Tag: yankton

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We Winter With Eagles

By Bernie Hunhoff

Eagles were a rare sight in South Dakota just decades ago. The pesticide DDT got in their food (fish) chain and decreased the birds’ fertility. Then, 522,000 acres of their favorite habitat along the Missouri River was flooded by the Corps of Engineers’ six big dams. Eagle sightings became rare.

I was working for the Madison Daily Leader in 1975 when a bald eagle showed up on a sunny morning and perched in a tall tree near Lake Madison, just east of town. Word spread, and by midday there was a steady parade of cars to the tree, where the big baldy patiently sat tall like a kindly king on a wooden throne.

That was just a few years after DDT was banned. As the eagles repopulated they discovered that the tailwaters of those big Missouri River dams were excellent places to winter because the constant discharges kept the water open even on the coldest days of January and February.

While eagles might be seen in any of our 66 counties, as winter deepens and most rivers and lakes freeze they now concentrate along those downstream waters. They roost in the tallest cottonwood trees, sunning themselves on brisk mornings and enjoying the surroundings.

As the sun warms the air, they will leave their perches to”float” on the thermals that develop. While it may appear that they are just at play in the sunshine, it’s likely they are also keeping watch for fish doing the very same thing in the river below.

Watch as they drop into a slow and deliberate glide to the river’s surface, talons outstretched like the wheels of an airplane. Usually they grab the fish in a graceful swoop, but no species is perfect; sometimes they take on too big of a fish and the ascent is less graceful. A few years ago, some Yanktonians were confused to find a large carp lying on a sidewalk a few blocks from the river. Apparently, one of the local eagles tackled a fish bigger than he could carry and dropped it on the sidewalk.

The noble birds are adapting to living near humans. Particularly in Yankton and Pierre, they roost in cottonwoods or other large trees in parks along the river, watching parka-clad pedestrians on the paths below. Still, it’s best to keep your distance. They may be napping or fishing, and it’s not nice to interrupt in either case.

Here are tips on eagle watching along South Dakota’s four dams, from south to north.

Gavins Point at Yankton — Eagles now nest here year-around, but 100 or so”snowbirds” arrive every December. As other waters freeze, they concentrate along the river from the dam and into the city of Yankton where they can be seen on treetops in Riverside Park. Grab lunch or a hot chocolate at several diners near Levee Street and then walk along the river or across the Meridian Bridge. If the birds aren’t in town, head west on Highway 52 and take any of the roads south to the river. Sisters Grove, a nature area just below Chalkstone Hill, is a good place to see deer. The forested areas just east of the dam are particularly good spots to look.

Fort Randall Dam by Pickstown — A top spot is the campground and recreation area on the west side of the dam. A 780-acre eagle refuge, created decades ago when the birds were on the endangered species list, is closed to the public. A few years ago, a strange carp kill caused a smorgasbord of carp for the eagles (see the unique photo by Michael Zimny). Generally, the”baldies” have to work harder for their lunch. Check out the remains of the old chalkstone chapel and the historic fort cemetery, all within a mile or so of the river.

Big Bend at Fort Thompson — Visit an area locals call”the Teardrop,” a recreation and campground complex on the west side of the dam. But like other tailwaters, the birds might be found anywhere. You might also find the Crow Creek tribe’s buffalo herd grazing a few miles north of Fort Thompson on Highway 47.

Oahe Dam above Pierre — Oahe Downstream, the campground area just below our biggest dam, is an excellent spot. However, the big birds also like to visit our state capitol in winter. Take a walk in Steamboat Park, which borders the Missouri, stroll forested LaFramboise Island or cross the river to old Fort Pierre and look for the birds in Fischer’s Lily Park, at the mouth of the Bad River. The park marks the spot where explorers Lewis & Clark had their first encounter with the Lakota people.

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South Dakota’s Sledding Hills

Local youth take to their sleds at Yankton’s Morgen Park. Photo by Bernie Hunhoff.

By Bernie Hunhoff

South Dakota’s reputation for geographic diversity holds true when it comes to snow sledding. Some of our eastern cities are too flat, and the slopes in some of our mountain towns are too rugged, steep and rocky.

In Aberdeen, where the terrain has been described as”flat as a barn door,” city leaders manufactured a 25′ hill so kids could enjoy winter. However, we discovered that most communities have a natural hill that becomes a hot spot when it snows.

Pack your sleds as you travel this winter because there are plenty of hills to explore. Most of the snow hills are unsupervised, so adults should be ready to act if they see something dangerous — a heavy toboggan sled, for example, that could carom out of control and hurt someone, or a motorized vehicle on the slopes. Sledding has long been a favorite winter tradition, even for our flatland friends. Let’s keep it alive.

Here’s our list of city slopes. Tell us what we’re missing. We’d also like to know where to find the closest and richest hot chocolate after a day on the slopes.

ABERDEEN — God created most of South Dakota’s hills and mountains, but man assisted with the modest slope in Baird Park (1715 24th Avenue NE), the most popular sledding spot in the Hub City. City officials created the gentle 25-foot just for kids.

BELLE FOURCHE — Slopes behind the Tri-State Museum (415 5th Avenue) are a favorite, though they may be too fast for younger kids and there is a walking path at the foot of the hill so watch for pedestrians.

CUSTER — Pageant Hill has been touted as one of the finest family sledding spots in the Black Hills. It may be too steep and long for younger kids, but you don’t have to descend from the very top. The hill is the summit of beautiful Big Rock Park, which also includes hiking trails and a disc golf course. It rises above the city’s south side.

HOT SPRINGS — Southern Hills Golf Course (1130 Clubhouse Drive) is fun and scenic.

HURON — Toboggan Hill (6th Street & Lawnridge Avenue), aka Slide Hill, is a bluff above the Jim River valley on Huron’s east side.

LEMMON — The ever-resourceful people of Lemmon discovered years ago that it was less expensive to build a small hill for their new water storage rather than just build a taller tower. Then someone got the great idea or also making it into a sledding slope with a warming shack. Tank Hill is quite easy to spot on the city’s west side. Many years ago, when the water tower developed a leak during a cold spell, kids were able to slide on the ice flow all the way downtown.

PIERRE — The slopes above the soccer fields in Hilger’s Gulch are popular. The gulch is a scenic valley just north of the State Capitol building.

