If you attend any big literary event in the Twin Cities you will see a tall woman with short white hair surrounded by people who want to talk to her. She is Ann Regan, one of the most quietly influential editors in Minnesota and beyond. As editor-in-chief of the Minnesota Historical Society Press, she has worked with some 350 authors to publish books that tell us about ourselves. Yet she has remained out of the spotlight.
“Editors delight in working in the shadows. I am very comfortable there,” Regan acknowledged in a conversation from her office at the Minnesota Historical Society building that looms over St. Paul on Kellogg Boulevard. “My job is to elevate the author. I am happy to be sitting back and applauding.”
Then, with typical Regan humor she adds, “But I’m also as egotistical as anyone else I ever met.”
Regan, 69, officially retires Tuesday after 46 years with the nonprofit publishing arm of the Minnesota Historical Society. Besides working directly with authors, she has been acting director off and on. (“It’s more fun to be an editor than director.”) During her career she has strived to fulfill the press’s mission — to serve all of the people of Minnesota by creating powerful engagement with history to cultivate curiosity and foster a more inclusive, empathetic and informed society.
“When you know more about the place where you live, you are a better citizen,” she says. “You know the back story, understand why some things are the way they are.”
Regan (pronounced “Reegan”) gets down to the nitty-gritty of grammar and punctuation as editor, but colleagues and writers she’s worked with say she has personal qualities that make her special.
Jim Cihlar, MNHSP marketing director, appreciates Regan’s thorough understanding of publishing and her ability to work with writers of different temperaments and skills.
“One of Ann’s catchphrases is ‘Over to you,’ meaning she has done her best work as editor, and now she trusts her co-workers to do their best as the project moves through to publication,” Cihlar said. “Ann has a remarkable memory and the ability to hold a whole manuscript in her head. She asks herself tough questions, too, challenging her own assumptions to better herself as an editor. She has natural poise, a striking presence, and a rich sense of humor.”
Ann Regan talks with friends during her retirement party at the Minnesota History Center in St. Paul on Wednesday, Aug. 28, 2024. (John Autey / Pioneer Press)
Patty Wetterling and Joy Baker, authors of “Dear Jacob: A Mother’s Journey of Hope,” credit Regan with keeping them going when they were questioning their writing partnership.
“I’ll never forget meeting Ann for the first time at Maynard’s (restaurant) in Rogers,” Baker recalled. “It was January of 2020, just before the world shut down due to COVID. Patty and I were working hard to complete her memoir, but struggling with co-writing. Ann assured us this was normal: She told us: ‘Your process sounds just right, and you’re making all the right complaints about how difficult it is, which is a good sign. Keep it up and you will have a book.’ ”
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Patty Wetterling: “Ann Regan helps writers grow and rise above their wildest imaginations. With humor, patience and skill she helped me believe in my story and select a shorter, more impactful way of sharing it. Ann has been a gift to us all and will forever bring a smile to my heart.”
Lynette Reini-Grandell, author of “Wild Things: A Trans-Glam-Punk-Love Story,” calls Regan “a dream combination of attentive mother and tough coach’” during the editorial process: “We had hours of discussions on structural ideas and minutiae (should we really have all those hyphens in the title?), and she set aside time to let things simmer. She was there when I needed to cry and knew how to leave the door open for me to come back and make the book better.”
Melvin Carter Jr., a former St. Paul police officer, appreciated Regan’s attention to detail when they worked on Carter’s autobiography “Diesel Heart,” but thinks she “sometimes overdid it a little” when it came to fact-checking. “It was like being nibbled to death by ducks,” he recalled with amusement about Regan questioning details such as whether the lilacs were really blooming in St. Paul when he returned from military service. When Carter wrote about happenings in Oak Park Heights prison, Regan hunted down witnesses, newspaper articles, and police reports to verify his memories. “She investigated because she cared about the integrity of me and my book,” Carter said. “She wasn’t a dictator; she helped me say things I wanted to say.”
