An authentic, "mom and pop" style Mexican restaurant in rural Iowa? Si, amigo! Welcome to Denison, Iowa, about 100 miles west of Des Moines, a place that hundreds of Hispanic immigrants now call home. I traveled to Denison last week to learn more about this changing town as part of our series on immigration called "Whose America?"

Correspondent Ron Allen, cameraman Ray Farmer and audio technician Dennis Fry rounded out our team. We went to talk with Denison residents, both native and newly-arrived, and to tour the Farmland Foods meat-packing plant, which is the main attraction for this new wave of workers. Its high-paying jobs rival those in big cities like Los Angeles, and the cost of living in Iowa is obviously far lower.

Upon arrival, Denison seems to be the typical portrait of "small town America." Coming into town, we passed the two biggest motels -- the Days Inn and the Super 8. No Four Seasons here! Drive a little farther, you'll come upon Main Street. Take Main Street a few blocks to Broadway, and you're in downtown Denison. But now, just near the theater which bears the name of Denison's favorite daughter, actress Donna Reed, you'll find tacquerias, beauty salons and other businesses owned and geared toward the growing Hispanic population. Visit the grade school, and you'll hear teachers giving lessons in both English and Spanish. This town is changing rapidly -- it's more diverse than anyone here ever could have imagined.

Yes, the town is experiencing some growing pains. The cultures are slowly learning to accept one another, and there's been some tension along the way. But what I learned on our trip, from talking to community officials, church leaders, and residents -- both Caucasian and Hispanic -- is that we all want the same things. We want to have a good life. We want to provide for our families. We want our kids to go to good schools. We want to feel safe in our hometowns. We want the American dream.

"Whose America?" examines who is or should be entitled to that dream... who takes great risks and travels great distances at the mere chance at achieving that dream... and who in this country wants to extend the dream seekers a helping hand or simply turn them away. I thank the residents of Denison for their hospitality, and I pray the two cultures will continue to grow together, not apart, all the while working to fulfill that sometimes elusive American dream.

We are in the heart of America. That's clear. The people work with their hands. They eat dinner with their families. The townspeople grieve together. This is a town that cares.

Like in most coal mining towns, the people here in Buckhannon are close. You've probably heard the townspeople saying, "We're family here." That's not just talk. They are. Almost everyone we have interviewed either knows a miner who died or knows someone who does.

When the cameras aren't rolling, residents talk about what hurts them the most. Yes, they mention those brutal hours when word spread that the miners were safe. But you might be surprised to know how much they dwell on the way these miners died – in the dark, in the dust and in the cold. Buckhannon is a town of miners. They know what's inside those black tunnels. And they're having a hard time absorbing the way these miners' lives ended.

This is a town that talks little, but feels a great deal. Right now, they're feeling pain – in all its rawness. It will take a long time until that pain dulls. So most of the people we've interviewed describe that pain -- not with fancy words, not with self-help explanations, but with simple language. And understandably so. These are simple, genuine people. They hurt. They are in pain. That's about all there is to it. They just lost 12 of their own.

The media coverage has now entered the delicate phase of covering the miners' funerals. It's a difficult circumstance for us because while the services are certainly "news" that we need to document, we obviously want to respect the families' privacy. A few families allowed a still photographer from the Associated Press into the services. But most of the families expressly wrote in the newspaper obituaries that the media was not welcome. That is perfectly understandable, and I believe that most media outlets, including NBC, respected the wishes of those specific families. At the other services, the media stayed back a considerable distance. It was mostly very quiet.

On Saturday, I covered a wake in the town of Philippi with a camera crew. We were at least 100 yards away, if not more, and there was no attempted communication between us or the mourners. Once the West Virginia governor left that service, we left as well. Meanwhile, at another service, one of my colleagues reported that some congregants did yell at them from their vehicles, calling the media "vultures" and telling them to leave. Again, we don't want to invade anyone's privacy. Honestly, we don't want to be there at all. It is truly the worst part of our jobs on a story like this. I do thank the residents here for putting up with us, and for being welcoming and tolerant for the most part. I know they're ready to get back to normal after a terrible week, and our presence here is anything but normal.

