MISSION STATEMENT.

OBJECTIVES. The North American Prairie lies in the center of what was once a vast expanse of tallgrass prairie, a region steeped in natural and cultural history. The prairie ecosystem began to develop millions of years ago, the product of a mid-latitude continental climate of moderate rainfall, vigorous winds, and intense sunlight. Within the last several thousand years, diverse groups of native peoples entered the region, adapting to the prairie and in some areas helping to maintain and even to spread its plant and animal communities through periodic burning. In the middle of the nineteenth century, peoples of European and African ancestry began settling in the region on farms and in small towns, quickly displacing most of the native peoples and over time transforming the prairie into farmland. Prairie soils were rich, and, with the aid of new technology and more productive crop varieties, farmers produced an ever-increasing amount of food for export around the world. Today, the tallgrass prairie in Iowa is almost gone, the family farm is threatened by the expansion of large-scale industrial agriculture, and most of the small towns are declining. Recognizing the enormity of these changes, scholars and the general public have begun to reexamine the history of the prairie region, seeking understanding, aesthetic appreciation, and a sense of place, and to engage in dialogue about the region's future.