From Montana to Minnesota
Regan grew up in Billings, Mont., with two sisters and a brother. Her father, Tom, was an architect, and her mother, Pat, taught junior high and served in the Montana legislature.
“My mother was a force of nature, a smart, strong woman, a good role model, ” Regan said. “Both my parents were really people of the book. Loving books, reading together. I thought it was what everybody did. I read so widely it’s hard to pick my favorites. I know I read all the Narnia books. I’ve gone back and tried to figure out why I liked something like a fairly sappy British book, “A Little Princess,” about a noble person treated badly and vindicated. It was built on a colonizer story about who should rule the world. You can grow out of that stuff.”
After graduating from the University of Montana, Regan was a volunteer at the Montana Historical Society editing book reviews for the organization’s widely respected Montana: The Magazine of Western History. That experience gave her the first glimpse of how to explain history through stories.
Still, Regan knew she wanted to leave her home state. Armed with a letter of recommendation, she moved to Minnesota where her big sister Kate was living. Thanks to a federal program, Regan was able to apply to the Historical Society Press, where she was introduced to immigrants’ history by working on, among other books, “They Chose Minnesota,” a survey of the state’s ethnic groups.
One of Regan’s first fans was former Historical Society director Nina Archabal, who watched the young woman climb the leadership ladder at the press.
“Ann is an unsung hero,” Archabal said. “We met in 1977, and I liked her from day one. She is one of the most positive people I know. Authors would come to me for help as director and I would send them to Ann in the publications department. Nobody ever got bad treatment there. They were either published or Ann would tell them where to look elsewhere.”
The intersection of story and history enriched the MNHSP list when Patricia Hampl brought Regan an idea.
“I first came to Ann with an idea for an anthology of short stories by F. Scott Fitzgerald,” Hampl recalls. “I suppose I was my own literary agent — just walked down Summit Avenue to the History Center. She immediately got it, and with (chapter) headnotes by Dave Page, she published “The St. Paul Stories of F. Scott Fitzgerald” (2004) with an introductory essay I wrote. Ann, along with the brilliant production team headed by Will Powers, brought out a book with enduring appeal. Later, Elaine Tyler May and I had the idea for a collection of essays by memoirists and historians that took on the relationship between autobiographical writing and history writing. Our idea was that history is public memoir, and memoir creates personal history. Once again, Ann immediately saw its value for the press.and published ‘Tell Me True,’ a collection of essays by writers.”
Regan points to the late Evelyn Fairbanks’ memoir “The Days of Rondo” as the book that “made me an editor.” It’s about living in the thriving Rondo area of St. Paul in the 1930s and ’40s, before the largely Black community was ripped in half by construction of the Interstate 94 freeway.
“Working with Fairbanks taught me how to be a developmental editor, looking at the manuscript and giving the author advice on how to revise,” she recalls. “Evelyn was very willing to rewrite. She had good stories to tell, a natural writing voice that was engaging. I would give her advice and she would tease me. Immediate closeness is very important when you are editing.”
On Regan’s first day at the History Center she met Bruce White, then assistant editor at the Historical Society’s Minnesota History magazine. They were married in 1984, a year after they bought their house in the Cherokee Heights neighborhood on the West Side. Their son, Ned, lives in New York.
“Bruce is a brilliant guy who’s been doing expert witness work for tribal nations pursuing treaty rights,” Regan says of her husband.
White, a historian and an anthropologist, has written several books for MNHSP including Minnesota Book Award-winner “Mni Sota Makoce: The Land of the Dakota,” written with Gwen Westerman, now Minnesota poet laureate. His latest is “They Would Not Be Moved,” about the legal battles of the Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe to retain and recover their land. To ensure there is no conflict of interest, Regan has nothing to do with the books her husband publishes with the press.
When the couple is able they head to “the farm,” a little vacation home near Taylors Falls. Ann describes it as “lovely, surrounded by farm fields, quiet and peaceful.” And if their guests are lucky, they might be served Regan’s specialty as a tart baker, a cranberry-caramel-almond treat.
