THE SMOKY VALLEY

Reproductions of a Series of Lithographs of the Smoky Valley
in Kansas
By
Birger Sandzen
An Introduction by Minna K. Powell
CARL J. SMALLEY
Kansas City, Missouri
1922
Copyright, 1922, by Carl J. Smalley
Kansas City, Mo.
Published December, 1922
Printed by the Republican Press,
at McPherson, Kansas,
in the United States of America

Sandzen and His Friend, the Smoky.

When Birger Sandzen looks into the seamed face of a pioneer farmer of Kansas, he sees the conquest of a spirit. When he looks upon the face of the Kansas prairie, he sees the conquest of the Wilderness and he makes the World feel the courage of the Kansas spirit and the power of Kansas sinews.

An artist who penetrates below the surface of his subject and sees the soul of it looking out, Birger Sandzen Was foreordained to celebrate in black and white and in color, the moods and the meaning of the Smoky Hill River, which winds so peacefully in and out among the farms of central Kansas.

The Smoky Hill River is not much wider than a creek, and the early homesteader valued it chiefly because it watered his land and his stock.