Light on the Prairie: Solomon D. Butcher, Photographer of Nebraska's Pioneer Days

by Nancy Plain

Once President Lincoln signed the Homestead Act of 1862, which granted 160 acres of free land to anyone with the grit to farm it for five years, the rush to the Great Plains was on. Solomon D. Butcher was there to document it, amassing more than three thousand photographs and compiling the most complete record of the sod house era ever made.

Butcher (1856–1927) staked his claim on the plains in 1880. He didn’t like farming, but he found another way to thrive. He had learned the art of photography as a teenager, and he began taking pictures of his friends and neighbors. Butcher noticed how fast the vast land was “settling up,” so he formed the plan that would become his life’s work—to record the frontier days in words and images.

Alongside sixty-two of Butcher’s iconic photographs, Light on the Prairie conveys the irrepressible spirit of a man whose passion would give us a firsthand look at the men and women who settled the Great Plains. Like his subjects, Butcher was a pioneer, even though he held a camera more often than a plow.

Watch an interview with the author.

Genres: Nonfiction, History

128 pages, Paperback

First published September 1, 2012

Reviews

[J.D. Steens]

The book is a story about Solomon Butcher and his photographs of Nebraska, particularly Custer County, in the late 19th century – sod houses (from dugouts to two-story edifices), railroads (the first train in Custer County; the building of the Union Pacific), prairie scenes (landscapes, farming), formal portraits and families, belongings (a “pump organ” from the East) and people scenes (hunting, schoolhouses, cowboys), and very young-looking towns.

Though the account of Butcher’s life and the history of that area is good, the book would have benefited from more pictures. We get just a taste. For those with ancestors from Nebraska, it’s a record about a rough-in-tumble past. Butcher took these photos as a way to make a living. Some of his work was destroyed when his photo studio was destroyed by fire. At the urging of one particular individual, the Butcher photos were bought for the Nebraska State Historic Society (the legislature funded the purchase of Butcher’s photos because the Society was not interested), though at a far less price than Butcher thought was fair.

[Katy Lovejoy · Rating 4 out of 5]

I always forget we were the great American desert

[Steve · Rating 4 out of 5]

A short book about the life of photographer Solomon D. Butcher and his life's work, recording the sod house era on the Nebraska plains. Butcher staked his claim to farmland in Custer County Nebraska in the 1880's with his father and brother but preferred photography to farming and spent much of his time documenting prairie life with his camera. A brief synopsis of Butcher's life and the lives of the plains farmers, ranchers and outlaws together with a few of Butcher's thousands of photographs this book was a great introduction to Butcher and his work documenting a fleeting place and time in our nations history.

[Cindy Crandall · Rating 5 out of 5]

I am researching family history and wanted to learn about early days in Nebraska, soddy houses and taming the prairies. My great-grandfather immigrated from Germany and my grandfather was born in a soddy. This book gave me a great insight into their lives.

[Denise Kearney · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book has some of Solomon Butcher's photos as well as a web sight to view many many more of life on the prairie when settlers lived in dugouts and sod houses.PBB(O)