Dakota for over 100 years to my new book from warm center to ragged and takes its title from mister got Scott Fitzgerald who is the author of probably most famously of the great gatsby and if you remember your gatsby from back in high school or college, you remember that nick karoly was from minnesota. Nick karoly went off to war, this would have been world war i and when he came back, he decided that he thought it would be sort of doll to move back to minnesota. Which he saw as the ragged edge of the universe. And he decided to move to new york and he got mixed up in the roaring 20s. On long island with gatsby and all that cast of characters from his book. But in the end, when he sees what happens to many of these characters, he begins to see the old midwest where he came from as the warm center of the world. So that contract is what i tried to draw in my new book, from warm center to ragged edge. In the decades after the civil war, the midwest was seen by many commentators as the pacesetter region. The place where literature was the most active, the place where their most the most dynamic economy. A place where political power was growing and would continue to grow. Most of the president s after the civil war, seven of eight came from the midwest. They came from places like ohio and indiana and iowa. And the midwest also in addition to its political and economic clout had a great deal of cultural clout because of its writers, because of its strong regionalist movement. Some of the prominent writers will be forgotten by most listeners but at the time they were household names. Im thinking about people like James Whitcomb riley of indiana whose latent state in indianapolis for a week because there were thousands of wellwishers who came through because he was so well known at this period of time. This was part of the indiana golden age of literature with featured people like riley and Booth Tarkington and lou wallace who was the author of ben hur. There were prominent authors like Sherwin Anderson of ohio and Sinclair Lewis of minnesota and f Scott Fitzgerald of st. Paul who we talked about a little bit ago. All these people were making major marks for the midwest and American Literary culture. About midway through the 20th century you could begin to say the effects of the growing cloud and growing power of the coast of american culture, especially with the movie industry, whatever the 1940s, that was the most dominant form of entertainment in the country and Many Americans went to three or four or five movies a week. That, most of those movies were shot in hollywood and in los angeles so that showed the power of california and the west coast at that time and soon after that found television. Much of which was produced in hollywood. And pretty soon, most americans in the span of a decade had a television set. When the 50s began, two percent of americans had televisions by the end of the decade, 90 percent of them did. So these local centers of the regional production of the culture in the midwest lost their one time influence. In addition to that, there was a growing cosmopolitanism in the country that looked down on what they saw as the kind of retrograde agrarian isolationist parts of the country. And this was particularly acute in the years after world war ii when there was a growing dedication to the United Nations and establishing a more prominent role for the United States of the world. The midwest or many years has been a countries, part of the country that was most ethical of getting involved in entangling affairs overseas. All these factors came together to reduce the prominence of midwestern culture , about midway through the 20th century. I think you can see the influence of the diminishment of midwestern regionalism in our politics and in the frustration of some people in the middle of the country with other people dominating or controlling the culture. I think theres a real longing in the interior parts of the country for more of a assertive role in our culture. They want to be more a part of the reflection of cultural forms that are prominent in our culture and i think you see this longing for a real genuine democratic pluralism in the country. People know and feel when theyre being dominated and when they dont have much of a voice. And i think you see those kind of frustrations bubbling up in our politics today. The good news is that there have been some major developments in the past few years that will allow people to rediscover their own regional and cultural history. I think the first step was the formation of the Midwestern History Association. Which is a National Organization that meets every year in michigan actually it was founded in sioux falls. The Midwestern History Association in particular was founded on the principle that the Academic Field of midwestern history had completely collapsed. By the mid1990s or so. And that it was far past time to redevelop the infrastructure that field. And the Critical Infrastructure is having an association dedicated to the study of a particular region. An association that meets every year, scholars together, its been on panels, get them talking about this region and also creates a space for them to publish their work. Midwesterners began to date into their own history, they are going to see similar stories and we hear those stories. You want to know what your ancestors went through and what they lived through and what shape them and what made them who they are, and thats that made people want to rediscover this history of our region. One of the complications of reviving the study of the midwest is that there are many midwesterners who are very humble and some of them think that we dont have much of a story to tell, and even if we gave, were