NPR’s The Picture Show—a blog of sorts that features photos, commentary, and questions from NPR’s multimedia team—has today posted a stunning rejoinder to all of those who would write off the Midwestern landscape as a monotonous repetition of corn rows and cattle. Featuring a gallery of selected images from Michael Forsberg’s Great Plains: America’s Lingering Wild, the posting demonstrates the diversity and abundance of wildlife and habitat still to be found in what was once the largest, but is now perhaps the most endangered, ecosystem in North America. Check out the photos on NPR’s The Picture Show blog. And if that’s not enough to convince you of the wild spirit and splendor of this irreplaceable part of the planet, the Press’s website also hosts a a gallery with even more of Forsberg’s spectacular photographs.
Between the fall of 2005 and the winter of 2008, Forsberg traveled roughly 100,000 miles across 12 states and three provinces, from southern Canada to northern Mexico, to complete the photographic fieldwork for this project, underwritten by the Nature Conservancy. Complementing Forsberg’s images and firsthand accounts are a forward by former poet laureate Ted Kooser, and essays by Great Plains scholar David Wishart and acclaimed writer Dan O’Brien. Each section of the book begins with a thorough overview by Wishart, while O’Brien—a wildlife biologist and rancher as well as a writer—uses his powerful literary voice to put the Great Plains into a human context, connecting their natural history with man’s uses and abuses.
Find out more about the book.