RAPID CITY — Meadowbrook School Hill (3125 W. Flormann Street) is a good spot, as well as the Civic Center hill that rises above the Holiday Inn Rushmore Plaza parking lot downtown.

SIOUX FALLS — Tuthill Park in southeast Sioux Falls is the site of weddings and parties in the summer months, but when the snow falls it becomes the domain of well-bundled children with sleds. Spellerberg Park (2299 W. 22nd Street), closer to the city center, also has a fair slope. Great Bear Ski Valley welcomes snow tubers, who get to ride the ski lifts.

SPEARFISH — Hills behind the Donald E. Young Center on the Black Hills State University campus are fast and fun.

STURGIS — Lions Club Park (off Lazelle Street) is a good place for younger kids, and Strong Field Hill on Ballpark Road is fun for older youth.

WATERTOWN — St. Ann’s Hill, a sledder’s delight, is so named because St. Ann’s was the original name of the nearby Prairie Lakes Hospital. Take Highway 20 to 10th Avenue and turn uphill.

WESSINGTON SPRINGS — It’s worth a drive to experience Ski Hill on the west edge of Wessington Springs. The natural setting in the Wessington Hills is idyllic, but the real attraction is an old, homemade invention with an electric motor that powers a 1,200-foot rope lift. Jokingly called the”Rube Goldberg ski lift,” the simple equipment has been lovingly cared for by handy volunteers, including Lloyd Marken, 85, who helped to build it in 1956.

YANKTON — Morgen Park (1200 Green Street) is the go-to sledding hill in town, however kids also like to slide down the earthen slope of Gavins Point Dam, where it rises above Pierson Ranch Recreation Area west of Yankton.

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More Winter by the River

Almost every morning, you’ll find retired Yankton High School teacher and debate coach Paul Harens along the Missouri, scouting for fresh views of our old river town. We shared a few of his cold-weather shots in “Winter by the River,” a story in our January/February 2020 issue, but here are a few more for your enjoyment. Look for more of Harens’ work on Instagram.

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The Murder of Patsy Magner

By Roger Holtzmann

Patsy Magner’s scrappiness served him well as a young boxer, and through life. He parlayed his sporting prowess into the gambling and liquor arenas of early-day South Dakota. Photo courtesy of the Dakota Territorial Museum.

Cold cases are often neatly resolved within an hour on television. In real life, they mostly stay cold. Families mourn without resolution. Perpetrators remain at large. Communities wonder whether a killer walks among them. Such was the murder case of Yankton’s Patrick”Patsy” Magner.

David and Mary (Creighton) Magner came to America during the great Irish migration of the 19th century. They married in Woodstock, Illinois, where David earned his living as a shoemaker. Patrick and his elder brother Michael were born in Illinois, but they came of age on the frontier because, like many of his countrymen during that era, David Magner was a restless soul. In 1872 he headed for Yankton, Dakota Territory, and set up his cobbler’s bench.

David passed away two years later, when Patsy was 7 years old, leaving Mary to raise two young boys.”Little is known of [Patsy’s] growing-up years,” wrote historian Bob Karolevitz,”but by his early 20s he was already a professional fighter.” Magner compensated for his slight build with ferocity, a characteristic that came to the fore during his most notable bout — in 1899, before a crowd of 500 at the Sioux City Athletic Club — against one-time world featherweight champion ‘Torpedo’ Billy Murphy.

“In the first round Magner used foul tactics, and Murphy also began to rough it,” reported the Sacramento Record Union.”In the second, when the police intervened, the men were fighting like dogs on the floor of the arena.”

Prize fighting was illegal in Sioux City, so Murphy, Magner and the fight’s promoters were hauled off to jail. This wouldn’t be the last time Magner ran afoul of the law. Almost by default, boxing put him in touch with unsavory types, especially gamblers; it is easy to see how he drifted into schemes and ways mentioned with disfavor in the statute books. From then on almost all of Magner’s various enterprises, even the strictly legal ones, had a whiff of malfeasance about them. His murder shocked Yankton, but few people in town would have been entirely surprised that he came to a bad end.

Yet he was always a popular, charismatic figure. In a rose-tinted recap of Magner’s life after he died, the editor of the Yankton Press & Dakotan wrote that,”many older citizens remember when, during his pugilistic career, he used to walk down the street and, seeing a group of boys pining to get into the theater, would pay the admission for the entire crowd.”

Magner did have one legitimate outlet for his athletic ability. Yankton’s fire brigade in the 1890s was organized around five hose teams,”and competition among these was very keen to see who could recruit the most prominent citizens,” according to the Yankton County History. As a well-known fighter, Magner would have been a prize recruit, and he was no mere show horse. At the South Dakota fireman’s tournament in 1896 Magner served as captain of Yankton’s winning hose cart race team, and he personally won the 100-yard foot race.

From the 1890s through the early 1900s, Patsy Magner split his time between Yankton and Sioux City. Both he and his brother Michael, who were 31 and 33 at the time, were listed as members of their mother’s household in the 1900 federal census. Michael’s occupation was”merchant,” and Patsy’s”button maker,” which is either evidence of a mother in denial or an inside family joke.

Michael and Patsy’s true occupation was operating saloons in Yankton and Sioux City, and they acquired their place in Sioux City after the previous owner was gunned down in the street.”Nobody ever connected them to the crime, but that was the kind of environment they operated in,” said Jim Lane, a Yankton native with a decades-long interest in Magner’s murder.

After Patsy Magner lost his farm in 1915, he bought this small house located along Old Highway 50 near Yankton.

Gambling went hand in hand with the saloon business, and not always harmoniously. Magner was hauled into court multiple times on related charges, most notably by T.D. Becker, who lost $12,000 in what he claimed was a rigged faro game.

In the course of their protracted legal wrangling, Becker”proceeded to catch the saloon men in a violation of the law [by] hiring Claude Klegin and William Grensel, minors, to purchase liquor from them,” reported the Sioux City Journal. Before the merits of that case could be argued, Magner was found in contempt of court and fined $200; to make matters worse, his attorney, after two hours of”a most bitter denunciation of Becker,” was forcibly removed from the courtroom.