not going to boast about it but im trying to shake these midwesterners out of their complacency and get them to think a little bit more about their region and think a little bit more about their heritage and where they come from. I think the world could certainly stand a few more stronger midwestern voices out there. Native american citizenship in the United States has had a challenging history that continues today. The author of in broken landscape, Indian Tribes and the constitution examines this history and talks about past legal casesand legislation that have interpreted and misinterpreted tribal sovereignty. I am my family came to south dakota in 1973, im originally from new york. When i first came here we lived and worked on the indian reservation for 10 years and then for three years i was directed to the plains legal services, the statewide Eagle Services program so after 10 years on the reservation and the year of fellowship, i joined the law school. They wanted me to teach indian law and its been my primary area, also from the law. But i also along the way become a tribal apologize. For several tribes in south dakota were members of the nine recognized tribes in south dakota, publicly they make up eight or nine or 10 percent of the state population so would you say in western states, native population but oftentimes its a significant part of that state population. And it made a few on the reservation and they live off the reservation. So you can find native people everywhere. Its important to understand that native people are citizens of free sovereignty. The United States system, they are citizens of the state in which they reside so native people from south dakota also are a state citizen and there are also private citizen of their tribe of which they are a family. The tribe has what is known as sovereignty. They have the authority from their free constitutional existence as selfgoverning sovereigns and thats the position they taken that they are selfgoverning sovereigns within their territory. However, thats the line with the dominant society, with the federal government interview so the struggle for Indian Tribes is to try to maximize their sovereignty. To maximize their zones of authority on and in Indian Country and to do that, that meets the approval of the United States congress and the United States Supreme Court. Sometimes sides seem to be going in the same direction and theres been an appreciation and recognition of tribal offer at the and other rhetorical contexts and other relationships seemto be going in the opposite direction where the federal government is inimical and its impossible to do tribal sovereignty. I think the main issue as far as most of the notion of expansion is that one way of looking at American History is that its premised on sort of western expansion. And its tough to engage in western expansion when there are already people here. What was one of the initial kind of amendments was how are our colonists went to deal with people that were already here. When they first came here, many people were numerically and often times militarily stronger than european immigrants but over time immigrants began to have sort of more power numerically and firepower and they began to have the upper hand. And the notion was that there had to be this continual western expansion for native land and thats been the primary historical attention of the federal government increasing growth and Movement Westward to obtain as much indian land as possible. From a native perspective, what they tried to do is to resist that as much as possible, to give up as little land as possible, to retain as much land as possible. One of the problems in that is trying to know what actually anchors that relationship. And one way of thinking and ive written about this is that we might have looked to the United States constitution to anchor and be more capable of exactly what is the relationship we need to sovereigns . All i think the constitution as originally written tried to do that, i think through both axis congress and the United States Supreme Court, they lost sight about the original relationship as described in the constitution. Native people historically have had struggles to be recognized as a United States citizen. They had to struggle to be recognized as state citizens and they fought not to have been, you wouldve thought that at some point native people would have been welcomed into the constitutional structure. Both as federal citizens and state citizens. Acrosstheboard native people have become federal citizens until 1924. The 14th amendment which we generally regarded as providing both federal and state citizenship to everyone including africanamericans in the aftermath of the civil war, theres a case that that was decided by the Supreme Court in 1881. That said because of language in the 14th amendment the 14th amendment and not make native people United States citizens, didnt make them state citizens so it was labeled sort of the postcivil war amendments which we always thought very positively about, we feel that they didnt really do anything or native people to move forward there citizenship as both several citizens and state citizens. In the l versus wilkins case, he was a native person living in omaha nebraska. Living also off the reservation and he went to vote in a local election. Anyway, he attempted to register to vote, to be able to cast his ballot and he was told that he was neither a citizen of the United States or a citizen of the state of nebraska despite the 14th amendment because theres language in the 14th amendment also appears in article 1 of the constitution. It has language from the phrase excluding indians not taxed. As you go through that phrase in article 1 