Latest Sandhills book from Alan Bartels tells of hidden histories

Alan Bartels is inviting readers to take a closer look at the Sandhills of Nebraska by reading his new book, Secret Nebraska Sandhills: A Guide to the Weird, Wonderful, and Obscure.

The Sandhills are often categorized as a quiet, consistent landscape. Bartels’ book spends dozens of pages telling of stories not widely known, bits of folklore, and even overlooked historical moments that happened in our sparsely populated part of the country.

View our full interview with Bartels in the video at the end of this story

A veteran journalist, photographer, and former editor of Nebraska Life Magazine, Bartels said the book grew out of years of curiosity and conversations that never quote fit into traditional travel writing.

“I’ve just been picking up these little tidbits of folklore and mythology, things that didn’t really at the time qualify to invest the time to see if there was a story there,” Bartels said during a KCNI Public Affairs interview. “But I never forgot those things.”

When his publisher approached him regarding their ‘Secret’ series, Bartels saw an opportunity to revisit those tidbits and follow where they led him.

“It gave me the opportunity to go flesh out some of those things, do some investigating,” he said. “I had a good time exploring the Sandhills talking to people about these things, and I think the very best ended up in this book.”

Oral storytelling found to be very localized

Unlike his last book that put travel destinations in the spotlight, this book expands on oral history, or stories often shared across generations that were rarely documented. It’s what Bartels said is part of what makes the Sandhills unique.

“The folklore in Thomas County, for instance, may be well known to those residents but a few counties away they may never have heard of these stories,” he said.

As a result of that localized storytelling, some leads faded away while Bartels found others opening up into narratives that he feels readers will thoroughly enjoy reading about.

The adventure of finding ‘the right spot’ to tell each story

Among the book’s more than 80 entries are sections that range from quirky to historical. One of the most meaningful for Bartels came while tracking down the site of a not widely known conflict known as the Battle of the Blowout. (A blowout is a sandy area where rapid wind erosion literally “blows out” a hole in the surface of the landscape)

After being told by a resident to simply photograph ‘any old blowout’ to accompany his story, Bartels said he kept digging and eventually connected with a family who unknowingly owned the land tied to the story.

“The folklore associated with it and the facts associated with that Battle of the Blowout and that afternoon of discovery with that Sandhills family is what’s going to stick with me forever,” Bartels said.

A book not short on bizarre

Bartels believes may readers will appreciate the book’s offering of the bizarre, including a time when Valentine, Nebraska’s main street was the barrier between two time zones in the late 1960s.

“You’d have the people at the bar on the east side of Main Street, they would have to leave at last call,” Bartels explained. “Well, they would just stumble across main street to the bar on the west side of the street that could legally stay open for another hour.”

Other oddities in the book’s pages include notorious horse thieves, alien tunnels, and even a Sandhills monkey, which Bartels took care to embrace for what makes them memorable while still doing his due diligence with careful research and direct conversations.

The people of the Sandhills made it possible

In the early pages of the book, Bartels acknowledged numerous people who helped him effectively tell the stories inside.

“They would always drop what they were doing to help me out,” Bartels said of the residents of the Sandhills. “Whether it was providing information on their part of the world or giving me a ride to some historical or scenic location. Sometimes it was just that they found me lost at the end of a dead end road or in their pasture and gave me a bottle of water and directions to the nearest road.”

Their willingness to share, he said, is a reflection of who they are as people.

“They’re good Nebraskans, hardworking people proud of their history and always willing to help out somebody who takes notice of their culture and wants to tell people about it,” Bartels said.

Where to find Secret Nebraska Sandhills going forward

With the release of Secret Nebraska Sandhills, Bartels is adding another layer to his work that includes publications in locations like National Geographic, USA Today, and Smithsonian’s Air & Space Magazine.

Secret Nebraska Sandhills: A Guide to the Weird, Wonderful, and Obscure can be purchased online through AlanJBartels.com or at retailers across the state and country.

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