Last month, I attended the Western History Association conference in St. Paul, Minnesota, where I took part in a meeting of the newly-formed Midwestern History Association. One of the association’s founders, historian Jon Lauck, suggested that, in contrast to the South and West, which have large, rich scholarships, the American Midwest was equally worthy of study, given its significant role in the country’s history. The Midwest was the country’s industrial hub, a core of what had once been the