North Dakota

“ Gophers flashing across the road. Little towns crowded on Saturday night, and busy cities shipping out the products of North Dakota and supplying the needs of the producers. Sudden blinding, isolating blizzards, and soft, fragrant spring days with tiny sprouts of grain peering greenly through the topsoil. Pasque flower and cactus, flame lily, and fields of yellow mustard. The sad, slow wail of a coyote on the still prairie. People—Norwegians, Germans, Russians, Poles, Czechs, Icelanders, but all Americans. Square dances in barn lofts, and college "proms" with corsages and grand marches. ”

“ North Dakota ranks fourteenth in size among the States.
Topography. The eastern part of the State is the perfectly level bed of the ancient Lake Agassiz, now traversed by the Red River and its tributaries. It lies about 1000 feet above sea-level, and merges westward into the rolling prairies of the central region. In the north the land rises to a height of over 2000 feet in the small forest-covered plateau known as the Turtle Mountains. This range extends about 20 miles south of the Manitoba boundary. ”

“ The tepee’s gone, the peace pipe and the dance,
Gone, gone, alas! forever,
The Red Man’s fighting chance.
[Pg 17] For pale face came, and from Dakota’s plain
The Red Man drove, and claimed his vast domain;
No power on earth could stay the Viking’s son,
For “iron men” are born
In the land of midnight sun.
* * * *
Onward they came, these Northmen, feared of old,
Bold pioneers, to wrest the hidden gold
From North Dakota’s hills and virgin sod;
The ploughshare won the land
For these “master men” of God. ”

“ North Dakota is a State of plains, very different from the other States, and the cost of the roads there was much less than it was in mountainous regions that the roads had to traverse. The State is mainly agricultural. Its markets are outside its boundaries and most of the distributing centers from which it purchases also are outside. It naturally follows that the great and very valuable terminals of the roads are in other States. ”

“ At the beginning of statehood North Dakota had been subject to a rather autocratic form of government in spite of decidedly democratic constitutional provisions. The State had been economically dependent on the East. The directing powers in the early State government were centered in St. Paul and Minneapolis. Eastern wealth had furnished capital for the railroads, and the railroads had been responsible for the settlement of the State. ”

“ North Dakota has turned out a lot of people to see this exhibition, Matt. The bluffs are black with them, and everywhere you look you can see people with their faces upturned, either gaping in wonder or yelling with delight. ”

“ On the other hand North Dakota was in the beginning chiefly settled by bonanza farmers, captains of industry, who came with large means, buying great areas of land and farming upon extensive lines. They and their camp followers were adventurous men whose traditions were entirely at variance with those of the homesteaders of the South, and the result was constant friction between the two elements. ”

“ North Dakota at the first two censuses was a part of the Territory of Dakota. The increase in the last decade amounted to 74.7 per cent. The counties along the Red River are the most densely populated. But few people are located in the western half of the State. There is a larger per cent. of foreign-born than is found in any other State. In 1900 this element of the population numbered 113,091, and there was a still larger number of native whites of foreign parents, these two elements almost equaling four-fifths of the total population. ”

“ Freely admitted is the rural character of the State, and there is seldom an attempt to cover native crudities with a veneer of eastern culture. The few writers in the State recognize and honor the possibilities of their native material; and each year finds a scattered handful of books, usually verse, telling of the North Dakota known to them and to seven hundred thousand other North Dakotans.
What is the North Dakota they know? A State of unbounded plains and hills and Badlands—elbowroom. Superb sunsets. High winds and tumbleweed. Farms and plows and sweeping fields. ”

“ North Dakota is a fairly large state (17th among the states in total land area) but a sparsely populated one (45th) . Most of the people live in rural areas, because there are few cities of any size; even these are, for the most part, widely scattered. The largest urban area (the tri-city area of Fargo, West Fargo, and Moorhead, Minnesota) has a combined population of under 120,000. ”

“ US 10, rising steadily toward the foothills of the Rocky Mountains, with a gain of 1,852 feet in altitude in crossing the State, traverses the three main topographic divisions of North Dakota (see Natural Setting) , from the low, flat Red River Valley, across the rolling Drift Plain and out upon the Missouri Plateau. Near the end of the route are the strange and beautiful Badlands.
Most of the country along the road is cultivated, and in the fields the cycle of farming operations—plowing, seeding, cultivating, harvesting—repeats itself as the seasons progress. ”

“ The black-earth region was the first part of North Dakota to be settled. Furs were the object of the earliest white settlers there, but the value of agricultural pursuits was by no means overlooked even during that early period. Alexander Henry, Jr., the fur trader who foresaw that the Red River Valley would be good agricultural land if the transportation problem could be solved, tells in his diary of planting a garden as early as 1800 at his trading post at the mouth of the Pembina River, where he raised carrots, cabbages, beets, potatoes, and other vegetables. ”

“ FARGO (907 alt., 28,619 pop.) is on the Red River of the North at the entrance of two transcontinental railroads into the State. A small, youthful city, whose varied activities give its business section a somewhat disorderly air, it is the largest town in North Dakota. Over the flatness of an old lakebed, where ten thousand years ago the water of the melting glacier stood 200 feet deep, the city now widely spreads its homes, manufacturing plants, wholesale houses, trees and parks, schools and hospitals. ”

“ A skilled physician when he visits a sick room always diagnoses the case of the patient before he administers a remedy. In order to comprehend thoroughly the tremendous significance the Land of the Dacotahs bears in its relation to the solution of the problem of country life in America, one must know something about the commonwealth and its people.
North Dakota is a prairie state. Its land area comprises seventy-one thousand square miles of a rich black soil equal in its fertility to the deposits at the delta of the River Nile in Egypt. There are over forty million acres of tillable land. ”

