Tag: spearfish

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More Than Talk

By Paul Higbee

Editor’s Note: We received word that longtime broadcaster Jim Thompson plans to retire at the end of May. He’s been a familiar voice at rodeos throughout the Upper Midwest, but even if you’re not into broncs and bulls you’ve probably heard him calling a baseball or basketball game or as the narrator of the popular De Smet Farm Mutual radio commercials. He’s been hosting the Country Cafe of the Airwaves, an afternoon show on Spearfish radio, for several years, and when the final program is broadcast on May 29, we know those airwaves won’t sound quite the same.

Here’s a column about Jim that appeared in our January/February 2009 issue. We wish Jim the best of luck as he heads down the next dusty trail.

Jim Thompson is a storehouse of rodeo stories, so I invited him out to lunch as I researched bucking horses. Our conversation turned some heads in the little coffee shop. Not that the other diners looked to be rodeo fans, but they knew Jim’s voice from his play-by-play radio broadcasts of basketball and baseball, his syndicated call-in show, and his great memories from De Smet Farm Mutual.

Jim told me some bucking horse stories, sure enough, and confirmed a rumor I’d heard: He and his wife Daryla were leaving soon for Las Vegas and the National Finals Rodeo, where Jim would be honored. There would be a ceremony complete with presentation of boots, jacket and a National Finals Rodeo belt buckle. Very nice, I thought, but not surprising considering Jim’s long career as an announcer for rodeos across the West.

Turns out, though, that Jim’s honor wasn’t an announcing award. Yes, he’s announced the Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association rodeo at Kaycee, Wyo., for 22 years. But he’s also raised money, written press releases, recorded TV ads and pulled the right people into the picture. There are about 700 PRCA sanctioned rodeos across the nation. Jim’s behind-the-scenes work for the Kaycee rodeo earned him the John Justin Standard of the West Committeeman of the Year award.

“I’ve always thought if someone expects an award, they really don’t deserve it,” Jim once told me. He certainly didn’t expect this one. When the phone call came telling him he’d won, it took Jim several moments to grasp what the caller was talking about.

Those who know Jim’s schedule — daily shows, commercial work, producing broadcast events through his Creative Broadcast Services company — wonder how he found time to be so deeply involved in a Wyoming rodeo. The short answer is he likes the people there and the event is a memorial for Deke Latham, a rodeo cowboy Jim admired who died young.

But there’s a longer answer, too. Several aspects of Jim’s career hint at that longer answer, but I’ll tell a story that began in De Smet in 1976. Jim sat down with Bill Poppen of De Smet Farm Mutual Insurance to discuss whether there was anything radio might do for that company. Bill said he didn’t need radio to sell insurance — he had agents doing that. But he might be interested in commercials that communicated how his company understood and appreciated people committed to farming and ranching. A few days later Jim was back to read some text he’d composed. It started out,”You know, my dad was really quite a guy …,” and continued to relate a memory, in just a few seconds, of Jim’s dad helping him take a steer named Yogi to a 4-H fair years before.

There have been a thousand or so great memories to hit the airwaves since, voiced and written by Jim, sometimes with writing input from Marian Cramer. In fact, Marian sat at a booth at the state fair for a while, gathering great memories from South Dakotans. It could be argued these are not just commercials, but a long-running radio serial. Jim records them against a background of what he calls”lying on a hill watching the clouds music.” He hopes the spots”transport people from where they are to where they’d really like to be.”

For 33 years the commercials (impossible to imagine with a voice other than Jim’s) have indeed communicated the sponsor’s understanding of rural America. At the same time they strongly imply that Jim understands and is committed to that way of life, too. And the first thing to understand about small towns, where Jim is especially popular, is that they need people who will work to create community amenities. That could mean organizing rodeos, staging events for an emerging museum, figuring out how to broadcast hometown American Legion baseball games and pitching in to build the press box for those broadcasts. Jim’s done all that, and much more. In urban areas, where no one expects to really know anyone, a broadcaster can get away with simply being a know-it-all”personality.” That doesn’t fly out here, where, strangely enough for a field that’s seemingly all about words, actions speak louder.

In addition to his National Finals Rodeo honor, Jim has been inducted into three rodeo or general sports Halls of Fame, and was South Dakota Sportscaster of the Year. Yet the day we met for lunch he was getting ready to promote a small town charity pie auction. Some accomplished broadcasters, especially sportscasters, would say no to that. But Jim knew he had listeners counting on him to help move some pastry.