of the constitution, what does that phrase actually mean . You can ask this of all all people and they really dont know. At that point even at the time the constitution was being adopted, there were a small number of indian people that lived off the reservation and at least technically were subject to taxation of the bargain in the constitution was excludingindians not taxed , meaning those native people were still living on the reservation in Indian Country, they wouldnt be counted. Those few people who moved off the reservation living in small towns, arguably subject to local taxation, would be counted for purposes and that language excluding indians not taxed for reasons not clear is still repeated in the 14th amendment. The court fastened on the continuation of that language in the 14th amendment to say that the 14th amendment did not see the citizenship status of native people. Were getting into the latter part of the 19th century and native people with rare exceptions were not considered citizens of the United States or citizens of the state in which they were living. I think that the major challenges that native people have to deal with Going Forward is one of theproblems of Economic Development. Theyre not in reservations in south dakota or among the poorest in the nation, usually roughly 4 of the poorestcounties in the United States. They are located in Indian Country in south dakota so poverty remained expensive. While that is true, thats not all of Indian Country. If people seem to know the man about Indian Country but they dont know the good. And i think thats a significant kind of problem or nonnative people to be more aware of the good things that actually occur in Indian Country. But there are colleges on reservations in south dakota, times the Fastest Growing colleges in the state. I would venture to say if you raise that question to a significant portion of the nonnative population in south dakota, they wouldnt have a clue that there are colleges on the reservation created by native people, governed by native people that are doing a tremendous amount of good work but theres some good and some things that there continues to be struggles. I think for example, its important for both sides to agree that there can be Common Ground to solve problems. At least there is the opportunity for common Economic Development schemes that would benefit both the state and the tribe to have those in Indian Country and i think there could be. I dont think thats been adequately explored in the context of tourism, for example you have a state trial partnership in the context of tourism. I think the notion of having opportunities for example members of the state legislature to travel to Indian Country, to meet Tribal Council members, just to have forums where they actually come together and i think in the absence of forums and the abs o forums and the absence of coming together, were going to have all that empty space between two people and you have a history of oftentimes that empty space is going to be filled by stereotypes, negative stereotypes. As long as people come together officially and unofficially in more contact with each other, then i think they can have a better sense of who people are and develop that respect i was talking about before. And to go around the law school here, youll see evidence not always true in other places theres a native presence here. You saw in the law association, you see start wilson in the buildings, if you go into the courtroom you will see all sorts of native artwork and stuff and traveling most other places in south dakota i dont think you will see that. Just like a basic thing. I dont think people when they come here, they see it. Its like well, theres some kind of cultural respect and native presence here and i think they dont want to underestimate that because when youre a nonnative person, you take for granted that everything reflects the background that you come from but the native people, its not like that at all. As long as people are hesitant to do that, and remain kind of separated and cautious , i think its just problematical for both sides to go forward. Quicks during the era of the american frontier, south dakota was considered a long post land where frontier justice came in many forms including lynch mobs. As we continue our look at the literary life of south dakota, stating that author of how north dakota tells the story of judge peter shannon, the man said by president Ulysses Grant to bring order to the area. Ask portions of this program contain images that some viewers may find offensive. Peter shannon was a chief justice of the dakota territory Supreme Court of the 1873 to 1882. He was admitted to the fifth bar, 1846. He had a very successful wall practice there. He was served a term as the judge and in pennsylvania. Shannon first of all, he was antislavery but also stridently anti fascists. He believed that if you seceded from the union you were a trader that could be done with accordingly. He served a short period of time in the civil war. And the pennsylvania cavalry unit and when grant was president , he offered him the position of the dakota territory to serve as chief justice. And because it was because he would be working in the law, with the law, he had previously refused a job offer to lincoln but because he wanted to be a judge, the position offered by us grant, before shannon got here, the justice was, the judges were incompetent, corrupt and lawyers were not knowledgeable in the law. But it was difficult to get a conviction. In fact, the us attorney for dakota territory was forced to write a letter of apology to the us attorney in washington saying i cant get the jury to convict anybody of anything. And unless people added to changes, its