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South Dakota's Other Big Hunt
April 10, 2012
... search of colored eggs. There are a couple of rules in these hunts. Parents have to at least try to stay out of the way; never, ever show up late — the hunt start waits for no mortal; and an April blizzard won’t stop an Easter egg hunt (I have seen eggs hidden in snow banks in that park.)
Years later, as an adult Jaycee, I saw the hunt from a taller perspective. Volunteers hard-boiling and dyeing ...
November/December 2000
... hatched at Fort Meade. [read more]
Skeletons of the Prairie: What is the value of crumbling rural architecture?
The Batesland Raid: Mountain oysters and tribal police rescued a Martin man.
The Great Blizzard of 1888: Aloise Matzner remembered the storm of the century in ther 1965 memoir.
Arikara Ghost Town: What should be done with an Indian village site in Hughes County?
Christmas at Wounded ...
January/February 1988
... Vermillion's university president.
Wheelright: Where there's horses and wagons, there's a need for a wheelright.
Boosting Dakota Art: A new era for regional artists may be dawning.
The Big Blizzard: Accounts of the killer storm that hit January 12, 1888.
Aberdeen's Memorialized Mules: A tribute to all beasts of burden.
James Earle Fraser: Prairie Inspired: The man who created the ...
January/February 2011
Freeman's drifted Main Street had little foot traffic when a blizzard blanketed the city. Photo by Bernie Hunhoff.
West River Oasis: Newell was built around water. [read more]
Inside Pine Ridge: Photographer John Willis' book provides a rare look at life on ...
March/April 2005
... Redlin's writing brought Katharina to South Dakota. [read more]
Viborg's Celebrated Son: Alvin Hansen's journey from farm boy to fame.
Shelter from the Storm: For a Hand County family, the blizzard came in March 1966.
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Please note: Online articles are edited and may not include all pictures or content from the original version.
Prairie Spires
February 6, 2012
... that the buildings and sites often hold a great deal of historic value in addition to their photogenic beauty.
Take St. Basil’s Church along Highway 212 near Ridgeview, for example. During the blizzards of 1949 and 1950 it served as a haven for stranded travelers who were forced to burn some of the pews to keep from freezing. Sounds like a plot for a good short story to me.
The country churches on ...
Dark Anniversaries For Lakota-Dakota-Nakota
December 27, 2011
... with several mild days. This time of year in the Great Plains is usually very harsh. Still, we should always be ready for those weather changes which can quickly bring subzero temperatures and white-out blizzards.
Despite the national holiday hype, many Lakota-Dakota-Nakota people do not view this month as one of celebration. December brings dark anniversaries for my people. I am one who believes in the memory ...
Surviving a Warm Winter
December 27, 2011
... landscape for 60 days — a land where they believe that there is no bad weather, only bad clothing — you accept a 55 degree December day almost the same way you would endure a biting blizzard.
I am everything but Norwegian, but I admire the culture of humility, modesty and practicality. Thus I know that the best way to cope with these beautiful winter days is to pretend they are not occurring.
When ...
Staging Comebacks
... weather returned with many fond stories of appreciative, sturdy settlers who traveled miles through the worst weather to watch performances. During the bleak winter of 1888 several communities staged "Blizzard Blockades." In northeast South Dakota, this required digging tunnels for the audience to enter the theatre.
Although weather remained the most visible aspect of South Dakota theatre, the railroad proved ...
High in the Saddle
... was a kid we raised corn and wheat and sheep and cattle and hogs. We worked seven days a week. I asked my dad for a half day off one time and he had a mouthful of mashed potatoes and it looked like a blizzard.”
When Wallum was 13 the house blew up. The family moved to Wallum Corner, and Galen enrolled in Iroquois High School, which he would eventually finish, “under duress. If I ever get ...
The Last Nurseryman
... didn’t have.”
Sales were slow those first years. “You can have the right ideas, but they don’t always work out perfectly,” Jay says. “You have to commit yourself. Hail, blizzards, and summer storms knock buildings down. You can’t look back. Just fix them and keep going.”
Sidney died just three years after starting the new nursery, but Jay gained family support from ...
Big Sioux's Mighty Flood
... structures, were swept away by swollen waters of the Big Sioux River. A winter of hardship and sacrifices had already preceded the flood disaster. The setting for the 1881 flood began with the big blizzard of October 1880, and continued with frequent snowfalls.
The snowfall of 1880-81 was unprecedented in the history of the Northwest. It was noted in the History of Southeastern South Dakota, “Not ...
Scenic: Where Characters Have a Town
... Sheep Mountain has long been a “last stop” for travelers arriving in the Black Hills. Scenic’s very first businessman, according to Hall, was bad-luck rancher Ab Jefferson. When a May blizzard pushed all of Ab’s cattle over the edge of Sheep Mountain, he decided to open a saloon. Ab drank too much of his own merchandise, and sold some of the rest to his Indian neighbors. Selling alcohol ...
The Missouri: A Strong Brown God?
... practice Monday afternoon with light caliber shot before rats entered any buildings or homes.”
In April 1951, fed by the Bad River that bulged with a two foot melting of snow from a late March blizzard, Mo peaked 10 feet over flood level in Pierre. Sometimes called Old Misery, her spring tantrums are recorded as far back as 1832. That was when Congress first set out to tame her.
This great river ...
Flood News
July 7, 2011
... newspaper done a better job of guiding the community through a difficult period.
Yankton and other South Dakota communities are not strangers to disasters. We have had our share of fires, floods, tornadoes, blizzards and other such mayhem. But seldom does a disaster linger for weeks, as this flood does. For those most affected, it is a slow-motion disaster. Though the water is broiling through the dams and speeding ...
A Sheepherder Named Gilfillan
... In recent years, it has been reprinted by the Minnesota Historical Society Press.
During his years as a sheepherder, Gilfillan suffered many hardships including lightning, cloud bursts, floods, blizzards, rattlesnakes, wolves, coyotes and two-legged camp robbers. Once, as a tornado approached, he was forced to seek shelter in an old well.
Gilfillan had other challenges in life. Card games, especially ...
Freeman Blizzard
December 29, 2010
Our Jan/Feb issue features Bernie Hunhoff's story and photos from a small town blizzard last January.
