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Retracing Roads to Our Round Barns

By Bernie Hunhoff

A barn-like pavilion is the centerpiece of the two-county fairgrounds near Nisland.

South Dakota Magazine staffers crisscrossed South Dakota 25 years ago in search of that rare architectural treasure — the round barn.

With help from the State Historical Society, we eventually found 29. They included livestock sales barns, the Butte-Lawrence county fairgrounds pavilion, two octagonal machine sheds and a charming, vertical-log barn near Sturgis. South Dakota never had many round barns, so forgive us for loosely interpreting the term.

We also learned that circular barn construction dates at least to the Bronze Age (hundreds of years B.C.), when boulders were used not just for castles in Britain but also for barns.

George Washington was among the first American farmers to build a barn in the round. A reconstruction of his original 16-sided barn, based on the first president’s own drawings, is a popular attraction at Mount Vernon.

The Shakers were the first Americans to experiment with round construction. A Shaker stone barn built at Hancock, Massachusetts, in 1824 is among the country’s oldest.

There’s just something about roundness. Eric Sloane, author of An Age of Barns, wrote,”Farmers made circular designs on their barns and their wives sewed circular patterns on quilts. They took delight in round hats, rugs and boxes, and they made round drawer pulls and hand rests for their severely-angled furniture.”

Anton Anfinson, a contractor from Wakonda, promoted the round barn concept in southeast South Dakota. Anfinson believed a round barn was the most efficient way to feed cattle. Many round barns featured a silo or a hole in the hay mow at the center. Livestock stood with their heads to the center at feeding or milking time, making it easier to feed the animals and clean their waste.

Most farmers who constructed round barns must have believed in Anfinson’s economic theory, but it’s likely that they were also intrigued by the thought of having something out of the ordinary.

They got what they bargained for. During our 1990s search, we found that if we got within 10 miles of a round barn and asked for help, somebody would soon have directions. Any well-kept old barn gets people’s attention, but a round barn becomes a neighborhood landmark.

“A man’s barn bespoke his worth as a man,” wrote Bob Lacy in a foreword to his book, Barn.”It expressed his earthly aspirations and symbolized the substance of his legacy to his children.”

Rural historians estimate that fewer than 3,000 round barns existed in North America, and most were built in Canada. South Dakota never had more than three or four dozen.

Twenty-five years ago, it was heartening to learn that someone cared about nearly every round barn we discovered. Over the past year, we retraced our travels and found that most of those barns still stand. Following are stories about the barns and the people who care for them in the 21st century.

Watertown

The Corson Emminger barn south of Watertown along Highway 81.

East River’s most visible round barn stands just south of Watertown along U.S. Highway 81. Corson Emminger came to South Dakota in 1905 from Wisconsin, where round barns were popular with dairy farmers, and built the 50-foot diameter barn with concrete blocks in 1910. He added an attractive cupola for good measure. The barn served as a milking parlor for decades. Today, the Emminger barn is missing a few shingles but it remains in good shape thanks to the Moeller family, its longtime owners.

1880 Town

West River’s most prominent round barn serves as a grand entry to the Hullinger family’s 1880 Town, a pioneer village located 22 miles west of Murdo along Interstate 90. Richard Hullinger remembers the day they moved the 14-sided barn from a ranch near Draper, about 45 miles away.”We came across the country on a ridge, and we had to do a little dirt work on the draws to make the crossings.” Built in 1919, before the invention of power tools, the barn’s symmetrical roof is high art to anyone who ever handled a handsaw or hammer.

Mission Hill

Norman Nelsen would be pleased to see the place he named New Hope Farm more than a century ago. Nelsen was a man who appreciated detail. He kept a journal of the materials and costs when he built an octagonal barn in 1913 as a machinery shed.”He recorded how many nails and how many boards he used, and he kept track of the costs,” says his great-grandson Chris Nelsen, who now lives on the farm, northwest of Mission Hill, with his wife Cindy and their children.”You can still see the hooks in the round barn where he hung the longest ears of corn to dry,” Nelsen says.”It was his method of doing natural seed selection.”

In 1914, Norman built a traditional rectangular barn just a stone’s throw to the west. Today, calves and sheep enjoy the big barn, and the smaller one is still used for storage. Chris and Cindy tend fastidiously to both barns — they plan to re-shingle the round barn and they recently sided and roofed the big barn, where letters atop the main door read NEW HOPE FARM.

Sioux Falls

The Shafer family has tended to a round barn on the northeast edge of Sioux Falls for many years. The barn was built of hollow block in 1919-20 by bankers Art Winters and Ray Stevens, who liked the round concept for cattle feeding. They installed a nearby scale and operated the farm like a stockyard.