not going to happen. Justices, its , if you get somebody committing a crime particularly if this is a horse thief, horse thieves were a special kind of criminal on the frontier. And if you stole a mans horse, you left him vulnerable to the elements. If he lost his life, so that was considered a capital crime. And if you were caught stealing a horse, for example if you were away from any settlement of ranch country, the, they would hang you. Summarily. If you are caught with one of these big ones over here. So that happened quite frequently. That was what you call frontier justice. But of course you could also argue that mom commit murder, theyre not in any way part of the Justice System but it was sort of the rule, the unspoken frontier rule that if youstole a horse, you are guilty, you could be hung. He was educated in the law. And that was more, that gave him a lot more credence than other judges and lawyers who were educated. For example, in the frontier if you wanted to be a lawyer, what you did, you knew a lawyer, you readthe law in your office for a while. And that lawyer would take you to a meeting at a bar with one of the judges, youd have a few drinks. You remember the barn. That was so easy. Thats why there was so much incompetence. Thats where shannon made a difference. He had a legal education. You have all, he went to law school. This impact was considerable. He brought integrity, he brought confidence. Hebrought good sense to the legal system. He got juries to take their job seriously. When he spoke in the courtroom, people listen. Trials in those days, particularly murder trials were entertainment for the community. The leisure time activity. When you came to hear the lawyer, they came to watch the trial and the women would sit on one side and then on the other but they all were very. Once in a while something would happen that would, and burst into applause and judges would have to go back to silence. But shannon was the first john who really understood the law, and how to apply it. It was like theres a new sheriff in town, well when he came through, there was a real judge in town. The newspapers covered trials like closely. But they really focusing on him. And the reporting on shannon was positive. That was good. Throughout the whole territory. So it was a matter of months that the people could see the difference. There were still shootings, still gambling, there were still fights and all that stuff that happened but they were being arrested more frequently and brought to justice. The trials of the crooked indian agents, they were supposed to manage all the money and the food, the Farm Equipment that the federal government sent out to these various agencies. They were supposed to manage it and distribute it to the indians. It was understood that the indian agents in the dakota territories were corrupt. What they did was absent the money, the cattle, the equipment, they just converted to their own use. Openly and shamelessly. They knew what they were doing but they were never, under public disfavor because if they were stealing, they were stealing from indians and nobody liked the indians. Although they were all acquitted why white juries, the fact that he convinced the south dakota us attorney to prosecute these people in the first place and the fact that there were several trials over and over again where i think where it really a credit to his sense of integrity and fairness. While bill hickok was a celebrity before he got to deadwood. He made a splashy entrance into deadwood and a caravan that included people Calamity Jane and colorado charlie and other outlaw luminaries. Clydesdale was interested in gold but he was also interested in gambling and drinking. Andy had quite a reputation as being a con artist and a straight shooter. And jack mccall was from kind of a neerdowell, a loser. They called him more of a dance hall dude rather than a bad guy. He came to, hunted buffalo in nebraska and eventually ended up in deadwood where he did what he could to stay alive and why he killed while bill is somewhat still kind of a mystery among people who write about while bill hickok. Some say that he was paid by a faction of people in deadwood who didnt like while bill. I dont believe thats true. I think he just got drunk. And shot him in the back of the head. And paid the price for it. But shannon, his office was in yankton, mccall was robbed there and charged shannon with the trial judge and it was a relatively short trial because they had, they had addressed evidence, eyewitness evidence that while bill was at a poker table with three other guys when he was shot and one of them was sitting right across him and the bullet went through while bills head and into this guys left wrist. His name was captain massey and he used that as a means to get free drinks. He went into a bar and would say heres the bullet that killed while bill on my wrist. So with that kind of evidence , and the mccall had legal representation. And hed be in those days, they appointed counsel. Or people trying at the time and they came out of people of with subpoenas to witness, to bring witnesses for the defense, they couldnt find anybody. They had no case. The only case was that they had no jurisdiction to try and because the Client Committee on indian reservation. So that didnt hold water with judge shannon. So he was tried and convicted. And was sentenced to death and he was executed, hung in the room on march 1, 1877 and it was the first legal execution in dakota territory. Lynchings were the typical wild west. The greatest challenge from this whole judicial career was when he was lobbying for appointment to a third fouryear term of josh. By that time, for too many lawyers had gained up against him, the entire