Magner’s checkered history was no obstacle to landing a gambling concession in Bonesteel during the land lottery of 1904. He operated a saloon and managed to thrive while the bad men ran riot; an article in the Norfolk Weekly News-Journal asserted that”crooks reaped a rich harvest of $75,000 for their three weeks trouble. Patsy Magner made $20,000.”

Yet when the town’s troubles multiplied and its citizens sought help they turned to Magner, who adroitly managed the transition from big-time gambler to municipal savior. Account after account of the conflict hailed him for his role in returning control of Bonesteel to”the respectable element.”

Magner shot himself in the foot during the commotion, but in the flush of victory no one seemed to care. He traveled to Sioux City on the same train as Chief Clerk John McPhaul, and according to the Sioux City Journal, the crowd that greeted them,”gave the gambler who cleaned out the town … an ovation upon his arrival.”

George W. Kingsbury published Volume IV of his epic History of Dakota Territory in 1915. He included a short biography of Patsy Magner that made no mention of gambling, liquor or anything unsavory. Kingsbury’s Magner was a progressive farmer who followed”advanced scientific methods” and sent more cattle and hogs to market than all but a few producers in the state.

Magner started with 160 acres in 1902, according to Kingsbury, and added to his holdings until his ranch comprised 520 acres,”on which he has one of the finest sets of farm buildings in Yankton County or in South Dakota.” What Kingsbury neglected to mention was how that increase occurred.

“Magner came into [his land] the old-fashioned way,” Lane says, laughing.”He married Maude Paul, who owned it.”

Maude A. Paul grew up on a Nebraska homestead. After moving to Yankton she purchased a 320-acre farm — an unusual step for a single woman in that era — and ran it successfully before she married Patsy in 1905. Kingsbury conceded that Maude’s,”knowledge of agriculture and stock-raising is equal to that of her husband,” but that assessment would seem to be a considerable sop to Patsy, who was more familiar with saloons than barns.

Nonetheless, Patsy did find ways to contribute to the bottom line.”One of the stories my dad told me was that Patsy used to pay his workers at the farm in cash, then he’d play cards with them, and a lot of times win it back,” Lane says.”Well, one week these two brothers cleaned house, beat him pretty bad, and he flew into a rage. They had to hide out in a cornfield until he cooled down.”

Patsy and Maude also owned a thousand-acre grain farm west of Yankton, but when the census taker came around in 1910 Magner listed his occupation as”liquor wholesaler.” He and Mike operated what they called a”Family Liquor Store” on Yankton’s Third Street, while Patsy and another partner owned a saloon in Bonesteel, where he carried on as he always had.

On Jan. 27, 1910, Bonesteel’s city commission met to discuss whether Magner’s liquor license should be revoked. They were charged with,”selling liquor to men who were blacklisted by their wives [and] carrying on gambling in a rear room,” according to the Norfolk Weekly News-Journal. He managed to retain his license after a vote by the commission, but that result led to one alderman bitterly denouncing another for yielding to Magner’s pressure.

Patsy Magner wrangled a gambling concession in Bonesteel, where the 1904 land rush attracted 104,000 men.

Magner’s career as a big-time farmer was short-lived. In 1915 he and Maude mortgaged their home place, perhaps to raise money and expand to take advantage of the spike in commodity prices caused by war in Europe. Whatever the reason, it didn’t pan out. Their farm and its fine buildings were sold at a sheriff’s sale just three years later; they moved to a small property on the east side of Yankton, and Patsy began raising show horses.

Worse yet was on the horizon. Prohibition came to South Dakota in 1918, two years before the nationwide ban took effect. Magner’s liquor store and saloons had to close, which likely abetted what happened next. Trapped between their accumulated debt and diminished income, Patsy and Maude were forced to declare bankruptcy in 1921.

Magner listed his occupation as”manager of a soft drink parlor” on the 1930 census form. Given his record, it is difficult to believe he spent the Roaring Twenties serving Yoo-Hoo while fortunes were being made in illicit liquor, especially considering the wide open situation in Yankton, where the county sheriff was reportedly in league with the bootleggers.

In any event, Magner opened a card room and beer parlor, the Blue Fox, in the spring of 1933, just days after President Roosevelt signed a law allowing the sale of 3.2 percent beer. Prohibition ended later that year. To Magner, it must have seemed that happy days were indeed here again.

Patsy Magner’s death was reported beneath a headline which spanned the Press & Dakotan’s front page on Dec. 31, 1934:”Patrick (Patsy) Magner, well-known businessman, age 65, was instantly killed about 10 o’clock while sitting in the parlor of his home … peacefully listening to the radio and talking with his wife.”

A coroner’s inquest was convened the next morning, and the first witness was Maude, who appeared”stoically calm” as she testified.”Mrs. Magner said her husband jumped from his chair as he was hit and said, ‘What the H— is going on here!’ and that as she started to arise from her chair two more shots were fired at her.” Patsy managed to stagger into the bedroom, where he collapsed and died within minutes. Maude ran onto the highway and flagged down a passing motorist, who called the sheriff.

Sheriff William Hickey had little to offer when he testified. He used string to determine that the shots were fired from outside, through a window, but the ground was frozen and so yielded no footprints. All he found at the scene were four casings from a Colt .32 automatic.

Magner’s funeral, officiated by Msgr. Lawrence Link, pastor of Sacred Heart Catholic Church, was held at his home. By the Press & Dakotan’s reckoning, “the procession to the cemetery was a mile long.”

That very day the newspaper published a fire-breathing call-to-arms entitled”Smoke Out The Rat.” In the good old days, wrote the editor, men confronted each other”on the street, in plain view of the town’s people.” Magner, in contrast, was slain from the shadows by a perverted, cowardly rat,”the most stinking, furtive, unsocial and unclean [form] of animal life …. We wish to insist that this is more than a murder. It is the beginning of an obnoxious form of crime that must not be permitted. This ‘rat’ must be found and destroyed.”

By chance, new sheriff William J. Limpo and new state’s attorney Frank Biegelmeier took office one week after the murder. They vowed to vigorously investigate the case, and the county commission offered a $500 reward. But days, then weeks and months went by with no progress.

Scant physical evidence was no impediment to rampant speculation, of course; as with many murders, the first suspect was close to home.

“Grandma said Maude did it,” Lane says.”That’s my family tradition.”

