When the Showers family arrived in Bloomington, Indiana, the railroad had only recently come to town and a modest university was struggling to survive. Having spent the prior 18 years moving from place to place, the family decided to settle down and invest its modest resources to start a furniture company. The business proved to be extremely profitable and a stroke of good fortune for the small community. The company’s success strengthened Bloomington's infrastructure, helping to develop new neighborhoods, and the philanthropic acts of the Showers family supported the town’s continued development. The family’s contributions helped Indiana University through difficult times and paved the way to its becoming the largest university in the state. In this detailed history of Showers Brothers, Carrol Krause tells the story of a remarkably successful collaboration between business, town, and gown.

Showers Brothers Furniture Company: The Shared Fortunes of a Family, a City, and a University

Business & Money

Krause, Carrol Ann

Biography & History

Quarry Books

A collaboration born of a shared love of music, photography, poetry, and Indiana, this book celebrates the history, literature, and art that informs the present and shapes our identity. Richard Fields's black and white photos are evocative imaginings of Norbert Krapf's poems, visual metaphors that extend and deepen their vision. Krapf's poems pay tribute to poets from Homer and Virgil to Walt Whitman, Emily Dickinson, and Wendell Berry, and to singer-songwriters such as Woody Guthrie and John Lennon. They also explore the poet's German heritage, question ethnic prejudice and social conflict, and praise the natural world. The book includes a cycle of 15 poems about Bob Dylan; a public poem written in response to 9/11, "Prayer to Walt Whitman at Ground Zero"; "Back Home," a poem reproduced in a stained glass panel at the Indianapolis airport; and ruminations on the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, "Questions on a Wall."

Songs in Sepia and Black and White

Literature & Fiction

Krapf, Norbert

Poetry

The towering sand dunes along Lake Michigan not far from Chicago are one of the most unexpected natural features of Indiana. Dreams of Duneland is a beautifully illustrated introduction to the Dunes region, its history, and future prospects. This area of shifting sands is also a place of savanna, wetland, prairie, and forest that is home to a wide diversity of plant and animal species. The preserved area of the Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore sits by residential communities, businesses, and cultural attractions, evidence of a long history of competition for the land among farmers, fur traders, industrialists, conservationists, and urban and recreational planners. With more than 400 stunning images, the book brings to life the remarkable story of this extraordinary place.

Dreams of Duneland: A Pictorial History of the Indiana Dunes Region

History

Schoon, Kenneth J.

Americas

A symbol of Indiana's past, the covered bridge still evokes feelings of nostalgia, romance, and even mystery. During the 19th century, over 500 of these handsome structures spanned the streams, rivers, and ravines of Indiana. Plagued by floods, fire, storms, neglect, and arson, today fewer than 100 remain. Marsha Williamson Mohr's photographs capture the timeless and simple beauty of these well-traveled structures from around the state, including Parke County―the unofficial covered bridge capital of the world. With 105 color photographs, Indiana's Covered Bridges will appeal to everyone who treasures Indiana's rich architectural heritage.

Indiana Covered Bridges

Arts & Photography

Mohr, Marsha Williamson

Photography & Video

New Stories from the Midwest presents a collection of stories that celebrate an American region too often ignored in discussions about distinctive regional literature. The editors solicited nominations from more than 300 magazines, literary journals, and small presses and narrowed the selection to 19 authors. The stories, written by Midwestern writers or focusing on the Midwest, demonstrate that the quality of fiction from and about the heart of the country rivals that of any other region. Guest editor John McNally introduces the anthology, which features short fiction by Charles Baxter, Dan Chaon, Christopher Mohar, Rebecca Makkai, Lee Martin, and others.

New Stories from the Midwest: 2012 (Break Away Books)

United States

This beautifully illustrated book on landscape gardening addresses shrubs and how to determine which you should plant among your perennials and where. Shrubs provide the foundation for a pleasing, yet low-maintenance garden. They are long-lived, have the ornamental appeal of perennials, and provide variety in color, size, shape, and texture, as well as shelter and berries for birds. Shrubs can make attractive arrangements indoors and provide seasonal variation through the entire year. Gillian Harris’s illustrations are botanically correct works of art that make this book absolutely irresistible.

Shrubs Large and Small: Natives and Ornamentals for Midwest Gardens

Crafts, Hobbies & Home

Andrews, Moya L.

Gardening & Landscape Design

In the summer of 1962, the peripatetic and irrepressible Pete Gill was hired on a whim to coach basketball at tiny Ireland High School. There he would accomplish, against enormous odds, one of the great small-town feats in Indiana basketball history. With no starters taller than 5’10", few wins were predicted for the Spuds. Yet, after inflicting brutal preseason conditioning, employing a variety of unconventional motivational tactics, and overcoming fierce opposition, Gill molded the Spuds into a winning team that brought home the town’s first and only sectional and regional titles. Relying on narrative strategies of creative nonfiction rather than strict historical rendering, Mike Roos brings to life a colorful and varied cast of characters and provides a compelling account of their struggles, wide-ranging emotions, and triumphs throughout the season.

One Small Town, One Crazy Coach: The Ireland Spuds and the 1963 Indiana High School Basketball Season

Curnutt, Kirk

Reynolds, Jerry

Roos, Mike

Blake, Mike

May, Chris

Lewis, Michael

Butcher, Jack

Buse, Don

Dean, Joe

Over the last half century, historic preservation has been on the rise in American cities and towns, from urban renewal and gentrification projects to painstaking restoration of Victorian homes and architectural landmarks. In this book, Nancy R. Hiller brings together individuals with distinctive styles and perspectives, to talk about their passion for preservation. They consider the meaning of place and what motivates those who work to save and care for places; the role of place in the formation of identity; the roles of individuals and organizations in preserving homes, neighborhoods, and towns; and the spiritual as well as economic benefits of preservation. Richly illustrated, Historic Preservation in Indiana is an essential book for everyone who cares about preserving the past for future generations.

Historic Preservation in Indiana: Essays from the Field

Rolling hills, rich forests, and beautiful vistas have made Brown County, Indiana, a favorite haunt of painters and ordinary tourists. In this gorgeous collection, landscape photographer Gary Moore reveals the spirit of the place in the morning hours as it awakens to the new day. Complementing Moore’s wonderful photographs is a text by James P. Eagleman, one of the area’s lifelong naturalists, which showcases the county’s unique flora and fauna. Included with more than 100 color landscape photographs are Moore’s tips on composition, atmosphere, and lighting, encouraging readers to test their creativity with whatever equipment they possess. A book to treasure, Brown County Mornings beckons visitors to enjoy this magical place at any time of day or year.

Brown County Mornings

Moore, Gary

Indiana is barn country. Beautiful, aged barns can be found tucked among bucolic fields from Valparaiso to Vincennes. Once a dominant feature of the Hoosier landscape, these evocative buildings are fast disappearing, giving way to more efficient, but less visually appealing, metal structures. Indiana Barns presents 138 of these charming rustics, drawn from the portfolio of photographer Marsha Williamson Mohr. Mohr has been photographing barns, covered bridges, and pastoral scenes for more than 20 years. Here, she showcases barns of all shapes and sizes, captured from every angle, during all four seasons, and in various states of repair and decay. Whether you have owned a barn or just admire the craftsmanship, this lively collection is sure to delight.

Indiana Barns

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