That Champion Red Oak tree drops a massive quantity of leaves and I’ve just spent much of the last week picking these up, schlepping each garbage can load to the compost pile. Phase two of spring gardening also included cutting back the few perennials I did not trim last fall and transplanting those I’d noted in need of a different …
The honesty, integrity and diplomacy of the United States of America worldwide is on the line. “The Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action” — the name of the agreement that the United States, United Kingdom, Germany, China and Russia signed with Iran — is about to be revoked by President Trump. The plan was approved by the United Nations Security Council. Its …
As lake weather approaches, it’s a little sad to learn that city leaders continue to have problems with the Detroit Lakes (Minn.) Pavilion. The Pavilion is old, more than a hundred years old. With age, come problems, not the least of which has been continuing drainage issues for the building, which in 1915 was set just a little too close …
Spring has finally sprung in the Midwest, as Bloomington, Minn., photographer Dave Vorland’s most recent images show. But it hasn’t been like that since its start March 20, when the landscape was snow-filled and trees were bare.
The University of North Dakota women’s softball team, behind the pitching of Kaylin VanDomelen, defeated Idaho State University 5-1, in the regular season finale Saturday afternoon at Apollo. UND (25-26, 10-8 Big Sky Conference) set a program mark for wins in a single season and the most-ever Big Sky Conference wins with the victory. VanDomelen picked up her 12th win of …
There is nothing simpler to make than fried cabbage. And combine it with a little meat, and you have a meal in a skillet. My taste for cabbage runs the gamut when it comes to spiciness. I like it lightly seasoned with just salt and pepper — some might call this bland — or it can be relatively hot when it features …
I never imagined when my family left El Paso, Texas, in 1970, that it would take me almost 50 years to return for a visit, but it did. I was an Army brat, and my father’s last posting was Fort Bliss, in El Paso, a gritty city in extreme west Texas. Since then, I’ve been very near to El Paso …
Grand Forks photographer attended the University of North Dakota Athletics Night of Champions awards banquet Tuesday night in the Empire Arts Center in downtown Grand Forks. Among the winners were University of North Dakota junior thrower Molli Detloff and junior defenseman Christian Wolanin. Detloff was named the Grace Rhonemus Female Athlete of the Year, and Wolanin was named UND’s Glenn …
OIL TO THE RESCUE A pair of Bismarck oil men, new to North Dakota and chasing the state’s first small oil boom, likely made the deal of their life in early 1952, acquiring almost the entire 127-acre tract of Highland Acres, complete with partially constructed streets, water mains, a couple of dozen good residents and the potential to earn a …
This passage from the great Catholic writer Richard Rohr really struck me when I read it a few days ago: “Anger is good and very necessary to protect the appropriate boundaries of self and others. I would much sooner live with a person who is free to get fully angry, and also free to move beyond that same anger, than …
Wow, what’s happening around this country? Oklahoma passes a bill preventing gays and lesbians from adopting. The National Rifle Association bans weapons at its own event featuring Vice President Pence. Republican men in Congress opposed a bill requiring lawmakers to pay their own expenses for settling sexual harassment lawsuits. As of this month, Flint, Mich.,, has been without water for …
As the news of our old friend’s tragic demise sinks in, I’ve been pondering the five stages of how grieving humans work through the death of a loved one. Denial, anger, bargaining, depression, acceptance. We’ve lost a dear part of our region’s family. Herberger’s, rest in peace. Denial? Oh, yes. Until the axe finally fell, I clung to the lingering …
MOVING IN Here are the first 21 residents of Highland Acres, gleaned from the files of the State Historical Society of North Dakota. Notice they are all just men’s names, the “heads of households.” We assume they all had wives as well. And probably children. I don’t have the dates of the purchase of each of these homes, but I’m …
1948: BUILDING HIGHLAND ACRES BEGINS The Bismarck Tribune reported in April 1948 that “Twelve houses are under construction in Highland Acres, the addition on the western edge of the city owned by the Bismarck Veterans Homeowners Cooperative Association.” The paper said that the housing co-op had also contracted for construction of nine additional homes. Looking over the building plans for …
Monday’s West Texas expedition was to the Davis Mountains area in search of Montezuma quails. The Davis Mountains are what is known as a “Sky Island,” rising high above the Chihuahuan Desert and are one of the most beautiful places in Texas. In addition to birding, our destination was the famous McDonald Observatory. On my last visit to Texas, we …
Grand Forks photographer Russ Hons spent this past weekend in Theodore Roosevelt National Park in western North Dakota, and here is what he saw. (Check out more photos from Russ Hons here.)