Don Tucker and his wife, Ava, have restored the Magner home east of Yankton. Tucker points to the window through which the murder happened in 1934.

Patsy and Maude had a notoriously stormy relationship, according to this theory. Maude either did it herself or hired a guy, who left town right after the murder. In line with that explanation, the .32 caliber gun that was used indicates an amateur job rather than a big-time criminal conspiracy, according to Lane.”It’s not a very powerful weapon. A professional hit man probably wouldn’t choose it as his first option to shoot through a window.”

Magner’s past and current business dealings provided ample material for rumormongering. At the inquest, Maude testified”that her husband had intended to dissolve his partnership in [the Blue Fox Saloon] with Fred Fincke,” according to the Press & Dakotan.”She said there had been friction between the two men for some time and that the dissolution was to have taken place that very day.”

Fincke wasn’t called to testify,”and was not questioned by officers aside from being asked if he knew of any acquaintances who might possibly have had a motive for the slaying.” If he had any suggestions to offer they led nowhere.

Fred and Maude, as Patsy’s widow, sold the Blue Fox soon after the murder. That may have been Magner and Fincke’s plan all along, but it’s doubtful everyone in Yankton accepted such a benign explanation. Not when it became known Aage Christensen was the buyer.

“My dad was a big bootlegger,” says Aage’s son, Marvin ‘Pal’ Christensen.”He was partners with the sheriff. They did business all over Iowa, South Dakota and a lot of Nebraska.” Christensen senior owned a barn that served as the pair’s warehouse during Prohibition.”Whenever there was going to be a raid by the state they’d always let the sheriff know. So then he’d call my dad, and he’d get everything cleaned up before they came.”

Christensen went to work as a bartender at the Blue Fox after Prohibition ended. Buying the bar made for a simple transaction on both sides, but Frank Yaggie, one of Aage’s lifelong friends, couldn’t shake the idea that there was more to it.

“When Frank was on his death bed he called me in and said, ‘You know, I got to get this off my chest. We always thought your dad shot Patsy Magner,'” Christensen says.”So I told him, ‘Frank, I don’t know if that’s true or not, but I doubt it.’ Then he died about 10 minutes later.”

Don and Ava Tucker now live in the house where Patsy was murdered. The house and its matching red-brick barn have both been beautifully maintained and restored. Tucker raises Rhode Island Red chickens and goats on the property, which sits on the eastern outskirts of Yankton.

Tucker is well-acquainted with the Patsy Magner story.”He was sitting right where I sit to watch TV,” he says.”I figure it’s safe enough. It’s not like lightning is going to strike twice in one spot.”

Tucker has had many conversations about Magner over the years, including several interesting discussions with Jerry Bienert, now deceased, a long-time county commissioner and storehouse of local history.

“Jerry said he tried to follow up [Magner’s murder] and figure out who did it, but he just kept getting stonewalled,” Tucker says.”It never went anywhere.”

Bienert did come across a rumor that the shooting was over Patsy Magner’s involvement with a young woman from a well-connected Yankton family, which could explain why the investigations always stalled.

So it goes when a crime remains unsolved. Every theory sounds plausible to someone, and they all have only one thing in common.

“Somebody just did it,” Tucker says,”and went on with their life.”

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

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The First Toilet of Spring

By Roger Holtzmann

We are just over a week into spring, that most glorious season when flora and fauna awake from their annual slumber and life renews itself. I am especially heartened by the sun this time of year. Each day it ascends a bit higher in the sky and stays a little longer in the evening. I absolutely love it! If I wasn’t a Christian I would probably worship Helios, the ancient Greek god who drove the fiery chariot of the sun across the heavens each day. On his feast day my fellow Heliots and I would drag flaming carts through the streets in his honor. It would be epic.

Everyone has their own way of deciding when spring is here. Some go strictly by the calendar. As for me, I don’t need no steenking calendar to tell me when the seasons have changed. Summer is here when kids get out of school. Fall begins on the night of the first high school football game, no matter how hot it is. Winter starts on the last day you can make a sandwich with the leftover Thanksgiving turkey. You can’t just stick a bunch of shredded turkey between two slices of bread and call it a sandwich, either. It has to incorporate big, man-sized chunks of meat.

People who are in tune with nature have their own ways of deciding when springtime has arrived. Some think the season has turned when they hear the first robin sing, or see great Vs of geese heading north. Gardeners don’t feel it’s here until they plant something, or see a particular blossom. I remember a wizened old gardener saying she knew it was spring when the buds on a certain tree were the size of a mouse’s ear. Ever since then I’ve wondered: how big is a mouse’s ear? Pretty small, I assume, but I can’t say for certain because I only ever see them streaking across the kitchen floor.

Fortunately for me, my means of deciding the weighty matter of spring’s true arrival doesn’t depend on the calendar, birds, or my knowledge of rodent anatomy. I know it’s spring when I see a toilet sitting by the curb.

For 50 or so weeks out of every year you can drive around Yankton and our fair city is a reasonably tidy place. Then right around this time great mounds of refuse appear on every street. It’s the springtime ritual known as Citywide Cleanup. For two glorious weeks citizens can drag to the curb items at which the garbage man would normally turn up his nose and the city will haul them away. No charge. No limit. It’s as close to pure freedom as you can get in this day and age.

In addition to toilets and sinks and an occasional bathtub, there are boards and brush and basketball hoops. Twisted hunks of tin. Cabinets without drawers and drawers without cabinets. Shattered plastic objects, enjoying a few moments in the sun before an eternity in the landfill. Unspeakably ratty couches and chairs. I often wonder where they were before they arrived at the curb. Surely they weren’t sitting on that couch!

Some homes have naught but an old electric fan or a five-gallon bucket before them. If I’m in a good mood when I pass by I admire such people for being so well-ordered and neat that they have almost nothing to discard. If I’m mildly crabby such places are mildly irritating. What are they hiding? Are they trying to make the rest of us look bad?

You are probably wondering why I pay attention to such things in the first place. It is garbage, after all. Well, I’m either embarrassed or not embarrassed to admit that I am one of those people who cruise through unfamiliar neighborhoods during this time of year looking for treasures amidst the trash.

