Shaping Minnesota's Identity illustrates the pressures and choices Minnesotans have faced in their 150-year history. State and national events have affected Minnesota's social, political, and economic paths. Minnesotans have shared the nation's prosperity and its depressions. A landscape of 15,000 lakes, prairie soils, the North Woods, and the Mesabi iron range also makes this history unique, as does an ever-changing ethnic composition. The state's history is a chaotic tapestry of diverse voices, intense political passions, divergent social forces, and distinct geographical arenas, all of which helped shape the identity of its people and the political direction of the state.