Sarah Walker

10/28/2012: For those of you who wonder why cars often come with doors that automatically lock at certain speeds, or how certain seatbelt laws came to pass—

10/27/2012:The current, familiar tower of the Capitol in Bismarck replaced the original Capitol after it burned down in 1930. However, on this date in 1953, the Devils Lake Journal reported that the building’s innards needed help again.

10/24/2012: On this date in 1918, manager T. J. Ahearn from the Jamestown Gas Company was surely licking some very real wounds he received on the job. It all started with the gas in the Northern Pacific depot lunch room. It had been turned off, but a leak was still apparent. He discovered that a plug in a one-inch gas pipe had been removed, with gas flowing into the basement.

10/19/2012: On this date in 1931, the residents of Bismarck laid a special pioneer to rest. This pioneer had no name and never lived: it was a trolley car, placed into service around 1905, originally intended to haul coal up the hill to the Capitol building. The trolley was reportedly the first streetcar in the state, and the first and only trolley line to be owned and run by any state in the country.

10/16/2012: Alfred Burton Welch was born in September 1874 in Afton, IA. He spent a good chunk of his childhood in South Dakota. He had an extensive military career; it began with a tour of duty during the Philippine Insurrection.

10/12/2012: North Dakota is well known for its wheat production. In 2012 alone, North Dakota farmers harvested 7,760,000 acres of wheat – only Kansas had more acreage. Measured in bushels, North Dakota’s total wheat harvest was 339 million bushels! Now, that’s a lot of work—and a lot of wheat. Soon to be a lot of flour!

9/29/2012: On this date in 1911, the local newspaper reported that two men there were arrested for fighting on Park Avenue in Sykeston, North Dakota.

9/27/2012: Emma Lazarus wrote the sonnet “The New Colossus,” which has hung inside the pedestal of the Statue of Liberty since 1903.

9/26/2012: In September of 1925, Theodore Roosevelt’s famous cabin did not sit amidst the crags and buttes of the badlands, but in Bismarck on the Capitol grounds.

9/24/2012: Denhoff was founded in 1901 as a Northern Pacific Railroad station in Denhoff Township, in Sheridan County. It achieved a peak population of 323 people in 1920, never organized, and today exists as a census-designated area.