Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Review Of With Good Intentions: Quaker Work Among The Pawnees, Otos, And Omahas In The 1870s By Clyde A. Milner Ii, Robert H. Keller Jr.

Great Plains Quarterly

Early in 1869, President Ulysses S. Grant began his "Quaker Policy" by inviting the Society of Friends to take responsibility for the administration of Indian affairs in Nebraska, Kansas, and the Indian Territory. The Friends, by appointing superintendents, hiring all reservation employees, and operating mission schools, would replace a corrupt patronage system and at the same time help tribes accommodate to a new way of life. The federal government, for its part, would supply goods, money, and official endorsement. Clyde A. Milner investigates the results of this experiment on three small reservations in Nebraska.

Over the past twenty years historians …

Review Of American Farm Tools: From Hand-Power To Steam-Power By R. Douglas Hurt, Reynold M. Wik

Great Plains Quarterly

R. Douglas Hurt deals with the invention and development of American farm implements and machinery with a special emphasis on the nineteenth century. The material is organized around the functions of various agricultural machines used in the major grain-growing states. Ten chapters focus on the improvements made in plows, grain drills, corn planters, cultivators, reapers, binders, headers, corn binders, corn shellers, threshing machines, combined harvesters, mowing machines, hay stackers, feed mills, and steam traction engines.

The author decided to describe certain lines of farm equipment without trying to catalogue all agricultural tools, implements, and machines. Therefore the reader will not …

Mapping The North American Plains An Introduction, Gary E. Moulton

Great Plains Quarterly

Exploration, no matter how scientifically oriented or technologically involved, has been popularly viewed as mostly romantic adventure. From Renaissance mariners to "right stuff" astronauts, explorers have been remembered more for their experiences than for their accomplishments. Partly to correct this notion, the Center for Great Plains Studies at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln sponsored the symposium Mapping the North American Plains in April 1983, to show achievements in cartography on the North American plains from earliest times to the present. Twelve speakers from the United States, Canada, and England presented addresses on a variety of topics within the theme. Four of …

Patterns Of Promise Mapping The Plains And Prairies, 1800-1860, John L. Allen

Great Plains Quarterly

During the great drive of the American people to the Pacific, the vast area lying between the Mississippi River and the Rocky Mountains was, for the better part of the nineteenth century, a zone of passage rather than a region of settlement. "Crossing the plains" became an epithet for what, to many, was a tedious but necessary part of a long journey to the dramatic Rockies, the exotic Southwest, or the bucolic Pacific Coast. In the romanticism that gripped America during the years between the opening of the nineteenth century and the Civil War, the supposedly featureless plains were largely …

"A Chart In His Way" Indian Cartography And The Lewis And Clark Expedition, James P. Ronda

Great Plains Quarterly

The sixteenth of January 1805 was not the kind of day Lewis and Clark would have chosen for calm deliberation and the thoughtful exchange of cartographic information. On that cold Dakota day, Fort Mandan was the scene of angry words and hostile gestures as Mandans and Hidatsas traded jeers and insults. While Lewis and Clark watched helplessly, Hidatsa warriors from the village of Menetarra charged Mandans with spreading malicious rumors designed to breed fear and keep Hidatsas away from the expedition. As the tough talk flew higher, the expedition's hopes for diplomacy sank. But in the midst of the bitterness …

Review Of Atlas Of The Lewis And Clark Expedition Edited By Gary Moulton & The Journals Of The Lewis And Clark Expedition, John L. Allen

Great Plains Quarterly

Revised editions of previously existing works of scholarship are not normally very exciting. They may include some new discoveries and some new interpretations and, by virtue of the benefits of hindsight, be marginally better than their predecessors. Therefore, anyone who may wish to dismiss this new version of the atlas of the Lewis and Clark journals as a "mere" re-edition of the earlier version edited by Reuben Gold Thwaites had better be advised: this new atlas is a great deal more than just are-editing of the Thwaites atlas. And it is very exciting indeed. The new Moulton atlas varies from …

The Scientific Instruments Of The Lewis And Clark Expedition, Silvio A. Bedini

Great Plains Quarterly

The Lewis and Clark expedition, "the most consequential and romantic peace-time achievement in American history," had its genesis in the mind of Thomas Jefferson fully two decades before the exploring party departed from Pittsburgh on 31 August 1803. The need to determine the character and . expanse of the western regions of the continent lingered in his mind, and during the intervening years he encouraged three unsuccessful attempts to explore them. After he assumed the presidency in 1801, he was finally able to bring his dream to realization. The venture not only achieved all that Jefferson had hoped, but also …

