The Dakota Prisoner of War Letters
In April 1863–after the Dakota War of 1862, after the hanging of thirty-eight Dakota men in the largest mass execution in U.S. history– some 270 Dakota men were moved from Mankato, Minnesota, to a prison at Camp McClellan in Davenport, Iowa. Separated from their wives, children, and elder relatives, with inadequate shelter, they lived there for three long, wretched years. More than 120 men died. Desperate to connect with their families, many of these prisoners of war learned to write. Their letters, mostly addressed to the missionaries Stephen R. Riggs and Thomas S. Williamson, asked for information, for assistance, and for help sending and receiving news of their loved ones. Dakota elders Clifford Canku and Michael Simon,...
read moreRez Life – NOW IN PAPERBACK
Celebrated novelist David Treuer has gained a reputation for writing fiction that expands the horizons of Native American literature. In “Rez Life,” his first full-length work of nonfiction, Treuer brings a novelist’s storytelling skill and an eye for detail to a complex and subtle examination of Native American reservation life, past and present. With authoritative research and reportage, Treuer illuminates misunderstood contemporary issues like sovereignty, treaty rights, and natural-resource conservation. He traces the convoluted waves of public policy that have deracinated, disenfranchised, and exploited Native Americans, exposing the tension and conflict that has marked the historical relationship between the United...
read moreMemory of Trees
“Memory of Trees” is a multigenerational story of Gayla Marty’s family farm near Rush City, Minnesota. Cleared from woodlands by her great-grandfather Jacob in the 1880s, the farm passed to her father, Gordon, and his brother, Gaylon. Hewing to a conservative Swedish Baptist faith, the two brothers worked the farm, raising their families in side-by-side houses. As the years go by, the families grow–and slowly grow apart. Uncle Gaylon, more doctrinaire in his faith, rails against the permissiveness of Gayla’s parents. Financial tensions arise as well when the farm economy weakens and none of the children is willing or able to take over. Gayla is encouraged to leave for college, international travel, and city...
read moreThirty Rooms to Hide In
“Thirty Rooms to Hide”"In” tells the story of Sullivan’s father and his descent from being one of the world’s top orthopedic surgeons at the Mayo Clinic to a man who is increasingly abusive, alcoholic, and insane, ultimately dying alone on the floor of a Georgia motel. For his wife and six sons, the years prior to his death were years of turmoil, anger, and family dysfunction; but somehow, they were also a time of real happiness for Sullivan and his five brothers, full of dark humor and much laughter. Through the 1950s and 1960s, the six brothers had a wildly fun and thoroughly dysfunctional childhood living in a forbidding thirty-room mansion, known as the Millstone, on the outskirts of Rochester, Minnesota....
read moreCanoeing With the Cree – Collector’s Edition
In 1930 two novice paddlers–Eric Sevareid and Walter C. Port–launched a secondhand eighteen-foot canvas canoe into the Minnesota River at Fort Snelling for an ambitious summer-long journey from Minneapolis to Hudson Bay. First published in 1935, “Canoeing with the Cree” is Sevareid’s classic account of this youthful odyssey to a vast and remote land, that has inspired generations of canoeists, wilderness enthusiasts and armchair adventurers. In our era of GPS, cell phones, power bars, and bug spray, the young men’s account is all the more remarkable and nostalgic. Relive their quintessential adventure with this limited-edition book and map set. It includes a newly designed book, a handsome multipurpose...
read moreThe Oranges Are Sweet
From Minnesota author Paul Sailer comes “The Oranges are Sweet” which is a deeply moving story about Major Don M. Beerbower, who was from Hill City, Minnesota, and the men who served with him during World War II. When he died strafing a German airdrome north of Reims, France, on August 9, 1944, he was the leading ace in the Ninth Air Force with 15.5 aerial victories and the commanding officer of the 353rd Fighter Squadron. The Fighting Cobras, as the unit was known, ended the war with 290.5 aerial victories, more than any other squadron in the United States Army Air Forces. Author: Paul Sailer Publisher: Loden Books US SRP: $34.99 Binding: Hardcover Pub Date: May 1,...
read moreEverything You Wanted To Know About Indians But Were Afraid To Ask
What have you always wanted to know about Indians? Do you think you should already know the answers–or suspect that your questions may be offensive? In matterof-fact responses to over 120 questions, both thoughtful and outrageous, modern and historical, Ojibwe scholar and cultural preservationist Anton Treuer gives a frank, funny, and sometimes personal tour of what’s up with Indians, anyway. - What is the real story of Thanksgiving? - Why are tribal languages important? - What do you think of that incident where people died in a sweat lodge? White/Indian relations are often characterized by guilt and anger. Everything You Wanted to Know about Indians But Were Afraid to Ask cuts through the emotion and builds a foundation for true...
read moreThe Last Hunter – An American Family Album
Minnesota’s Will Weaver has been a hunter since he was a young boy, following in the footsteps of his father, a dedicated and seasoned outdoorsman. As he writes, “in the fall, when Canada geese came through and when partridge season opened, [we] heard the far-off thudding report of shotguns–and in November the heavier poom-poom! of deer rifles.” Hunting frames Weaver’s childhood memories, his relationship with his father, and his own definition of self. And although one side of his family lineage includes men who would not hunt, or go to war, or carry a rifle, Weaver is caught off guard when his son and daughter show no interest in upholding the tradition of the hunt. “The Last Hunter “is a...
read moreThe Assassination of Hole in the Day
Explores the murder of the controversial Ojibwe chief who led his people through the first difficult years of dispossession by white invaders–and created a new kind of leadership for the Ojibwe. Author: Anton Treuer Publisher: Borealis Books US SRP: $17.95 Binding: Paperback Pub Date: August 1, 2011
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