Modern life moves fast, often leaving local history and the natural environment behind. Historic buildings like one-room schools and old barns are fading from view, taking the stories of early immigrants with them. At the same time, native wildlife, including local birds and insects, faces a quiet decline due to habitat loss. Communities risk losing their connection to their heritage and their environment if these stories and sights go unrecorded.
Author and photographer Anneke Letitia works to preserve these memories and natural habitats through her writing and speaking engagements. With her books, “Pictured Life: And True Stories from Northern and Upper Michigan” and “Birds Bugs Butterflies,” she documents the early 20th-century immigrant experience and the details of local wildlife. We sat down with her to discuss how she uses photography, storytelling, and musical presentations to bring the history and nature of Michigan into focus.
Q: Your book “Pictured Life” traces your journey from Friesland to Michigan alongside the histories of early immigrants. What motivated you to document the stories of these families and the buildings they built?
Anneke Letitia: I was born in Friesland, a province of the Netherlands, close to the German border. In 1951 my family immigrated to the United States.
In a surprise finding of the North Bessemer School in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, I noticed two sculpted Great Horned The Owls along the roofline representing the wisdom of our forefathers. The school once welcomed second and third grade students in the early twentieth century. Seeing it brought me back to my first year of school in Friesland, where I stood in the front row singing Christmas carols. I studied the building’s details; a stone path lined with wildflowers, a wide door with a heavy metal handle, and a light fixture still hanging in each classroom. That light seemed to speak to me. It became the starting point for my search for “light” within the stories of early immigrants–their schools, barns, churches, and homes. Each building, uniquely designed, showing the impact of the former homeland of the builders, carried a story connected to families from Finland, Sweden, Norway, Italy, Poland and the Netherlands.
Q: You combine historical narrative with photography of weathered schools and barns. How do these images help audiences connect with the hardships and triumphs of the early 20th century?
Anneke Letitia: Every structure–a barn, school, home, church or historic building–built with hope for a new future, tells a story of understood purpose. Barns were crafted from wood with distinctive designs, while historic buildings of red Lake Superior clay, stone and granite still stand today. These structures reflect the strength, perseverance, and endurance, love and joy of twentieth-century immigrants who built them for farmers, mothers, children and generations to come. The stories are of the immigrants.
Q: For “Birds Bugs Butterflies,” you spent eight years photographing local wildlife. What changes in the insect and bird populations did you observe over that time?
Anneke Letitia: Yes, my Birds Bugs Butterflies book was photographed and authored over eight years. Each day, I walked slowly and intentionally through meadows and woods, observing the small creatures along my path. I viewed the insects and listened to the bird calls. In 2021, as I walked the same paths, I heard fewer bird calls and observed fewer bugs and butterflies. I continued walking and began recording what I observed. My disappointment soon turned to alarm. New neighbors were spraying pesticides on their fields, cell towers appeared nearby, and lawns were being treated by insect killers. I felt a deep sense of urgency, therefore, Birds Bugs Butterflies book began as a necessary call to inform others–a plea to look, listen, and learn.
Q: Both of your books rely heavily on visual storytelling. Why do you feel photography is the best medium to communicate the need to protect our history and our environment?
Anneke Letitia: For many readers, photographs spark the imagination. As an art form, they invite us to see beyond the image itself. When I look through a cracked window-pane, I imagine and hear the children in grades two and three singing Christmas carols–Silent Night, O Holy Night, and Joy to the World. I am a visual artist; many readers love viewing photographs.
Q: When you present to groups and media programs, you often play the flute. How does incorporating music change the way audiences experience your historical stories?
Anneke Letitia: I perform hymns and classical music on my flute; pieces I first sang and memorized as a child. As I play, I imagine immigrants singing familiar hymns during their long and challenging ocean crossing. Their voices seem present in the music. I hear the children singing in the classroom, rehearsing for a Christmas program. The selections reflect the themes in my photographs and writing. At my presentations I invite the audience to sing or hum along so their memories can rise to the surface. I delight in the smiles of happiness on their faces.
Through rhythm and melody, life feels circular. For me, image, text and music come together as one unified form of expression, shaped by my years as a music instructor and flautist.
Q: What specific message do you hope younger readers take away when they look at the wildlife photos in “Birds Bugs Butterflies”?
Anneke Letitia: I hope young readers come away from Birds Bugs Butterflies book with a sense of wonder at the beauty and intrigue of each image. I want the photographs to spark curiosity, encourage children to look closely, and inspire them to explore meadows and woods, as they discover birds, bugs and butterflies. Through the wonder of discovery, children will learn to appreciate nature’s remarkable design and feel motivated to protect it. My hope is that the children ask their parents to take them on a walk, and say, “Let’s go for a walk and look for birds, bugs and butterflies.”
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How My Interest in Birds, Bugs, Butterflies Began
My interest in birds, bugs and butterflies began when I was three years old, walking with my father along the paths of Apelsche, a national forest in the Netherlands. I held his left hand, my elder sister held his right hand, my younger sister sat on his shoulders, lightly bouncing and holding onto his dark black hair. As we walked slowly through the meadow, my father pointed out the insects flying around us. We even saw a curled napping garter snake.
Every Sunday afternoon, our father took us for a walk. Even as our family grew to eleven children, the walks continued through middle school. In grade nine I was given an assignment to collect twenty-five insects; my collection grew to 500 insects. Each insect was required to be labeled by its common name and scientific name. My elder sister and I walked quietly together, searching carefully for insects.
Anne Crans: A Brief History
Anne began studying the piano at age five. Her father was a pianist and organist, having studied piano with some of the finest teachers in the Netherlands.
As an artist, he viewed the world with depth and perspective, helping Anne develop an early appreciation for music and art and careful observation. Her siblings also showed strong artistic and musical abilities, reflecting a family grounded in creativity. Anne’s mother knew all things about nature, and helped her appreciate nature and all things created.
Anneke Letitia
Through her writing and photography, Anneke Letitia provides a clear record of Michigan’s past and its natural present. Her work highlights the endurance of early immigrant families and captures the fragile details of the local environment. By combining these visual records with public speaking and musical performances, she creates a space for audiences to reflect on what we risk losing.
Recording local history and monitoring wildlife will only become more vital as our surroundings change. Authors and speakers like Letitia play an important role in reminding communities of their roots and their responsibility to nature. Her books offer a practical way for both children and adults to appreciate the past and protect the environment for the future.
To learn more visit https://authorannetcrans.com/