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8/5/2011: On today’s date in 1958, Douglas Armond Nelson staged a hold-up at the Wahpeton National Bank, and those who witnessed the event will never forget how it unfolded – not because of any excitement or gunplay, but rather because poor Douglas didn’t have much experience at bank robbing.

8/12/2011: On today’s date in 1932, North Dakota lost a great champion. Her name was Marguerite – Golden Marguerite – and she was truly a “Gold Medal Cow.” In 1921, she produced 977.7 pounds of butter fat in one year, a record not beaten until 1969.

8/17/2011: On this date in 1956, the Bismarck Tribune wrote about a rising star’s dazzling performance at a Bismarck Barons baseball game. The star’s name was London, and he had fur, four legs, and a tail. Little did the fans know, that one day a writer would call London "the smartest dog that ever lived."

8/30/2011: When you’ve spent a lot of time growing your crop, caring for it, and harvesting it, you really don’t want all of your hard work to go to waste. So, in 1950, when the country found itself in the midst of a boxcar crisis, everyone felt the pressure…especially since the crisis took a turn for the worse during harvest time, August through October.

9/2/2011: North Dakota’s highest rated news story in 1955 was chock full of slander and politics. It was around this time of year that four college professors were packing their bags to leave North Dakota Agricultural College (now NDSU), and the state. This controversy, later coined “The Purge,” would tarnish NDSU’s reputation for years to come.

9/8/2011: Wiz Khalifa, the American rapping sensation, was born on this date in 1987 in Minot, North Dakota. Born Cameron Jibril Thomaz, Khalifa’s military parents were stationed in Minot before the family moved to Pittsburgh when he was only two.

9/9/2011: The first Yellowstone Expedition left Fort Rice under military escort on this date in 1871. The expedition team consisted of surveyors and engineers of the Northern Pacific Railroad, who hoped to chart a course for the railroad across the northern plains and Rocky Mountains to the Pacific Coast.

9/12/2011: On this date in 1944, the Bismarck Tribune reported that Millikan believed he could to measure hydrogen rays in North Dakota, and was on his way to Bismarck.

9/14/2011: This date in 1900 started with a rainstorm that ended in a cold and dreary morning. Despite the weather, a crowd had already trickled into Minot’s courthouse by 5:00 am. They gathered in the hallways of the jail cell, many by special invitation, some just curious, to see the last moments of Hans Thorpe, who was the only man legally hanged in Minot.

9/15/2011: On this date in 1968, as fall settled in and students returned to school, the school board in Garrison had already faced some serious issues, with money woes a major component of a recent school board meeting.