WALLACE STEGNER: IN PRAISE OF COOPERATIVES In early 1947, the Bismarck Veterans Homeowners Cooperative Association’s management committee developed a mimeographed newsletter for mailing to co-op members and in one of its first issues included excerpts from an article written by the noted author Wallace Stegner in the April 1947 issue of the magazine “47,” noted by some as “The Magazine …
I am in Texas at the invitation of my friend, Valerie, who has a house here near the Davis Mountains. I have been a birder for more than 40 years, and she and I greatly enjoy birding together whenever we get the chance. Here we birded together five years ago, but it was February, so I jumped at the chance …
FINDING A NAME: HOW WE BECAME HIGHLAND ACRES The new development needed a name. Bismarck Tribune editor Ken Simons wrote a story for his paper announcing a contest would be held to name the subdivision and the streets within it. Entries were to be submitted to the committee, with an entry deadline of Aug. 12, 1946. On Aug.t 22, the …
As I drove across town Thursday on one of the first lovely afternoons in an otherwise lousy spring, I attempted to put a positive spin on life in Minnesota. Sure, we’ve had April temperatures 30 degrees below normal. And yes, I could still see, out of the corner of my eye, those dirty, lingering snow piles along the side of …
HIGHLAND ACRES AND THE BISMARCK VETERANS HOMEOWNERS COOPERATIVE ASSOCIATION — PRODUCTS OF A PERFECT STORM Highland Acres Addition to the city of Bismarck, was a housing subdivision developed cooperatively by a group of returning World War II veterans in the 1940s and 1950s. Its success led to the subsequent development of nearby Highland Acres Second and Third Additions and Torrance …
Regular readers of this blog (both of you, as my friend, Dan Ulmer, likes to say in his weekly newspaper column, poking fun at himself to remind him not to take himself too seriously — I’m with Dan) will notice that I haven’t been very active here lately. That’s not because there hasn’t been much going on to write about. …
Remember when the line “We’re No. 1” was a badge of honor? Well, Fargo has once again claimed that distinction … but in a category where no one wants to be included. North Dakota and Fargo are No. 1! They outdo Moorhead and Minnesota in the categories of the drunkest city and drunkest state in the country. By whatever measure …
At a speaking engagement of mine a few months back, a woman in the audience said something that I will never forget. She had lost her spouse more than a year before and continued to grieve deeply. But something in her suffering had shifted, she said. “I used to see grief as an enemy,” she said. “After reading your book, …
I remember a couple of years ago, when my stepdaughter, Jessica, called from Cincinnati to get a recipe. My granddaughter, Naomi, wanted hotdish — the way Grandma makes it. Back when we were both still working, Therese used to make the tasty hotdish for our grandson, Rakeem, on Tuesdays, when I worked from 4 p.m. to midnight. In retirement, we continue …
My daughter and I were wandering about the J.P. Morgan Library in New York City last week, vaguely looking for whatever they had about Edward S. Curtis, the Seattle photographer who took those incredible black-and-white images of Native Americans at the turn of the 20th century. We saw a range of amazing things in two hours — one of the …
It is the tradition for members of the Badlands Conservation Alliance to do a day of service, usually in Theodore Roosevelt National Park, on the weekend closest to Earth Day. On this past Saturday, we did just that, rollin’ up our sleeves for Theodore Roosevelt National Park, in the heart of the Bad Lands, our sacred landscape. I’ve been involved …
Grand Forks photographer Russ Hons attended the Grand Entry of the 2018 University of North Dakota Indian Association Time-Out Week/ Wacipi Powwow on Friday night in Hyslop Sports Center. The weeklong celebration concludes Saturday with another Grand Entry at 1 p.m. Saturday. (Check out more photos from Russ Hons here.)
Grand Forks photographer Russ Hons has an eye for wildlife, and these images provide the proof. (Check out more photos from Russ Hons here.)
