Making my way from Chadron to Alliance and Scottsbluff on the western fringes of the state, I visited Tom and Aleisha at a large ranch in the middle of the Sandhills. Their ranch is along Highway 27 amid the landscape and its people famously and notoriously rendered in the writings of Mari Sandoz. Despite comprising over a quarter of Nebraska and being designated a National Natural Landmark in 1984, Tom said that many Nebraskans know little about the Sandhills. Out east, we are unaware of this vast expanse and its place in our social, economic and historic narrative. The ranch house was several miles west of the highway along a track acceptable for trucks though somewhat less comfortable in an RV. With people and animals so dispersed, I asked Tom what community means to him. He observed, “You can live in Omaha and hardly know your neighbors at all, and when you live out here there is a whole lot more opportunity to get to know and work with your neighbors. Your neighbors are miles …