bar wanted him out of there and they were looking, they thought he was too strict. They thought he cited too often with the prosecution and then he, they wanted a more viable judge, somebody that they canmold. He had a lot of support from National Public figures and a lot of support from some of the newspapers was the yankton bar and get the newspaper that up on him and eventually convinced chester a arthur who was then the president to what somebody else so that was his biggest challenge is unfortunately they were not able to succeed. We can learn respect for the law and judicial, learn about judicial fairness, about fairplay. About administering justice in an evenhanded way. A working competent judicial system. So thats the biggest part of his legacy. Behind me are two falls sioux falls. Up next we speak with other bob right to learn more about the history of business in this area. Today we are at the center for western studies at Augustana University in beautiful sioux falls, south dakota, which is in the southeastern part of the state near the place where iowa, minnesota and south dakota meet. I wasnt born here but i got here as soon as i could, which was about, right after the financial crisis. One reason i came was it was clear to me that south dakotas economy was very robust. And so i begin to investigate why it was so robust and come to find out by a lot of measures south dakota has the most entrepreneurial economy in the country. You might wonder how that is, because we dont, we are not overflowing with Thomas Edison at elon musk and folks like that, right . But yet recall there were fewer than 800,000 people in this state. Its smaller than a lot of counties back east in terms of population, right . Its not surprising we havent had the big inventive or innovative entrepreneurs. Also it turns out there are three different types of entrepreneurs. Theres the innovative type, the type that invent stuff. Weve had some of those, just no huge name. Theres another type called explicated, and that is explicated, that is your tony soprano type entrepreneurship, the illegal illicit sort of stuff. We dont have a lot of that either thankfully but what we do have is, reams and reams, scads and scads of what are known as replicative entrepreneurs. As the name suggests a replicative entrepreneur takes idea that was developed elsewhere and visit to a new location. So we can measure these things, economists measure these things by various measures, including the percentage of total income that comes from a selfemployment, that comes from proprietorship, from direct ownership in the business. Its higher in south dakota than in other states in the country. In terms of the history of native american entrepreneurship, it starts with the arrival of human beings in the new world. Where talking 10,000 b. C. E. , 12,000 years ago. Maybe a little bit longer than that. Significant numbers in the past 10,000 years. So what People Living in south dakota before south dakota was never a thought. They were extremely entrepreneurial in terms of actual evidence of entrepreneurship. Theres a site in present day mitchell, the dome which is run by the university where they found huge numbers of bison bones, and only a small presence of humans. So unless these guys were, and gals were eating like five bison the day, each, the numbers just dont add up. And then there are pieces of pottery that come from cahokia, which is near presentday st. Louis, so the obvious implication is that they were taking bison, processing them in mitchell, which they would do by turning it into a product known as panic and which is a mix of dried meat, that and often a barry or some kind of fruit flavoring, combine the two and its very stable. It doesnt rot. Doesnt spoil. You could package that up, put into what are known as little boats use from stretched bison skin, load it down the Missouri River to the confluence with the mississippi and trade it for pottery. The indians were very entrepreneurial, up to the point they got put on reservations and began to be essentially controlled. The reason that some of the poorest parts of the United States are located in south dakota, which otherwise has a very thriving entrepreneurial economy, these because reservations are under a different system of political economy than the rest of the state. They are essentially socialist entities that are largely controlled from washington, d. C. , specifically the department of the interior bureau of indian affairs. They have socialized medicine. They have their own educational system, which is substandard, and different sets of rules and regulations that apply to them. They have a different system of Property Rights, which is much inferior to the system of Property Rights that are available in the rest of south dakota and the nonreservation part of the United States. So many of them, many, many entrepreneurs in Indian Country, but they are all what we call nana entrepreneurs. They are self proprietors. They may be informally, will hire a Family Member or two to help out, making quilts, for example, but it never goes beyond that. Some of the guys will have a business where they will help to fix cars, because they like to keep their cars running a long time out there and get the most value out of them as possible. They dont even put a sign up. They have to get approval to have a formal business. So its all done on a cash basis, under the table here you cant then go to a bank and say hey, ive been making so many thousands of dollars a year doing this, you know, can i now get a loan so i can buy a formal shop and a site and all that . Because theres no documentation for it. The impacts of the bia and essentially socialist political economy impose on indian reservations