Welcome to the Ruth Suckow Memorial Association Website
Ruth Suckow was a famous writer with Iowa roots; this website was created by the Ruth Suckow Memorial Association (RSMA) to celebrate her literary legacy, and to help readers find more information about her life and work--as well as several sample stories.
The pictures above are of Ruth as a young woman, in mid life, and with her husband, Ferner Nuhn. Several years after her death, Ferner helped to establish the Ruth Suckow Memorial Association to make sure that new generations of readers would be able to read her short stories and books.
August, 2012 -- Ruth Suckow is the featured author on the Rural Lit R.A.L.L.Y website.
What does RALLY stand for? Reinvigorating American Life and Learning through Literature
of Yesteryear. Ferner was the featured author in September! What fun we've had the last couple of months: my class participated in discussing "A Rural Community" with participants from the Rural Lit Rally group, using a Facebook page, with some of our Suckow Board members joining in as well. We got a big bump of 125 visitors to this site on the day that Cherie Dargan, webmaser, was interviewed on Talk of Iowa, on Iowa Public Radio. Student feedback was overwhelmingly positive, and the Unit test saw a high percentage of them picking the Suckow story as one of their five top favorite short stories. Students also read and discussed Ferner's essay, "Like a Thick Wall," which was added to the curriculum for the first time.
Featured author -- biography of Ruth Suckow, drawing on the RSMA website
Interview with webmaster Cherie Dargan
TALK OF IOWA SHOW -- Thursday, September 27. You can listen to the podcast of the show, if you missed it! Host Charity Nebbe interviewed Cherie Dargan, RSMA Webmaster, and Rural Lit's Dr. Paul Theobald and his wife Maureen.
http://news.iowapublicradio.org/post/rural-iowa-literature-and-scott-siepker#.UGXLA7MM-J8.facebook
Cherie Dargan’s Introduction to Literature students are participating in an online discussion of “A Rural Community, “ a short story written by Iowa author Ruth Suckow, featured author on http://rurallitrally.org/, and using materials posted on the Ruth Suckow Memorial Association (RSMA) website, http://www.ruthsuckow.org/. Rural Lit Rally has posted a bio of Suckow, as well as an interview with Suckow scholar Cherie Dargan about her use of Suckow in her class, as well as her work as webmaster for the Suckow website. Rural Lit Rally, a joint project of Buffalo State College and Buena Vista University, focuses on preserving the literature of rural America, and found the Suckow website this past summer. Waterloo Courier's November issue of the Cedar Valley Business Monthly November, 2012 My new column is available in one of the best kept secrets in the Cedar Valley: the Courier's Cedar Valley Business Monthly, available at area HyVee stores. I wrote about a recent project done with my Intro to Lit class, the Suckow website (www.ruthsuckow.org) and Rural Lit Rally, http://rurallitrally.org/?page_id=853. Our common goal was to help my students discover a wonderful Iowa writer, Ruth Suckow, one of the writers featured by the Rural Lit Rally website. We used Facebook to host discussion between participants & it was very successful. We ended up on Iowa Public radio's Talk of Iowa & generated web traffic for both sites. New Pages Added Please check out the new page on Ferner (Resources on Ferner Nuhn) as well as Mentions to discover what other websites are saying about Suckow & RSMA (Links to Posts on Blogs), Writing about Suckow (for another chance to read Marsha's poem on Suckow), and RSMA News (for updates about projects and events). Find a reference to Suckow, a new photo, or have information about one of Ruth or Ferner's relatives? Please contact Cherie, web master, at cheriedargan@gmail.com
The blog is another source of information about our organization and includes the opportunity for you to comment on postings.
Some of Ruth Suckow's Books are now Available on Google Books!
I did a Google search for New Hope, curious about what I might find. The Good News: Our website came up as the FIRST hit. Surprise? Some of the Suckow books are now available from Google Books; I purchased New Hope for my Ipad for $9.99. There is a wonderful opportunity here for all of us in the RSMA: we should be posting reviews of the various Suckow books that we have read so far, because there are not any reviews posted. Check it out for yourself. If you don't have a Google Books library, I encourage you to create one, because there are a lot of great books for free, and you can access them on your PC, laptop or mobile device.
http://books.google.com/books?id=1vxFpHVmWZ4C&source=gbs_similarbooks&hl=en Since there were not any reviews, I posted a short note to let people know about our website. This year marks 120 years since Ruth Suckow's birth. Her legacy goes beyond regional writing and even the label of realism does not adequately describe her ability to describe the everyday lives of people living in the small towns of Iowa. While some of the expressions in the dialogue might be a little dated, her books and short stories focus on many themes still relevant today.
As a Community College teacher, I use one of her short stories in my Introduction to Literature class and find students are able to identify with the characters and themes.
Cherie Dargan, Associate Professor -- Communications Department, Hawkeye Community College
Webmaster of ruthsuckow.org
We are still working on the entry for Ferner Nuhn; just when I thought it was nearly done, we discovered more information, which is a good thing!
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Last updated April 14, 2013
Cherie Dargan, Webmaster
Original website created and maintained by Michael Dargan
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