However, the feeder cattle created too much moisture in the winter months, causing thick layers of ice to collect on the walls. The bankers eventually abandoned their operation and sold the barn to the Shafer family, which owns it today. For years, they operated a dairy in the barn; today it’s mostly used for storage.

Ron Hodne says Lawrence Welk and his band entertained in the round barn.

Winfred

Lawrence Welk and his band played a few songs at a dance in the Hodne family’s big round barn southwest of Madison near the little town of Winfred. Entertaining seems to fit the Hodne family, which now operates a big hunting lodge affectionately called Hodneville (officially the Bird’s Nest) within shotgun range of the barn.

The 80-foot diameter barn was built for beef cattle in 1918. Ron Hodne’s parents bought the place in 1946 and today he lives nearby with his wife, Ev. They and three sons — Brad, Brian and Brandon — run the lodge, which can accommodate 50 overnight guests.

A few years ago, Hodne asked his sons if they thought the barn was worth preserving because it needed a $40,000 roof.”They said, ‘Do it,'” he says.

The family has used the round barn for just about everything you can raise in South Dakota — cattle, hogs and chickens.”We even tried artichokes,” Hodne jokes. It’s empty today, except for a farm cat, but he and his family may eventually find a way to incorporate it into the lodge.

Draper

The Freier barn near Draper was built from a pre-cut mail order kit, possibly from the Gordon Van Tine Company of Davenport, Iowa. It was used as a sheep barn for decades.

Renner

Blocks for a round barn on the northern outskirts of Renner were made from sand and gravel collected at a nearby pit in 1917. The Sorum family has owned the barn for generations. They used it as a dairy for many years, but in recent decades it has served as a horse stable and a cat paradise.

Gettysburg

South Dakota’s largest round barn is on the Sloat farm north of Gettysburg. Measuring 100 feet in diameter, the wood-frame structure is used for swine, beef and dairy.

Sturgis

A barn of vertical pine logs stands in Bulldog Gulch near Sturgis.

South Dakota’s only round barn made of logs lies in Bulldog Gulch, just south of the Black Hills National Cemetery near Sturgis. It was built of pine logs, stood vertically on a circular concrete footing, in about 1941 by the Blairs, a prominent pioneer ranching family.

Dick and Lonna Morkert removed 2 feet of cattle manure when they bought the barn 30 years ago. Once cleaned, they found the barn was perfect for their four horses. Lonna, who then worked at a clinic in Sturgis, met the man who cut the logs.”He was an old-timer who was known for his mules,” she says.”The Blairs gave him the job of cutting the trees. He said he skidded them down from the mountain just to the west.”

Bulldog Gulch has a rich history. The 1874 Custer Expedition stopped there and watered horses at the same creek that the Morkert horses enjoy. Some think the gulch was named for Madame Bulldog, who ran a saloon there.

The Blairs arrived in 1907. They raised registered Hereford cattle and held bull sales at the log barn in the early 1940s. Dick Morkert says old-timers remembered that bidders sat on long benches.

Weddings are sometimes celebrated at the No Name City campground, which borders the Morkerts’ barn and corrals. On a few occasions, a bride with good taste in architecture will ask to have a picture taken by the very clean log barn.

A round barn is among the collection of 14 old agricultural buildings at the Little Village Farm near Trent.

Trent

When the Big Sioux River threatened a century-old round barn near Trent in the 1990s, the landowners called Jim Lacey and said,”You need that barn!”

Lacey agreed, but moving round barns is not easy because they lack the floor beams of rectangular structures. Still, the Beckers of Marion agreed to move it with Lacey’s help, and together they brought it out of the river valley and onto what’s now known as Little Village Farm, a collection of 14 old agricultural buildings.

The village’s only other round barn is a brooder house.”It was a prefab job, probably sold by Sears or Wards,” Lacey says.”You put it together just like the old redwood water tanks, with steel bands. Tenant farmers could buy one, and then take it with them if they moved from one farm to another.” If the chickens dirtied a spot, the farmer simply pulled the brooder house to an area with fresh grass.

Jim and Joan Lacey welcome guests to their Little Village Farm, located west of Trent in Moody County. The buildings are full of farm and ranch machinery, tools and collectibles, including more than 6,000 farm caps. There is a small admission fee.

Zell

Twin 12-sided round barns sit in a horse pasture on the northeast corner of Zell, a small village west of Redfield on Highway 212. Zell was named by Benedictine sisters who built a wood monastery there in 1886 which is also standing, though showing its age.

