History As They Lived It

History As They Lived It

Margaret Kimball Brown
348 pp + xxii, illus., maps, appendix, references, index, paperback only,
ISBN 1-880397-57-9, $22.95 + $4.95 s/h

Once every two or three decades a book is published casting new light on almost forgotten towns of the middle Mississippi Valley. Natalia Belting’s Kaskaskia Under the French Regime is one. Carl Ekberg’s towering Colonial Ste. Genevieve is another. Now, Margaret Kimball Brown takes us back to 1722, the founding of Prairie du Rocher, and brings us forward to the twenty-first century. Wedding the skills of a trained and careful historian to a delightful brand of journalism, she presents this fascinating study of a lively little community.

The appearance of History As They Lived It at this particular time is most welcome, for it brings together the fully ripened thoughts of a mature scholar at the very moment that students of the Illinois Country need such a book.

—Carl J. Ekberg, Ph.D., author of Colonial Ste. Genevieve, An Adventure in the Mississippi Valley

In History As They Lived It, Margaret Kimball Brown displays at once the curiosity of the archaeologist, the tenacity of the archivist, the broad view of the sociologist, and the discipline and analysis of the historian. It returns to us the many particulars and motifs that help us to identify (and accept with enduring gratitude) the ethos that has made Prairie du Rocher, our second mother, a very special community.

—Dan Franklin, coauthor of three major books published by McGraw Hill.

Dr. Brown’s work is unique and fills a major void in the history of Midwestern communities, as she examines over a period of some two hundred years the long and unusual persistence of the French cultural identity, the integration of early American arrivals into this culture, and lastly the process of eventual French integration into American culture.

—Pierre LeBeau, Professor of History, North Central College, Naperville, Ill.

About the Author

Margaret Kimball Brown earned the Ph.D. in anthropology from Michigan State University in 1973. She served as site manager of Cahokia Mounds Historic Site from 1984 to 1998, where her work earned high honors and brought international fame to the Illinois landmark. She was staff archaeologist/chief archaeologist of the Illinois Department of Conservation from 1975 to 1984. She has lived in Prairie du Rocher for many years.

Index of Titles by Subject
To El Dorado	On the Lincoln Highway	Biographies, Humor & Fiction
To Santa Fe	Lewis and Clark	Anything Midwest
To Oregon	Tales of the West	Maps, Postcards, Kids, etc
To Zion	Antique Automobiles	Music