Ted Kooser is the first U.S. Poet Laureate choosen from the Great Plains and "a major poetic voice for rural and small town America," according to James Billington, Librarian of Congress. Kooser was appointed laureate in 2004 after a 30-year career as a poet. In 2004, his book Delights and Shadows was awarded the Pulitizer Prize for Poetry. Ted lives on a farmstead outside rural Garland, Nebraska, and teaches at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln where he is the recipient of the first U of N Presidential Professorship.