Unityville

A big tile barn once stood just west of a little town with the fine name of Unityville in McCook County. The town was christened as Stark when it was founded in 1907, but when officials learned that there was already a Stark in North Dakota they unified around the new name. The landmark round barn was built in 1921. Unfortunately, Unityville is all but gone, the farmstead is now a cornfield and only the barn’s silo is now standing. Life is stark in Unityville.

Potter County

A 20-sided hog house built by John Nold in 1903 may be the first round barn built in South Dakota, according to a 1995 study by the South Dakota State Historical Society.

Nisland

The entire Butte-Lawrence County Fairgrounds is on the National Registry of Historic Places. Its jewel is the round pavilion.

Buried in the cottonwood and oak forest of the Belle Fourche River valley lies one of America’s truly unique county fairgrounds, and its centerpiece is a century-old, octagon pavilion.

The forested 40-acre site is a mile west of Nisland in Butte County, which has shared a county fair with Lawrence County since 1980. And who wouldn’t want to share such fairgrounds?

The white-washed buildings include two long, rectangular barracks that housed German POWs during World War II. The prisoners helped farmers with the sugar beet harvest. Big-branched cottonwoods shade the buildings and grass. The entire fairgrounds are on the National Registry of Historic Places, but the pine jewel is the round pavilion. President Calvin Coolidge attended the fair and was pictured at the pavilion when he vacationed in the Black Hills in 1927.

The sturdy structure survived several calamities, including a 2012 windstorm that damaged the roof and windows. The two counties and their fair board invested nearly $300,000 in repairs and updates. Officials hope to find ways to use the pavilion throughout the year — maybe for weddings and family reunions — to garner income for future expenses.

The fair is held the first weekend of August, a week before the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally. Area 4-Hers exhibit crafts, garden produce and other projects on the main floor and a second story balcony of the pavilion. REA co-ops host a free barbecue. Boys and girls show their livestock and compete in catch-the-sheep and dress-a-rabbit contests. At sunset, animals sleep in the barns as country music wafts to the high ceiling of the pavilion.

Admission is free at the fair, perhaps because the atmosphere is priceless.

Editor’s Note: This story is revised from the January/February 2020 issue of South Dakota Magazine. To order a copy or to subscribe, call (800) 456-5117.

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In Full Swing

By Christian Begeman

For the last seven years, I’ve tried to visually document the first signs of new life in “spring journals.” From the first wildflowers to the arrival of songbirds, rambling nature walks through parks in southeastern South Dakota have become increasingly fun. In years past, I usually started documenting signs of spring in March — and sometimes as early as February — but the last two winters have been long and trying. This time, I started my journal entries on the day after a major blizzard struck on April 12. It is amazing how much changes on the Great Plains in a 30-day window. We’ve gone from feet of snow on the ground in mid-April to a near 80-degree day in mid-May, with birds and bumblebees in the air instead of snowflakes. All this change makes it quite difficult to not get caught up in spring fever … and I’m OK with that.

April 13

I found a patch of snow trillium in Newton Hills State Park living up to its name standing strong above the recent snow accumulation.

April 15

I decided to take a walk around Palisades State Park. I discovered a mixed flock of golden-crowned and ruby-crowned kinglets foraging in the cedar trees above the quartzite cliffs. These tiny birds were fearless and foraged all around me as if I wasn’t there.

April 19

The evening sun warmed the first butterflies of the season at Union Grove State Park, including this eye-catching Eastern comma.

April 21

On Easter Sunday I travelled through the glacial hills between Eureka and Leola in McPherson County on my way home from visiting family. I took a couple gravel road detours to look for pasqueflower stands and was not disappointed.

April 24

For only the second time ever, I found blooming white fawn lily (or trout lily) flowers at Union Grove State Park. Although not a rare wildflower in general, it is rare for our state. It has only been documented along Brule Creek in Union County.

May 2

My first spring hike at Big Sioux Recreation Area near Brandon turned up brush flowers and yellow rumped warblers catching insects out of mid-air above the hiking trails.

May 4

While returning from a hike at Newton Hills State Park, I pulled off I-29 at the Canton exit to go west a few miles. I caught a striking spring sunset over West Prairie Lutheran in rural Lincoln County.

May 7

Another hike at Palisades State Park turned up a rare look inside a raccoon den in a hollowed out tree. This young coon looked like he was just waking up from a nap, and I was a bit jealous. He looked quite cozy in there with his siblings.

May 9

I took a walk around sunset at the Japanese Gardens of Terrace Park and saw a female common yellowthroat warbler frolicking on the edge of Covell Lake.

May 10

While walking a trail along the northeastern cliffs of Palisades State Park, I was buzzed by my first ruby-throated hummingbird of the season. I turned to follow and found a good nectar source (Missouri gooseberry shrub blossoms). I waited for more than half an hour as the sun sank lower in the sky. Just as I thought I had missed my chance, the hummingbird returned with a couple friends; one of them allowed me to get this photo. It was a memorable close encounter with nature, and I was thrilled to come away with a photo (in focus) to remember it by.

