Where the Sky Began: Land of the Tallgrass Prairie (Bur Oak Book)

Rating:
Summary: Where the Sky Began: A terrific book!
Review: As a kid growing up in post-war Chicago suburbia, I got to see farmlands give way to housing tracts. The question I asked was "What was here before the farms?" Madson has the answer--prairie. Practically a million square miles of prairie and the first European settlers never had an idea that a vast expanse of grassland stretched roughly from the eastern border of Illinois to the Rocky Mountains.

Madson takes you to the prairie from an historical, personal, anecdotal, and geological perspective. You can practically see the prairie flora, feel the prairie air on your face, hear the prairie fauna calling you in this excellently written and touching book. Enjoy!

Rating:
Summary: Where the Sky Began: A terrific book!
Review: As a kid growing up in post-war Chicago suburbia, I got to see farmlands give way to housing tracts. The question I asked was "What was here before the farms?" Madson has the answer--prairie. Practically a million square miles of prairie and the first European settlers never had an idea that a vast expanse of grassland stretched roughly from the eastern border of Illinois to the Rocky Mountains.

Madson takes you to the prairie from an historical, personal, anecdotal, and geological perspective. You can practically see the prairie flora, feel the prairie air on your face, hear the prairie fauna calling you in this excellently written and touching book. Enjoy!

Rating:
Summary: Where the Sky Began: A terrific book!
Review: As a kid growing up in post-war Chicago suburbia, I got to see farmlands give way to housing tracts. The question I asked was "What was here before the farms?" Madson has the answer--prairie. Practically a million square miles of prairie and the first European settlers never had an idea that a vast expanse of grassland stretched roughly from the eastern border of Illinois to the Rocky Mountains.

Madson takes you to the prairie from an historical, personal, anecdotal, and geological perspective. You can practically see the prairie flora, feel the prairie air on your face, hear the prairie fauna calling you in this excellently written and touching book. Enjoy!

Rating:
Summary: John Madson -- Brilliant
Review: I once got lost with John Madson in the Great Batchtown Swamp, but I never got stuck in any of his books -- he is a great outdoorsman and writer, who always takes your imagination somewhere interesting (and often useful). He wrote the best book ever on The Pheasant, a wee paperback that he dashed off in a couple of weeks but which has never been bettered. It must be natural talent, but as Lee Trevino said, I had to hit a million practice balls before my natural talent began to show through. Willy Newlands (Scotland)

Rating:
Summary: A down-home review of prairie ecology and culture
Review: John provides a factful and sometimes comical look at prairie ecology and culture. A good first book for those interested in the prairie.