Notes And News- Winter 1984

Great Plains Quarterly

NOTES & NEWS

NEH SUMMER SEMINARS FOR COLLEGE TEACHERS

CENTER FOR GREAT PLAINS STUDIES SYMPOSIA

"VIEWS OF A VANISHING FRONTIER"

SANDHILLS SEMINAR

CONFERENCES AND COLLECTIONS

Mapping The Missouri River Through The Great Plains, 1673-1895, W. Raymond Wood

Great Plains Quarterly

For decades, "the Way West" referred not to any kind of overland trail but to the channel of the Missouri River. St. Louis became famous as the gateway to the West because it was the port of entry to the vast western domains drained in part by this mighty stream. Considering the extensive scholarship devoted to such land routes as the Oregon, Santa Fe, and Overland trails, it is curious that the equally important role of the Missouri River as an artery of exploration has been neglected. Only three works have made any real attempt to offer such a history, …

Title And Contents- Winter 1984

Great Plains Quarterly

GREAT PLAINS QUARTERLY

WINTER 1984 VOL. 4 NO.1.

CONTENTS

MAPPING THE NORTH AMERICAN PLAINS: AN INTRODUCTION Gary E. Moulton

PATTERNS OF PROMISE: MAPPING THE PLAINS AND PRAIRIES, 1800-1860 John L. Allen

MAPPING THE MISSOURI RIVER THROUGH THE GREAT PLAINS, 1673-1895 W. Raymond Wood

"A CHART IN HIS WAY": INDIAN CARTOGRAPHY AND THE LEWIS AND CLARK EXPEDITION James P. Ronda

THE SCIENTIFIC INSTRUMENTS OF THE LEWIS AND CLARK EXPEDITION Silvio A. Bedini

BOOK REVIEWS

Atlas of the Lewis and Clark Expedition

Fur Trade and Exploration: Opening the Far Northwest, 1821-1852

NOTES & NEWS

Review Of Fur Trade And Exploration: Opening The Far Northwest, 1821-1852 By Theodore J. Karamanski, John Warkentin

Great Plains Quarterly

Historians of Canadian exploration have repeatedly told the tale of the great journeys that made known the major lineaments of northern North America, but rarely can one find an integrated account of the exploration of a major region. Theodore Karamanski makes an important contribution to the exploration literature of North America not only by providing a comprehensive history of the exploration by Euro-americans of northwestern Canada, a region larger than many countries, but also by providing much new information on the course of individual exploratory journeys within a context where the significance of th~ travels can be understood. This is …

Review Of Read This Only To Yourself: The Private Writings Of Midwestern Women, 1880-1910 By Elizabeth Hampsten, Julie Roy-Jeffrey

Great Plains Quarterly

Hampsten has written a rich, provocative book on the private writings of midwestern women between 1880 and 1910. As she points out, there has been a long tradition of studying working-class male authors but little interest in working-class women writers. To recapture women's consciousness, Hampsten suggests, one must do more than approach the sources as if they were written by men. Not only the content but also the omissions, the form, and the style of women's writings are significant.

The structure and style of working-class diaries and letters bear few resemblances to what was considered "good writing" by contemporaries. Hampsten …

Review Of Indian-White Relations In The United States: A Bibliography Of Works Published 1975- 1980 By Francis Paul Prucha, Roy W. Meyer

Great Plains Quarterly

One of the shortcomings of any bibliography is that it is somewhat out-of-date by the time it is published. The more being written in its area of coverage, the sooner it needs to be updated. It is an indication of the current interest in Indian white relations that Francis Paul Prucha's compendious bibliographical guide published in 1977 has already had to be supplemented with a bibliography containing more than three thousand entries. In the single area of legal relations, for example, nearly three hundred fifty new titles have appeared in the years 1975-1980.

Users of Prucha's original guide will find …

Review Of Alfred Jacob Miller: Artist On The Oregon Trail, Joseph C. Porter

Great Plains Quarterly

This volume is devoted to the life and oeuvre of the American artist, Alfred Jacob Miller. Historians, art historians, anthropologists, and geographers are indebted to Miller, who depicted the American wilderness frontier. In 1837, the flamboyant Scots nobleman and soldier, William Drummond Stewart, chose Miller as the artist who would record his odyssey to the Rocky Mountains. With forty five men and twenty carts, Miller and Stewart traveled along what became the Oregon Trail to Horse Creek in Wyoming, where the artist witnessed the 1837 rendezvous of mountain men, Indians, and traders. The rendezvous and subsequent excursions into the Wind …

Review Of The Code Of The West By Bruce A. Rosenberg, Henry Nash Smith

Great Plains Quarterly

In Custer: The Epic of Defeat (1975), Bruce A. Rosenberg analyzed more than a century of discussion of the massacre of the general and some two hundred cavalrymen under his command by Sioux Indians near the Little Bighorn River in 1876. The book demonstrates how in American popular culture this catastrophe was transformed into the heroic triumph of Custer's Last Stand. Rosenberg says that in his new book, The Code of the West, he has used the same method but expanded its "cultural implications." His table of contents does indeed present an attractive variety of topics. In addition to …

