Ancient glaciers passed by the Driftless Area and waterways vein its interior, forming an enchanting, enigmatic landscape of sharp ridgetops and deep valleys. Across time, this rugged topography has been home to an astonishing variety of people: Sauk, Dakota, and Ho-Chunk villagers, Norwegian farmers and Mexican mercado owners, Dominican nuns and Buddhist monks, river raftsmen and Shakespearean actors, Cornish miners and African American barn builders, organic entrepreneurs and Hmong truck gardeners.
The Driftless Reader gathers writings that highlight the unique natural and cultural history, landscape, and literature of this region that encompasses southwestern Wisconsin and adjacent Minnesota, Iowa, and Illinois. The more than eighty selected texts include writings by Black Hawk, Mark Twain, Laura Ingalls Wilder, Frank Lloyd Wright, Aldo Leopold, David Rhodes, and many other Native people, explorers, scientists, historians, farmers, songwriters, journalists, and poets. Paintings, photographs, maps, and other images complement the texts, providing a deeper appreciation of this region's layered natural and human history.
Highlights include excerpts and art from:
Carol Ryrie Brink
William Cronon
John T. Curtis
August Derleth
Richard Eberhart
Fabu
Hamlin Garland
Pedro Guerrero
Hoowaneka (Little Elk)
Juliet Kinzie
Patty Loew
Ben Logan
Truman Lowe
Jacques Marquette
Ken McCullough
Edna Meudt
Mountain Wolf Woman
Zebulon Pike
Henry Schoolcraft
Clifford D. Simak
Wallace Stegner
Pearl Swiggum
Frank Utpatel
Mark Wunderlich