Dorette and I love to attend the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Film Festival every spring. On Thursday, we saw the new Russian-made movie “Vronsky,” complete with English subtitles. The flick is set in the Russo-Japanese War of 1904-05. It imagines the aftermath of Leo Tolstoy’s novel “Anna Karenina” from the point of view of Anna’s lover, Count Vronsky, several years after …
For more than a decade, Jim and I have been writing together and editing one another’s work. Wednesday was a big day in our writing life. Our first jointly written article has been published and the journal was dropped into our mail slot this afternoon by our friendly postal delivery woman. We are thrilled. At least, I am. For Jim, …
I had the goofiest dream last night. The president of the United States, in a panic, placed a call to the president of Russia seeking guidance. It went something like this: POTUS: Sarah Sanders, get the Russian president on the line. Don’t call your daddy for permission to make the call. Just call! Sanders: I’m calling on behalf of the …
Privacy was a big deal when I was growing up in small-town North Dakota — mostly because there wasn’t any. From party lines to rural postmasters who made a mental note of your bills and letters, confidentiality was as rare as neighbors who didn’t gossip. My mother adhered to just one strategy: When you turn on the lights at night, always …
I had a pretty good week. My lawyer, Sly M. Ball didn’t get raided, and his paper shredder is working just fine. It’s powered by a V-8 Cummins, which gets terrible mileage, but thanks to the rollback of fuel efficiency standards, he won’t have to deal with a solar-powered model. The problem there is twofold. First of all, most of …
My wife and I spent a healing hour watching the news Tuesday night. When was the last time anyone could say that? The topic, of course, was the passing of former First Lady Barbara Bush at age 92. As the tributes poured in, how nice it was to be reminded that her human greatness did not derive from her role …
As perhaps you know, I’m now the editor of the quarterly journal of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, “We Proceeded On.” That’s one of the refrains of William Clark’s journal of the 28-month expedition that was the brainchild of the great Jefferson. Whatever else was true, virtually every day (there were 1,123 of them), Clark announced that “we proceeded on” — …
Holy moly, where has the time gone? It seems like only yesterday, Ryan Zinke was on North Dakota soil. Yes, THE Ryan Zinke. I still shiver at the thought. The ethically challenged secretary of the Interior — most in the Cabinet are corrupt, so it’s no big deal — was smack dab in Grand Forks, to fire up the Republican …
On Monday, I read their names. The names of some of the men, women and children who were among the 6 million Jews who were killed during the Holocaust. As part of Yom Hashoah Holocaust Remembrance Day, Voices of Hope and the Mandelll Jewish Community Center in West Hartford, Conn., sponsor a Community Wide Reading of the Names. A member …
I get so tired of the Sally Hemings story. At almost every public presentation I give in the costume and character of Thomas Jefferson, someone sashays up to the microphone in the aisle and says, “Tell us about Sally Henning” or some other slight botching of her name. “Or tell us about your family, and I mean all of your …
Do you still remember Sept. 11, 2001? That’s the day four planes were hijacked. Two were flown into the Twin Towers in New York and another into the Pentagon. The last crashed into the ground in Pennsylvania when its passengers overcame the terrorists who had planned to take out a fourth target. The hijackers were 19 men affiliated with al-Qaeda. …
In a few days, a week of events will mark the first two decades of the Empire Arts Center in Grand Forks. A 20th Anniversary Celebration Concert on April 21 will open the week that will also include an open mic night, a movie night and more and conclude with the Empire’s annual dinner and dance. The Empire is such …
I turned 60 in December, a season in life when, for hobbies, a more sensible person might have turned to watercolors or growing orchids. I have turned to Aerosmith, the Rolling Stones, Tom Petty, Credence, Pink Floyd and REO Speedwagon. I’m not talking about the oldies station on the radio, or air guitar when no one is looking or belting …
Reading has been important to me since I was a first-grader at Fram Township School No. 3 in Wellsburg, N.D. My teacher, Sylpha Hovland, inspired me. I still have my “report card” from that year long ago — the marks were great for reading, not so hot for “deportment.” Here are the first lines of 10 of my favorite novels. …
I was just wrapping my head around this Tide pod trend when I learned that condom snorting might be a thing. Now, I’ll have to sit down and have a talk with India about this. When we discussed the dangers of Tide pods, she assured me she had no intention of eating our laundry detergent because, and I quote, “You …