Gm     F     C

[Verse 1] 
N.C.        F                  C/E                 C   G   Am C
 Follow the typical signs, the hand painted lines down prairie roads.
          F                  C/E                         C    G Am  C
Pass the lone church spire, pass the talking wire from where to who knows?
C            F                 C/E                         C    G  Am C       
  There's no way to divide the beauty of the sky from the wild western plains.
      F                     C/E                 C    G Am C
Where a man could drift in legendary myth by roaming over spaces 
                          F          C    
The land was free and the price was right 

[Verse 2] 
Gm                        F                             C   
Dakota on the wall is a white robed woman tall yet maidenly
Gm                       F                                 C   
 Such power in her hand as she hails the wagon man's family.
      Gm                              F                          C  
I see Indians that crawl through this mural that recalls our history

[Verse 3]
             F                
Who were the homestead wives? 
     C
Who were the gold rush brides?
C     G   Am  C    
Does anybody know? 
         F                    C                    C    G   Am   C  
Do their works survive their yellow fever lives in pages they wrote?
               C          F          C
The land was free yet it cost their lives

[Verse 4]
Gm                                   F                                 C
 In miner's lust for gold a family's house was bought and sold piece by piece
Gm                             F                              C
 A widow staked her claim on a dollar and his name so painfully
   Gm                                    F                                     C
In letters mailed back home her Eastern sisters they would moan as they would read
   Gm                F                       C
Accounts of madness childbirth loneliness and grief
   Gm                F                        C
Accounts of madness, childbirth, loneliness and grief