Alumni Author: Brian W. Beltman

Dutch Transplanters on the Grasslands and the Fruits of Chain Migration by Brian W. Beltman

Summary from cover:

This narrative describes the transoceanic and internal migration pattern and resulting settlements across the Midwestern grasslands by Dutch immigrants in the nineteenth century. The transplantation process involved repeated pioneering and community formation that exhibited persistent culture transfer and ethnic identity, even as necessary adaptations occurred because of environmental imperatives and contextual change. The Dutch settlers maintained highly recognizable enclaves in Marion and Sioux counties in Iowa and in Douglas and Bon Homme counties in South Dakota. This study retells their history with fresh insights into precise configurations of the colonies with demographic specificity and discussion of economic pursuits and social attributes. Special attention focuses on agricultural developments in the emerging Corn Belt. The book includes two biographical accounts of individual immigrants that provide concrete examples to flesh out the larger portrait of the migration and resettlement experience.

Author Bio:

Brian W. Beltman, born in Orange City, Iowa, in 1945, received his BA from Northwestern College in 1967 and completed his MA the next year at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Military duty intervened, and he served in the artillery with the 101st Division in Vietnam. In 1970 he resumed graduate studies at UW to obtain his PhD in 1974. For five years he taught full-time, including postings at Dartmouth College, Arizona State University, and the University of South Carolina. After changing careers from education to the energy industry he worked for SCANA Corp. for thirty-one years while remaining an adjunct professor of American history for three decades at USC. He is the author of  Dutch Farmer in the Missouri Valley: The Life and Letters of Ulbe Europe, 1866-1950 as well as other publications in professional journals. Now retired, he and his wife live in Rock Hill, SC. 

Book Review by  Douglas Firth Anderson

Douglas Firth Anderson is professor emeritus of history at Northwestern College in Orange City, Iowa, co-author of the book Orange City and co-editor of the faculty research open-access annual Northwestern Review.