is a very low quality of life. The rates of diabetes certainly are up on reservations. Suicide rates start skyrocketing. Alcohol and other toxic substances starts to be used, and then people start blaming the indians themselves for their situation. And the indians are blaming themselves for the situation, forgetting that it was, they were once a very entrepreneurial people who fed themselves with no problem, prospered with no problem, or developing along their own timeline. And its really this intercession and this essentially jailing them on reservations. But if there is any ray of hope, it comes from history and from comparative economics and from what are sometimes called natural experiments. Korea used to be one country, and it was arbitrarily divided into two, north and south, and the north has a very repressive regime and has had one since its founding. In the south had a repressive regime at first, but it improved over the years, and within a generation, south korea went from a place that we thought of as some place where people eat dogs and barely get by two, by the 1980s, its a a major competitor in many fields, right . That not only started outcompete us in some areas but even the japanese. That happened over a 30 year span. So its possible simply by changing the political economy of a place, within a generation you can go from desolation to a place of increasing prosperity. But you have to change that political economy which means draining the bia. With the help of our cable partners, cspan is in sioux falls, south dakota, children more about its literary community. We continue our special feature with sioux falls native sam keen, author of caesars last breath. He examines the history of the world through the science of air. We are here in the sioux falls Downtown Public library. I grew up a few blocks from here on the north end of sioux falls. I am a writer and my roast my most recent book is caesars last breath. Its about the only connection that we have to someone like Julius Caesar. He died in 44 bc so his body is long gone. Most of the buildings around their argon. His close or gone. Even the iron daggers that stabbed him have long ago rusted into dust. They are gone. About the only thing we have left of Julius Caesar was ever connected with you materially is his breath, where theres little bit of air i came out of lungs and started to spread their way around the world. And its not just Julius Caesar. You can connect it with anyone that youre interested in in history. Relatives, people you like, people you dont like. The error air is one of the vew things that connects all human beings throughout history, even the people that we dont have anything remaining of their lives. We know very little about them. We do know as a fact that bits of their air are still around that we are still breathing in and we still have that material connection to them. And that encapsulates the title of the book, caesars last breath, because what im trying to do is show people a different side of the atmosphere. The air is sort of this invisible thing that we all know its kind of important, but we hardly Pay Attention to it. We dont think about it much. I wanted to show people there is this hidden, fascinating site to enter as well. And if you look at it you can really connected with lots of our biology, about our history, our civilization. It suited one of the most important things around us even if we take it for granted sometimes. So with each of the stores and telling what it really want to do is get people engaged with it, to think about it, not a something cant abstract and locked away in the lab at something that really touches your life in a direct way. I think the way to do that is with stories. Because the human brain works best when it gets information in a story form. If there are heroes and villains, if theres conflict and drama and all these great things we want industry, were very good at remembering that we pick up on that and we do that a lot better than we do sort of abstract scientific fact. What i could do as i tried to spin each of these tales as a story. Some of my favorite stories in the book, a few come to. There was one about the ozone layer in the atmosphere and about how an unusual quirk of the ozone layer and some scientists studying it is related kind of an unusual way to the roswell suppose it indian invasion in new mexico in the 1940s. Something you would never think to connect, the ozone in the air with the roswell alien invasion but theres a very direct link to those things. With the roswell story we know about the ozone layer, we know it should be important but you wouldnt think to connect it to some sort of like alien invasion. It goes through the people are doing this work, what you learned about the ozone layer, have tried to take advantage of it and what it basically was doing was the thought that was a quirk of the ozone layer that would allow us to spy on the soviet union and the Nuclear Weapons testing. Because it turns out that because of the different temperature layers in the air, basically a channel sound. Theres whats called the sound channel up there were take sound, sort of magnifies and we dont know about it down here because we much lower than the ozone layer, but when you start to get a pirate you can hear sounds magnify. We may be great if we could spy on the soviets by floating this giant balloons with microphones on them . We could hear if their testing Nuclear Weapons. They were suspending these kind of gigantic dangling balloons with all this equipment at their highest in the atmosphere. Eventually some of them started to come down. They started to crash and some of the equipment that they started finding around the roswell area was things that they