Category: business

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School for Snowshoes

By Laura Johnson Andrews

Snowshoes and other traditional crafts are preserved at the Four Winds Boat Shop near Vermillion.

Students are welcome in the refurbished schoolhouse nestled into the hills of Dawne and Matt Olson’s farm near Vermillion. But instead of grammar and geography, these students are learning to make boats, pine needle baskets, fishing flies, wing bone turkey calls, snowshoes and other traditional crafts.

Dawne Olson came to woodworking through her love of the outdoors. After seeing a cedar strip canoe under construction at a canoe museum, she bought a book on canoe building and decided to try it, even though she had no prior experience.”I literally propped the book up in my shopping cart while I wandered around the store trying to find the tools that were recommended to use, even though I had never heard of half of them,” Olson says. She picked up additional books and peppered an online boat-building forum with questions. By the time Olson had a finished canoe, she was hooked. She opened Four Winds Boat Shop in 2015, in part so that she could help others feel the sense of satisfaction that comes from developing a new skill.”When I finished my third year of snowshoe workshops, one of the participants sent me a picture of her completed snowshoes,” Olson says.”She said, ‘I can’t remember the last time I was this proud of myself.’ I love that so much.”

Editor’s Note: This story is revised from the January/February 2019 issue of South Dakota Magazine. To order a copy or to subscribe, call (800) 456-5117.

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Turning to the River

By Bernie Hunhoff

Emily and Uriah Steber sat on the tailgate of their pickup and imagined how their restaurant, Drifters Bar and Grille, might fit along the banks of the Missouri River.

American rivers were once treated as the backyards of our cities, convenient places for unsightly factories, meatpacking plants, city dumps, salvage yards and such. South Dakota was no exception, even along the fabled Missouri River. Sioux Falls architect Tom Hurlbert saw that paradox when he traveled to Fort Pierre to assist with plans for a new riverside restaurant called Drifters Bar & Grille.

“It was a bit surprising that for as much as Pierre and Fort Pierre, and South Dakota for that matter, are influenced by the Missouri, that much of the city and state has turned its back to the river,” Hurlbert says.”Drifters was an opportunity to turn back toward the water.”

The vision, says Hurlbert, came from the Zarecky family — especially Emily Zarecky Steber, a Pierre native who grew up on the river.”We spent our summers on the water, sometimes from sunrise to sunset,” she says.

Her parents, Mark and Glennis Zarecky, bought the property 12 years ago and had development plans”shovel ready” in 2011 when the great flood hit the Missouri, swamping the river valley for months. Emily always thought the riverside location would be perfect for a restaurant. She went off to college at the University of South Dakota where she gained restaurant business experience while working at Chae’s, a then-popular Vermillion eatery. After graduation, she continued to learn the trade at top restaurants in Denver and Sioux Falls.

As the riverfront property recovered from the flood, Emily longed to go home. Her family redrew plans for the development — which include a 78-slip marina, commercial and residential space — and then her fiancÈ, Uriah Steber, also grew enthused about the dream of a restaurant.

“We sat down here when it was all dirt and had dinner on the back of my pickup truck and envisioned what we wanted,” says Emily.”Uriah and I got engaged there where that middle booth would be.” The restaurant opened in May of 2016 and they were married in June of 2017.

“Clearly our major theme is nautical,” says the young restauranteur,”but we wanted to have western and industrial elements as well, along with an outdoor fireplace and cedar siding.”

Hurlbert says the Zareckys’ love of the Missouri was inspiring.”Emily and her family had lots of experiences and ideas that came from being on and around the Missouri, but they were also influenced by travels around the country, particularly from the architecture and landscape around other bodies of water. They saw an opportunity to help create and capture a river identity.”

Emily’s love of the water is reflected throughout the 13,000-square-foot restaurant and event space. Her father stamped a nautical compass on the concrete floor. Boat cleats serve as purse hooks. An authentic wooden canoe from Steber’s home state of Wisconsin was repurposed and wired for lighting over the bar. Exposed ceiling beams were shaped like the hull of a large ship.

