"This book uses the story of Isaac Beckley Werner, a homesteader in Stafford County, Kansas, to reveal how the Populist Movement involved and affected Kansas farmers. From 1884 until his death in 1895, Werner kept a diary whose content revolved around the advice of Henry Ward Beecher: recording events around him rather than focusing on himself. Owner of an extensive personal library, an attendee of Populist lectures who contributed columns to the County Capital and spoke at the county seat, and closely tied to his community, Werner's account provides a rare glimpse into rural life in late-nineteenth-century Kansas. In 2010, Fenwick found Werner's 480-page diary in the basement of the Lucile Hall Museum in St. John, Kansas. Rather than a simple transcription of the diary, this manuscript branches out from Werner's words to provide a more readable account of his life, and to elaborate upon the ties that bound his remote community to national trends in farming, politics, and westward migration, sometimes in unexpected ways. In a similar fashion, Isaac's premature death-which Fenwick attributes to his use of Paris Green, a popular powdered pesticide and pigment-resonates with the present-day concerns of Kansas farmers"-- Provided by publisher.