In December 1921, P.C. Arildson of Alexander caused a stir when he sent some scorpions, pulled from a lignite mine, to Dr. Webster, an entomologist at the State Agricultural School, for examination. In turn, Webster forwarded the samples to Dr. Ewing at the U.S. National Museum in Washington for further analysis. According to local newspaper reports, it was believed that the scorpions had been brought into the area on timber used for constructing the mine.
However, Franklin Jahnke from McKenzie County disagreed with this assessment. He asserted that Edna Rupp, who served as librarian at the State Historical Society in Bismarck for several years, had records showing that the first scorpions in North Dakota had actually been found a few years earlier, in 1917, in a mine in Mountrail County. Jahnke stated that “no lumber shipment had ever been received” there. The scorpions were identified as coming from the Old Weideman ranch, located near the Missouri River. When found, newspapers reported that “the unwelcome insect” was not believed to have “been conveyed there in a crate of bananas.”
Jahnke sent the scorpion to the State Historical Society for examination, and due to the rarity of the insect, it was decided to send it to Dr. Walcott at the University of Nebraska, who was considered “an expert entomologist.” At that time, Walcott “identified the insect without question as a scorpion” and expressed interest in the fact that they had been found so far north. The correspondence regarding this matter between Jahnke and Rupp is preserved at the State Archives.
Dr. Webster wrote a report about these insects in 1923 after further study. He received several more specimens from around the state but noted that they all came from the Badlands or nearby areas. He stated that Dr. Ewing had determined the species to be “identical with others” found in South Dakota and other nearby locations. While there had been no previous literature documenting these scorpions in North Dakota, Professor J.H. Comstock noted in his Spider Book that this species was the only one found “at all in the northern United States.”
It is also worth noting that in 1925, a newspaper report from Winnipeg indicated that scorpions were being found “all over Manitoba.
Dakota Datebook by Sarah Walker
Sources:
- SHSND MSS 21685
- Grand Forks Herald, February 23, 1922, p11
- Bowbells Tribune, January 20, 1922, p1
- The Bismarck Tribune, January 13, 1922, p7
- The Bismarck Tribune, August 21, 1917, p2
- https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.58.1500.248.a
- The Bismarck Tribune, June 4, 1925, p6