Aficionados of both beer and boating seem to enjoy the Brewski, a wood water ski with 16 holes that hold 5-ounce sampler glasses. Visitors also love to pose for pictures with Mojo, a giant steel pelican created by a Florida artist.

Immense windows offer views of historic LaFramboise Island, Griffin Park and a sandbar known as Discover Island where waterfowl and eagles often gather.

Drifters soon became a popular part of the Pierre-Fort Pierre dining and entertainment culture, and the satisfied customers include the architect.”I’ve had the opportunity to sit outside on the patio on a cool summer evening with a fire going and enjoy a great meal with the sounds of the river in the air and the silhouette of the capitol against the Missouri Hills,” says Hurlbert.”It’s a beautiful place. Of course nature and the kitchen did most of the heavy lifting on that night. All we had to do was create a nice space to land and get out of the way.”

Editor’s Note: This story is revised from the September/October 2018 issue of South Dakota Magazine. To order a copy or to subscribe, call (800) 456-5117.

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A New Look

By John Andrews

The problem stared Jordan Deutsch in the face as he sat in the cab of his tractor. Deutsch is an avid waterfowl hunter whose farm lies just outside the Langford city limits. He always believed the camouflage he wore was too dark to blend well with the fields of corn stubble that he and his friends hunt every fall. So he started taking pictures of corn and contacted a graphic designer who helped him devise his Killer Korn pattern.

Capturing the intricacies of corn in its various stages proved challenging.”It’s lighter in the spring and more yellow in fall,” Deutsch says.”I took pictures of wet corn that had been rained on, combined corn. Some brands are more red than others, or more yellow.”

After three years of tweaking the pattern, he found a company in New Jersey that could reproduce it on clothing, and Deutsch’s Fallin’ Fowl Camo brand was born. It’s now appearing on blinds and other outdoor gear and is available at rchuntingstore.com, a retailer based in Aberdeen, or through Deutsch’s Fallin’ Fowl Camo Facebook page.

Editor’s Note: This story is revised from the September/October 2017 issue of South Dakota Magazine. To order a copy or to subscribe, call (800) 456-5117.

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Rescuing a Colonial

By Bernie Hunhoff

An original hitching post inspired the equestrian theme on Pierre’s newest bed and breakfast.

Ron Lutz tends to the bridges of South Dakota and the nation by day; by night he has long been the king of hospitality in Pierre, operating hotspots like the Whale Inn, The Flame, the St. Charles and The Falcon.

An engineer with Aaron Swan and Associates, Lutz is also an accomplished vocalist who sometimes sings with Jim Szana, a popular jazz pianist in the Capital City.

He borrowed on all those skills and more when he bought the old house at 635 North Euclid in Pierre’s historic district. The foundation of the 1907 Colonial seemed unstable, but the interior charm won his heart.

“When I got ready to sell the St. Charles, I thought I’d like to have a smaller bed and breakfast,” says Lutz.”I came and looked at it, and it was a wreck but I started to design how it might work and it seemed possible. I wanted it to run more like an inn with separate bathrooms in every room.” So Lutz enlisted the help of Jeremy Phelps, the new business manager at Aaron Swan and Associates. Phelps wrote his master’s thesis on turning a midcentury castle in Germany into a bed and breakfast.

Lutz and Phelps nervously exposed the foundation, cutting away volunteer trees that had grown around the foundation, trapping moisture and causing the settling and cracking. Workers trenched around the exterior basement walls and re-enforced them with concrete.

Then they opted to replace all the electrical and plumbing.”We pulled 7,200 feet of wire for the contractor,” Lutz laughs,”and it didn’t do my shoulders any good.”

They labored to save the old house’s charm.”We wanted to leave it as untouched as possible,” Lutz says, so they painstakingly polished and preserved the”egg and dart” trim molding, sanded and stained the hardwood floors and repaired the original metal lock and key for the big front door.