I can’t decide if I’m embarrassed or not because my attitude on this aspect of the Citywide Cleanup likewise varies with the day. Sometimes I feel like I’m Dumpster diving, as if I’ve crossed the line between me and the world of bums. Other days I think of myself as cutting edge. I was recycling — going green in today’s terms — long before it was fashionable. There is hardly a room in our home that doesn’t have a”rescued” item in it.

In case you’re wondering, however, there are some lines I’ve never crossed. This I swear by the great and powerful Helios: our toilet came with the house.

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

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Yankton’s Civil Rights Champion

By John Andrews

Until the day Ted Blakey died in 2004, he possessed a newspaper clipping from February 1838. It advertised his grandfather, an 11-year-old boy at the time, for sale at a slave auction in Missouri. For Blakey, a Yankton businessman and tireless Civil Rights advocate, it served as a reminder of how far his family had come.

Blakey was born in Yankton in 1925, the youngest of 11 children. His family roots were in Missouri, but his father and uncle were encouraged to move to South Dakota after hearing Tom Douglas, an African-American who ran a successful business in Yankton. Douglas wanted to share the freedom he enjoyed so in 1904 he traveled through Missouri, telling everyone who would listen that if they came to Yankton they would find”freedom like you’ve never seen anywhere.”

Blakey’s father and uncle were in the crowd one day and were intrigued by the proposal. The final straw came the day his father was accused of assaulting a white woman after simply bumping into her in a dry goods store. The clerk threatened to lynch him if he ever returned. When he got home he told his wife they were leaving for South Dakota. They arrived in Yankton on Oct. 16, 1905.

In the Dakotas African-Americans did not find the same attitudes toward them that were prevalent in Southern states, but discriminatory language still found its way into early territorial laws. Gov. William Jayne, in his first message to the new territorial legislature in 1862, called for a ban on slavery. Despite his entreaty, a committee passed a bill preventing”persons of color” residing in Dakota Territory. Fortunately the full House rejected the measure. Still, the Organic Act that authorized a government for Dakota Territory declared that only”every free white male inhabitant of the United States…shall be entitled to vote at the first election.” Not until 1868 did the legislature delete the word”white.” Similarly, schools were”equally free and accessible to all white children,” until 1868.

Blakey became the owner of a successful janitorial service and pest control business in Yankton. He was also president of the school board and the PTA and active in the Jaycees and Kiwanis.”It was never really that bad,” Blakey recalled in a 2001 interview, though there were incidents of discrimination in the 1960s. South Dakota’s chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People surveyed the state and found certain restaurants in Sioux Falls, Rapid City, Huron, Mitchell and other larger towns refused to allow blacks to eat in. Another survey by the Black Hills Civil Rights Committee revealed that 90 percent of bars and barbershops and 30 percent of restaurants and motels in Rapid City refused service to blacks.

The NAACP and Gov. Archie Gubbrud recruited Blakey to remedy the situation.”That was when I really hit it,” he later recalled.”I went before Rotary, Kiwanis, the Sacred Heart PTA and a lot of clubs there. See up until then, a black person couldn’t get a haircut in Yankton until after 5 o’clock. He (the barber) pulled down the shade and cut your hair. There was not a barbershop in Yankton that would cut a black man’s hair in 1963.”

Blakey helped change all of that. In 1963 Gov. Gubbrud signed a Civil Rights Bill. Blakey also urged the state legislature to approve the 24th amendment to the constitution, eliminating the poll tax. South Dakota was the 38th and final state needed to approve the amendment in 1964.

In time Blakey came to be the unofficial spokesperson for South Dakota’s black population, a role he especially relished whenever outsiders had questions.”We hear about the Holocaust, and survivors of Pearl Harbor,” Blakey says.”I want them to know what black people did in South Dakota, and in Yankton.”

Thanks to Ted Blakey, many South Dakotans knew the story well.

Governor Archie Gubbrud and Ted Blakey of Yankton
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Trial and Error at the Community Garden

By Rebecca Johnson

The Johnsons hone their gardening skills in Yankton’s community garden.

Our lawn is too shady to grow vegetables, so my husband and I sow our seeds in a community garden established on the west side of Yankton. Community gardening is fairly young in Yankton, but it has a long history, beginning in Detroit in the 1890s. The federal government promoted community gardens during World War I to supplement the food supply. Gardens fed the unemployed during the Depression, and the federal victory garden campaign during World War II encouraged patriotism and built morale. Interest dwindled after the war, then resurged in the 1970s. Community gardens have been growing ever since (pun intended).

South Dakota State University Extension agents coach groups interested in starting a community garden and there are several across our state, each one a little different than the next. Lead’s Mile High Community Garden, organized by NeighborWorks Dakota Home Resources, has 12 plots in an abandoned neighborhood near the edge of Homestake Mine. The Standing Rock Native Gardens Project hopes to prevent Type 2 diabetes by reclaiming traditional Lakota foods. And the Montrose and Murdo Horizons groups grow produce for those in need.

A committee promoting healthy lifestyles started Yankton’s garden. We joined the inaugural year, leasing two 12-by-18-foot plots for $20 each. Mark Hunhoff, a local machinery dealer, tills the soil at the start of the season and water is free — just bring your own hose. Each plot is marked with a plank painted with sayings like,”God made rainy days so gardeners could get the housework done,” or”You can bury a lot of troubles digging in the dirt.” My husband’s favorite is”I was determined to know beans.”

Jeremy and I started without horticultural skills, and we’re still not master gardeners, but we’ve learned a few tricks while digging in the dirt. For example, when planting leave more space between plants than you think you’ll need. And even if it seems wasteful, thin seedlings early and generously. Thinning and weeding is satisfying because of the tidy results, but if you squat for a long time you will get a serious head rush when you stand. Sit, kneel or bend over.

Once plants are in, you’ll become preoccupied with weather. Like farmers, I now start casual conversations with”Did it rain last night?” or”Have you heard if it’s supposed to storm?” I attribute this to my quest to”water evenly.”‚Ä® Zucchini and beets grow funny shapes and tomatoes get blossom end rot if you don’t. I wasn’t initially sure what”water evenly” meant. Apply water evenly to the ground? Don’t stand on one foot with the hose? My friend Tamme Klutman from Green 4 Ever in Sioux Falls explained it for me. Water every day when hot and dry. If it’s mild, water every other. About a gallon for most plants works best. Blossom end rot is caused by lack of calcium.”When the soil is too wet, the plant can’t absorb it and when the soil is too dry, the plant can’t absorb it, either,” Klutman says. So don’t over soak and don’t go bone dry in between.

