Our next slideshow is going to be a hodge-podge of tulip photos. If you have a tulip photo you'd like to share, email katie@iw.net. If you don't have one, now is a good time to go out and get one. Send photos by Wednesday, May 6.

Photo by Carol Klein of Sioux Falls

Yesterday the National Trust for Historic Preservation announced their 2009 list of the 11 most endangered historic places in America. The grand, crumbling buildings on the Human Services Center were included on that list - an important step toward saving and restoring the campus.

The HSC buildings were chosen for their grandeur but also because they are slated to be demolished - the shortage of money in Pierre saved them from proposed demolition this legislative session. The buildings, which all have 12 inch thick walls (besides one with 24 inch thick walls) would cost millions to take down.

A group gathered in the Mead building to commemorate the occasion. The Mead building is perhaps the fanciest of all the old buildings left on campus (two have already been demolished). The Yankton County Historical Society has plans to move their museum to the building. Being on the "top 11" list is a huge step toward saving the buildings. Jenny Buddenborg, from the Denver branch of the National Trust, hosted the event. She reported that of 200 buildings on their endangered list, only 6 have been destroyed.

Other speakers at the event talked of the historic buildings as a great opportunity - not a liability. To learn more about the National Trust's endangered list, and to see a video and pictures of the campus, visit
preservationnation.org

Buddenborg encourages anyone interested in saving the buildings to also sign the petition to Mike Rounds (available on the same link as above.)

Photos of the Mead building, Courtesy of the Dakota Territorial Museum

By John Andrews

The police log is one of the more popular sections of any newspaper, right up there with the obituaries. It's even more entertaining to read when the writer adds wry comments and witty observations.

That's why I wish I subscribed to the Custer County Chronicle so I could read Deputy Seth Thompson's weekly column. Thompson reports on the week's incidents with a bit of humor that you don't see in many other papers. Read his recap of the Top 10 crime stories of 2008 here.

Here's a quick sample:

Saturday, July 26

10:31 p.m.: A bag of marijuana was found on the floor of a Hermosa convenience store. Anyone who thinks they might have dropped their weed while dazed and confused in Hermosa should contact the sheriff’s office to claim it.

No word on if anyone did.

By John Andrews

When is a five-dollar bill worth $40,000? When it’s an 1875 note issued by the Merchants National Bank in Deadwood and signed by Seth Bullock.

Collectors are bidding online for the 134-year-old bill, which will also be at the Central States Numismatic Society’s annual convention in Cincinnati April 29 through May 2. The quick story behind the bill goes like this. After Wild Bill Hickok was murdered in Deadwood, sheriff Seth Bullock arrived to restore law and order. He held other jobs in town, one being vice president of the Merchants National Bank. At the time, it was common for bank officials to sign notes, as Bullock did in the lower right corner of this one. Another Bullock bill surfaced in 1999 and was sold for $10,000, though it was in rougher shape. This bill is estimated to fetch between $50,000 and $70,000.

Internet bidding is allowed up to the start of the Ohio convention, where there will be a floor auction. Any takers?

Dafna Michaelson is making a 50-state journey across America, looking for "problem solvers and idea generators" who are making a difference in communities. She maintains a journal that provides an interesting (if predictably nice) report on the places and people she encounters.

Dafna arrived in South Dakota several days ago, flying into Rapid City and then motoring across the state only to be late for her first appointment because she forgot about the switch from Mountain Time to Central Timea at Murdo. Heck, who hasn't done that?

Here's a link to her Website. Readers are welcome to nominate people you think she should visit.

We're glad you're in South Dakota, Dafna. Enjoy yourself. Try the strawberry pie at Al's Oasis.

By Bernie Hunhoff

Our native son Tom Brokaw suggested to the New York Times this week that the Dakotas have too many colleges and universities for our sparse population. He even offered a solution: joining the two states into a Dakota Territory Public University System with satellite offices and a single administration. Here's an excerpt:

In my native Great Plains, North and South Dakota have a combined population of just under 1.5 million people, and in each state the rural areas are being depopulated at a rapid rate. Yet between them the two Dakotas support 17 colleges and universities. They are a carry-over from the early 20th century when travel was more difficult and farm families wanted their children close by during harvest season.

I know this is heresy, but couldn’t the two states get a bigger bang for their higher education buck if they consolidated their smaller institutions into, say, the Dakota Territory College System, with satellite campuses but a common administration and shared standards?

Speaking of an education, he would get one if he'd come home and run for governor in 2010 with that as his political platform.

I did some brief online research, however, and found that the broadcaster might want to start in neighboring Minnesota with his consolidation efforts. The Gopher State of 5 million people has 54 public campuses in 47 towns and cities — far more per capita than South Dakota. The University of Minnesota alone has more students than our entire system. Plus the Twin Cities have more than two dozen private schools.

I'm not necessarily picking on Minnesota. It just happened to be nearby. Let's take New York State, population 19 million and home to Brokaw and the New York Times. I quickly counted 136 colleges — one for every 139,000 citizens. And of course they often have far bigger and more populated campuses.

We could certainly find some efficiencies in our regental system (and the legislature forced some this session with a surprise-surprise budget cut on the last day of session). But other states are greatly expanding access to higher education with free tuition, generous scholarship programs and other investments. Kentucky wants to double its number of college grads over the next few years, following the lead of other states who see higher education as the best economic development program of the 21st century.

Cutting the emphasis on higher education in 2010 might be an unintentional way of ensuring that the "greatest generation" Brokaw applauds in his books will remain the greatest generation ever in America. Along with their war experience, education made possible through the GI bill is often credited with helping our grandfathers create one of the most amazing economic boom cycles in world history.

I never thought we had too many college towns in South Dakota. Maybe we would be smarter to try to even grow and improve them? Or would that make us too much like the neighborhoods in New York State where Brokaw lives?

The editors of the Wessington Springs True Dakotan noted this week that it has been a long, hard winter for their oldest reader, 108-year-old Anna Stoehr. But Anna isn't complaining. She still lives on her own. She bakes cookies and bread regularly.

She told her son recently, "I'm really getting tired of this snow! I'm getting a little tired of scooping a path to get my mail every day!"

by Roger Holtzmann
In the course of researching a story today I came across the name of Allen, South Dakota. I couldn’t place it right off hand, but instead of looking the town up on a map as I might have in the past, I Googled it. Here’s what I found at Wikipedia.

“Allen is a census-designated place in Bennett County, South Dakota. As of the 2000 census, the CDP had a population of 419. It is considered the poorest place in the United States.”

Most of us who live in “white” South Dakota are dimly aware that the Pine Ridge and Rosebud Reservations – which border Bennet County on three sides – are some of the poorest areas in our nation. President Bill Clinton visited Pine Ridge about ten years ago and reminded us. But the rez and its suffocating poverty is far away and out of mind, so we tend to forget that fact, just as I did until my chance encounter.

Lots of people are facing tough economic times these days. I just thought I’d pass along a reminder that there is a place quite nearby that’s been facing much tougher times for more than a century.