Besides, a good pie auction always holds potential for another great memory.

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The Mysterious Baker’s Falls

By John Andrews

It all started with a simple question:”Where is Baker’s Falls?”

It came via our Facebook page from a reader whose curiosity was piqued by our Jan/Feb issue’s cover shot from the Fassbender Photographic Collection. A young man is shown crouched behind a frozen waterfall. The only details are those written on the photograph:”Baker’s Falls, Spearfish Canyon, Black Hills, S.D.”

We called Paul Higbee, our West River correspondent. He’s lived in Spearfish for several years and knows that area better than anyone in the office. After a little investigation, Paul told us he thought the spot was likely a place known today simply as the Ice Caves. He said you could find them high in the rim rock just above Bridal Veil Falls on the left side of the road as you’re driving up Spearfish Canyon.

Case closed. Or so we thought.

Paul called again today to report that our cover shot is generating a lot of talk around Spearfish, and that many of the locals who mention the photograph believe it actually shows the Community Caves during a year in which more water was flowing around the formation. No one seems to know where the name”Baker’s Falls” came from, or even recalls any Bakers from that time and place.

One reader who talked to Paul even remembered a different photo of a frozen-over Community Caves that appeared in South Dakota Magazine a decade or more ago that he says looks strikingly similar to our current cover photo. They are tracking down that lead right now, but in the meantime we thought we’d open it up to our online readers and see if anyone can shed any light on the mystery?

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Your ‘Little Rock’ Moment

By Paul Higbee

When Ernest Green attends one of his high school class reunions, a funny thing happens. Everyone recalls he or she was Green’s pal, on his side.

Indeed, some classmates were. Plenty were not, though. Green’s graduating class was Little Rock (Arkansas) Central High School, 1958, and he was the class’s sole African American. He had enrolled the previous fall as one of the Little Rock Nine — nine African American teenagers who broke the school’s all white color code. With help from President Eisenhower and U.S. Army troops, Green and the rest got through the school year (the others were younger, not seniors). The Little Rock Nine made national headlines, although at the 1958 graduation ceremony the principal predicted the class would be remembered not by those headlines, but by its successful athletic teams. Wrong.

Wrong as were so many things at that high school that year. Green endured slurs, threats and physical harassment.”There wasn’t a morning we didn’t wake up scared stiff,” he recalls. Some teachers saw it their duty to support the Little Rock Nine and some were as cruel as any teenager could be.

I remember first learning about the Little Rock Nine 14 years after they made history, when I was a high school senior. Green’s era seemed like ancient history to me then, the time of Ike, Sputnik and Elvis when he was skinny. When I shook Green’s hand in Spearfish in 2011, it was strange how he felt like a contemporary ≠– like me, a little gray but still kicking.

In 1995, Ruth Ziolkowski, of Crazy Horse Memorial, told me she never travelled because if you live in the Black Hills, everyone you’ll ever want to meet will eventually show up. So it was with Green, who was invited to speak at a Midwest Alliance for Professional Educational Learning and Leadership conference. Among those who listened to Green were a couple dozen Black Hills State University students. I know from experience that when you speak to university students, they’re unabashed about communicating that you’re missing the mark, mainly by yawns if not actually dropping asleep.

In Green’s case, the students were riveted. They recognized his genuine courage and his place in history. When they gathered around him for a group picture after the talk, it was a rock star moment. Green had words just for them: At some point, he predicted, all of them will face a Little Rock moment. They’ll be tested and will pass if they have the courage to be true to their values and best instincts, and do the right thing.

Green believes that most people living in Little Rock 57 years ago didn’t want to see the Little Rock Nine hurt.”They did want to see us fail, though,” he says. What Green and the others were fighting for wasn’t just an education, but an education of the highest quality. There could be no denying that Little Rock’s segregated schools for black students lacked resources and were sub-par when compared to Central High.

There can be no denying, either, that Green made the most of his Central High diploma, moving on to achieve solid academic success at Michigan State University, becoming a successful investment banker, and even serving a stint in Washington, D.C. as Assistant Secretary of Labor. He believes that in the 21st century, with the United States facing stiff international competition in business and industry, making quality education available to all American children is a matter of national defense.

About those old classmates who show up for reunions in Little Rock and remember Green as their good friend when, in fact, they were anything but friends. In a strange way even they mark the nation’s progress in civil rights over the past half-century. They didn’t do the right thing during the tumultuous 1957-58 school year, but looking back they wish they could say they did.

In fact, they do say so.