Ron Lutz used his engineering and hospitality skills to renovate the Hitching Horse.

With the design skills you might expect from an engineer, they were able to convert the five-bedroom home into four bedrooms with four baths — and make every room look as if it was always there.

They decided to call it the Hitching Horse B&B, recognizing an original iron hitching post still standing on the front lawn. They opened to wonderful reviews from travelers in 2009. Guests appreciate the establishment’s architecture and dÈcor, and they rave about the complimentary breakfasts. They’ll cook whatever you wish, but they specialize in gourmet omelets with toast and accompanied by a salsa recipe handed down from Lutz’s mother.

Phelps also partnered with Lutz to open The Equestrian, a 3-stool bar (with more seating in the living room and on the porches.) Lutz, Szana and other Pierre musicians have entertained there many times. The lounge is open six evenings a week, except when the state legislature is in session.

When Lutz bought the house, he was unsure of its history. Since then, he and Phelps have learned that it was built by Lester Clow, a local lumberyard operator. Supreme Court Judge Samuel Cleland Polley lived there in the 1920s and 1930s, followed by the Morrissey and Hansen families.

Members of the Dean Hansen family, who are active in South Dakota horse breeding and racing circles, gather nostalgically at the Hitching Horse on the first Saturday in May for a Kentucky Derby Party. New traditions are growing in one of Pierre’s oldest homes.

Editor’s Note: This story is revised from the May/June 2018 issue of South Dakota Magazine. To order a copy or to subscribe, call (800) 456-5117.

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Frosting Zebras

By Katie Hunhoff

Janine and Keith Ellis produce Zebras and numerous other pastries and baked goods with help from Sue Royle (center) and other staff at the Royal Bake Shop in Centerville.

Dale Merritt’s legacy as a baker is legendary in Turner County. Merritt grew up at Parker and left South Dakota to serve as a sailor in World War II. After the war, he went to Minneapolis where he studied at the Dunwoody Baking School on the GI bill and worked for Pillsbury Flour Mills on the banks of the Mississippi River.

But by 1946 he was back home in Turner County, and soon bought the Royal Bake Shop on Centerville’s Main Street. Keith Ellis was a teenager when he went to work for the old soldier turned baker in the 1980s.”Dale was a great teacher and very intelligent,” Ellis says. “He was old school. You worked hard, you showed up. But he was patient. I think he was one of the best in the industry.”

Keith and his wife, Janine, both Centerville natives, felt honored to have the opportunity to succeed Merritt as proprietors of the bakery in 1993.”I felt like it needed me. I thought I could do a good job,” Keith told us. Twenty-three years later, he is still the baker, and Janine does everything but the baking: she packages, delivers, serves customers donuts and coffee in their shop and does the bookkeeping.

Little has changed at the bakery since Merritt’s era. It’s still located in the original building. All the breads, pastries and rolls are still made with the founder’s recipes, some dating from the early 1900s but with personal touches you might expect from an educated baker. Keith worked particularly hard on a chocolate frosting recipe.”It took three years to get it right. It either flops or it don’t,” he once said of his attempts at tweaking recipes.

The chocolate frosting recipe proved important to the success of the bakery because it tops the bakery’s signature donut, the 99-cent Zebra, which is trademarked by the state of South Dakota. Keith describes the Zebra as a marbled donut with fudge frosting and glaze.”People go nuts about it,” says Janine. On a normal Saturday the Ellises bake an average of 1,000 donuts, and 350 of them are Zebras. Most days they run out. Some customers enjoy the delicacy with coffee at a table inside; others eat and stroll the old downtown or take them home.

We arrived at the bakery on a quiet afternoon, when only a few lonely donuts remained on their shelves. But Centerville’s Main Street was busy. The town of nearly 900 people, on the banks of the Vermillion River, is a blue collar and farm town. Tractors and grain trucks frequent the streets, and grain bins make a skyline along with the silo-like water tower with the town name printed vertically.

