Whistle-Stop is a fitting description for the fictional small town of Lincoln, Minnesota. The Great Northern (sometimes called the Jim Hill locally) rumbles through the town, usually not stopping. Unless to unload or pick up a package or passenger. Or to sidetrack for handling boxcars at the grain elevator. When a new young and attractive teacher arrives on the Jim Hill, she helps transform the small school into a place of creative learning. And she quickly spots an outstanding student, who just wants to be a basketball star. But he's the runt of his class and team. Slowly he grows physically and intellectually to become a star and scholar. Afraid his talent might be wasted on the prairie, the teacher wants to provide him a chance to go to college, despite the constrictions of the Great Depression that curb that possibility. But she and others at her college cobble together a free ride for him with a combination of options they call the "new deal of education." Part of his package includes work in the office of the Civilian Conservation Corps, where he becomes the "poster boy" of the CCC to promote that Federal New Deal program. There he learns to be an outstanding writer, designer and spokesman for the CCC. Meanwhile, his good looks, athletic ability and pleasing personality make him popular with students, espicailly the coeds who gradually make up what he calls his "harem."

In a company-owned tiny logging town in Washington state, high school student Neil Krondahl earned the reputation as a "Renaissance man" for his varied academic and athletic talents. He also earned the name "Artful Forger" because of his sign painting and other artistic skills. But as a member of the National Guard in the mid-1930s, Uncle Sam activated his unit before he could graduate and get a promised university football scholarship. Then Uncle Sam discovered his artistic potential and sent him to Cooper Union art school in New York. The Army secret services wanted to prepare him there to forge German money and documents as a way to sabotage the growing Nazi power.

While studying art and architecture at the University of Wisconsin during the Great Depression, Karl Nelson wanted to make some extra money by joining the Reserve Officer Training Corps. But he got more than he bargained for when his unit was called to active duty in the Army. Then the Army Secret Services saw his art training as a springboard for his studying in Sweden as a cover for his spying on art being looted by the Nazis. There he enlisted a Swedish woman art student to join him as a spy. After the war, these Art Sleuths continued to investigate ownerhip of art, to the dismay of varied possessors of art with questionable provenance. Along the way, the publicity about their sleuthing generated considerable demand for art produced by the Sleuths.

Overcome by the loss of family and loss of hope in the middle of the Great Depression, 13-year-old Sven Johnson caught a freight-car in Minnesota to head west. Via the Great Northern train and the hobo jungles along the line, he expanded his education and his chance for opportunity. In Montana, he was thrown off by the railroad "bulls" and toward a fresh start in a new family, community and school. Applying his talents and tenacity, he grew in character and capabilities toward remarkable associations and accomplishments.