The author Michael Wallis described Angie Debo (1890-1988) as “the distinguished historian, teacher, author and editor, an inspiration to so many others, and an Oklahoma pioneer who deserves nothing less than sainthood.”  

In 1940, And Still the Waters Run--probably the most important of Dr. Debo's many award-winning books--was published by Princeton University Press.  

• At the time, the University of Oklahoma Press had declined to publish her meticulously researched nonfiction due to the threat of libel suits from prominent Oklahoma politicians and business people.


• Dr. Debo's documentation of the betrayal and liquidation of the five independent Native American republics of the Choctaws, Chickasaws, Cherokees, Creeks, and Seminoles proved to be too ugly a story for many of the land-hungry white men who had perpetrated an orgy of criminal exploitation against the rightful owners.

Was the library from your childhood as elaborate as the delightfully ornate Law Library in the Iowa State Capitol building?  Did your library sport a playful gateway like the Children's Section of the Andover Public Library?  Mine neither.  

But these libraries, like my town's public library, possessed books that led to adventures far more fantastical than any in my neighborhood.  And the pleasant librarians encouraged me to borrow as many books as I wanted--at the rate of four books per check-out, of course.