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5/8/2010: The American Indian Movement's siege of the small village of Wounded Knee, South Dakota, ended on this date in 1973. The activist group had held the town for over seventy days, hoping to draw attention to Native American rights.

5/10/2010: The Great Depression was a time of dust storms, heat waves, and crop failures. But in Minot, alongside Highway 2, there was a roadside oasis in the summer swelter of the 1930s - a root beer stand called "The Barrel." The Barrel looked like a giant, wooden, root beer barrel - two stories tall, with dark, varnished wood.

5/13/2010: Always the most fashionable neighborhood in Grand Forks, Reeves Drive was home for the leaders and financiers of the community. The street had been named for D. P. Reeves, builder of steamboats in the 1870s.

5/15/2010: Seeing how far you can spit tobacco isn't exactly a class sport. However, on this date in 1952, students from the North Dakota School of Forestry in Bottineau were lining up to do just that.

5/16/2010: Constitution Day, or Citizenship Day, became a federal holiday in 2004. Today it is celebrated on September 17, but its origins stretch back to the 1940s, when Congress first initiated it as "I am an American Day," held the third Sunday in May. If still celebrated in this way, it would have been on this date.

5/17/2010: May is National Historic Preservation month, and this week we will look at the role the Historic Preservation Act of 1966 has had in preserving and protecting North Dakota's legacy. Currently, there are 404 names listed on the National Register from North Dakota, but it should be noted that a number of these are historic districts with numerous buildings.

5/18/2010: This week is National Historic Preservations week. Too often we drive through the countryside and see the remains of old buildings, no longer viable, deserted. The families who laughed, played, cried and struggled to tame the land are long gone and the house and barn are left to the elements. Once the barnyard was full of chickens, horses pranced in the corral and even a few cows and pigs ambled about.

6/15/2010: In times of war, a person's patriotism is often questioned. The Espionage Act of 1918, often called the Sedition Act, was heavily enforced, and the courts were busy trying cases in North Dakota. German immigrants still held a loyalty to the homeland, but when America entered the war the previous year, freedom of speech did not include criticism of the war effort.

6/16/2010: A. T. Patterson, State's Attorney for Mercer County, North Dakota, returned to Bismarck on this date in 1904 with news of a terrible murder near Stanton. Details of the sensational murder shocked Bismarck residents, especially since it involved a female culprit.

6/17/2010: A Fargo stable boy received the most unexpected news on this date in 1904. Edward Plunkett, a "bright, industrious" young man of twenty-one had just recently traveled to Fargo from Willmar, Minnesota. He hoped to attend the Fargo College, but ran out of money after only a few months' time.