May 11

There is a lot of water around this spring. Too much water for many people. I was crossing a very full and fast moving Skunk Creek just west of Ellis at sunset, and the colorful sky reflected on the rushing water looked like an abstract painting.

May 12

After church on Sunday morning, I took a walk at the Sioux Falls Outdoor Campus and got a nice look at this blackpoll warbler. He, like the majority of warblers migrating through this time of year, has made his way north from as far as Central America and won’t stop for the breeding season until reaching the boreal forests of Canada.

May 13

There are few aromas I like better than plum blossoms on a spring breeze. This orange-crowned warbler at the Big Sioux Recreation Area also likes flowerings because they attract nectar-seeking insects that must be quite tasty.

May 14

The temperature was near 80 degrees in Sioux Falls, and I spent some time walking through a very busy Terrace Park after work. With lilacs just beginning to open and ducklings on Covell Lake, spring appears to be in full swing on the upper Great Plains, and that is very good news.

Christian Begeman grew up in Isabel and now lives in Sioux Falls. When he’s not working at Midco he is often on the road photographing South Dakota’s prettiest spots. Follow Begeman on his blog.

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The Creek That Thinks It’s a River

By Jeanne Richardson

Split Rock Creek flows 55 miles through lush woodlands accentuated with quartzite outcroppings.

They call it Split Rock Creek, which is probably an accurate description as far as geographers are concerned. But who can blame some of its aficionados for considering it a river? Beautiful vistas. History. Even its own tour boat. Split Rock has everything a self-respecting river could want — and a charm all its own.

That which we call Split Rock, whether creek or river, was called Eminija before the arrival of white settlers. It springs to life in a pasture northeast of Ihlen, Minnesota, growing slowly before flowing into Split Rock Lake, formed in 1938 when the WPA (Works Progress Administration) dammed the creek south of town. One of the large rocks that protrudes from the ground on the east side of the lake is cleaved nearly in two, hence the name Split Rock. (Some believe that the split occurred over a long period of time, from water freezing, while others think lightning split the rock). Formations of that same reddish-pink stone, known as quartzite, can be found at many spots along the creek, forming the waterway’s spectacular, scenic views.

The meandering creek begins its South Dakota life east of Sherman — a town that once boasted five grain elevators, a stockyard, and an opera house where Lawrence Welk kept toes tapping. But Sherman isn’t what it used to be. About 1 mile west of town, Split Rock bubbles over 486th Avenue. There is no bridge, only a cement pad for the water to flow over, but it serves well enough. Most of the time.

From there the creek wends southwesterly, through Dakota farms, making its way toward Garretson and Devil’s Gulch, a picturesque canyon where scraggly cedar trees and bushes cling to the quartzite walls for life. Even to the unimaginative, Devil’s Gulch is a vaguely ominous place; its name derives from the eerie noises that come from its bowels as the winds blow through. Within the gulch the water lies oily and motionless, except for an occasional gurgle of life, but it is said that powerful currents rage below the surface. Some areas are reported to be bottomless.

Devil’s Gulch is also known as Spirit Canyon, a name based upon Indian legend. It seems that Iktomi, one who was fond of tricks, jokes and “keeping the pot stirred” while making other spirits and men look ridiculous, was challenged by an Indian warrior, Ha-Shootch-Ga, to a tomahawk duel. Iktomi raised his tomahawk and let it fly, high into the sky, then it plummeted to earth and cut a huge, gaping gash. That was the birth of Spirit Canyon. When he witnessed Iktomi’s power, Ha-Shootch-Ga disappeared.

In more recent times, relatively speaking, Devil’s Gulch was visited by the outlaws Jesse and Frank James. They stumbled upon it in 1876, during their escape from the law after a botched bank robbery in Northfield, Minnesota. As a posse was closing in the brothers decided to ride in different directions. Jesse soon found himself on the rim of the gulch. Desperately he spurred his stolen horse onward, and with a Pegasus-like leap jumped the 20 foot-wide canyon. Once he was safely on the other side Jesse took refuge in a cave hollowed out of the quartzite canyon walls.

After the creek skirts Garretson’s west side, it flows toward Palisades State Park, a pocket-sized park at scarcely more than 150 acres, but one of the most beautiful spots in all of South Dakota. Its name comes from the steep cliffs of quartzite that rise to heights of 50 feet or more along the creek. Some of the rock formations have been given names such as Castle Rock and Balancing Rock. The park is a paradise for hiking, picnicking, camping, fishing, swimming, rock climbing, nature walks and memory making.

