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Tosten Boe and his wife Mildred, of Minot, had a bit of luck after a lot of bad luck in 1947. The two lived in a house in Minot, and unfortunately for them, some coal gas started filtering into their house. It would not take long for this to affect them. Tosten fell onto the ground, and Mildred passed out on their bed. That was nearly the end of the Boes, and they would have died on this date except for a little luck.

How many times have you seen the Northern Lights in the nighttime sky? It has been reported that it was more common to see the them in North Dakota back in the 1880s. For example, on this date in 1887, the Griggs County [Cooperstown] Courier reported: “The aurora borealis or northern lights were beautifully visible in the northern skies on Monday night.”

For Sue Balcom, it's never too soon to start planning for the growing season.

Around this time in February 1925 at the University of North Dakota, student editors of the 1926 Dacotah yearbook were putting their final touches on their work. The University's student newspaper reported that the book would include an epic poem that, in the editor's words, "approaches anything ever written by Longfellow or any of the rest of the immortals.” The writers of the poem were members of the yearbook staff, but they were characterized by the paper as the "noted campus poet laureate," Diplodocus.

We have had our fair share of cold weather this winter, with temperatures well into the twenty to thirty below zero range. Although many among us are more than ready for warmer temperatures, we also seem to fall back on that old saying that the cold temperatures “keep the riffraff away.” Those cold temperatures might also be helping keep the emerald ash borer away.

The phrase “pulp fiction” makes most people think of the 1994 Quentin Tarantino film. But the phrase actually comes from magazines of explicit content that used to be printed on wood pulp paper. The first example dates back to 1896, and the format's height of popularity came in the 1920s, 30s, and 40s.

Friday, March 4, 2022 - Ukrainians in North Dakota: In Their Voices explores what it means to be both Ukrainian and American. We visit with Bill Palanuk of the Ukrainian Cultural Institute and State Librarian Mary Soucie. ~~~ News Director Dave Thompson has his weekly news debrief. ~~~ Matt Olien reviews Drive My Car.

Most of us are familiar with the hooting of great horned owls. But we hear them a lot more than we see them. It is amazing that they can stay so well hidden. But if you have an interest in seeing them, now might be a good time to begin looking for them in earnest. That is because they have started to nest, and the young should start hatching in about a month or so. With the deciduous trees still bare, the owls are about as observable as they get.

You may know by now that I am getting obsessive about my quest to discover and regenerate the ballads and balladry of the Great Plains. Many a dark morning I carry my coffee with me through digital portals into that world where the Canadian settlers of Emmons County are writing and singing their own homesteading ballad, or where picnicking Grangers are breaking into choruses of “The Farmer Is the Man.”

Just a few years ago—2018, by my notes—I was wondering what had happened to the English sparrows, a.k.a. house sparrows, that I had cussed for years as they cleaned out my bird feeders. A quick internet search disclosed that the sparrow disappearance was a global phenomenon, some sort of plague that had swept across Asia and Europe and North America. Not to worry, the sparrows are back now and as voracious as ever.