From the Editors: July 2026
Identity Crisis
Last April, for the Erie Reader Book Club, we all read and discussed the novel North Woods by Daniel Mason. I essentially forced everyone to read this book because I think it is one of the greatest books ever written, and I'm not being hyperbolic. It is grand in its scope, but intimate, moving, personal, and deeply creative in its details. It marks the passage of time through one piece of land in the forests of Massachusetts and tells that land's story (and thus, the country's story) from the beginning of America as we know it to the near-ish future. And it tells the stories of all the different identities of America. From its wild, untamed, beginnings – of dense forests of chestnut trees and their slow descent into blight, of throngs of birdsong once so deafening that are eventually silenced by wildfires, of wild cats once stalking the land, hunted to the brink of extinction. And it tells the stories of people – of indigenous bravery and sadness, of agrarian magic, of lovers and sisters and ghosts – of doctors, teachers, builders, and artists. Mason shares that really, the only way to see the story of America as anything other than a tale of loss is to instead see it as a tale of change.
As we are all currently bearing witness to the bombastic red, white, and blue display of performative patriotism that is America 250 this month – and while the current administration continues to make it harder and harder to feel anything close to admiration for the current version of our country – we have only to look to the different identities of America to feel a true sense of patriotic pride. American pride is, at its historic core, based in revolution. It is based on celebrating the people who said "no, not this way," and then fought, died, thought, wrote, acted, spoke, and worked to change America's identity – over and over again throughout history. While American soldiers did it in 1776, countless others have done it in other ways since and the identity of America shifts, even slightly, with each new version, each act of bravery and change.
And what of Erie's identity? Part of our identity comes from our history – from battles, flagships, maritime traditions, choices, buildings, houses, and roads and those who built them. Part of our identity comes from our educational institutions – those which enlighten the minds of our engineers, doctors, historians, lawyers, and teachers. Part of our identity comes from our landscape – from our wild, untamed beginnings and from those who are working to conserve those once towering forests and uninhibited birdsongs. Part of our identity comes from our artists – painters, sculptors, ceramicists, writers, dancers, photographers, muralists – those imprinting Erie's identity into our visual memory. Part of our identity comes from our hospitals and those people who dedicate their lives to saving the lives of others, to bringing care to all corners of our county, and to helping our children rise out of trauma so they can contribute to building Erie's future versions.
All of the facets of Erie's defining characteristics are represented within these pages of what makes up the 14th annual 40 Under 40 issue. Get to know what these folks are doing – the many doctors, teachers, builders, leaders, and artists who are helping to shape the version of Erie we're working on becoming right now. Their work builds onto what has identified Erie for generations and contributes to the changes to which we can all look forward and in which we can feel a sense of true, rational, and genuinely celebratory patriotic pride.