Within the park’s boundaries is the former town of Palisades, but all that remains is the schoolhouse, resting in a barnyard at the south end of the park. These days the school beckons not to scholars but to cud-chewing cows and spirited horses. One day it will be nothing but a memory. As unlikely as it might sound, this area was once the site of a silver mining boom. In 1886, along the shores of the Split Rock Creek and in its guardian quartzite walls at Palisades, Charles Patten discovered silver. His claim was called the Merrimac.

News traveled fast. Within two weeks 300 claims were staked out over 1,000 acres in the area. Records show that even a woman staked a claim: Mrs. Abbie Peterson filed the “Abbie Lode” on March 26, 1886.

Unfortunately, assay reports found the ore to be very low grade — about 3 ounces of silver to a ton of rock. Mining would be just too expensive. It was reported that only two people made money from silver. One was Shanny Kincaid, who charged a dollar to record a claim, and the other a young man who sold his claim for $25.

There still is a possibility of finding wealth in the Palisades, though. According to legend, a railroad paymaster once disappeared in these parts, along with the payroll entrusted to him. The paymaster was later found sitting along the railroad tracks, near Palisades, clothed only in boots and underwear. He couldn’t explain his lack of clothes or where the payroll was, but he did mention something about leaving the money in a satchel in the kitchen and his clothes in a closet. His clothes were found a few years later, tucked in a rock crevice in the Palisades, but no reports ever surfaced about the money being found.

Next on the Split Rock’s journey to the sea comes Corson — which some have been unkind enough to call a suburb of Brandon. You won’t hear that from those with generations of roots there, going back to the Norwegians and Swedes who originally settled the area. But some of those who have made Brandon one of South Dakota’s fastest growing towns might be excused for saying that — once.

On the southeast edge of Brandon lies McHardy Park, a former cow pasture with Split Rock Creek horseshoeing its way through. The land was donated to the Brandon Lions Club by Bryson and Hazel McHardy, who once lived on the banks of the creek, and the Lions in turn passed it on to Minnehaha County to develop into a park.

Near McHardy Park is a spot where, in 1879, the Split Rock showed its deadly side. Two couples set out on a trip to Beaver Creek, Minnesota, from Sioux Falls: Mr. and Mrs. Ole Thompson, and their teenage daughter, Louisa; and Mr. and Mrs. E. K. Lee, accompanied by their 9 month-old son, Clarence, (Mrs. Thompson and Mrs. Lee were sisters). The travelers easily forded the creek in their carriage on their way out, but on the return trip, after a couple days of summer rains, the travelers found Split Rock Creek swollen. They believed they could safely cross anyway. Upon entering the creek, though, the current swept their carriage downstream.

Mr. and Mrs. Thompson drowned that day. Louisa was floundering in the swirling waters when another traveler, George Eells, who was waiting on the west bank for the creek to subside so he could cross, heard her hollering. He dove into the creek and rescued her. Mr. Lee managed to struggle to safety, but his wife and their son disappeared in the creek. After rescuing Louisa, Eells noticed a baby’s foot break the surface of the water. Once again he dove in, and finally found the baby. After struggling to shore, he tried to resuscitate him, but Clarence died in his arms. Mrs. Lee’s body was found the next day.

Split Rock Creek, then and now, occasionally demands respect.

About 2 miles south of Brandon is a parcel of ground where, in 1857, a townsite was established by the Dakota Land Company. It was called Eminija, and included the area where Split Rock Creek empties into the Big Sioux River. Eminija’s promoters believed steamboats might one day ply their way from the Missouri River, up the Big Sioux, to the site. Like so many other dreams of that era, however, that one never came to pass. Some old-timers talk about a cabin that once stood there, but no evidence remains.

Just west of the creek, in part of what was to have been Eminija, is a group of 38 dome shaped, earthen mounds, burial sites of Blood Run, a 17th century Oneota city with an estimated population of at least 5,000. In 2013, Good Earth State Park at Blood Run became South Dakotaís newest state park.

All told, Split Rock Creek runs about 55 miles from beginning to end. Not long, as such things are measured. But what Split Rock lacks in length, it makes up for in character.

Editorís Note: This story is revised from the July/August 1999 issue of South Dakota Magazine. To order a copy or to subscribe, call (800) 456-5117.

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Butterflies and Fluttering Fish

Photographer Scott Korsten and his wife Marilyn recently brought visiting family to the Butterfly House & Marine Cove in Sioux Falls. “It was a great experience for the kids who were mesmerized by the hundreds of different free-flying butterflies found throughout the tropical conservatory,” Korsten says. “Before making our way in to the butterfly area, we spent time in the Marine Cove where we saw vibrant fish and corals.” The Cove boasts more than 10,000 gallons of aquariums and a popular pop-up dome aquarium, where kids get a unique view from “inside” the aquarium. There is also a shark and stingray touch pool and a Pacific tide pool.