Editor’s Note: This story is revised from the January/February 2012 issue of South Dakota Magazine. To order a copy or to subscribe, call (800) 456-5117.

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Grace Balloch’s Books

By Paul Higbee

As a high school student I used to stop by Spearfish’s Grace Balloch Memorial Library some days after class. I’d read a literature assignment, or work on a history paper, and sometimes check out a book for a report. It always ran through my mind: this is a quaint and appropriate name for a library. Grace Balloch. What kind of woman would earn the honor of a namesake library? I imagined a bespectacled lady, white hair in a bun, her clothes smelling a bit musty like vintage volumes, and whose whole world revolved around those classic books.

Which should tell you that I didn’t have any great capacity for original thinking at age 16 or 17, believed in certain stereotypes, and wasn’t driven to research the truth behind local history.

But it’s never too late to reform. Forty years later, after spending time with Grace’s handwritten letters, photos, and mementos, I’ve discovered a remarkable woman who lived a life of adventure, always certain of her own principles and high standards. She went to war at age 40. Late in life she presented Spearfish an offer it couldn’t refuse.

Grace Balloch wore lots of professional hats, but had someone asked who she was in her heart, there’s little doubt she would have answered”teacher.” There are still a handful of Spearfish people who recall her as a local college English professor and registrar long ago. In Grace’s thinking education meant more than presenting information or guiding students toward it. It also meant encouraging young people to believe themselves worthy and then helping them find necessary resources — including financial ones.

Darleen Young describes assistance her husband, Don Young, got from Grace when as a college student he was hospitalized for eight weeks with typhoid,”leaving him flat broke with a horrendous bill.” The late Evelyn Heinbaugh, one of Grace’s students and longtime publisher of Spearfish’s weekly newspaper, always admired her teacher’s knowledge, patience, sincerity and love of life.”Mrs. Balloch had courage that was self-sacrificing,” Evelyn wrote.

Born Grace Herr Franz in Pennsylvania in 1878, the future teacher graduated from Millersville State Normal School in that state. Much like the college where Grace would teach in South Dakota, Millersville’s original mission was preparing educators and it later evolved into a more diversified state university. Shortly after graduation she was running her own private school just outside Washington, D.C., in Montgomery County, Maryland. There she met Archibald Balloch, geologist and cattle buyer, and Grace’s life changed dramatically. The couple married in 1902 and decided they should relocate out West where the cattle industry flourished — St. Louis and later Chicago.

Grace worked as a librarian at the University of Chicago and taught at Bloom Township High School in Chicago Heights, where she won a reputation among students as a powerful mentor. She took special interest in pupils needing encouragement in hard times, as was the case with 16-year-old Walter Hoeppner in 1916. His mother died during surgery that year. He later recalled,”I am convinced her death was due to incompetence of the surgeon. … This was one factor that persuaded me to study medicine.” Walter had no money for higher education, but Grace helped him figure out ways to win scholarships and work his way through school at the University of Chicago and its affiliate, Rush Medical College. It’s almost certain the Ballochs paid some of his fees, as well. Walter went on to enjoy a long medical career in the Chicago area and would always consider Grace his foster mother.

As Walter wondered whether a career in medicine might be within his reach, Americans wondered whether Walter’s generation would fight in the World War then raging in Europe and other regions. In April 1917, President Woodrow Wilson announced the United States would, indeed, send troops abroad. In France they would face some of the harshest conditions in wartime history, encountering poison gases fashioned into weaponry, and fighting from trenches where disease killed just as ruthlessly as German bullets.

Grace told her husband she was sailing to France to support American boys in the trenches. She knew that the YMCA needed volunteers to staff canteens and”huts” near the front lines. These were places of shelter and refreshment, yet YMCA documents make clear that it saw its mission in France as much more than respite. Soldiers needed contact with people of strong character who could help them make sense of a world where they regularly watched friends die, and where it was easy to stop believing in God and the better instincts of humanity. In late summer, 1918, Grace boarded a transport ship and finally saw the French coastline after a voyage through remarkably stormy weather. Archibald, meanwhile, was off to Virginia, where he supervised loading military equipment aboard ships.

Grace later recalled her time in the war zone.”It was easy to keep the boys’ morale up during the fighting. They knew what they wanted, what they were fighting for, and that the sooner it was over they could return home. But after the war the let-down was terrific.” The Armistice ending combat was signed Nov. 11, 1918, but soldiers soon learned there was plenty of mop-up work for them in Europe.