“ An impetus was given to settlement by the construction of railroads, begun about 1872, and by the Custer discovery of gold in 1874 in the Deadwood district and the region of the Black Hills. The movement for statehood dates about from 1883, though it was not until 1889 that the state, and with it North Dakota, was admitted into the Union with a constitution of its own. ”

“ Because North Dakota is a farm State, many of its customs hinge on certain matters of rural importance such as the weather and the crops. Whether or not the farm people are able or inclined to attend is the greatest factor in the success of most social and civic events. ”

“ A few miles from the streams the country is less broken, and there are deep grassy valleys, in which the animals may find shelter in winter. Cattle sometimes congregate in cold weather around a burning coal seam and enjoy the warmth. The lignite in this region also warms the ranchman's cabin, being easily mined where a seam is exposed in the walls of a ravine or on the side of a hill.
North Dakota has a mean elevation of 1900 ft. The highest point in the state, about 3500 ft., is in the southern part of Bowman county, east of the Little Missouri river. ”

“ North Dakota is rich in remains of early Indian life. Mounds and village and camp sites yield arrowheads, stone implements, enigmatic petroglyphs, beads, and pottery. Old trails of early white explorers, soldiers, and home seekers can still be traced in many places, despite the fact that large areas have been plowed up.
Of the numerous fairs and agricultural exhibits held throughout the State, probably the most interesting to the tourist are those in the western counties, where rodeos are usually a part of the program. ”

“ International repute as a farming State brought North Dakota a steady stream of immigration up to the time of the World War. Tales of the rich wheatlands of Dakota drew a continuous procession of settlers with their household goods from the eastern States and from across the sea, to claim a share of the fertile western acres. ”

“ Even the new State of North Dakota with its farmers crying for seed wheat showed the moral courage to resist the fastening into its vitals of the delicate, but deadly tendrils of the octopus which saps the morals of the commonwealth which tolerates its embrace as does its physical prototype the very life blood of the individual victim on which it fastens its fangs. ”

“ The farmer in North Dakota loves his country, too; but the idea that it is a land of rocks and rills and templed hills seems to him rather farfetched. His heart does not thrill with rapture when he thinks of these things. He can plow all day in the Red River valley without striking a stone, and he is glad to have it so. ”

“ Although these figures are small in comparison with those of essentially industrial States, they are large in view of the youthfulness of North Dakota and its distinctly agricultural economy.
The fur trade prospered until the Indian insurrections of 1863-64. Then trapping became a perilous occupation, and traders and trappers returned East. Eastward, too, went most of the settlers who had come to farm. The only ones to remain were Charles Cavileer and his little colony at Pembina, who staunchly continued to cultivate their level farms in the face of Indian dangers. ”

“ The extension of the Northern Pacific across the Red River into North Dakota was partly responsible for this sudden increase in population. Immigrants found it easier to reach the lands which the Government offered them. The Northern Pacific had been given by Government grant alternate sections of land for a distance of 20 miles on each side of its right-of-way. The land between these sections was opened to homesteading; and since the free lands were just as desirable as its own, the railroad could find no market for its property. ”

“ During past ages the Little Missouri has been the chief agent in cutting into the prairies of North Dakota the wide slash that is the Badlands region. Rain and surface waters have washed away the soft upper layers of the deposits made by successive prehistoric seas, and, continually seeking lower levels, in the slow process of erosion through the centuries have left a jumble of jagged buttes. The sides of these buttes expose the various strata, each the testimonial of one age in the geological history of the area. ”

“ North Dakota will expand in wealth and influence, therefore, in proportion as she throws wide open the door of agricultural opportunity for the young people of the state. This she can best accomplish by means of public education expressed in terms of rural life. ”

“ Badlands views, petrified forests, horseback riding, camping.
Theodore Roosevelt's biographer, Herman Hagedorn, writes:
"Between the prairie lands of North Dakota and the prairie lands of Montana there is a narrow strip of broken country so wild and fantastic in its beauty that it seems as though some unholy demon had carved it to mock the [Pg 175] loveliness of God. On both sides of a sinuous river rise ten thousand buttes cut into bizarre shapes by the waters of countless centuries. The hand of man never dared to paint anything as those hills are painted. ”

“ North Dakota offers many diverse forms of recreation among scenes varying from the spectacle of the fantastically carved Badlands to the severe beauty of the far reaching prairies. The Badlands are probably the best known recreation area of the State. Here the two Roosevelt Regional State Parks have been set aside, and many miles of bridle paths and automobile roads are being built. The strangely colored buttes form one of the most unusual scenic and geologic areas in the United States, and contain endless treasures of petrified wood and fossils of prehistoric plant and animal life. ”

“ In 1849 North Dakota east of the Missouri became part of Minnesota for a time, and the area west of the river was made a part of Nebraska Territory. In 1851 to the Federal government was ceded part of the lands held by the Sioux Indians, and these lands were thrown open for settlement. In 1861 Dakota Territory was created, part of Montana and part of Wyoming being included in it; while two years later, on the creation of Idaho Territory, the Dakotas assumed almost their present area, and in 1889 they were separated, forming North Dakota and South Dakota. ”

“ Verendrye, the first white man known to have touched North Dakota soil, and other explorers who followed in those early years, came on foot to visit the Indians. They found the Mandans, who lived beside the Missouri, in possession of unusual means of water transportation. The dugout canoe, made of a log, was found on all the rivers of North Dakota, but only in the Missouri Valley did the Indians use the bullboat, a circular craft of the coracle type which the Indians made by stretching a buffalo hide over a willow frame. ”