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Grace Olmstead grew up in a tiny Idaho farming community her family has called home for generations. But, as so many young people do, Olmstead decided to leave her rural town. She attended college on the other side of the country and now lives outside Washington, D.C., where she\u2019s a journalist who focuses on farming, localism, and family. Olmstead\u2019s writing has been published in The American Conservative, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, and Christianity Today, among many other publications. She\u2019s also one of our favorite writers here at Strong Towns.\nOlmstead has a new book coming out tomorrow: Uprooted: Recovering the Legacy of the Places We\u2019ve Left Behind. It\u2019s an important (and beautifully written) work about the places we come from and counting the costs of leaving them behind. Combining memoir and journalism, Olmstead explores her family\u2019s deep roots in Emmett, Idaho, what it means to be transplanted elsewhere, and the pressures and opportunities facing many small towns like the one she grew up in.\nThis week, Grace Olmstead returns to the Strong Towns Podcast to talk with Strong Towns president Chuck Marohn. They discuss the new book and why we need to tell complicated rural stories. They talk about two archetypes of the American West\u2014\u201cBoomers\u201d and \u201cStickers\u201d\u2014and about how the most successful western communities were built not on rugged individualism but on extreme neighborliness. Olmstead and Marohn also discuss how farming communities have come to resemble other kinds of extractive communities\u2014and whether new approaches to farming, such as agritourism, can coexist alongside conventional agriculture.\nAdditional Show Notes\n\nUprooted: Recovering the Legacy of the Places We\u2019ve Left Behind by Grace Olmstead\n\n\nGrace Olmstead\u2019s monthly newsletter\n\n\nMidwest Futures, by Phil Christmans\n\n\n\u201cThe efficiency curse,\u201d by Michael Pollan\n\n\n\u201cThis Is What Happens When Markets are Too Efficient\u201d (Podcast)\n\n\nHillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis, by J.D. Vance\n\n\nHeartland: A Memoir of Working Hard and Being Broke in the Richest Country on Earth, by Sarah Smarsh\n\n\nThe Homecomers Podcast\n\n\nGrace Olmstead (Twitter)\n\n\nCharles Marohn (Twitter)\n\n\nStrong Towns content related to this episode\n\n\u201cThis Is Where the Work Begins,\u201d by Grace Olmstead\n\n\n\u201cGracy Olmstead: It Still Takes a Village\u201d (Podcast)\n\n\n\u201cThe Tragic Downside of Efficiency,\u201d by Charles Marohn\n\n\n\u201cWe\u2019re in the Endgame Now for Small Towns,\u201d by Charles Marohn\n\n\n\u201cA Plan for Building Strong Rural Communities,\u201d by Charles Marohn\n\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s Time to Fix our Fragile Food Systems,\u201d by Charles Marohn\n\n\n\u201cTim Carney: \u2018Alienated America\u2019 and the Rise of Populism\u201d (Podcast)\n\n\n\u201cPatrick Deneen: Big, Impersonal Institutions Are Failing Us. Loyalty to Our Communities Might Save Us.\u201d (Podcast)\n\n\n\u201cBoomers, Stickers, and the Lifecycle of a Cool Neighborhood,\u201d by John Pattison