Search results for

1/17/2014: The Territorial Legislature met on Tuesday, January 8, 1889, for the beginning of what was hopefully the last session as a territory. On the first day, the Republicans in the House called a caucus to select their leaders and map out their strategy, while their Democratic counterpart decided against it. Edwin McNeil from Cass County concluded it involved too much time and paperwork since he was the sole Democrat in the House! On the other side of the hall, of the twenty-five members of the Council, only three were Democrats.

2/12/2014: On this date in 1889, the Territorial Legislature was thirty-six days through the sixty day session and was getting down to business. The Farmers Alliance controlled the legislature, and as a result, bills dealing with the railroad and flour monopolies received considerable attention.

2/18/2014: Theodore Roosevelt came West in 1884 to seek a new lifestyle. As a rancher, adventurer, lawman and statesman, his stay in North Dakota was relatively brief, but he was never forgotten by North Dakotans. In turn, Roosevelt fondly recalled his life in the Badlands and stated that if it wasn’t for his time there, he would have never been President.

2/20/2014: On this date in 1889, the aspirations of thousands of citizens from Dakota Territory who had struggled so hard for self-government appeared to be finally bearing fruit in Congress. B

2/28/2014: In August of 1879, Tower City was founded as a Northern Pacific Railroad station in Tower Township, Cass County. The post office had been established on May 5 of that year, and the village was incorporated in 1881.

3/4/2014: The dark, cold winter causes epidemics of spring fever among college students, and in the 1940s this drove a fraternity into protest at North Dakota State University, then known as the North Dakota Agricultural College.

3/6/2014: On this date in 1889 the Territorial Legislature was at Day 58 of the sixty day session. It had been a tumultuous session.

3/7/2014: The story of Andrew Carnegie is well known. This poor boy from Scotland immigrated to America and became rich through his Carnegie Steel Corporation. In 1900, Carnegie sold his steel company to banker J.P. Morgan for 480 million dollars, whereupon Morgan said: “Congratulations, Mr. Carnegie, you are the richest man in the world."

3/12/2014: Shortly before midnight on March 8, 1889, the sharp rap of the gavel announced the end of the 18th Territorial Legislative Session and hopefully the last Session of Dakota Territory, North or South. There was a lot of work ahead to ensure statehood for North Dakota.

3/17/2014: Dr. Henry Wheeler, M.D., was famous in Grand Forks for three reasons. First, his medical practice began in the early 1880s and he healed many; second, he became mayor, elected for his first term in 1918, and, on this date in 1920, the Grand Forks Herald announced that Dr. Wheeler had been re-elected. And third, all who knew Mayor Wheeler acknowledged a well-known fact – he was a hero who had helped thwart bank robber Jesse James in 1876.