Our Virtuous Heartland

Jon K. Lauck, a South Dakotan who has taken it upon himself to lead a revival of the study of Midwestern political, social, and cultural history, offers a guidebook for fellow revivalists in The Good Country: A History of the American Midwest, 1800-1900. As much a history of the history of the Midwest as a straightforward history of the region, which is rare enough to be valuable, Lauck’s book verges on something even rarer: a history of the United States as viewed from the Midwest.