Grace’s happiest day in France came in 1919 when she reunited with her foster son, Walter, a soldier serving as a medic. She came to love France and its people and even opened a bank account there, certain she and Archibald would return to visit.

Did Grace and other YMCA volunteers make a difference in France? Back home, some Americans scoffed at the program. But today, in Spearfish, yellowed letters that Grace kept the rest of her life attest that for some soldiers her presence was perhaps life changing.

“I sure am proud to have two friends such as you and Miss LeRoy, and being with you is when I feel my best,” wrote soldier Tom Johnson from a post at a French stone quarry, three days before Christmas, 1918.”I assure you I will try and return your many good traits.”

Grace spent that Christmas at a military hospital, writing letters from wounded soldiers to loved ones in the States. Reminding soldiers to write home, it seems, was something she repeated like a mantra.

She kept a copy of this poem by an anonymous soldier who, among other things, appreciated those reminders to write:

When he wants to write a letter

(And you know that he had better)

To his mother, or his father, or the girl,

Or he’s feeling sort of lonely

And the thing he craves is only

An oasis in the racket and the whirl

Or he yearns for conversation

Or the glad exhilaration

Of a dish of ice-cream or piece of custard pie,

He will hurry helter-skelter

To the YMCA shelter

Hereinafter to be spoken as the”Y.”

By spring Grace had completed her YMCA work and applied to work a few months more in France, helping noted historian Ray Stannard Baker document the war. A close friend of Woodrow Wilson, Baker had been the President’s eyes and ears in wartime France and his press secretary when the Treaty of Versailles was signed. Grace was selected as part of Baker’s team, and there’s no doubt that their extensive work contributed to Baker winning the Pulitzer Prize for an eight-volume biography of President Wilson.

Finally it was time for Grace to return to America, and the soldiers she trained to write letters continued writing her for years. But their letters found Grace not in Chicago, but the Black Hills. Photos dated 1920 show Grace and Archibald with horses on a ranch near Custer. At the same time Archibald was helping build the first roads through Custer State Park. In 1923 Grace taught summer English classes at Spearfish Normal School (today’s Black Hills State University) and was offered a full time position that fall. Spearfish would be the Ballochs’ home for the rest of their lives.

They never made that trip to France. Archibald died in 1934. Five years after that another world war engulfed Europe. In 1940 Grace learned of Paris falling to the Nazis. They even seized the French bank where she had deposited $150 during World War I in hopes of returning. She told a reporter that most French citizens valued freedom and their own form of government and would”gladly die for their cause. It is horrible that a few ambitious traitors and blood-thirsty dictators can bring so much misery and destruction to the backbone of the French nation.”

Grace was in no condition to participate overseas in the new war. She learned she was terminally ill at age 63, and she set her sights on solving a local problem. Spearfish, her adopted hometown, had no public library and Grace decided to nudge the community towards developing one. Not that Spearfish was anti-book. It claimed a history of literary clubs, book exchange groups, and a short-lived Works Progress Administration library service in the 1930s. But as a college community Spearfish could sometimes sit back and let its state-supported school provide certain services, rather than funding those services itself. Black Hills State was happy to let Spearfish citizens use its library, especially after they helped re-stock it following a 1925 fire. Sometimes the college even loaned books to a Main Street store for checkout.

In Grace’s mind that was a far cry from a public library, and she said she would donate her personal collection of 1,500 volumes. Grace wrote in her will:”To the City of Spearfish, to be used as a nucleus for a city library, I give and bequeath all my books, and I request that a committee be appointed by the Mayor of the City of Spearfish to take charge of this bequest.” The will further left the Balloch home on Main Street to Grace’s sister, Anna, and after Anna’s death the property would go to the city for constructing a library building.

Grace died in November 1944, happy to know that France had been liberated from the Nazis. Certainly she understood that her gift to Spearfish would be somewhat difficult for city leaders, who had no space for her books and no budget for operations. Initially the city council declined the donation. But as was true for Grace everywhere, she had touched Spearfish lives profoundly and left behind loyal friends. In 1945 voters overwhelmingly demanded that city funds be directed toward a library to be called Grace Balloch Memorial.

It’s hard to imagine a more modest library than the first version to bear Grace’s name. It was a 10-foot by 30-foot room in Tom and Margaret Cutter’s Spearfish Hotel. In 1962 the books were carted up the block to rooms in the Sullivan Insurance building. There was no room for expansion or programming, but library patrons knew better days were coming. The city had acquired Grace’s home site after her sister’s death in 1959, and readers who kept a library book a few days too long at least had the satisfaction of knowing all fines went into a construction fund.