While covering the mine tragedy in Philippi, West Virginia, I encountered an unlikely parallel, an ironic commonality with one of the folks we met. Rusty, owner of Thorn Hill Florist, was busy preparing close to 100 floral arrangements for several of the miners' funerals. This is not simply business for Rusty, his wife, and their team of florists. In a small town, they usually know the deceased. And in this case, they are simply overwhelmed by knowing all of the families of the miners. With tears in his eyes, he told me "it's really hard having this job right now."

His words struck me because that's how we feel covering a story like this. It's extremely sad, so tragic. It hurts us to cover such a painful event. But we have to. It's our job. So, my heart really goes out to Rusty. Like us, he is doing his best to do his job, albeit reluctantly under the sad circumstances. I know he would gladly give up the money this tragedy is generating for his floral shop to have the miners alive and well, and home with their families.

One of the most peculiar and challenging aspects of building a newscast is the quest to achieve balance. Wednesday night we had to lead with the tragic and deadly bombings in Amman, but there's also the desire to close the newscast on a lighter, more positive note. To me, that balance is especially difficult to achieve when you're in the midst of a news day filled with death and destruction.

But my assignment was to cut the "feel good" closing piece on Wednesday, the story of 18-year-old Michael Sessions, who on Tuesday was elected mayor of Hillsdale, Michigan. No, your eyes aren't playing tricks on you -- he's just 18 and he's the town's new mayor! Correspondent Carl Quintanilla, along with field producers Christiana Arvetis and Mark Hudspeth, made the road trip from our Chicago bureau to talk to Michael, who is still in high school. Here's a kid who wanted to make a difference for his hometown, his neighbors, and his family, and campaigned to get enough write-in votes to win the election.

So, even on a day filled with tales of terror and uncertainty, we still owe it to our viewers to provide a positive snapshot of America; one person's story. When Brian says "goodnight" at the end of the show, we do want the "good" part to stay with you.

As the cutting producer of Martin Savidge's stories this week, I am on the receiving end of the amazing video and compelling stories coming out of the Katrina zone. Martin and his field producers gather the footage and interviews all day, then feed the material via satellite to me in Chicago. I then work with a video editor to put his story together, then we feed it to New York for the newscast.

Tonight's story hit close to home for me, as my father's family is originally from Washington Parish, Louisiana, Martin's last road stop of the day. I made the suggestion that our team visit there because, as the Parish president says, it is often "the forgotten parish."

My family hails from Franklinton, the Parish seat. There is a street there, T.W. Barker Drive, named for my late grandfather, an educator who pushed for racial integration and equality. But the plights of Franklinton and nearby Bogalusa were overlooked because so much of the Katrina spotlight was on New Orleans. In the days immediately following the storm, my relatives begged me to do whatever I could to help our home parish get media attention. It was the only way FEMA would know what was happening. They had no food, no water and no communication for more than a week after Katrina. Downed trees were virtually everywhere, as highlighted in tonight's story.

NBC did not travel there initially, but, as Martin's piece pointed out tonight, the folks in that Parish pulled together to make it through. This week's series is important because, finally, it is giving small towns like this a voice. The rest of the nation needs to know what they are going through -- what they have lost -- and that it is indeed going to be "a long road back." The real impact of Katrina will be felt for months to come as these small towns struggle to survive. Tonight was surreal for me as the focus touched on my family roots. It's really an honor to be part of the team telling the stories of these towns. It's one of those unique times in a journalist's career where you feel you're making a difference.

I would just emphasize to the viewers that we are getting hours and hours of video, but we're only able to bring you a 2-minute snapshot of the devastation in our reports. Multiply what you are seeing by 100 -- maybe more -- and you'll only begin to know what this region is facing. The images I have seen are indescribable; some folks who tell their stories break down as they struggle to convey their desperation. This disaster is not over, not by a long shot... and that's what this series is about.