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This section is devoted to Great Plains resources available on audio cassette tape. As I've mentioned elsewhere, I like listening to these while falling asleep at night. And occasionally, it's fun to pack them on a trip, since my minivan does in fact have a cassette player built in.

You might want to buy copies of these for your own personal collection. Better yet, you will find that school or public libraries often have audio cassette tapes to borrow. That's in fact the route I took, getting one from a local public library, and the other from a school I used to teach at.

Whatever it takes, do try to find these; they're great fun!

Centennial

Okay, if you're familiar with this epic novel by James Michener, you'll be wondering how they squeezed it all in on four cassette tapes. Well, the answer is of course, the editor cut like crazy!

Despite that, this is an excellent rendition and does manage to convey quite a bit about the book. The copy editor focused on several key incidents, like the first fur traders, the Oregon Trail, the cattle drive (my favorite part), the murder and the Dust Bowl years. All in all, wise choices were made so even though this book on tape is a mere six hours long you'll come away with a pretty good feel for Michener's Centennial.

It's read by David Dukes, a professional actor who passed away recently. He had a good voice, but I noticed that the pronunciation of several words gave him some problems occasionally (most notably, "travois.") His command of dialects was a bit weak; it was hard to tell who the Germans were and who the Arapaho were! But this is just quibbling— it's still a very fun tape to listen to. I must have heard it a hundred times by now.

We took this along with us on our first journey to the Pawnee National Grassland (which is where quite a bit of the story takes place). Rather amazingly, the tape stayed in sync with our driving more often than not. For example, when we pulled into Courthouse rock, the story had just gotten to that point. And so it went for quite a bit of the trip.


I found this set of tapes at the South Central Technical College library. Since Michener has been so immensely popular over the years, I think the odds are good you'll come across it in a library near you.

You'll find the complete bibliographic data for Centennial on audio cassette in the sidebar to the right. And then at the bottom of this page are some associated links.
James A. Michener, Centennial, read by David Dukes, (Los Angeles: The Publishing Mills, 1993), 4 sound cassettes (6 hours), Dolby processed.

O Pioneers!

This story of the prairie, O Pioneers!, was written in 1913 by Willa Cather, one of America's finest authors. Cather, in fact, lived in Red Cloud, Nebraska, the part of the state featured in the book. We visited her childhood home, the memorial prairie and the society book shop when passing through Red Cloud back in 2000 — but I'll save that for another section of this Web site.

This is an exquisite story about the early homesteaders of Nebraska, mostly Swedes, Norwegians and Germans in these parts. As you might suspect, the real protagonist of O Pioneers! is the land. I think Cather truly captured this, not only the land and the grasses and the birds, but the love a certain type of person might have for all that. In fact, the sentiments of John Dunbar in Dances with Wolves (to whom I've alluded many times here) is not all that different from what Cather describes.

Since this is a short novel (I guess that's what you'd call it), it is possible to find unabridged versions of it on audio cassette. The set I've listened to fits on five tapes. The reader was actress Leanor Reizen, who does a spectacular job. She's excellent at portraying different characters, not by dialects mind you (very sensibly), but just by a subtle change of pitch and inflection. You tend to forget that it's just one person reading and get lost in the idea that you're really hearing several people in conversation. These cassettes have been my constant bedside companion on many winter nights.


I found O Pioneers at the Blue Earth County Public Library. You might have a harder time finding this set than Centennial, though. The URL for the publisher (see the bibliographic details to the right) appeared to be defunct, and an Amazon search turned up zippo. However, I did note that there are some newer editions, by other publishers and with different readers, available. You might want to give them a try, for this really is an excellent story
Willa Cather, O Pioneers!, read by Leanor Reizen, (Okemos, Michigan: Literature on Tape, Inc., 1995), 5 sound cassettes.

Little Bighorn Battlefield Self-Guided Auto Tour

If you're planning a trip to the Little Bighorn Battlefield National Monument in Montana, then this tape is a must-have. I'll explain why in just a moment. But first, let me tell you a little bit about the cassette.

This is a 70 minute program designed especially for use in your car's tape player when visiting the Battlefield. The narrator lets you know when you should stop at various points of interest along the drive, and calls out the associated odometer readings.


There are a number of stops along the five mile stretch where you can pull the car over and hoof it on walking trails. By including all of these, you can easily spend the entire morning learning about the Custer battlefield and the Reno-Benteen battlefield. And you'll be glad to know that this is a balanced treatment, so you'll be guided to a number of stops important to the American Indian side of things.

Sam Shiromani and Richard Fox, Little Bighorn Battlefield Self-Guided Auto Tour, (Hardin, Montana: El Conejo Productions, Inc., 2001).


Included with the cassette are several maps which really help you pinpoint the sites of note. By using the tape, the included maps and the Park Service brochure you get when you enter the Monument, you'll have more than enough info at your fingertips to make sense of Custer's last days. And don't do the usual out-of-shape American thing and only drive the tour. Get out of your car and hike to the several walk-in sites. The Little Bighorn valley is quite pretty, and there's still a ghostly feel hanging over the area. By the way, you'll find dispensing boxes at the trailheads containing additional detailed brochures.

What I really like about this tape is its depth. This isn't some cheesy tour guide that glosses over the details; we found that it really answered a number of specific questions we had and gave the scientific reasons for the conclusions drawn. That's not surprising, since one of the co-writers is Richard Fox, an archaeologist from the University of South Dakota in Vermillion. Fox has been one of the leading researchers at the Battlefield over the years. When we visit important places in the West, whether it be a grassland or a historic site or an author's childhood home, we like to really dig in and learn about it. This Little Bighorn Battlefield Self-Guided Auto Tour cassette won't disappoint.

My suggestion is to pack in a sack lunch (which is what we did) and get ready to spend a fascinating day. After your auto tour and then lunch, you can explore the excellent museum in the Visitor Center during the afternoon. This truly is an all-day experience, although most of the tourists we saw seemed to be in a hurry to check it off the list.

As mentioned above, you can obtain the tape at the National Monument itself. But you might want to prepare for a trip ahead of time by ordering a copy directly from the publisher. Check out the links below for details.

Links to Tapes Mentioned
Links to Related Resources



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