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Crooks Rodeo

Crooks hosted its annual rodeo and Community Days May 30-31. Fans have flocked to the little town north of Sioux Falls for last 24 years to see events like barrel racing, steer wrestling, bull riding, team penning and calf roping. Over 70 people competed this year with prize money totaling over $16,000.

Crooks was originally called New Hope. A name change was made in 1904 to honor early settler D.O. Crooks, who acted as depot agent, bank president, waterworks and lighting plant owner, township board member, postmaster and school treasurer. Residents have suffered good-natured ribbing ever since. Photos by Kim Nelson, Vermillion.

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Searching for Spring

By Christian Begeman

The last two years I have chronicled my search for spring in South Dakota in this column. In 2012, it was a very mild winter and an early spring. Last year saw a nasty April ice storm and spring seemed to tarry until almost mid-May. This year it seems like winter and spring are in a tug of war. A handful of beautiful and warm days are followed by gusty, cold winds that chill to the bone. I’m hopeful the last cold spell is done by the time this column is posted, but who knows. This is South Dakota, where the weather does what it wants when it wants.

March 9

With temperatures in Sioux Falls nearing 60, I went for a Sunday afternoon drive. The snow along the back road ditches of Kingsbury and Lake counties was dirty, dusty and full of rooster pheasants staking out their territory for the coming spring. Southeast of Lake Thompson just before sunset, I witnessed three flocks of snow geese converge in a cornfield. These were the first snow geese of the year for me.

March 16

I happened to catch the full Worm Moon rising through the hazy evening air in rural Turner County. It’s called the Worm Moon because it’s the time of year that earthworms begin stirring in the rapidly warming soil.

March 19

Spring-like showers moved through the area even though the temperatures only topped out in the mid 40s. North of Humboldt I happened upon a rare scene of spring and winter clashing. A rainbow with accompanying snow geese hung in the sky above a small lake with ice fishermen still on it. It is also the time of the year when the sun sets due west, which can be problematic when driving east/west roads in the evening or early morning. However, it can make for an interesting picture as I found at Island Lake on the border of McCook and Minnehaha County.

March 20

The first official day of spring. A co-worker told me she saw over 30 bald eagles near her home north of Hartford the night before. After work I investigated, and found 18 still there. One was perched on a tree not far from a county road bridge over Skunk Creek. After a minute or two of him watching me take his photo from the bridge, he decided he didn’t like the looks of me after all and flew to a new perch.

March 22

Two days into spring and it certainly didn’t feel like it. The temps only got up to the mid-20s and the wind was bitter. The sunset in southwest Turner County, however, looked warm and inviting.

March 27

A heavy wet snow fell most of the day. The weather system began to clear just before sunset allowing me to get some interesting images of Zion Lutheran Church and the area northwest of Wall Lake.

March 29

On my way to Fort Pierre, I saw thousands of snow and white fronted geese flocking at Lehrman Slough near the Spencer exit on I-90. It is always impressive to see so many birds concentrated in one little area.

April 6

Spring is knocking on the door again. The high temp is just under 70 degrees and I spotted my first pasqueflower of the year at Lake Vermillion Recreation Area. Only three blooms were showing and each was probably just a day or two old.

April 9

The temperature hit 81 in Sioux Falls. After work, I drove down to Newton Hills State Park to search for snow trillium. I’ve never seen or photographed this wildflower before, but according to the March/April 2014 issue of South Dakota Magazine, they grow on northward facing slopes under the trees. Sure enough I found several little clumps of the white flowers pushing through the dead leaf carpet. Another sign that spring is winning the battle of the seasons!

April 10

After work there was very little wind and the temps were hanging in the mid-60s, so I drove to one of my favorite known pasque patches in Hanson County. Clouds came up from the west to obscure the late sun, but the soft evening light and no wind made for unique conditions to take a portrait of our state flower.

April 14-15

A bright full”Pink Moon” began to rise just before sunset. It is called a pink moon because this is the time of the year when the wild ground phlox usually starts to bloom. Ironically this full moon turned to a blood moon just after 2 a.m., as a full lunar eclipse took place. I tried to use Sioux Falls landmarks to frame the moon shots including the Old Courthouse Museum clock tower and St. Joseph Cathedral’s spires. The night air was brisk, but the calendar now shows that April is half over. Spring must be here for good, right? Only time will tell.