The Royal Bake Shop sits in the middle of town, and has been a mainstay of Centerville and Turner County culture for generations. When Irene State Bank, located 12 miles away, celebrated its 20th anniversary in 1966, the Centerville Journal chose to focus its report on the cake.”Eighty pounds of cake plus 50 pounds of icing were delivered to Irene on Sunday by Dale Merritt of the Royal Bakery as the Irene State Bank celebrated their 20th anniversary at the school auditorium in Irene. Approximately 750 people were present, the largest number ever served at one time from a Royal Bakery cake. Actually, the cake was made in individual pieces on petit-fours and was transported to Irene on glass frames. Each piece has a rum flavored topping and was then dipped in a fondant icing, then enhanced with a sweet pea decoration. It took about 18 hours of labor to complete the cake.”

The Royal Bake Shop is a mainstay of downtown Centerville.

The Royal doesn’t make birthday cakes anymore ó especially of that size ó but for celebrations they do sell giant Zebras that are 12 inches in circumference, costing $19.95 decorated or $15 iced.†But regular donuts are their”bread and butter” ó twists, pretzels, cream delights, jelly Bismarcks, fried Danish, apple fritters, blueberry turnovers and raspberry rosebuds. They also make English muffins using†Keith’s†special recipe.

Most of the goods are sold in a flurry between 8 and 10 a.m.†After the morning rush, the bakery becomes quiet and peaceful, and there’s time to relax and josh with customers or enquiring magazine writers.”We are our own boss,” Janine told us.”That’s the best part. We take vacation when we want. In January we told people we were closing for a few weeks. Everyone was ready when we got back, but people appreciate that and understand.”

Even if there had been hard feelings, they wouldn’t linger. Who could stay mad when there are Zebras to eat?

Editor’s Note: This story is revised from the July/August 2016 issue of South Dakota Magazine. To order a copy or to subscribe, call (800) 456-5117.

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Soap That’s Good For You

By Rebecca Johnson

Erin Nelson of Beresford has always been health-conscious, striving to use products free from chemicals and impurities.”It’s made a huge difference in how my body and skin feels,” she says. When Nelson couldn’t find soap that fit her lifestyle in local stores, she started making her own.”I decided people have been making it for hundreds of years and I just wanted to know how,” she explains.

Nelson started her Irish Twins Soap Company in 2009. She hand stirs and pours more than 35 types of bar soaps in her downtown shop, including varieties for acne, psoriasis and eczema. Many contain French and Moroccan clays, and her Dakota Gunsmoke contains activated charcoal.”The clays pull toxins out of your skin and activated charcoal does too,” she explains.

Along with artisan bar soaps, Nelson makes soy wax candles, bath and body products and household cleaners. And she’s fussy about ingredient quality, using honey, beeswax, goat’s milk, herbs and botanicals from local farms.

This story is revised from the July/August 2017 issue of South Dakota Magazine. To order a copy or to subscribe, call (800) 456-5117.

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Getting the Lead Out

By John Andrews

It doesn’t have a catchy name yet (in legalese it’s known as RRT 01), but a new machine built by brothers Dakota and Lance Tschetter of Huron and Colin Treeby of Rapid City is cleaning up shooting ranges across the country and has people around the world asking about its availability.

Treeby had tried doing reclamation on several shooting ranges but never pinpointed the best way to do it. He approached the Tschetters, who run an ag-based manufacturing company called Lankota, and in May of 2015 the three of them rolled their new machine out of the shop. Operating as Range Recovery Technologies, the crew focuses on pistol and rifle ranges, where shooters fire into a berm. Layers of earth are scraped away and run through a crusher and a series of screens. Clean dirt comes out the end, while lead fragments are collected, bagged and sent to a certified recycler. The machine processes 5 to 25 yards per hour, meaning a typical range cleanup lasts a week to 10 days.

