North Dakota: A Guide to the Northern Prairie StateFederal Writers' Project of the Works Progress Administration for the State of North Dakota
History
North Dakota: A Guide to the Northern Prairie State
Federal Writers' Project of the Works Progress Administration for the State of North Dakota
North Dakota; North Dakota -- Guidebooks
Bismarck's first church service was held on June 15, 1873, although
Mrs. Linda W. Slaughter organized a Sunday school in a Camp Hancock
tent as early as August of the previous year. The first church in the
city was the Presbyterian, at 303 Second Street. When the Catholic
church was built in 1898 the Marquise de Mores gave a large stained
glass window in honor of her late husband. The window, portraying the
Immaculate Conception, bears his name and is in the front of the church
in the choir loft. Fourteen religious denominations are represented in
Bismarck.
Two hospitals and several clinics serve both the urban population and
a large rural area. Radio station KFYR, with studios at 200 Fourth
Street, is an associate member of the National Broadcasting Company
and operates on 5,000-watt power during the day and 1,000 at night.
Four newspapers in addition to the _Tribune_ are published in Bismarck:
Two semi-weeklies, the Bismarck _Capital_ and _Der Staats Anzeiger_
(German); and two weeklies, the _Leader_, organ of the Nonpartisan
League, and the Dakota _Freie Presse_ (German). Bismarck and its
surrounding territory have a large German and Russo-German population.
The city was the home of James W. Foley, North Dakota poet, during his
school days, and later he was a member of the Bismarck _Tribune_ staff.
His numerous books include _Prairie Breezes_ and _Voices of Song_.
Although Bismarck is in the heart of the spring wheat region, where
four times more acres are planted in wheat than any other crop, the
city's industrial life is subordinate to its political. Commercially it
is a wholesale distributing point for many State or district offices
of various lines of merchandise. In addition there are flour mills,
creameries, grain elevators, and seed-houses. A pioneer seed-house and
nursery, the Oscar H. Will Company, founded in Bismarck in 1881, is the
largest concern of its kind in the State. Specializing in seed corn, in
which it followed the example of the agricultural Mandan Indians, the
company has propagated many new, and acclimated several established,
varieties of plants, grain, and nursery stock that are exceptionally
hardy, drought resisting, and quick maturing. North of Bismarck are
extensive lignite coal deposits, with one of the largest strip mines in
the State in north Burleigh County, near Wilton.
In 1903 several thousand farmers of German extraction migrated from
Wisconsin to settle the farm lands in the Bismarck territory. They have
made the city a shipping point for a constantly increasing dairy, wool,
honey, and corn output. The drought conditions of the 1930's have cut
into agricultural production, but have intensified recognition of the
need for diversified farming, which is more widely practiced each year.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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