Christian Begeman grew up in Isabel and now lives in Sioux Falls. When he’s not working at Midcontinent Communications he is often on the road photographing South Dakota’s prettiest spots. Follow Begeman on his blog.

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Making It Rain

By John Andrews

Eastern South Dakota was in the throes of a drought in 1894. Farmers wanted nothing more than a few drops of rain to help their tiny crops grow and flourish. Then a man named Mr. Jewell from Iowa showed up in Sioux Falls and said he could provide exactly that.

Concerned citizens presented a petition with 40 signatures to the Minnehaha County Commission and asked them to appropriate $800 to have Jewell bring his gas tube and box trap and”mix up his chemicals and wet down Minnehaha County as it should be.” The commissioners refused, but the drought persisted and their constituents became ever more vocal. The sheriff and a few businessmen guaranteed Jewell $200 plus another $400 if he produced a fair amount of rain. Finally Jewell himself appeared before the commission on June 19.

“Jewell knew what he was talking about, and assured the commissioners that he had conducted 51 experiments, and had been successful 51 times,” according to the History of Minnehaha County.”He said, among other things, that he could produce rain under any circumstances, although it would not be so copious if high winds prevailed and the temperature was below 50 degrees, but with both of these obstacles in his way he could still milk the atmosphere. At Des Moines after the weather bureau had announced there were no prospects of rain and there was no moisture in the atmosphere within a circle of 100 miles of the city, he liberated the gas in the box car he was traveling about in, and it shot up into the ethereal canopy through his three little tin tubes and the parched earth was drenched with water.”

This convinced a majority of the commissioners, but Andrew Berdahl remained opposed. The Berdahls had come in a caravan of 11 covered wagons with other Norwegian families to Dakota Territory in 1873. Andrew Berdahl quickly became a respected member of the community around Garretson, but his moisture-starved neighbors railed against his stance.”When I came home from the rainmaking session to Garretson there was a farmer who wanted to beat me black and blue for voting against and writing something against the rainmaking,” Berdahl wrote in his memoir.

The commissioners agreed to pay Jewell $200 for chemicals and another $400 if he produced a half-inch of rain. Now the talk turned to logistics. One commissioner wanted the gases released in the geographical center of the county. Another man believed each commissioner’s district should receive the same amount of rain. Jewell assured them he could do just that.

After the meeting Jewell went to the local drugstore, bought $1.50 worth of chemicals, returned to his box car and”let loose to an unsuspecting, unprepared firmament all the gas he could produce from the materials he purchased.” The next day he announced through local newspapers that Sioux Falls would be deluged before 6 p.m. Thursday evening. But Thursday passed with no rain. On Friday, Jewell admitted”the great altitude of Sioux Falls made it difficult for him to inject his gas into the atmosphere and bring it down to the dew point.”

On Saturday a writer for the Sioux Falls Preset explained how ludicrous Jewell’s scheme had been.”He went at the problem from a scientific standpoint and demonstrated how impossible it would be, even by the use of trainloads of chemicals to condense the moisture in a single cubic mile of the atmosphere, to say nothing about causing a rainfall over an area of 816 square miles of territory.”

Jewell left Sioux Falls that very day, but not before selling the rights to use his invention in Hanson and McCook counties, bilking each local government out of $700.”Since then,” wrote a local reporter,”rainmakers are not on the schedule of quotations.”

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Winter is for the Birds

By Christian Begeman

A friend of mine recently shared a link to a bird photographer’s exquisite work capturing small songbirds in flight. The message was accompanied by a good-natured challenge to start producing similar images of my own. I’m always up for a challenge. The problem, I soon discovered, is that getting a good photo of wild birds in nature is extremely hard … not to mention predicting where and when said bird will take flight. What I’m trying to say is that I’ve failed miserably in this particular challenge … so far.

With that confession on the table, I figured I’d share some tips (and photos, both good and bad) that I picked up along the way. Now I’m not much more than a greenhorn birder myself, but I do have a starting suggestion. Find the nearest winter bird feeder and camp out nearby. Last year I had good luck at the Sioux Falls Outdoor Campus during a steady morning snowfall. This year I tried the bird feeders at Farm Island State Park near Pierre and at the entrance to Good Earth State Park southeast of Sioux Falls. These feeders allow you to get fairly close as long as you stay still and are willing to wait for the birds to return after initially disturbing them. This wait can take anywhere from five to 15 minutes. At Good Earth, I chose to sit cross-legged on the ground next to an evergreen as I waited. Soon I had juncos hopping a few feet away and a downy woodpecker nearly ran into my head. I sat so still for so long that my leg fell asleep. Good thing no one was around. Standing up was accompanied by numerous mutterings and murmurs.