A sparkling new library opened in June 1971. Presiding at the building dedication was Mayor Don Young, the man Grace helped back to his feet as he recovered from typhoid 35 years earlier. Certainly those who attended the dedication believed the building would serve many generations. But Spearfish’s population boomed the next two decades and the library’s collection kept pace with that growth, outstripping the space. In 1996 the library moved a fourth time into the ground floor of Spearfish’s new municipal services building, a beautifully designed structure that is certainly beyond anything even the well-traveled Grace Balloch could have imagined.

Amber Wilde, library director since 2008, notes that Walter Hoeppner’s family still makes an annual contribution to the library fund. She is impressed by the wide range of Spearfish area residents making use of the library regularly. There are story times for children, programming for adults, and of course computer access to information centers around the globe. There are more than 71,000 books, audiobooks, tapes, and other items catalogued.

Readers can still find some of Grace’s own 1,500 volumes on the shelves, identifiable by her personal bookplate. It depicts a child, looking at a bookshelf, as if awaiting someone’s help in selecting something to read.

Editor’s Note: This story is revised from the November/December 2010 issue of South Dakota Magazine. To order a copy or to subscribe, call (800) 456-5117.

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Hanging With My Political Neighbors

By Cory Allen Heidelberger

Now I know why Rick Weiland is smiling.

I had the pleasure of touring South Dakota last week and talking politics with a wide array of my neighbors. It was a blast.

After charging up with a sunny morning run up Lookout Mountain, I started my political tour in Rapid City, where I interviewed Gordon Howie, our newly certified Independent candidate for U.S. Senate. We talked about EB-5, the federal budget, abortion and guns. Gordon threatened to shoot me, and I threatened to run, further supporting my argument that guns don’t offer nearly as much utility as a good pair of sneakers. We smiled and laughed through arguments and agreements alike.

Later in the week I headed for friendlier turf, the Sioux Falls Democratic Forum. I listened to aspiring pol Cody Hausman discourse and field lots of questions on how Democrats can draw the youth vote (emphasize ideals over wonkishness; talk global economy, diversity, and civil rights). I watched Democratic gubernatorial candidate Joe Lowe wind Dem stems with a passionate campaign speech. And I shook hands and chatted up all sorts of fellow hopeful Dems.

That afternoon I sat down for coffee with Independent gubernatorial candidate Mike Myers. Once we got past his initial ire at my past blog critique of his political theater, we had a good hour-long conversation about the policies he’d like to discuss with South Dakota and the problems he’d like to fix.

Then I raced up to Brookings to join my friend and co-blogger Toby Uecker for a Corinna Robinson fundraiser at former state senator Pam Merchant’s house. We chatted up our Brookings neighbors, Corinna’s staff, and Corinna herself about issues and campaign tactics. Toby and I then spent the rest of the evening evaluating the event and plotting Dem revolution (over a hot Greek Supreme loaded with gyro meat at George’s, one of the best pizzas on the prairie).

Toby and I continued our political analysis over breakfast at Cottonwood CafÈ (bagels, oatmeal, and political discourse downtown — a fine Saturday morning) before I chased a spring dust storm east to Pierre and sailed on to Sturgis, where friends of the blog invited me for afternoon tea and more political conversation. We talked the Rally, road construction, campaign finance … just the sort of weekend conversation you’d expect from your neighbors, right?

I was going to cap my tour off by putting my feet up at the Franklin Hotel. But then I got a text telling me to get up to the Lincoln Day Dinner in Spearfish, so up Highway 85 and through the I-90 obstacle course I went. I stationed myself discreetly at the back of the hall, tweeting the speeches. Even as I tweeted, my Republican neighbors greeted me warmly. I enjoyed pleasant conversations with Larry Rhoden and his wife Sandy, Pat Miller and her husband Walter Dale, Stace Nelson and his much prettier, quieter, better half Aiza. I got an unexpected and hilarious ribbing from Shantel Krebs. I lassoed a Tea Party activist and made progress in changing his mind on Keystone XL (two words: eminent domain). In a Republican room where a casual observer might think a liberal blogger would get tarred and feathered, I received almost nothing but warm handshakes and rational conversation from neighbors who share my keen interest in good policy for South Dakota.

South Dakotans are a friendly political bunch, even the ones with whom I disagree. My week hanging out with them and talking politics was a week well spent.

