Solomon D. Butcher, Photographer of Nebraska’s Pioneer Days
Once President Lincoln signed the Homestead Act of 1862, which granted 160 acres of free land to anyone with the grit to farm it for five years, the rush to the Great Plains was on. Solomon D. Butcher was there to document it, amassing more than three thousand photographs and compiling the most complete record of the sod house era ever made. Butcher (1856–1927) staked his claim on the plains in 1880. He didn’t like farming, but he found another way to thrive. He had learned the art of photography as a teenager, and he began taking pictures of his friends and neighbors. Butcher noticed how fast the vast land was “settling up,” so he formed the plan that would become his life’s work—to record the frontier days in words and images. Alongside sixty-two of Butcher’s iconic photographs, Light on the Prairie conveys the irrepressible spirit of a man whose passion would give us a firsthand look at the men and women who settled the Great Plains. Like his subjects, Butcher was a pioneer, even though he held a camera more often than a plow.
Awards for Light on the Prairie
* Spur Award for Best Western Juvenile Nonfiction
* Nebraska Book Award for Youth Nonfiction
* Will Rogers Medallion Award for Juvenile Nonfiction
* Award of Merit, American Association for State and Local History
Professional and Peer Reviews
“Nancy Plain tells of Solomon Butcher’s quest in Light on the Prairie: Solomon D. Butcher, Photographer of Nebraska’s Pioneer Days, a biography written for young adult readers, but one that will appeal strongly to adults. Two-time Spur Award winning writer, Plain is eloquent, detailed, precise, and evocative in her descriptions of Butcher’s life.
Plain has again taken a subject, explored it deeply, and expressed the nuances of
the story in a way that both educates and entertains. Published by the University of
Nebraska Press/Bison Books, this is a book that belongs in every Nebraska school, and
the homes of anyone who wants to understand our western homestead legacy and Great
Plains history better.”
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Will Rogers Medallion
Award Committee
“Plain has an enviable gift for storytelling.”
“Nancy Plain tells of Solomon Butcher’s quest in Light on the Prairie: Solomon D. Butcher, Photographer of Nebraska’s Pioneer Days, a biography written for young adult readers, but one that will appeal strongly to adults. Two-time Spur Award winning writer, Plain is eloquent, detailed, precise, and evocative in her descriptions of Butcher’s life.
Plain has again taken a subject, explored it deeply, and expressed the nuances of
the story in a way that both educates and entertains. Published by the University of
Nebraska Press/Bison Books, this is a book that belongs in every Nebraska school, and
the homes of anyone who wants to understand our western homestead legacy and Great
Plains history better.”
Read More
Will Rogers Medallion
Award Committee
Reader Reviews
great photos
i always wanted a book by Butcher.. I love American history and this book teaches with wonderful pictures..thank you very much
Light on the Prairie
This book had lots of good photos. My husband said he learned a lot about the photographer. He always enjoys photos of the past.
Winner of the Will Rogers Medallion Award
One thing we hear a lot is "What was the West really like?" Between the heroic version served up by TV and the movies, the revisionist versions currently popular among certain academics and the wishful projections on Cowboys and Indians from our youth, we lose sight of the fact the West was settled by men and women who were pretty much like most of us. Well, they had a little more adventuresome spirit than most of us, but by and large, they at least looked normal. That is the inescapable conclusion one must draw from Nancy Plain's wonderful reprisal of Solomon D. Butcher's photographs of pioneer Nebraska. Perhaps most of us do not have (or probably never had) a cow grazing on our roof, as the cover photo does, but Butcher captured life on the sod house frontier as no one else did. A transplant from Illinois, Butcher much preferred the life of an intenerate photographer, glass plates and all, to farming. He took over 3000 photographs, and Nancy Plain has winnowed that amazing total down to just 62 which capture a fleeting era of Western History - History as it really was. He took pictures of families, cowboys, cattle, sheep, Indians--and houses made of sod (up to two stories!) on a treeless prairie. To add to the priceless collection of images, Nancy Plain has added text that is every bit as outstanding as the pictures. It is expository without being condescending. It is fresh and interesting for younger readers, be they six, sixteen, or sixty. This is truly a book that needs to on every serious Western writer's desk as well as in the classroom and school library.--Review by Charles Williams
I wanted to see more of Mr. Butcher's pictures.
I was very happy with the speed in which this book arrived. It will have a permanent place in my library.
Very interesting book. Just what I was looking for ...
Very interesting book. Just what I was looking for. Arrived quickly
A must have book (merely reading it is insufficient) for ...
A must have book (merely reading it is insufficient) for anybody with a real interest in the history of the plains states.
