Creating Dairyland

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How Caring for Cows Saved Our Soil, Created Our Landscape, Brought Prosperity to Our State, and Still Shapes Our Way of Life in Wisconsin

Edward Janus

An engaging history of dairy farming in Wisconsin and a tribute to the many thousands of farmers who have found a way to stay on their land with their cows.

232 pages, 7 x 9, 125 color and b&w photos
Paperback: $26.95 | ISBN: 978-0-87020-463-0
Ebook: $15.99 | ISBN: 978-0-87020-509-5
Publication Date: 6/17/2011

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Description

The story of dairying in Wisconsin is the story of how our very landscape and way of life were created. By making cows the center of our farm life and learning how to care for them, our ancestors launched a revolution that changed much more than the way farmers earned their livings—it changed us. In Creating Dairyland, journalist, oral historian, and former dairyman Ed Janus opens the pages of the fascinating story of Wisconsin dairy farming.

Creating Dairyland explores the profound idea that led to the remarkable “big bang” of dairying here a century and a half ago. Janus helps us understand why there are cows in Wisconsin, how farmers became responsible stewards of our resources, and how cows have paid them back for their efforts. And he introduces us to dairy farmers and cheesemakers of today: men and women who want to tell us why they love what they do.

Ed Janus offers a sort of field guide to Dairyland, showing us how to “read” our landscape with fresh eyes, explaining what we see today by describing how and why it came to be. Creating Dairyland pays tribute to the many thousands of Wisconsin farmers who have found a way to stay on their land with their cows. Their remarkable effort of labor, intelligence, and faith is one of the great stories of Wisconsin—a story still being written.

Author Bio

Ed Janus

Ed Janus is a Wisconsin-based author, oral historian, and former dairy farmer known for his deep love of storytelling and rural life. A former community organizer and founder of Capital Brewery, he later turned to audio journalism and public radio, producing award-winning oral histories. Janus lives in Madison, preserving Wisconsin’s rural stories before they’re lost.

Never before has one book encompassed the complete tale of Wisconsin’s dairy industry in such a mesmerizing and musing way.

Jeanne Carpenter

Wisconsin Cheese Originals

“This book is a celebration of people, of families, of communities, and of the optimism that is central to living on the land. Ultimately, Creating Dairyland tells us that even if you’ve never milked a cow or even spent time on a farm, when you live in Wisconsin you’re part of the dairy industry.”

—Patrick Geoghegan, Wisconsin Milk Marketing Board

“The most eloquent statement I’ve read yet of a truth seldom expressed because it rubs some farmers the wrong way. Dairying is one of the few kinds of farming that can be both ecologically and economically profitable at the same time.”

—Gene Logsdon, author of Holy Shit: Managing Manure to Save Mankind and The Contrary Farmer

“Starting with an excellent history of dairy farming in Wisconsin, Ed Janus includes nine stories of cheesemakers and dairy farmers in their own voices in this important book about the Wisconsin dairy industry, then and now.”

—Jerry Apps, author of Old Farm: A History and Barns of Wisconsin

“Janus makes clear that Wisconsin’s transition to a dairy-based agricultural economy, even a dairy-influenced culture, was not accident . . . , but a deliberate and abrupt shift led by enlightened state educators and leaders.”

—John Umhoefer, Executive Director, Wisconsin Cheesemakers Association

“Anyone who grew up on a dairy farm or has any connection to the dairy industry will enjoy reading this book.”

—Bob Cropp, Professor Emeritus and dairy economist, University of Wisconsin–Madison