By Bernie Hunhoff
The thermometer reads 10 degrees and it’s New Year’s Eve, so this is a good day for little other than pontificating and wondering what 2010 will bring to South Dakota.
We begin the year with South Dakota’s very first 38-day legislative session. Voters allowed lawmakers to meet for up to 40 days in the [...]
Most public employees in South Dakota are drawing modest (at best) salaries, often-times for tough jobs like guarding prisoners, caring for the mentally ill, patrolling the highways and collecting taxes.
Last night while driving home, I saw a state worker who was finally getting around to shoveling his sidewalk. It was well after dark — and [...]
State Rep. Martha Vanderlinde of Sioux Falls sent us this poem of winter in our favorite place. With 20 inches of snow on the ground and sub-zero temperatures coming later in the week, we thought you might be in the mood for it ….
WINTER Poem
It’s winter in South Dakota
And the gentle breezes blow
Seventy [...]
By Katie Hunhoff
On this day in 1890 over 300 Lakota were killed by federal troops in the valley of Wounded Knee Creek. A group of 350 Lakota, led by Chief Big Foot, were traveling from the Miniconjou village to the Pine Ridge Agency to join with Red Cloud, who had promised them food, horses and [...]
By Bernie Hunhoff
We’ve observed from our travels that the best small towns have a fellow (sometimes it’s a lady) who unofficially represents the town to outsiders. He or she is nearly always the first to welcome visitors or newcomers. He or she is nearly always the first to patronize a new coffee shop or drop [...]
Then you’ll want to be in Delmont on Thursday for the little town’s ninth annual end-of-year parade. We just got the news from Sam Grosz, a popular local newswoman and all-around busy lady.
Sam says about 30 parade floats will line up at the Zion Lutheran Church and start rolling down Main Street at 2 p.m. [...]
With snow and wind everywhere in the West, we figured this might be a good day for a Christmas Where-izzit Contest. Guess the town where this statue of Mary stands and you’ll win a special prize — a Christmas ornament of Yankton’s historic Pennington House, home of South Dakota Magazine.
We’ll offer a few clues [...]
By John Andrews
Fancy radars and weather predicting equipment beyond my comprehension have been warning us of a coming blizzard for the last week. Our ancestors had no such capabilities in 1888, which is why people like John Jensen, who left his Aurora County farm house to clear snow from a well so his cattle could [...]
By Bernie Hunhoff
Yes, we have the nicest readers in the world. We’ve known it all along. But proof came again this week when Father Gary Ternes, chaplain of the state penitentiary, organized the packing of 2,900 holiday treat bags for prisoners.
Thanks in part to a story by our food editor Ruth Steil in our Nov/Dec [...]
We’re working on a Fort Pierre story for an upcoming issue, but True West scooped us with a feature on the town.
The True West editors named Fort Pierre as No. 6 in its Top Ten Historic Towns. The little city of 2,500 does have an amazing amount of history — much more, actually than Deadwood. [...]
By John Andrews
Sturgis native Carroll Hardy’s claim to fame is being the only man to ever pinch hit for Boston Red Sox great Ted Williams. But this story in today’s Boston Globe talks about the other extraordinary events in Hardy’s sporting career.
Unsure of a career in football or baseball, the San Francisco 49ers called him [...]
By John Andrews
There’s a suicide emergency on the Pine Ridge Reservation. Earlier this week a Lakota man was shot three times at the Lakota Nation Invitational in Rapid City. Mitchell Zephier and Mark St. Pierre mentioned both of these situations this week when we called to talk with them about their new documentary entitled Mato [...]
By John Andrews
We’re familiar with Oscar Howe’s traditional Native paintings, and now we get a chance to see the earlier stages of his work. A collection of Howe’s drawings is on display, many for the first time, at the University of South Dakota.
USD has the largest collection of Howe’s works in the world, including paintings, [...]
By Bernie Hunhoff
Much has been made about rural South Dakota motorists’ friendly finger waves. But we’ve never written much about it in the magazine because we never figured “the country wave” was unique to South Dakota. We’ve encountered the same hale-good-fellow greeting in all our surrounding states.
Urban cousins do find the practice a bit [...]
By John Andrews
Our upcoming January/February issue has a story on the town of Gary. The tiny Deuel County town that straddles the Minnesota border was once home to the state School for the Blind. The school moved to Aberdeen in 1961, and the buildings sat empty for decades. Today they are being renovated to create [...]