Farm baseball … with ghost runners!
By Tom Kovach
Growing up on a farm in north-central Minnesota wasn’t all chores and hard work … although there was plenty of that too. But back in the l950s and early l960s when I...
Quilts — Masterpieces of the heart and windows into women’s history
By Marlene Parkin
Issue #22 • July/August, 1993
Many of the quilts of yesterday took a lifetime to make. Perhaps the mystical part of quiltsthe aspect that makes them almost humanis the countless hours of work...
The greatest American who was never President
By John Silveira
Issue #60a • November/December, 1999
"The election's next year, right?" I asked.
Dave Duffy, the publisher of Backwoods Home Magazine, was editing a rather lengthy article on water. I don't know if he didn't...
Was the first government gun confiscation attempt foiled by an unsung colonial heroine?
By John Silveira
Issue #119 • September/October, 2009
Gun control people don't seem to get just how deeply etched into the American psyche gun ownership goes and that the resistance to being disarmed by their own...
The summer of ’35
By John Graesch
Issue #64 • July/August, 2000
Sixty five years ago I was living in that part of Seattle, Washington, known as South Park. Few places had as much natural beauty as "The Park" as...
President George Washington’s Farewell Address
Friends and Fellow Citizens: The period for a new election of a citizen, to administer the executive government of the United States, being not far distant, and the time actually arrived, when your thoughts...
George Washington Carver — He wrote the book on self-reliance
By John Silveira
Issue #31 • January/February, 1995
"What were you listening to when I got to your house? Sounded nice. I don't think I've ever heard it before."
O.E. MacDougal looked at me from across the...
Remembering what grandma used
By Marjorie Burris
Issue #57 • May/June, 1999
My grandmother, Mary Etta Dillman Graham, was one of those frontier women who took life as it came; extremely practical, resourceful and inventive, she was always, always ready...
The vanishing outhouse
By Tom Kovach
Issue #79 • January/February, 2003
A person recently wrote to a large Midwest newspapers' advice column asking for information about outdoor privies. It seems that this person's family inherited a log cabin from...
Oregon Trail preparedness: What supplies did the settlers carry?
By Don Lewis
Issue #176 • April/May/June, 2019
The year was 1834, a year that didn’t really stand out as all that particularly important in American history. But like any other year, it had its share...
James Polk — A model for modern presidents
By John Silveira
Issue #32 • March/April, 1995
It was snowing and three of us were up at the office. Dave Duffy, the fellow who publishes BHM, and I were trying to get some work done...
Catfish Biscuits
By Danny Fulks
Issue #87 • May/June, 2004
Danny Fulks, 71, grew up in southern Ohio where his parents worked the land and milked cows, and his tightly written stories paint a vivid picture of life...
the gee-whiz! page: Animals, humans, extraterrestrials, and tools
By O. E. MacDougal
Issue #154 • July/August, 2015
There was a time when it was thought that a defining difference between humans and animals was: we use tools, they don't. But, in the last few...
Doesn’t anyone remember Tom Paine
By Robert L. Williams
Issue #19 • January/February, 1993
Many years ago, before I came to my senses and left public education for good, I was teaching on a college campus when one of the administrators...
The time-travel ad
By John Silveira
Issue #125 • September/October, 2010
It's become a minor Internet phenomenon. The ad reads:
It's also been read by Jay Leno on his late night TV show, on National Public Radio more than once...
Fly it proudly and properly
By Roger Meyer
Issue #130 • July/August, 2011
Since September 11, 2001, more Americans are displaying the national flag. Our flag gives us a sense of unity and purpose as a nation. Old Glory represents our...