Lance says they were surprised at how quickly news about their machine spread.”As soon as the machine was done and we had our website up, we had offers from people who wanted to buy one, but we’re not sure where we want to go with it,” he says.”Less than a handful of companies in the U.S. can do what we’re doing.”

Editor’s Note: This story is revised from the May/June 2017 issue of South Dakota Magazine. To order a copy or to subscribe, call (800) 456-5117.

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The Art of Growing Grapes

By Rebecca Johnson

A young picker helps harvest during a grape stomping event at Schade Vineyard and Winery west of Volga.

South Dakota’s climate is too cold for most common wine varieties to flourish. The only grape species that naturally performs well is Vitis riparia, also known as riverbank grape or frost grape. Fermenting quality wine from Vitis riparia is not common, but it is possible.

Eldon Nygaard trademarked the name”Wild Grape” after creating the first commercial wine from Vitis riparia in 1996. He used grapes found naturally along the Missouri River near Vermillion and on the Rosebud Indian Reservation to make what he considers a young Cabernet Sauvignon. Wild Grape has been sold throughout the United States, China and Paris, and served at the White House.

But South Dakota wine growers are no longer limited to the wild variety. University researchers in Minnesota and South Dakota have developed cold-hardy hybrids from Vitis riparia and Vitis vinifera, a species normally cultivated for wine. South Dakota State University Horticulturist Ronald Peterson released a grape variety bred for the plains and prairies called Valiant. The hardy blue grape is a cross between wild grapes he gathered along the Missouri River bottoms in eastern Montana and a hardy New York state variety called Fredonia.

The Valiant grape is less acidic than its wild parent, and its vines have survived temperatures below -40 and prolonged periods below -30 without bud injury. It was the first variety Nygaard and his wife, Sherry, planted for South Dakota’s first winery, Valiant Vineyards. The Nygaards returned to Eldon’s South Dakota roots in late 1992, having left Las Vegas for a prairie home that included a quarter section of farmland near Viborg. They’d seen how valuable vineyard property could be in the western United States and with that vision in mind, planted their first vines in 1993. Once grape production proved successful, they built a $1.5 million facility on the west edge of Vermillion. The rustic Buffalo Run Winery includes a bed and breakfast, tasting room and boardroom.

Sandi Vojta, a fifth generation winemaker, works with local growers to ferment wines at Prairie Berry in Hill City.

Numerous wineries and vineyards followed. The South Dakota Department of Revenue lists 28 operational licensed wineries with 134,972 gallons of wine produced in 2016. Meanwhile, the number of vine growers has grown from six farms in 1992 to over 100 today. Rhoda Burrows, professor and extension horticulturist at SDSU, estimates the current total acreage of vineyards at approximately 200 acres. They’re located mostly in the southern half of the state. A longer growing season and slightly milder winter make the area more suitable for grape production, though vineyards do grow further north.

Jeremiah and Lisa Klein started With the Wind Vineyard & Winery in the northeastern corner of the state in 2012. They both grew up in South Dakota but lived in Summit County, Colorado for nine years after they were married.”We had two of our three kids there, but in 2009 we decided to come back and raise our kids in our home state,” Lisa says.”We had our third child just a few weeks after we moved back, then we began farming.” Jeremiah grew corn and soybeans on rented land for about four years. Then they started looking for a farm of their own.

The Kleins fell in love with a 20-acre farm south of Rosholt.”It had been abandoned for about 12 years and had lots of junk and an old house that needed to go away, but I think we could see the vision of the beauty of the land,” Lisa says. Their homestead consists of rolling prairie with south facing slopes and sandy loam soil, which Jeremiah tested and found excellent for grapes. Though grape vines are adapted to a wide range of soil types, they thrive in land with good aeration, loose texture and good drainage.

Jeremiah says his property is not ideal for growing corn and soybeans.”You’d have to put in pivot irrigation. You’d have to fertilize like crazy. You’d have to do many things in order to get a decent crop off of it,” Jeremiah says.”But we kind of feel like we’re going with the wind in terms of what has already been placed here. We’re not trying to force something.”

