Mr. Garland's twentieth century output has been prolific of popular novels and short stories. His latest book, "A Son of the Middle Border," is pronounced by William Dean Howells a unique achievement and ranking well up with the world's best autobiographies.
A new name associated with Iowa at the close of the last century was that of Emerson Hough. "The Story of the Cowboy" (1897) can hardly be classed as fiction, and yet it "reads like a romance." Mr. Hough, long a roving correspondent of Forest and Stream, first tried "his 'prentice han'" as a story-writer in "Belle's Roses," a tense story of army life on the plains.[ [4] This was followed by several promising short stories and, in 1902, by "The Mississippi Bubble," a historical romance of quality founded upon the adventurous career of John Law, pioneer in the fields of frenzied finance. Three years later came his "Heart's Desire," a beautiful love story of the Southwest. In 1907 appeared his "Way of a Man" and "Story of the Outlaw." Several other novels have come from his facile pen. The most severely criticized and best seller of the series is his "54-40 or Fight," a historical novel based on the diplomatic controversy over Oregon in 1845-6. Mr. Hough is the most successful alumnus of Iowa State University in the difficult field of fiction.
Lingering over the index to the eleven volumes of Iowa's pioneer magazine, I am tempted to mention in passing several other names that stand out prominently in the memory of Midland readers.
Mrs. Virginia H. Reichard contributed an interesting paper, "A Glimpse of Arcadia." Mrs. Caroline M. Hawley gave a valuable illustrated paper on "American Pottery." Mrs. Addie B. Billington, Mrs. Virginia K. Berryhill, Mrs. Clara Adele Neidig, and other Iowans contributed to the poetry in the magazine's columns. Hon. Jonathan P. Dolliver, Hon. William B. Allison, Gen. James B. Weaver, and many other men prominent in the public life of Iowa contributed articles of permanent value. Mrs. Cora Bussey Hillis was the author of "Madame Deserée's Spirit Rival." Editor Ingham, of the Register, then of Algona, Editor Moorhead, then of Keokuk, now a Des Moines journalist, Minnie Stichter (Mrs. C. J. Fulton of Fairfield), Mrs. Harriet C. Towner, of Corning, Charles Eugene Banks, born in Clinton County, now a prominent journalist and litterateur in Seattle, Dr. J. Foster Bain, then assistant state geologist, now a resident of London, and one of the world's most famous consulting geologists, Barthinius L. Wick, of Cedar Rapids, a voluminous historiographer, are among the many who, during the last five years of the old century, did their bit toward putting Iowa on the literary map.
Irving Berdine Richman, of Muscatine, had already written "Appenzell," a study of the Swiss, with whom, as consul-general, he had lived for several years. His Midland sketch, "The Battle of the Stoss," was followed by a little volume, "John Brown Among the Quakers, and Other Sketches." But the two great historical works to which he gave years of enthusiastic research were not published until well on in the twentieth century. The first of these, "Rhode Island; a Study of Separation," was honored with an introduction by John Bryce. It was so well received that the "study" was amplified into a two-volume work, "Rhode Island; Its Making and Meaning." The second, a work compelling years of research in old Mexico and Spain, is entitled "California Under Spain and Mexico." These alone give the Iowa historian an enviable world-reputation.
Literary Iowa in the Twentieth Century
Our study of the high places in Iowa literature has already been somewhat extended into the new century. The transfer of the Iowa magazine to St. Louis, in 1898, and its speedy suspension thereafter did not deter many Iowans from continuing to write. Difficult as it was for our unknowns to find a market for their wares in Eastern magazines and publishing houses, the persistent few, who knew they had what the public should want, "knocked" again and again "at the golden gates of the morning," and in due time the gates were opened unto them.
Edwin Legrange Sabin's first essay in Midland fiction was "A Ghostly Carouse,"—full of promise. His first book, "The Magic Mashie and other Golfish Stories," in common with all his other works, throbs with the heart of youth. His magazine verse, mainly humorous, has the same quality. Latterly he has been illuminating history, and especially the fast-dissolving wild life of the West, with stories closely adhering to fact and yet rampant with adventure—the kind of books our outdoor boys take to bed with them! To his readers Kit Carson, Fremont, Buffalo Bill, are as much alive as are the heroes of the stadium, the tennis court and the links. But underneath this delightfully light literature there is well-nigh concealed a poet of the Swinburne type, as witness this bit of verse:
"Upon the purple hillside, vintage-stained,
In drowsy langour brown October lies,