From the word go, the Nebraska story is an adventure story. No matter at what point you chance to pick it up--on the epic of the cattleman's Long Drive or the homesteader's struggle to tame the Wild Land; on the dust and dash of the Pony Express or the roar of jets streaking across the wide Nebraska skies--the elements of melodrama are always there, action and suspense are forever present, the chips are constantly down. Culled from more than a thousand books and articles, the ninety-odd pieces comprising Roundup: A Nebraska Reader were selected for their richness in human interest, historical significance, and entertainment value. Here is the Nebraska of native Nebraska writers--Willa Cather, Mari Sandoz, Bess Streeter Aldrich--and Nebraska as seen by a host of "visiting firemen," among them Mark Twain, Robert Louis Stevenson, Rudyard Kipling, A.G. Macdonell, Emily Post, Lucius Beebe, and John Gunther. Here are Nebraska and Nebraskans viewed sometimes dispassionately, sometimes with affectionate prejudice, by outsiders and insiders, contemporary participants and second-guessers. A book taking into account the paradoxical qualities which add up to the sum total of this many-faceted state has required the collective effort of many individuals. And while no single volume can pretend to tell the whole Nebraska story, Roundup will go far to convince its readers that there is indeed no place like Nebraska.