Our Landlady

Nancy Tystad Koupal is a native of Mitchell, South Dakota, and serves as director of the Research and Publishing Program at the South Dakota State Historical Society.

"It is widely known that L. Frank Baum spent several years in South Dakota before moving to Chicago, where he wrote the Oz books that made him famous. . . . Koupal carefully lays out the complexities and ambiguities of Baum’s thinking by providing us with the full texts of Baum’s columns published weekly in the Aberdeen Saturday Pioneer between January 1890 and February 1891, and by adding her own commentary and a glossary to place these writings in context. Entitled ‘Our Landlady,’ the column described in a generally humorous vein the conversations and activities of four fictional characters—the landlady and three of her regular boarders—and a wide variety of prominent local residents of Aberdeen."—Great Plains Quarterly

"Readers will be grateful to Koupal for this amusing and edifying supplement to our understanding of one of the giants of American popular culture."—Western Historical Quarterly

"Baum’s humor is of the biting kind. . . . Readers of Our Landlady will find the beginnings of Baum’s wonderful world of humor as well as an informative look at life in a prairie state."—South Dakota History

"Koupal is an admirable editor. It’s hard to see how the work could be improved."—Baum Bugle