and retirees. These communities have built new economies and identities based on local natural resources and are highly dependent on the natural environment. With these changes have come new questions: Do retirees and seasonal residents fit into their new surroundings? Do longtime and new residents share the same values and visions for the future? Do diverse community members disagree about how to manage their forest and water resources? Condos in the Woods explores how these issues are reshaping community structure, employment, and inhabitants' attitudes toward their environment in the Northwoods. Looking at trends from the 1970s to the present, this work moves from the national scale to the Pine Barrens region in northwestern Wisconsin and examines the approaches of residents to the management of their natural resources. At the heart of this story, the authors find that despite the diverse makeup of such communities, residents share many common goals and values and display more successful integration than previously expected. "Makes a major contribution linking and expanding beyond an array of research on the question: What does the growing dominance of seasonal home ownership and use mean for the communities of northern Wisconsin?"—Susan I. Stewart, USDA Forest Service, Northern Research Station