Across The 49th Thunderstorms In The Northern Great Plains, Alec H. Paul

Great Plains Quarterly

Hail, lightning, flash floods, erosion, severe gusty winds, and tornadoes produce multimillion- dollar losses to the economy of the northern plains each summer. Research into these meteorological phenomena has been fragmented by the presence of political boundaries in the Great Plains, especially the 49th parallel, which separates the United States and Canada. Perceptions of and responses to the thunderstorm hazard still differ north and south of the border. Tornadoes, for example, have only recently appeared in the weather forecasts for the Canadian prairies, and such responses to summer storms as weather modification experiments and hail insurance coverage have been made …

Index- Fall 1983

Great Plains Quarterly

Great Plains Quarterly Fall 1983

Index pp. 248-54 (7 pages)

Notes And News- Fall 1983

Great Plains Quarterly

NOTES & NEWS

GREAT PLAINS SYMPOSIA ANNOUNCED

GUIDE TO AMERICAN INDIAN RESOURCE MATERIALS PUBLISHED

NEBRASKA ARTISTS AND POETS

Review Of The Dust Bowl: An Agricultural And Social History By R. Douglas Hurt, Gilbert C. Fite

Great Plains Quarterly

This is the third book to appear recently on the Dust Bowl and the 1930s. Some readers may ask whether the subject deserves another study so closely on the heels of Donald Worster's Dust Bowl: The Southern Plains in the 1930s, and Paul Bonnifield's The Dust Bowl: Men, Dirt, and Depression, both published in 1979. But the fact is that scholars have been too long in filling this important historical void.

In The Dust Bowl: An Agricultural and Social History, R. Douglas Hurt has written a brief, clear, straightforward account of life and times on the southern plains …

Review Of The Red River In Southwestern History By Carl Newton Tyson, Forrest D. Monahan

Great Plains Quarterly

In this book Carl Newton Tyson recounts the role of the Red River in southwestern history from the time that Spanish explorers discovered the stream to the modern era. Flowing some twelve hundred miles from its origin on the Texas high plains, it drains about one-tenth of the continent before emptying its waters into the Mississippi. Claimed by Spain as a result of Coronado's marching across its upper reaches in 1541, it became a river in dispute from about 1700, when Frenchmen appeared along its lower reaches. In fact, it became a conduit for expanding the French empire westward. The …

Review Of Arapahoe Politics, 1851-1978: Symbols In Crisis Of Authority By Loretta Fowler, William K. Powers

Great Plains Quarterly

The thesis of this book is that the Arapahoe, who share the Wind River reservation of Wyoming with the Shoshoni, have somehow adapted better than other tribes to white domination through the creation and use of effective political symbols, particularly those values associated with traditional age grades, a distinctive feature of early Arapahoe society. Fred Eggan, in the Introduction, states that it is clear from the author's account "that the Arapahoe have made the most successful adjustment to white culture of any Plains tribe" (xv, italics added). It is a wonder why this intolerable statement was included. For many …

Review Of Magic Images: Contemporary Native American Art By Edwin L. Wade And Rennard Strickland, Mary Jane Schneider

Great Plains Quarterly

One of the attractions of American Indian art is that it offers something of interest to practically everyone. For the romantic there are paintings that depict past tribal life-ways. For the realist there are contemporary paintings that present current social issues and depict Indians as citizens of a complex society. For collectors there are avant-garde pieces of individual vision that will influence the direction of American Indian art. For scholars, there is the opportunity to study, evaluate, and debate the origins and relative merits of styles and techniques. Magic Images: Contemporary Native American Art reflects this diversity of interest in …

Review Of The West As Romantic Horizon By William H. Goetzmann, Joseph C. Porter, And David C. Hunt, Robert Spence

Great Plains Quarterly

This book, the first major publication of the Center for Western Studies at Omaha's Joslyn Art Museum, serves as "an introduction to the Inter North collections" housed at the museum. The three collections are the Maximilian Bodmer cache of 427 sketches and watercolors, the Alfred Jacob Miller collection of more than one hundred paintings, and the Artists of the Western Frontier collection (eighty-six works by thirty-seven artists, including Catlin, Eastman, Bierstadt, Remington, and Russell).