After you get a watering rhythm, watch for bugs. Though Sneak Some Zucchini on Your Neighbor’s Porch Day implies otherwise, zucchini isn’t foolproof. My first attempt contracted vine borers. I performed surgery, slicing the base of the plant to dig out grubs, but the plant never fully recovered. Now I watch for moths fluttering around and eggs on stems and leaves. You can remove the parts of the plant with eggs. Organic pesticide helps, too.

And once mid-summer hits, always bring a bag or bucket to your plot. Even if you think nothing will be ready, your garden is likely to surprise you with a small harvest.

Editor’s Note: This story is revised from the July/August 2014 issue of South Dakota Magazine. To order a copy or to subscribe, call (800) 456-5117.

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Judging a Junk Man

By Bernie Hunhoff

Photos courtesy of the Grant County Review

Emil Tucholke, Milbank’s junk man, sold postcards featuring this professional portrait taken by local photographer Milton Fischer to supplement his second-hand business.

Ted Rathjen was Yankton’s junk man. His white, two-story house near Broadway Avenue in the center of town was surrounded by rusting bicycle frames, old appliances, yesterday’s automobiles, worn furniture, abandoned toys and just about everything else that was once sold as”new” in the downtown stores. Rathjen was a tiny, smiling man who hobbled about on crutches because his legs were crippled from a childhood injury.

In his older years, he just poked his head out from a second story window and advised customers on where they might find what they needed. Schwinn rims were piled beneath the big elm tree. Garden tools were hanging on the picket fence by the road. Toys were in the front of the house by the mailbox.

He suggested a price, and it was usually so low that any negotiation seemed silly. He charged nickels and dimes to kids who needed bike parts, and dollars to adults for the same merchandise. If he was upstairs, he asked visitors to leave the payment in a coffee can on the porch. Ted crossed the highway once or twice a day to have coffee at Sunshine Grocery Store. He fed the store’s penny bucking-horse for kids and always had a smile and a story for the regulars on the stools. Most of the town fathers had bought bike parts or toys from him when they were young, so nobody made a serious attempt to clean up his property until the late 1980s, after his death.

Every town had a junk man. And there were altercations, as with all professions that involve money and territory. One of the most serious situations involved Shorty Miller, a bearded old man who lived in Canton’s town dump by the Big Sioux River until he was 94 years old.

When he died at the South Dakota Human Services Center in Yankton, a local editor memorialized him as”a hermit, river rat, friend of the beaver and blue jay, dump caretaker emeritus, figure familiar, colorful storyteller, character extraordinaire.”

He was also lucky to have reached such a ripe age. In the 1980s some young men tried to infringe on his territory. An argument ensued, and Shorty was shot in the arm and shoulder. He later admitted to also firing a gun.”I got four rifle shots off, just to scare’em,” he later said. While there were some discrepancies between the two parties’ stories, the sheriff said the dispute”evidently arose over a longtime feud over scavenging rights” at the city dump.

Despite his brush with the law, Miller was known as a friendly hermit who delighted in entertaining visitors with stories about the Big Sioux River. He was a contemporary of another Lincoln County hermit known as Rattlesnake Bill. In his obituary, the editor quoted an acquaintance who said Miller”was a gentle and likeable old guy and when he of- fered you a cut of left-over beaver meat it was hard to say no.”

Ted Rathjen sold old bike parts, appliances and other oddball items at his home along Broadway Avenue in Yankton.

But none of the aforementioned junk men could hold a discarded candelabra to Grant County’s Emil Tucholke, who took on city hall, won a moral victory, and nearly parlayed that into a political career.

After considering a career in the ministry, Emil bought two small pieces of land west of town along Whetstone Creek. Then he began to collect odds and ends from the citizenry.

Rev. Jack Garvey grew up in Milbank, the son of the postmaster in the 1940s. He remembers Emil as one of his hometown’s most colorful characters.”He was more than just a junk collector,” says Garvey, a Catholic priest.”He had a 1902 Cadillac that he loved to drive in parades. He had a horse-drawn carriage that he would use to travel up and down the alleys, picking up junk before there was any garbage collection. He grew strawberries on a floating raft in the creek. He would bring them into the post office and give them to dad.”

Garvey also remembers that Emil gave his dad a piece of pottery.”It was an old Greek urn of some sort, just a piece of junk I’m sure. But that thing sat on Dad’s desk and I always imagined it was worth millions.”

As Emil’s outdoor inventory grew in size, it spilled over from his land onto a weedy lot owned by the county. Some of the very people who had made contributions to the collection now began to complain, so the county commissioners filed a lawsuit to force him out. Surely they figured that they could evict him without much trouble, but they were wrong. Emil wasn’t about to abandon his domain. After some legal wrangling, a court date was set and the bearded junk man showed up in the courtroom wearing a hangman’s rope around his neck.

Emil acted as his own attorney, and his wit and ready answers seemed to delight Judge Van Buren Perry. The junk man was especially adept at cross-examination. He asked a public official whether he had ever visited the property. The official denied being there until Emil reminded him that he’d visited just the previous Sunday.

“Did you ever buy anything from me?” Emil asked.

“No,” said the official.

“I guess that’s right,” Emil countered.”You just took that stove part without paying me.”

Emil carefully examined all of the state’s exhibits, made numerous motions and objections and invited the judge to recess the proceedings long enough to tour the junkyard. When they returned to court, the judge was carrying a beautiful antique china bowl — a gift for his wife from Emil.

Milbank’s famous junk man lived in a covered wagon that he hitched to his horses and rode in local parades.

Phyllis Justice, the longtime editor and publisher of the Grant County Review, covered the trial.”Over the years, he had built up a huge collection of what some would call junk, but to him it was treasure,” she wrote years later for an anniversary issue of the paper.”Actually, he had preserved some valuable materials, including his prize 1902 Cadillac and covered wagon. In a way he performed a free trash service for residents and restaurants. He fed his team of horses the food thrown out by the restaurants.”