Matthew Jackson studied enology at California State University before starting Belle Joli’ Winery in Belle Fourche.

Besides preferred soil type, the Kleins knew little about vineyard production. They started with a half-acre test plot and about 300 plants. When those did well they planted 600 more. Their vineyard includes four varieties: two for red wines (Frontenac and King of the North) and two for white (Frontenac Gris and Brianna). All are cold-hardy hybrids.

Unlike corn, beans and most traditional farm crops, grapes are perennials that take at least three years to establish, so the Kleins purchased from other growers to ferment their first wines. A vineyard’s upfront cost is big, but Jeremiah says the crop is worth more per acre than corn or beans. Instead of needing 1,000 acres to make a traditional farm viable, a farmer could have a profitable vineyard with just 10 acres and the 25-year life span of a grape vine. (The world’s oldest known vines in Maribor, Slovenia are over 400 years old.)

“When they’ve excavated old vines that have eventually died off in places like France or Italy, they’ve found that, if there’s not compaction layers in the soil, their root zones will penetrate to nearly 30 feet. So when we’re talking in terms of the volatility of climate, flooding versus drought, things like that, the vines are set up well in order to go through that,” Jeremiah explains.

Crop failures in a vineyard are rare. The robust plants can survive stress, and growing grapes in an area with varied weather has advantages.”After we harvest in the fall, we can pretty much walk away from the vineyards until probably at least March,” says Matthew Jackson, enologist at Belle Joli’ winery in Belle Fourche.”In most grape growing areas, growers have to be in the vineyard year round because of pests and other issues. There are a few really serious diseases that devastate vineyards, but because it gets so cold here it actually kills off a lot of those things,” Jackson explains.”I’ve never had to spray here in western South Dakota, where in most vineyard regions they do have to spray for mold and mildews.”

Still, there are challenges. Birds can wipe out a ripened crop if vines aren’t secured with netting. Hail can obliterate grapes and a late spring frost may damage buds, reducing production.”They can come back. They don’t come back as productive as they would have been, but they’ll still produce a new set of buds so long as it’s only one freeze,” says Jeff Wilde of Wilde Prairie Winery in Brandon.

Herbicides sprayed on neighboring fields and ditches are a major hazard.”The new danger is with Dicamba resistant soybeans — Dicamba is very damaging to grapes,” says Rhoda Burrows of SDSU. Frontenac grape leaves have slight tolerance of 2,4-D, an active ingredient in many herbicides used to kill broadleaf weeds, but it still damages the fruit and can set the vine back a year or more. And most other cold hardy grapes are very susceptible to its volatile form, which can move quickly with the wind a mile or more.

“We really need to get the word out to farmers and ranchers that it’s one thing to spray grandma’s tomatoes once in a while by mistake, but it’s another thing if you get your neighbor’s grapes,” says Dave Greenlee, who owns Tucker’s Walk Vineyard and Farm Winery with his wife, Sue, near Garretson.”They’re perennials and we’re trying to make a living at this.”

Russ and Laura Bortnem started La Ru Vineyards on Lake Campbell after Russ retired from a career as an airline pilot.

The Greenlees started their vineyard as a hobby in a small area of their horse pasture, but now have 5.8 acres on which they grow LaCrescent, Frontenac Gris, Brianna, St. Pepin, St. Croix and Marquette. Dave posts signs asking neighbors to spray after his vines are dormant.

People usually comply, because the Greenlees are good neighbors. They throw big parties at harvest time, inviting friends to pick and rewarding them with wine. Greenlee also invites the Augustana University wrestling team to work one afternoon each fall.”The wrestlers don’t have a low gear — they’re just wired to be competitive. So they’re in a competition to see who can pick the most grapes or who’s the fastest. Some of the local people come up just to see these wrestlers out there. Usually it’s a warm, sunny day and they’ll take their shirts off and everybody sits on the deck and watches the wrestlers work,” he laughs. Greenlee donates to Augie’s wrestling boosters to thank them for their labor.