From this bountiful feast we are served only thirty-six color plates-fourteen Bodmers, thirteen Millers, nine of the Western Frontier group-and arguably too many of these are …

Review Of Custom Combining On The Great Plains: A History By Thomas D. Isern, Thomas R. Wessel

Great Plains Quarterly

Probably one of the most often observed but least known institutions on the Great Plains is custom harvesting. Although the practice probably dates from the Hrst itinerate laborer who bought a grain craddle, Thomas Isern's book is about the men who traveled from Texas to Canada seeking employment for their expensive combining machines. For the most part, Isern's custom harvesters entered the business during World War II and survived the long period of low prices and high costs that characterized American agriculture in the 1950s and 1960s.

Custom harvesting reached maturity during world War II, when farmers received high prices …

Willa Cather And The Populists, Robert W. Cherny

Great Plains Quarterly

Despite the wealth of critical and analytical treatments of the life and work of Willa Cather, few have noted the relationship between her writing and the Populist movement of the early 1890s. Some have specifically described Cather as nonpolitical or even antipolitical. The two exceptions, John H. Randall III and Evelyn J. Hinz, base their conclusions on sources other than the Populist movement in Nebraska. Cather's writings, nonetheless, exhibit clear evidence of the impact of both Populism and its ideological successor, Bryanism. Cather did not like either variant of agrarian radicalism, and she expressed her distaste both explicitly and implicitly. …

Escape From The Great Plains The Icelanders In North Dakota And Alberta, Howard Palmer

Great Plains Quarterly

Immigration historians in Canada and the United States are becoming aware of the need to look at immigration history within the larger context of North American history. Canadian immigration patterns have been affected, indirectly, almost as much by American immigration policy as by Canadian policy. Within many ethnic groups in North America, there has been a significant exchange of people and cultural patterns between Canada and the United States. Marcus Lee Hansen and John Brebner first looked at the interchange of people between Canada and the United States in their pioneering work, The Mingling of the Canadian and American Peoples …

Title And Contents- Fall 1983

Great Plains Quarterly

GREAT PLAINS QUARTERLY

FALL 1983 VOL. 3 NO.4

CONTENTS

ACROSS THE 49TH: THUNDERSTORMS IN THE NORTHERN GREAT PLAINS Alec H. Paul

WILLA CATHER AND THE POPULISTS Robert W. Cherny

ESCAPE FROM THE GREAT PLAINS: THE ICELANDERS IN NORTH DAKOTA AND ALBERTA Howard Palmer

BOOK REVIEWS

The Code of the West

The West as Romantic Horizon

Alfred Jacob Miller: Artist On the Oregon Trail

Magic Images: Contemporary Native American Art

Indian-White Relations in the United States: A Bibliography of Works Published 1975-1980

Yuwipi: Vision and Experience in Oglala Ritual

Arapahoe Politics, 1851-1978: Symbols in Crisis of Authority

Slim Buttes, 1876: An …

Review Of Yuwipi: Vision And Experience In Oglala Ritual By William K. Powers, Raymond J. De Mallie

Great Plains Quarterly

This volume provides an introduction to contemporary Lakota religious life among the Oglalas of Pine Ridge Reservation. It focuses on three basic rituals that form the core of traditional religion as individuals face the problems and challenges of day-to-day life: the sweat lodge, vision quest, and yuwipi meeting. Although written from an anthropological viewpoint, with an anthropologist's concern for ritual detail, this is a literary treatment, more descriptive than analytical. It paints a vivid picture of these contemporary rituals, recreating in novelistic detail an actual family crisis that prompted a young Oglala man to carry his concerns to a medicine …

Review Of Soils Of The Great Plains: Land Use, Crops, And Grasses By Andrew R. Aandahl, James V. Drew

Great Plains Quarterly

Andrew R. Aandahl provides a visual and descriptive overview of the soils of the Great Plains, a region that accounts for approximately one-third of the cropland and one-half of the grassland pasture in the United States. Its soils are a basic resource for the region's productivity.

Aandahl examines this soil resource in seventy high-quality color photographs of soil profiles and associated landscapes, accompanied by a text that thoroughly describes and classifies the soils. In addition, the soils of the Great Plains are delineated on a map that accompanies the book. The 195 mapping units are color coded in order to …

Review Of Slim Buttes, 1876: An Episode Of The Great Sioux War By Jerome A. Greene, Thomas William Dunlay

Great Plains Quarterly

Books on the Sioux War of 1876 tend to concentrate on the defeat of George A. Custer at the Little Bighorn and either slight or ignore the months of campaigning that followed that disaster. Both buffs and scholars should therefore welcome Jerome Greene's study of the operations of General George Crook in August and September 1876. Although especially arduous and frustrating, the campaign and its climactic battle at Slim Buttes, South Dakota, were far more typical of the wars on the plains than Custer's spectacular downfall.

The campaign became known as the "Horsemeat March," because the failure of supplies forced …