I read that Farm Island is home to northern saw-whet owls, so after spending some time at the feeder missing shots of flying finches (those things can move!), I searched for a couple of known saw-whet roosts reported on a birding website. I failed to find them as well. My guess is that the high water a few years back may have re-arranged a lot of things on the island (but in reality, being a rookie birder didn’t help much either). I did, however, have a fun game of hide and seek with a noisy northern cardinal male for about a half hour along the trail. I must have been near its nest when I saw a flash of red and heard the telltale metallic chirp. Long story short, he let me get the closest I’ve ever been to a cardinal, with one stipulation: he put as many branches and twigs of his favorite tree between the two of us at all times.

I really like owls, and earlier in the month I accidentally scared a great horned out of an abandoned church. He flew to the tree windbreak nearby and, like the cardinal, kept the densest part of the tree between him and me. I saw a long-eared owl for the first time in my life while checking out the swans of LaCreek National Wildlife Refuge in Bennett County. He was sunning himself in the early morning light and I happened to notice his outline from at least a quarter mile away. I didn’t get a great shot of him from that distance, but it made the day worthwhile.

The last tip I have is to use your ears. The best tool for locating a bird while out and about is hearing them. I’ve still got work to do on this one. Just last weekend, as I sat quietly along Sergeant Creek at Newton Hills State Park, I could pick out cardinal, chickadee and at least two other unknown songs amongst the steady drumming of woodpeckers and the brazen calls of blue jays. The only birds I could actually see were two bald eagles soaring high above the distant Big Sioux River. Experiences like this make birding addicting. I know they are out there, I know they make great photos, and I know it is a challenge to put it all together and get the unique shot. I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Christian Begeman grew up in Isabel and now lives in Sioux Falls. When he’s not working at Midcontinent Communications he is often on the road photographing our prettiest spots around the state. Follow Begeman on his blog.

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Fall Medicine

By Christian Begeman

I had a good day last week. A good medicine day. You know, one of those”good for the soul” kind of days. October is always a bittersweet month for me. The days noticeably grow shorter and it is not hard to feel the whisper of winter on the wind. I don’t mind winter, but the transition to it always seems to get me down. The Saturday before last, however, was one of the rare, late fall days when the sun was shining, the breeze was light and I had nothing to do but go and explore.

I haven’t had a lot of time between my work schedule and overcast weather to seek out fall color here in the southeastern corner of the state this year. Up until that Saturday, the only good East River fall photograph I was able to capture was taken in Brookings County in the last light of evening after the sun broke through departing rain clouds. That Saturday, however, I was on a quest to find more fall color.

I started at Beaver Creek Nature Area south of Brandon. There I found Allen Severtson harvesting corn with tools of yesteryear, including a 1954 SC CASE tractor. Allen spied me on the road with my camera and motioned for me to come join him. We didn’t harvest much corn where I grew up on the border of Ziebach and Dewey County, but riding with Allen a couple times around the small nine-acre corn field reminded me of when I was a kid and loving riding with my dad in the tractor or combine.

After that trip down memory lane, I made my way to Newton Hills State Park, south of Canton. Hiking along the Big Sioux River on the northeast edge of the park, I discovered some beautifully golden leaved trees hanging their limbs over the edge of the water. Squirrels and birds were still quite active on this late fall day and I even spied dragonflies along the banks.

The next stop was Union Grove State Park, south of Beresford, followed by Adams Nature Preserve near McCook, SD. I saw downy woodpeckers and blue jays while there but was unable to get a decent photo. I decided to head back up the Missouri River. When looking eastward from I-29 I thought I could see the afternoon light glinting on golden bands of cottonwoods near Vermillion.

I wasn’t disappointed. Clay County Park provided wonderful views of the Missouri River framed with fall color. As evening approached, I started making my way to an intriguing unused barn east of Wakonda that I remembered from an earlier trip. On the way there, I drove by beautiful, tall stands of colorful trees south of Gayville. The evening light was perfect. There were high, wispy clouds in the sky above the barn when I got there. What I didn’t realize was that the back wall had a significant hole in it. So when the sun set behind the structure, I could see it clearly through the front opening of the barn. By luck and by being at the right place at the right time, I was able to frame up a unique shot of the barn and setting sun through the two openings. It was a perfect ending to my day.

I’ve learned over the years that days like that don’t come as often as I’d like. I guess it makes it that much more enjoyable when they do. Days like that Saturday have a way of renewing my love for the hobby and life in general, and that alone made the day really good medicine.


Christian Begeman grew up in Isabel and now lives in Sioux Falls. When he’s not working at Midcontinent Communications he is often on the road photographing our prettiest spots around the state. Follow Begeman on his blog.