were sending up to try to spy on the soviets. So it connects the atmosphere with this big political thing, with the cold war, then the u. S. Government tried to cover up what was going on. This big connection to Something Like the cold war is something you wouldnt think about with the atmosphere. Theres one story i hesitate to bring it up a little bit about a performance artist in paris in the late 1800s in the moulin rouge. And his talent put it frankly was he was a artiste they called him. He was basically very good about inhaling air through his rectum. He would release it back out and he would do and prescience with that. He could do roosters. He could do dogs. He could do human beings. He could sing the French National anthem through his backside. He can blow out candles, play instruments. This man was very, very talented. This story did sort of make me choke on a glass of water first time i read it. I couldnt believe this existed in first place but but i thougt about it more and i thought ive always been kind of curious about whats going on there, but like most people i think, but i did know much about it. So i said im going to try to see if i can make this an little bit more scientific, learn a little more about it because we are all curious about it. It turned out to be a real fascinating chapter. Like i said i did learn a lot except to learn to laugh a lot about this guy. A few things i learned, most people think that methane is the part of gas that spells. That is not to. Nothing has no order whatsoever. A lot of different other gases that are smelling, most of it is produced in inhouse so to spey bacteria. They are taking the things you eat, breaking them down, making some of the smelly chemicals. Most of these chemicals have sulfur involved with them. If youve ever been near a volcano or an interruption or in some geological hotspot, you might remember there was a smell, usually a sulfur related snow. Thats another question people always want to know is, what are the odds im still breathing parts, some of that sum exhal . The answer is it depends a little bit can someone is in the vicinity then have to break it to you, you might be briefingn a little bit of those things. However, those molecules are usually a little bit more reactive, more volatile so they will break down pretty quickly over time, whereas save the air that you are exhaling which is mostly nitrogen molecules, those are going to stick around for it much, much longer time. So the odds of you breathing in caesars last breath and not caesars last fart are much higher. I knew the be a lot of Great Stories about the atmosphere but its also very topical topic in that its something people are worried about, they are thinking about in some ways with Climate Change, global warming. I really like that combination of it being a fun topic but an important one as well. So the current state of our atmosphere, there are a couple of Different Things going on. Its not all doom and gloom. One thing we have been good about is cutting down on carbons which are heating of the whole any liquor the ozone layer hasnt has a recovered yet but it has started build up a little bit. It is a success story. We have done some good things. Unfortunately, the heading of the problems as im sure most people know with levels of Carbon Dioxide and other Greenhouse Gases rising in the atmosphere. Unfortunately, its getting to the point now where simply cutting back on those might not be able to sort of hit pause on Climate Change what we might need to look at more active solutions, where were really trying to pull things out of the air and put them in some sort of solid or liquid form so theyre not trapping heat from the atmosphere anymore. I hope people walk away from the book with a couple of things. One, i want people to know, to Pay Attention to the atmosphere, to look at it although different way, to think about it. The air really is a cool, interesting thing. Scientists sometimes say the atmosphere is the most complicated system that we know of besides a human brain. It really is an intricate, amazing system if you get more information. Look at the details. But even broader than that i think something i try to do with all my books is to make people think that science can be fun. You can be touched by side. You can try a little bit. You can laugh with science. It really is a a human activity and what people know that all of the things we enjoy about being human art and science as well. We are doing something a little different today with our driving tour, and so john is going to drive us around the city of sioux falls to talk about some of its history in the city so. John, why dont you introduce yourself . I jon lauck. I live in sioux falls, proud to call sioux falls home, a beautiful place, booming city on the prairie and happy to be with you, giving you the store. We are glad to have you. Where are we right now . Were in the heart of old sioux falls, settled in the 1850s. Just to the north of us is of the famous falls on the Big Sioux River from which the city takes its name. But right now were on one of the main thoroughfares of sioux falls, south dakota, Phillips Avenue. Along some of the older buildings of sioux falls where you get a good feel for what would be considered the main street of sioux falls. This was part of the sculpture walk in downtown sioux falls. To the left is a federal courthouse. You can see its built out of this pink sioux falls quartzite. This is one of the reasons settlers chose this area because its in plentiful supply. Would that be downtown sioux falls, or is that sort of representative of historical sioux falls, Phillips Avenue . Historical sioux falls. But downtown is coming back. Broke while downtown can build out to the