Continued from www.cullmantribune.com/2025/07/06/column-south-dakota-is-amazing
Almost 221 years ago, in 1804, Lewis and Clark headed west under the commission of President Thomas Jefferson, to see what we had bought in the Louisiana Purchase. In the fall of that year, the explorers had made their way westward to what would eventually become North Dakota. As they stood on the banks of the Missouri River, they decided to build a fort there where they would shelter for the harsh winter. They cut down cottonwood trees and built the fort and interior rooms in only six weeks. They had met a friendly indigenous people there known as the Mandan Tribe, so in honor of their new friends they called it Fort Mandan.
North Dakota was one of three remaining states I had never set foot in. Now, only two more remain to be seen. I not only wanted to see North Dakota, I wanted to see where Lewis and Clark had spent that winter in the fort they had built, before they headed on toward the West Coast. It was there at Fort Mandan that they added Sacagawea and her family to their team.
Three weeks ago, on June 20, Jean, Drew and I stood on the bank of that same Missouri River, perhaps near the same spot, where Lewis and Clark had stood so long ago. I imagined their arrival there in the wilderness. No doubt, it looked much different than when we arrived. The original cabins and the surrounding 18-foot-tall wooden fence were long gone by the time we arrived. It was all destroyed by fire in 1806. Fortunately, a replica has been built to contribute to our imagination of what life must have been like for them that winter. No doubt the two stone fireplaces were enough to keep them from freezing to death, but maybe not by much. We were there in June and even then, the evenings were still nippy. I can only imagine how it must have felt in the dead of winter! The rough-cut wooden bunk beds with ropes for a mattress didn’t make me think of a good night’s rest! With a sense of thanksgiving, I thought about how comfy the Holiday Inn Express, in nearby Bismarck, had felt for us the night before.
As we left the fort, we stopped for pictures with the larger than life-size statue of another important member of Lewis and Clark’s exploration team. He was a 150-pound Newfoundland named Seaman. He was the only animal to complete the entire three-year journey. Before we headed westward again, we watched a movie and walked through North Dakota’s Lewis and Clark Interpretive Center. There is one also in South Dakota and in Montana.
With the 75-mph speed limits, it didn’t take long to make it to Dickinson for the evening, where we encountered a sudden storm with rain, hail and winds almost as high as the speed limit there! The next morning, we headed out to see another great American leader – President Theodore Roosevelt. Well, we didn’t actually see Mr. Roosevelt, but we did see where he lived for a couple of years. On Feb. 14, 1884, Roosevelt’s 48-year-old mother and his 22-year-old wife both died…on the same day, within hours of one another. Obviously, he was devastated by such tragedy and he retreated to North Dakota to mourn and recover. He built a ranch house in the Badlands and spent the next couple of years there raising cattle. The house is no longer there, but the massive area is now Theodore Roosevelt National Park. We probably could have spent a couple of years in that beautiful place ourselves, but we still had more to see.
Bill King can be reached at bkpreach@yahoo.com or 334-728-5514 (office).
