Janus was born in Washington, D.C., in 1945 and was graduated from Lake Forest College in 1968 with honors for his thesis on the dramaturgy of political demonstrations.
In the early 1980s Janus led a group that brought professional, small town baseball back to Madison after an absence of 40 years.
At the time (1983–84) there was a mere handful of new local breweries in the U.S. Janus and his partners decided to create authentic German beers such as might have been brewed in Wisconsin early in the century.
For his efforts, or chutzpah, Janus was nominated by the state securities commissioner for an Arthur Young Wisconsin Entrepreneur of the Year award.
Since then he has interviewed hundreds of people on topics covering education policy,[2] the environment,[3] business, health and language.
As he writes in the book's introduction: During the 160 years since dairy cows began to reshape Wisconsin's landscape, economics, moral ethic, and way of life, many thousands of men and women have been initiated into a kind of faith: faith that care of the cow and the soil would bring them prosperity, even happiness.