Editor’s Note: Cory Heidelberger is our political columnist from the left. For a conservative perspective on politics, please look for columns by Dr. Ken Blanchard on this site.

Cory Allen Heidelberger writes the Madville Times political blog. He grew up on the shores of Lake Herman. He studied math and history at SDSU and information systems at DSU, and has taught math, English, speech, and French at high schools East and West River.

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Spirit of the Hills

Spirit of the Hills Wildlife Sanctuary in Spearfish was founded in 1999 by Michael Welchynski to provide a permanent home for unwanted and abused animals. The sanctuary is home for a variety of species, from African lions to potbellied pigs. Around 300 animals live there, and he plans on taking care of them for the rest of his life, without pay. He uses donations to pay for food and care for the animals and is grateful for volunteers who help with manual labor. Photos by John Mitchell, Pierre. View more of his photos on Facebook and at sodakmoments.com.

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Fishing for Answers

By Bernie Hunhoff

Biting the friendly hand of Washington wouldn’t be wise, considering that Uncle Sam has been feeding us lots of goodies in South Dakota for a long, long time.

South Dakotans get about $1.50 back for every dollar sent to Washington — far more than most states — and what do we have to show for it? A family farm economy, an Air Force Base and National Guard, national forests and grasslands, veterans hospitals, interstate highways, Mount Rushmore, airports, rural water systems and many other staples of South Dakota life.

Then let’s not forget the D.C. Booth Fish Hatchery in Spearfish. The pastoral little hatchery in the center of Spearfish has been raising trout since 1892. Next to the cavalry and homesteading, it may be the oldest federal program in the state. And it may be one of the first to go.

We heard rumors last week that the hatchery on Spearfish Creek is on a closure list. There’s no confirmation from Washington; neither is there a denial. If it’s true, that’s a sad way for the feds to say goodbye to a 117-year-old fisheries partner.

Government spending as a percentage of our nation’s GDP is too high. We can all agree on that. But the closure of the Booth hatchery seems to be a knee jerk reaction. Shouldn’t someone stand up and explain the reasoning? Shouldn’t someone from Washington show up and say here’s what it costs, here is the cost/benefit analysis and here are the options?

Shouldn’t the community of Spearfish — which has contributed many thousands of volunteer man-hours to the hatchery through the years — and the state of South Dakota be given some time to respond?

This is no way to run a government. Maybe the D.C. Booth Fish Hatchery is the most wasteful federal program in America. We suspect that it is not. But shouldn’t we know that before we net the trout and drain the ponds? Every dollar spent by Washington should be similarly analyzed. Sadly, the programs that seem safest are those with a wealthy constituency. The little hatchery in Spearfish doesn’t have a lobbyist so it’s fair game.

We’re all at fault for this debacle. Dysfunctional politics have forced the hands of those who feed us federal dollars. Because elected officials are unwilling or unable to make sound analytical decisions — apparently because they can’t face the consequences of standing up to powerful special interests on all sides of the political spectrum — we must deal with bureaucratic rumors of back-office decisions that nobody wants to own. Our congressional delegation should be sharpening their hooks. At the very least, South Dakotans deserve an explanation and a chance to make our case for the hatchery.

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Can Golf This Fun Be Legal?

By Lee Schoenbeck

Heading west towards Spearfish at interstate speeds is a tough way to take the full measure of South Dakota’s newest and most fun golf course: Elkhorn Ridge. The course opened its first 9 holes in 2009, which probably wasn’t the best market timing for the residential development that accompanies it. But the golf layout, nestled into the elevations on the east side of a ridge on historic Frawley Ranch in Centennial Valley, four miles east of Spearfish, is South Dakota’s best.

A GOLF PATH UNDER THE INTERSTATE?

From the blue tees the course plays 3254 yards, an average length, and sports a 125 slope, a tougher than average layout. You know you’re someplace unique when the cart path from the driving range and modern clubhouse takes you to the first tee box through a tunnel under the interstate! Lest you fear the trip, the carts are equipped with modern GPS, so the yards to and from trouble are clearly spelled out. And when you decide to look for your ball in one of the residential yards or corrals near the course, the cart slows to a crawl and tells you to get back to the business at hand.

HOLES 2 THROUGH 5 ARE THE BEST ANYWHERE

The fun really begins on the #2 tee box. The hole is a dogleg left up the ridge, but with two special twists. The landing”target” for your first shot is about 210 yards ahead — and above you! The hole rises over 120 feet in elevation to the target. If that long uphill poke isn’t enough of a challenge, be careful not to hit too far or too left, as there is a ravine. 210 yards — good shot; 211 yards — bottom of ravine. The second shot (if that whole first thing worked out) is through a cut in the brush and across a ravine to a green cut into the mountainside.