Most South Dakota vineyards are picked by hand, but mechanical harvesters are available. Jim Schade, who co-owns SchadÈ Vineyard & Winery with his wife Nancy near Volga, uses a machine on his vines.

Russ Bortnem, one of Schade’s suppliers and a retired airline pilot, founded La Ru Vineyards with his wife Laura on Lake Campbell in 2005. He recalls long hours of planting, installing trellis systems, netting for birds and picking by hand when they started. Like a lot of South Dakota growers, Bortnem feels the pride of growing quality grapes is worth the effort.”I’m an old farm boy and I just love the vines,” Bortnem says.”They’re beautiful to look at. It’s a lot of physical labor, but I don’t mind that at all.”

Editor’s Note: This story is revised from the May/June 2017 issue of South Dakota Magazine. To order a copy or to subscribe, call (800) 456-5117.

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Little Manor on the Prairie

By Katie Hunhoff

Andy and Jenny Todd, owners of the Prairie House Manor Bed and Breakfast in De Smet, appreciate the connection to Laura Ingalls Wilder and her family.

We arrived at Prairie House Manor right after the morning rush. While the owners, Andy and Jenny Todd, were preparing breakfast we settled into the formal parlor to wait just as a young couple came down the ornate staircase. Feeling a bit like undercover investigators, we asked them if they liked their stay.

It turns out they were serious Laura Ingalls Wilder fans who came to De Smet for their love of the Little House books and the TV show. They introduced themselves as David and Shawna Halley and said they had traveled 20 hours from Ontario, Oregon.

“It’s the trip of a lifetime,” Shawna told us.”There’s such strong history here.” Shawna, 29, started watching the show in third grade.”Then I started reading the books and I loved them. I’ve read them six times, even as an adult.”

Shawna’s husband David also became a fan. They recently found some Little House DVDs at a yard sale in Ontario for $4 and began a Laura TV marathon.”The stories are just great,” says David.”Mr. Edwards is my favorite. He doesn’t take any crap from anyone.”

Even though they live three big states away, the Halleys know more about Laura’s family and the town of De Smet than many South Dakotans. They know that the Ingalls family lived just three doors down from Prairie House Manor. The house, especially to Wilder fans, is known as the Banker Ruth house. Ruth received a quick mention in The Long Winter for purchasing the last sack of wheat in town for $50, more than Charles Ingalls could pay, and over $1,000 in today’s money.

Col. Thomas H. Ruth migrated west from Pennsylvania after the Civil War, arriving in De Smet in 1880, the year the town was founded. He built the Victorian house in 1884, where he and his wife Amelia raised a son, Edwin. Ruth soon became an important part of De Smet life; he was town mayor, active in the Methodist church and a mason along with Pa Ingalls. He was an early businessman and president of the Kingsbury County Bank. He also became involved in politics and served as state Commissioner of School and Public Lands.

Col. Thomas Ruth

After Ruth passed away in the 1930s, Amelia sold the home to a family who renovated it into four apartments. The grand structure began to slowly decline until Larry and Connie Cheney decided to renovate it into a bed and breakfast in the 1980s.

Over a decade later, another East Coast couple was destined to live in the house. Andy and Jenny Todd grew up and raised a family in New Jersey.”I’m the Laura fan,” says Jenny.”In the space of five years or so, our family visited Laura sites for almost every vacation, beginning with Almanzo’s boyhood home in upstate New York.” In 2007 they visited their last Laura site: De Smet.

They made reservations at the Prairie House Manor.”We sort of feel a connection to Mr. Ruth,” says Jenny.

Feeling a connection to De Smet, they purchased the B&B. With their four children (Aubrey, Cassie, Jessie and Jon), they fell easily into life in De Smet.”No stoplights. No traffic, children walking and riding bikes without adult supervision, vehicles and homes unlocked. It felt like a community where people really care about one another. It felt like we had gone back in time 50 years. It still does,” says Jenny.