Leaving with pride
Regan is most proud of books she edited by writers of all ethnicities — Native American, Black, Asian, European, Scandinavian and others. She worked on several by Anton Treuer, professor of Ojibwe at Bemidji State University, including the popular “Everything You Wanted to Know About Indians but Were Afraid to Ask.”
Treuer talked about Regan’s wide-ranging influence in the most recent Minnesota History magazine: “I watched her solicit, edit and publish manuscripts consistently for decades until (MNHSP) emerged as the best state historical press in the country with the deepest and broadest list of Native American history. Her leadership … elevated many often-marginalized voices.”
A book Regan edited that got national attention is “A Good Time for the Truth: Race in America,” in which 16 accomplished writers discuss what it’s like to be a person of color in Minnesota. The anthology was edited by Sun Yung Shin, who calls Regan an inspiring collaborator.
“I could not be more proud of my work with Ann,” Sun Yung Shin says. “An editor has to be a visionary, a tactful diplomat, a businessperson, a kind of therapist, and much more. She is one of the many dedicated and deeply knowledgeable book people who make living in Minnesota a historically grounded experience. Her leadership in that role will be missed by and forever appreciated by me.”
Regan says working with these diverse authors enriched her.
“I grew up in Billings where ‘diversity’ is the Crow people from the reservation and Mexican-American field workers,” she recalled “It is a stupendously generous act on the part of these (diverse) writers to speak with honesty. They don’t have to put themselves out there so I and a lot of other people could learn. That is the work that has changed me the most, taught me the most, explained my world to me the most.”
Ask Regan why she’s retiring and she replies there isn’t a single reason. “I am not fed up, exhausted, losing it,” she says. “It was time and there will be new colleagues, John Rahm as director and Ryan Hemmer as acquisitions editor. They are strong, smart publishing professionals. This place is heading in an interesting new direction. They have energy and good ideas.”
And the question every retiring person is asked: What’s ahead?
“I’ve never been big on planning, but I have a good set point for happiness, so I’m not worried about it,” Regan says. “I’ll do all the things people do, like travel and volunteering. But mostly I’ll figure out who I am when I’m not in this job.”
(Editor’s note: The abbreviated quote from Anton Treuer comes from a profile of Ann Regan in the current Minnesota History magazine, published by the Minnesota Historical Society, written by Allison Ortiz in collaboration with Sarah T. Williams. Go to shop.mnhs.org/minnesota-history-magazine-summer-2024-64-2.)
More author praise
Roger Barr: “As a professional writer, I’ve worked with dozens of editors over the years. Hands down, Ann Regan is the best I ever worked with. If she hadn’t chosen to be an editor, she could easily have been a diplomat for the State Department. She’s fearless in her critiques, yet at the same time, she’s willing to listen to a defense and change her mind. She possesses an unparalleled ability to get inside a writer’s head and work almost invisibly to improve a manuscript.”
Kathryn Kysar: “Ann Regan is a book doula, a master at massaging a manuscript, easing the process, and supporting her authors for the best outcomes possible. She is sensitive, insightful, sharp and honest, Blunt or sympathetic as needed. Ann has shaped the literary landscape in Minnesota, one book at a time.”
Danny Klecko: “I have been lucky enough to work on several projects with MNHSP. During times when I felt overwhelmed or out of place, I found myself ducking into Regan’s office because five minutes with her calm and patience more often than not put me back on track. Ann Regan is more than a regional legend. She’s a national treasure.”
Christopher P. Lehman: “Ann was the editor for my most recent books, ‘Slavery’s Reach: Southern Slaveholders in the North Star State’ and ‘It Took Courage: Eliza Winston’s Quest for Freedom.’ As I worked with her, she made me a better researcher and a better storyteller. She has my eternal thanks for taking a chance on my proposals and guiding me through their fruition.”