At this point sea-level folks may need to get the Dramamine out, as you are going further up the mountain to the #3 tee box. At #3 you have a par 3 to a landing pad on top of the next hill, 200 yards away. Note the rattlesnake habitat warning signs as you approach the green — there are more ways to get stung here than a bad bunker shot.

#4 is from an elevated tee down to a lush green fairway 230 yards below, and then a second shot up to the green. The gentleness of 4, nestled in the trees along the side of the mountain, is a set-up for the magnificent par 5 that follows — from the top of the world. The cart path shows an arrow straight up, and it understates the climb. From the tee box, you feel like you can see seven zip codes. It takes binoculars (seriously) to really pick out the green structure, far off in the allegedly 500 yard distance. (They must measure from the base of the mountain — it looks like a half mile from the top.) The signature elk print sand traps line both sides of the fairway, way down below. More imaginative minds interpret them differently — a few years ago, my youngest exclaimed,”Those look like bear butt prints, Dad!” Whatever animal or anatomy, they are an impressive sight to see and frame the fairway perfectly.

FINISHING HOLES ARE MERE MORTALS — ALMOST

As your ears pop on the descent back to mere mortal golf, the course still has a few surprises. On the par three #6 you can see the imposing water along the left side, but not the pond wrapping around to the back — an unfortunate ball-washing for the more aggressive swinger. #7’s sand feature is one of South Dakota’s largest, and is pretty much unavoidable.

LOCAL KNOWLEDGE

The pro, South Dakota native J.R. Hamblet, warned about the elevation. The 285 feet of elevation change on the course is more than the uninitiated will first appreciate, and playing it is trickier than most are used to. Ok, I’ll give him that elevation greater than a step-ladder challenges we flat-lander South Dakotans, but that’s not the main secret to know. The real local knowledge is that you have to play the course more than once. There are so many blind shots, hidden gulleys, tricky traps, and other things that hate my bogeyness, you just can’t figure it out the first time around. I lost count of how many blind shots I had to trust to the hope of hitting somewhere near the barber pole marker visible over a rise out in a fairway.

MORE TO COME

This fall Elkhorn Ridge is going to start construction on another nine holes in, over and around a canyon on the south side of the interstate. If their first effort is any indication, South Dakota golfers have some great fun ahead of them on an exciting and affordable golf track.

Lee Schoenbeck grew up in Webster, practices law in Watertown, and is a freelance writer for the South Dakota Magazine website.


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Hiking Crow Peak Trail

By Lee Schoenbeck

Driving into Spearfish from the north this past week, my wife and I noticed a big mountain towering over Spearfish to the west. It looked like a pan of heated Jiffy Pop popcorn about to pop, so we had to check it out. We’re trying to hike most the trails in the Hills, so it looked like an opportunity.

WHAT IS IT

Crow Peak owes its shape to the magma that formed it many years ago by creeping up through fissures in the limestone and cooling. It is the product of the same geological action that formed its neighbors to the west, Devils Tower, and to the east, Bear Butte.

HOW DO WE GET THERE? GOOD QUESTION!

How can a mountain be so hard to find? Here’s a hint: take Higgins Gulch Road.

The Forest Service map tells you to take Utah Street west out of Spearfish to Road #214. There are at least three reasons why that map will not get you to Crow Peak.

First, there are no road signs. None. Nada. These people obviously got no promotional advice from the Hustead family at Wall Drug. The only sign concerning Crow Peak Trail is behind the first row of trees when you are starting your hike up the trail. You can’t even see it from the parking lot at the trailhead.

Second, according to GPS and the corresponding road signs,”Utah Street” is actually Hillsview Road. There surely is an interesting local explanation for that one.

Finally, according to the Forest Service map, there is no Road #214 anywhere near Crow Peak! The real road that you want to find, while driving west out of Spearfish on Hillsview Road, is Higgins Gulch Road.

So, how does one actually find Crow Peak, then? The obvious and most dependable way for an informed South Dakotan to do so is to call Spearfish native and Black Hills State University grad Jason Glodt on your cell phone and let him talk you through the route. Bernie won’t let me publish Jason’s cell phone number here, so just email me if you are planning the trip and I’ll send it to you. The trail is worth the trip (and the call, if you need it).