Although De Smet has a population of around 1,000, in the summer it turns into a busy tourist hub for Laura lovers.”We have met some incredibly devoted Laura fans,” says Jenny.”More than once, new guests have introduced their daughters, decked out head to toe in Laura gear as Mary, Laura, Carrie and Grace. We’ve even met a boy named Wilder.”

Guests often sit for hours at the B&B and chat”Wilderology,” the study of Laura Ingalls Wilder.

We followed as Andy and Jenny tidied the rooms; the house smelled fresh, with a breeze entering through open windows. Andy stripped the bed sheets and told us about some of the people they’ve met. Such discussions are what he loves best about the B&B.”There have been people here from Germany, Italy, Australia, Japan, all over. I had no idea Laura was popular around the world. The most interesting guest we had was a Muslim from the United Arab Emirates. We had a conversation about politics and religion. Who figures there’s a Laura fan in the United Arab Emirates?”

The Ingalls family lived just a few doors down from Prairie House Manor.

The B&B features six rooms, each with a theme (such as My Rose Garden and Americana Medley) and matching dishes. A screened, wrap-around porch offers several seating areas and a pool table. Inside, a formal parlor connects a small guest kitchen with a large breakfast room. Two guest bedrooms on the main floor feature Jacuzzis, and there are four guest rooms upstairs. All rooms have private baths.

Off limits to the guests are a modern kitchen where Jenny makes omelets and pancakes each morning, and a casual living room where Andy and Jenny relax in their spare time. They’ve made several updates, and are proud the inn’s income has doubled since they purchased it over nine years ago. They are offering the business for $379,900 and that includes the property, furniture, sheets, towels and dishes.

The Todds plan to stay in De Smet, but are ready for a slower lifestyle. Both have jobs outside the B&B. Jenny works at the De Smet News and hopes to have more time to volunteer at the Laura Ingalls Wilder Pageant. She plans to keep her ServSafe kitchen license to help out the next owners until they feel comfortable with the business. Andy works for the high school, driving teams to games and managing the school buses.

They hope the Prairie House Manor sells to a Laura fan, someone who would enjoy talking to guests, like Shawna and David, who were just getting ready to leave for the tour. First, they were going to find a hill outside town to video each other rolling down the hill as Carrie does in the opening credits of the TV show.

“I couldn’t even sleep last night,” Shawna told us.”I can’t believe I’m here.”

Editor’s Note: This story is revised from the November/December 2016 issue of South Dakota Magazine. To order a copy or to subscribe, call (800) 456-5117.

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Tough Times Call for Tough Kennels

By John Andrews

Doug Sangl and Lyle Van Kalsbeek knew hard times were coming. The Great Recession had just hit, and business at their plastics molding company in Tea was slowing to a crawl. They needed a project to fill time, so they combined their love of animals and engineering expertise to design a dog kennel that’s tougher than anything else on the market and a better fit for cars and trucks.

Since then, production of Ruff Tough Kennels has become the partners’ top priority.”We wanted to make them safer and more compact,” Sangl says.”The body is solid; we got rid of the joint where they typically get molded together. That takes a few inches off. Our intermediate size kennel is popular for hunting dogs, and you can fit three wide in back of a pickup. Other kennels with a lip on them won’t do that.”

Other improvements include double doors, which allow access through either side of a car and provide another opening in case of an accident.”They’re kind of like a helmet for your dog,” he says.”We’ve had several testimonials from people who have been in accidents who tell us their dog is alive because of our kennels.”

Ruff Tough Kennels are available at Cabela’s, Scheels and Nyberg’s Ace Hardware in Sioux Falls, or online.

Editor’s Note: This story is revised from the March/April 2017 issue of South Dakota Magazine. To order a copy or to subscribe, call (800) 456-5117.