The prosecutor accused Emil of maintaining an”unsightly nuisance area.” Emil countered that the covered wagon, which his horses pulled in local parades, served as his dwelling and an old outhouse was his kitchen and cook shack. He said he was growing strawberries on a raft and feeding beaver.

Justice said that Judge Perry eventually rendered a Solomon-like verdict. In his long opinion, he noted that even though the county commissioners regarded the place as an unsightly garbage dump, there were other ways to describe Emil’s property.”Many years have taught him that some can live on what others waste, and that articles discarded by some have utility and value for others … He has assembled these articles upon his lots … as neatly as his strength and character of material permitted. His stock of merchandise probably amounts to more than a hundred tons, gross, and would probably assay as much as Homestake ore, which runs about $8.00 a ton, I believe.

“Upon these lots we observe an enormous quantity of firewood, the concentration of which no doubt eases the minds of citizens who are apprehensive under the activities of John L. Lewis and the high price of oil. This wood would heat the whole of Milbank for a considerable period,” the judge continued.”There are fruit and pickle jars in sufficient quantities, if used, to tide Milbank over a crop failure or two. Furniture from all periods, some of it repairable, some containing walnut and other woods coveted by tinkers and some only firewood, is piled here and there.

Tucholke scavenged surplus foods like stale bread and rolls and shared them with his horses and chickens.

“Machinery of all kinds abound. A laundry is dickering for a large churn, which he salvaged from a creamery. Horse-drawn vehicles such as sleighs, carts, surreys and wagons are there, to say nothing of a priceless 1902 Cadillac which runs and which Christopher [locals often referred to Emil as Christopher Columbus] sometimes drives in parades to the astonishment and delight of all.”

Judge Perry was especially respectful of Emil’s independence.”The defendant, disdaining pensions, supports himself and pays taxes on his lots by selling stuff from this stock,” wrote the judge.”Numerous citizens testified that they were able to buy from him much-wanted items otherwise unobtainable. His business is lawful and useful, if a bit unsightly in some respects. It is unique and has some elements of fascination. There is a beaver dam in the creek, with live beavers. To them and to his horses and chickens the defendant feeds stale bread, which he also eats and which the bakeries are glad to get rid of. On a sizeable raft in the beaver pond the defendant raises by hydroponic methods a considerable quantity of strawberries in season.”

In an opinion he clearly enjoyed authoring, the judge also complimented Emil on his”insulated prairie schooner,” his flock of poultry and even his”magnificent beard.” He concluded that the defendant”lives the life of Riley, enjoys himself, supports himself, salvages a good deal of useable material and conserves it so that many people are able to purchase needed items at a saving or which are not elsewhere obtainable.”

But, concluded the judge,”law is law. The lot belongs to the county and the county commissioners have the say-so about it.” In a cunning twist, he granted the county permission to remove Emil’s possessions but he cautioned that any such disposition must be accomplished”tenderly, carefully and with the complete approval of Mr. Tucholke and to see that not the least bit of damage results to [the collection].”

The result was a victory for Emil.”In other words, he allowed Emil to stay on the land since there was no way the county could meet the requirements,” Justice said.”He gave the county its pound of flesh but only if there was no letting of Emil’s blood.”

Emil tried to parlay the ruling into elective office. He ran for state representative in 1952 as an independent. His motto was simple and poetic:”The world is full of corruption and evil — but keep cool and vote for Emil.”

In a full-page advertisement in Justice’s paper, he published Judge Perry’s ruling and then noted,”I handled the case mentioned below without a lawyer. Seems this should be a fair recommendation for any candidate … “

The eccentric junk man tallied 1,496 votes — a respectable showing but not enough to win a seat among the bland, suit-and-tie crowd in Pierre. Instead, he returned to his business of finding and selling used goods. Now somewhat of a local hero, he became even more popular in local parades. He put a new canvas on his covered wagon for the territorial centennial in 1961. Milbank photographer Milton Fischer took a picture of Emil in an old fur coat and the Grant County Review printed it on glossy postcards that he sold to supplement his second-hand business. He enjoyed hawking them for”a dime apiece or two for a quarter.” When he was no longer permitted to drive, he traded his car for a tractor and used it to collect junk.

In the end, he died alone in April of 1962. His body was found near the railroad tracks that ran by his junkyard. If he hadn’t befriended the local newspaper publisher he might be forgotten. But Justice included a lengthy article on the junk man in the 125th anniversary paper for Milbank.

Like his cohorts in other towns, Emil practiced conservation before most of us understood the concept of recycling. Such men had an aversion to waste and an appreciation for frugality, two traits quite rare today. The junk man saw a need and filled it, and that’s as American as his 1902 Cadillac.

Editor’s Note: This story is revised from the November/December 2008 issue of South Dakota Magazine. To order a copy or to subscribe, call (800) 456-5117.

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Quest for the Czech Kolache

By Laura Johnson Andrews

Ed and Carol Radack make fresh kolaches daily, but there are Bon Homme County natives scattered far and wide. That’s no problem, because the Radacks will ship them out of state.

When the first Czech immigrants came to South Dakota in 1869, they brought a pastry as round as the wagon wheels that rolled them here — the kolache. In fact, the name derives from kolo, the Czech word for wheel.

These circular sweet rolls filled with fruit, poppy seeds or cheese and topped with a sprinkle of streusel have a passionate following. Along with pivo (that’s Czech for beer) and traditional dancing, kolaches are a star attraction at Czech Days, held in the little Bon Homme County town of Tabor every June. But Czech Days only comes once a year. Luckily, businesses in Yankton and Tyndall fill the void for the rest of the year.

At the Tyndall Bakery, Ed & Carol Radack honor local tastes and traditions with kolaches and other baked goods created from recipes that date back 70 to 80 years. The kolache dough is used in many of the bakery’s products, such as long johns, doughnuts, kuchen, buns and Carol’s original recipe, apple fritter bread. In November and December, the Radacks stir up peanut brittle, Klondike and anise-flavored Christmas candies using the bakery’s old copper pot and marble worktable.

The Radacks wanted to try something new when they bought the bakery from Bob and Judy Rueb in 2007. Ed had been with the state highway department for 11 years, and Carol worked at Chicago Rawhide in Springfield until it closed.”This is completely the opposite of what we were doing,” says Ed. The husband-wife team works 60 to 80 hours a week, with extra help provided by their sons, Tim and Ty, and local high school students who man the front counter while Ed and Carol bake in the kitchen.”You’re married to it,” Carol says.

