Heartland River

The simplest and strongest evaluation that I can offer of Heartland River is that it inspired in me the profound desire to experience firsthand the region it chronicles. This reaction, while potentially dismissed as not scholarly informed, is a testament to the volume's scholarly intent to evoke and describe the myriad facets of the Big Sioux River Valley.One of the significant strengths of the edited collection as a whole is the disparate nature of the contributions; each of the chapters offers a markedly different vision of the region. In so doing, however, the work also exhibits a great deal of cohesiveness. The result is that the reader cannot help but feel as though they understand the area as a “place” distinct from its wider context(s) and as a product of its historical and geographic idiosyncrasies.Running the gamut from its introductory section “Natural History and Indigenous Peoples” to the last two essays in its final section, entitled “Personal Reflections,” the collection manages to blend together cohesively a diverse array of scientific and historical voices and couple them with humanistic impressions of the region. In between there are sections entitled “Explorers, Settlers, Outlaws, and War,” “Writers, Scholars, and Artists,” “Politics,” and “Water Quality,” each of which expands the narrative of the Big Sioux River Valley in one or several ways.There are many highlights to be found in the individual chapters, and, while each chapter effectively contributes to the overall purpose of the text, the reader undoubtedly will find that some of them resonate more than others. Since I have not the space here to reflect upon each essay, I will highlight how several of them resonated with me.In part 1, “Natural History and Indigenous Peoples,” chapter 1, “A River through Time: Early Culture on the Big Sioux River,” lays important groundwork in terms of the human occupation and use of the area over the last eleven thousand years. Chapter 2, “From Pipes to Pistols,” introduces an appreciation of the dramatic change precipitated among Native Americans by European contact in the region.Part 2, “Explorers, Settlers, Outlaws, and War,” shifts the emphasis to European colonization of Siouxland. Chapters 7 and 8 stand out for their chronicling of seminal “frontier” events—the James/Unger Gang bank robbery in Northfield, Minnesota, and the “massacre” and kidnapping of settlers during the conflicts of the 1850s, respectively—each of which allow the authors to reflect upon the ambiguity of historical narratives.Part 3, “Writers, Scholars, and Artists,” offer memoirs of specific creators whose works bear the imprint of their connections to the Big Sioux River Valley. Perhaps the most fascinating of these contributions is chapter 10, which chronicles the origins of the term “Siouxland” in the work of author Frederick Manfred. This term, erroneously described by Wallace Stegner as a reference to the Indigenous peoples of the area, was actually an environmental/geographic/social amalgamation meant by Manfred to encompass and invoke the lands and lifestyles of the Big Sioux River Valley and surrounding areas.The two chapters of part 4, “Politics,” describe the electoral politics (chapter 14) and the politics of water (chapter 15). The latter provides an effective point of connection with the topic of part 5, “Water Quality.” Part 6, “Personal Reflections,” which concludes the volume with two heartfelt and insightful essays on the quality and nature of life in the Big Sioux River Valley.By way of conclusion, I will offer one final note of appreciation for this contribution by expressing my hope that other scholars and institutions will take this work as a template and produce similar works describing overlooked (or even not so overlooked) river basins across the American West and beyond

Aesthetics · Archaeology · Art · Context (archaeology · Environmental ethics · Humanism · Indigenous · Literature · Narrative · Political science · Politics · Section (typography · Sociology · American Environmental and Regional History · Archaeology and Natural History · Ecology · History · Law · Philosophy