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Lucid Thomas

  • About 50 species of shorebird migrate through North America. Of those 50 species, about 36 pass on through, while a few stick around for the summer. They all take advantage of the lakes, wetlands, and the water pooled in farm fields.
  • The National Statuary Hall is one of the most popular locations in the U.S Capitol Building, with tourists flocking year-’round to see the collection of statues from across the 50 states. The hall is one of the earliest examples of Greek revival architecture in America. The hall has the shape of an ancient amphitheater, with pilasters made of sandstone and columns made of Breccia marble quarried along the Potomac River. The Corinthian columns were carved from white marble in Carrara, Italy.
  • Protest can take many forms. From a singular person starving on a doorstep to thousands flooding the streets, people have many ways of making their voices heard. One interesting North Dakota protest occurred on this date in 2006, involving three men dressed as clowns at the site of a nuclear missile silo near the Minot Airforce Base.
  • North Dakota is a great location for fossil hunting. Enthusiasts come from all over to participate in public digs. North Dakota is rich in prehistoric discoveries due to its geography. Most of its surface is made of sedimentary rock that has not been touched by glaciers, creating ideal conditions for finding fossils. While most of the discoveries are by people looking for them, every once in a while someone stumbles across an ancient sample by accident. This is what happened at an oil drilling site in 2005, reported on this date in 2007.
  • No matter how mighty your locomotive is, it will need a bridge to cross a river. As a result, there are hundreds of railroad bridges scattered across the state of North Dakota. One very significant bridge is the High Line Bridge near Valley City.
  • The Souris River flood of 2011 was devastating in Minot. Even though people banded together to strengthen flood defenses, the water still flowed over levies on June 22. Thousands of homes were destroyed.
  • Today many farms are industrial in scale, using chemicals to help improve yields. By the time fruits, vegetables, or grains have made it to the shelves, these chemicals are trace enough to offer little risk. However, in larger quantities, these chemicals can be toxic. The city of Minot grappled with these effects when a fire started in a chemical warehouse on April 4th, 1987. The event made national news and the New York and LA Times reported about it on this date.
  • This Datebook is darker than usual, but history is not always a happy story. So, a warning: The topic of this Dakota Datebook could be distressing for some listeners. On September 13, 1993, a woman named Sarah was raped in her condominium in Boulder, Colorado. The complex was called Tantra Lake. She managed to call 911 that night and get a full sexual assault examination. Sadly, it would take 11 years to find her assailant and in that time, he would go on to rape four other women at the Tantra Lake complex between 1993 and 1998. He became known as the “Tantra Rapist.”
  • North Dakotans have a lot of fun in the winter months -- sledding, snowmobiling, skiing, and even more simple things like making snow angels. And we’re quite serious about the snow angels. Twice, North Dakotans held the record for most people making snow angels simultaneously.
  • Penny auctions were collective actions to help farmers during the Great Depression. When a farm was foreclosed upon and sold by the lending financial institution at auction, the crowd would conspire to bid a trivial amount and return the land and assets to the farmer. Unfortunately for many tribal members, no similar strategy was available two decades later when they were forced from the lands they had lived on for millennia to make room for the Garrison Dam and the lake it would create.