COME FOR THE EXERCISE, CATCH YOUR BREATH WITH THE VIEW

The Crow Peak trail is 3.2 miles up, and unless you can fly, another 3.2 back down. Smokers need to hang close to the parking lot on this one — it is a work out. It’s rated”difficult” according to the trail system map. For perspective, the popular and strenuous hike from Sylvan Lake to the fire tower at Harney Peak is rated an easier stroll.

The trail circles the peak as it rises from 4200 to 5600 feet. The hikers enjoy — through very deep breaths — vistas of Wyoming, Montana, and South Dakota landmarks. The ski runs at Terry Peak are crystal clear to the southeast. Bear Butte is obvious as it looms to the east. Spearfish and its valley are at your feet.

ALWAYS IN GOOD COMPANY

We saw seven groups on the trail, and it looked like all but one would make it to the top. As you would expect with any South Dakota place, you meet friendly folks on the trail. While having lunch on the Peak we met Jesse Wolff and his buddy who had hiked up just behind us. Their effort was a little more strenuous, as very young Michael had tagged along in a backpack on his father’s back. Michael was fun to watch on top. While the adults were discussing the view, the mine you can clearly see, and the beauty of the Hills, Michael was pretty much focused on the charms of the Cheerios his astute father had packed in.

ENJOY THE STROLL DOWN

On the way down you breathe a lot easier. Hiking down the mountain finally gave us a chance to enjoy the scenery. We were surprised to see the abundance of our state flower, the pasque, in bloom about us along the trail. We didn’t see any mountain lions, but I would’ve been prepared. I had assured my wife that if one came upon us, I would swiftly run for help. She didn’t seem reassured, and I noticed that she decided to wear her running shoes too — instead of the boots I bought her!

Lee Schoenbeck grew up in Webster, practices law in Watertown, and is a freelance writer for the South Dakota Magazine website.


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Christmas Spirit of the Hills

By Katie Hunhoff

Mike Welchynski’s Spirit of the Hills Wildlife Sanctuary celebrates the season each December by hosting a living nativity in Spearfish each evening from Dec. 18-24 in the sanctuary’s barn. Guests are welcome to mingle with the animals while enjoying creamy hot chocolate.

The sanctuary is home for a variety of species, from African lions to potbellied pigs. Around 60 animals and 20 people comprise the cast for the Christmas nativity, and several of those actors and animals appeared in the original Passion Play that helped bring Welchynski to Spearfish.

For many, a visit to the sanctuary is a holiday tradition. “People can come to know the animals by name and love them, and they were someone else’s throwaway,” Welchynski says.

The story behind the animal sanctuary is as touching as any holiday story we’ve heard. We published a feature article about the sanctuary in the Nov/Dec 2007 issue of South Dakota Magazine. Paul Higbee, the author, lives in Spearfish and his wife, Janet, was a volunteer at the sanctuary. In 1998, Welchynski lived in Canada, his home country, providing care to people with disabilities and running a small animal sanctuary in Manitoba. Then he met husband and wife Johanna Meier and Guido Della Vecchia of Spearfish. They were on tour in Canada with their Black Hills Passion Play. The couple told Mike if he wanted to expand his sanctuary they would donate land in South Dakota because they admired what he was doing. The Meier family had property south of Spearfish that included pastureland, pined hills, a deep Black Hills gulch, a stream, pond and a cabin.

Welchynski agreed it was the perfect setting. “I came to Spearfish and smelled the pines, and I knew this was a place that would sustain me physically and emotionally,” he told Higbee. He moved to Spearfish in 1999 and began preparations for Spirit of the Hills. Around 300 animals live at the sanctuary, and he plans on taking care of them for the rest of his life, without pay. He uses donations to pay for food and care for the animals and is grateful for volunteers who help with manual labor.

“I want this place to be a permanent institution for those kinds of animals, and I want it to be here long after I die,” Welchynski told us. He also believes it is important to educate the thousands of kids who visit the sanctuary on field trips. He worries that more and more youth are isolating themselves from the lessons that only nature holds. Although Welchynski rarely discusses his past, he grew up in rural Manitoba in a situation where, at times, his best option “was to go to sleep with the sheep and pigs, or out in the woods for a few days.”

And today Welchynski is giving back to nature, a place he once found refuge. The hardest part of running the sanctuary is relying on the uncertainty of donations to care for the animals. If you’d like to make a donation this holiday season, or get directions to the live nativity, visit www.spiritofthehillssanctuary.org or call (877) 761-7754.