ATDDTA (6) 175 S 2

[Monte Davis]

> He guessed that 
> every cabin, outbuilding, saloon, and farmhouse in his field of sight 
> concealed stories that were anything but peaceful...

For those of us of a certain age, the period photographs and small-town
newspaper extracts of Michael Lesy's _Wisconsin Death Trip_ (1973) were a
look into the darker side of rural life in 1890-1910: "accounts of barn
burnings, attacks by gangs of armed tramps, threatening and obscene letters,
death by diphtheria and smallpox (the Wisconsin townsfolk had, some years,
to attend several funerals a week), alcoholism, madness, business and bank
failures, and even a case or two of witchcraft."
 
Closer to the cities is his 1998 _Dreamland: America at the Dawn of the
Twentieth Century_, which I've just ordered based on the Amazon account:
"208 black-and-white pictures from the archive of the Detroit Publishing
Company, the hugely successful postcard business. The images depict
skyscrapers under construction, bustling urban streets, farmers and dusty
country roads, and the glories of the newly charted American West, with its
cowboys, miners, and distant prairie towns... Poignantly contrasting with
the serenity of the photos are thumbnail histories of the time's roiling
social, political, and cultural changes..."

Wouldn't surprise me a bit if AtD drew some inspiration as well as scenery
from it. Lesy is an ace social historian with a fine eye.