west side where the malls were, but theres been a big resurgence in downtown sioux falls, like a lot of downtowns in many cities across the country. Do you know the breakdown, the population or the Ethnic Diversity as far as numbers are concerned . Let me give you one little fact about that. You are left is a little restaurant called maneuvers are we at lunch early in the week. Wonderful lunch. That restaurant is an old greek restaurant. In early 20 20th century there were about 15 greek restaurants and confectioners in sioux falls, which shows some of the emigrant mix who came into sioux falls because of the timing of the growth of sioux falls was about the same time as there was a large influx of middle eastern immigrants, lebanese and greeks and syrians in particular here people might be surprised by this but south dakota is the only state in the union who has had to lebanese senators. We just drove by the downtown holiday inn in sioux falls which has been there for a long time, but thats the hotel that George Mcgovern stayed in in november s waiting for the election returns to come in from the president ial race took of course, George Mcgovern is the only south dakota and to be nominated to run for president. I dont think he was shocked when the results came in and he lost that election ballot including losing south dakota, his home state, which i think he always deeply regretted and wasnt happy about. We are pulling into, where are we right now . This is falls park, so named after the sioux falls or the big drop in the Big Sioux River that creates these rapids or falls. But this is the namesake of sioux falls. This is why it is called sioux falls. Straight across you can see that big the mill, which was built on queen b so they could capture the rapids and turn all the machinery in the mill and grind wheat. For two or three years that mill cranked out about 1000 barrels of flour a day. I think in the end it didnt produce as much wheat as they thought because obviously the river died down later in the summer. I also wanted to point out the old coliseum. This is what a lot of the major events were held in downtown for many, many decades. It was built in the 19 teens come about the time of world war i, and after world war i Woodrow Wilson as you know went on this famous speaking tour of the country to try to sell the country on joining the league of nations. And he had a major fight with the senate, including many midwestern senators who were isolationists or skeptical of getting involved in the league of nations. But he gave a big speech theyre trying to convince south dakota senators to join the league, which ultimately failed in the senate. We mention the german immigrants in sioux falls a number of times. This is currently the new art deco city hall built in the 30s or 40s of sioux falls, but before that it was the old germania hall, built by german immigrants to a big meetings, festivals, et cetera. It also, most importantly, was the site of the writing of the south dakota constitution during the statehood movement. So when 1883, 1885 and 1889 there were three separate constitutional conventions held in germania hall. Up here on the left is an old fire hall in sioux falls, but whats significant about it is that in the year 1900, when he was campaigning on the national ticket, National Republican ticket, as a Vice President ial candidate, Teddy Roosevelt had a major rally on this corner. And he barnstormed through south dakota at that time. He made 27 stops in south dakota in like two days, taking the train to rent a this is when they did whistle stop tours, and Teddy Roosevelt loved doing these. He especially love being out here in the decoders because he had that place up and north dakota. Coming up i want to point out to you this statue. This is on the bluff overlooking the Big Sioux River, over there about eight miles or less would be the state of iowa. Straight ahead that way about 1f minnesota. So youre kind of at this junction here of minnesota and iowa and south dakota. So you have a very midwestern spot for you and a very nice view of the river valley. But i also want to point out this memorial, which was put out by the Minnehaha County historical society, and the related plaque. The plaque is designed to help people remember the consequences of what was called the great sioux uprising for the settlement at sioux falls. In 1862 there was a rebellion in minnesota by the santee sioux against settlers were kind of pushing into the area and starting to farm, and the santee sioux fought back and killed about 700 minnesota farmers in the area. And when the army came in and, of course, this was during the civil war so there were not many troopers around, but when the army finally came in, any of the santee sioux spread out into this part of dakota territory in the attack the settlement at sioux falls, or there was great fear of an attack, and so everyone left the settlement and went to yankton only two other places, sioux city, to be safe. Sioux falls was a small prairie city most of its life. Much of its economy was based upon being a supporter of the surrounding agricultural areas and being kind of a rail hub for people to come and go from sioux falls. How did you get so involved in history and in politics . Im not sure how i came to be so interested in history. Ive always had that itch to scratch, going back to grade school, and have always loved it. I guess it has to do with wanting to know more about your roots and your heritage and where you are from and to better understand your identity. And i always find that when you Start Talking about it, other people are interested in it, too. Maybe they had a Boring High School teacher of
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