The Vanishing Great Plains

My students just finished an essay for which they research their "place" -- a neighborhood of a large city, an entire small city, but for most of my students, this means studying the small town they call home in a new way. One of the challenges is determining and maintaining a tone, an attitude toward the place that is established and consistent throughout, reflected in each representative "icon" they choose. If they want to say their town is a place of somber pride, then each person, location, and event peculiar or important to the place they discuss needs to establish that somber pride.
We often use data from www.census.gov and show how populations and demographics have changed over time. I usually choose a town deep into what South Dakotans call West River, a part-geographic, part-disparaging term that is the rough equivalent of what certain denizens of the city mean when they refer to someone as "country" or "rustic". In many counties out West River, the populations have fallen below two persons per square mile. Many students have no idea how the population of their home towns compares with, say, forty years ago.
I read it too late to use this semester, but the NYT just ran a great story examining how football has changed as these sparsely populated schools have consolidated. I think I'll use it this spring. You can read it here.