Kolaches have a reputation for being difficult, but the Radacks make the process look easy. Using the bakery’s secret recipe, Carol mixes the dough until it reaches the right consistency.”It should be smooth like a baby’s bottom,” Carol says. It rests in a large wheeled tub for about 45 minutes before she pours the quivering, almost liquid mixture out onto a floured worktable. Carol then grabs a dough scraper, slices off a wide strip of dough and flours the top. To break down the dough’s plasticity, she rolls a spiked wheel called a docker over the surface, followed by a metal rolling pin. Ed uses a small, 3-inch round cutter to form the kolaches, then Carol arranges the pillowy circles on a metal pan, poking the center of each circle to create an indentation for the kolache filling.

Once the cutting is done, Ed and Carol gently press on the kolaches again to reinforce the hollow that will hold the filling. Working with swift, smooth motions, they then squeeze fruit, cream cheese or poppy seed filling into the indentations.”She’s faster than I am, but mine look better when they’re done,” jokes Ed.

The pans of kolaches then rest in a room called the proof box for 30 to 45 minutes. The proof box is like a sauna for baked goods. A water-filled pan placed over a burner provides heat and humidity, helping the kolaches and other yeasty desserts to rise.

After the kolaches have rested, they’re topped with a little streusel before entering the Tyndall Bakery’s enormous oven for 15 minutes. The propane-fueled behemoth contains six rotating racks, providing the Radacks with enough room to bake 30 full sheet pans or 120 kuchen at once. Once baked, the kolaches are allowed to cool before glaze is added. Then they’re ready for appreciative customers.

The Radacks have a time-honored system, but there are other methods of kolache-making. Drive east of Tabor, the Czech capital, on Highway 50 and you’ll soon arrive in Yankton where kolaches can be found at Czeckers Sports Bar and Grill, a joint venture of Matt and Kelsey Hunhoff and Matt’s parents, Dan and Jean Hunhoff.

Czech flair is evident at Czeckers in Yankton, both in its decor and its menu, which includes kolaches. Abbey Kokesh (left) was the restaurant’s kolache master before teaching the art to Kelsey Hunhoff, who owns the business with her husband, Matt, and Matt’s parents, Dan and Jean Hunhoff.

Czeckers, which opened in the former Elks Club in September 2013, blends the board game’s red and black colors with the family’s Czech pride.”Matt is very proud of his heritage, and Jean is as well,” Kelsey says.”He’d thought of the name and the theme several years ago.”

That pride extends to Czeckers’ menu. Since the Czech Republic is the birthplace of pilsner-style beer, Czeckers offers two varieties: Pilsner Urquell and Staropramen. Beer is also the key ingredient of their pivo-battered fries. On Friday and Saturday nights, the restaurant serves a Beseda meal: roast beef or duck, dumplings, sauerkraut, mashed potatoes, rye bread, and of course, kolaches.

Matt’s sister, Abbey Kokesh, was the restaurant’s kolache maker in the early days.”My grandma made them my whole life. I enjoyed eating them, but never learned how to make them,” Kokesh said. After her grandmother, Amy Rokusek, developed Alzheimers, Kokesh turned to Ann Beran, a longtime kolache-making demonstrator at Tabor’s Czech Days, for guidance. Now, Abbey teaches the Saturday kolache demonstration for beginners during Czech Days.

Kokesh tells beginners that kolaches aren’t fast food.”You really can’t be in a hurry. I usually put aside a half day because it takes time.” She also recommends patience.”Mom has made them, and hers don’t turn out right but she just doesn’t have the passion to bake them like I do.”

Here are some other tricks:

  • Keep the kitchen warm. That helps the dough to rise.
  • Use bread flour. They’re not sure why but that’s what the bakers do.
  • Be creative with fillings. Try chocolate, peanut butter, jelly or anything that might make a pie.
  • Pair dark fillings with dark and light with light so they cook evenly.
  • Find a mentor. Otherwise it may be frustrating.
  • Kolaches are best served hot but they will keep a week, or you can freeze the dough or the baked kolaches.
  • There’s no right or wrong way. Find out what works for you.

Czechoslovakian immigrants brought kolaches – round sweet rolls filled with fruit, poppy seeds or cheese and topped with streusel – to southeastern South Dakota when they began settling there in 1869.

Czeckers’ Kolache Recipe

2 packages or 2 tablespoons dry yeast

3/4 cup warm water

1 teaspoon sugar

2 cups warmed milk

3/4 cup potato flakes

1 tablespoon salt

3/4 cup sugar

2 eggs, slightly beaten

1/2 cup vegetable oil

5-6 cups bread flour

Dissolve yeast in warm water and 1 teaspoon sugar. Set aside.

Heat milk and pour into mixing bowl. Using a mixer, add potato flakes, 3/4 cup sugar, salt, oil and slightly beaten eggs and mix well. Stir in 2 cups flour, then add yeast mixture. Continue adding flour until it’s a soft dough. Switch to dough hooks and add the rest of the flour. Move dough to floured surface and knead slightly until the dough is no longer sticky. Move to a greased bowl, cover and let rise until dough doubles in size and the dough no longer pops up when poked with a finger.

Shape dough into small, smooth balls about 2 inches in diameter. Thomas’ method involves manipulating spoonfuls of dough by flattening them into a disc, folding the edges into the center and popping them through her thumb and forefinger to create an uncreased dough ball. Place the balls on a greased pan, brush with oil and let rise for about an hour.

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Using a stamper (the Hunhoffs use the bottom of a plastic bottle) or your fingers, flatten the dough ball into a circle by making an indentation in the center and fill with kolache filling. Sprinkle streusel on top of filling.

Bake at 400 degrees for 11 to 12 minutes. After baking, brush with melted margarine or butter or a combination of 1 tablespoon sugar and 3 tablespoons hot water. Yields 4 dozen kolaches.

Poppy Seed Filling

1/4 cup sugar

2 tablespoons flour

1 can Solo brand poppy seed filling

3/4 cup half and half

1 teaspoon vanilla

Mix sugar and flour together. Add poppy seed filling, half and half and vanilla. Microwave on high 3 minutes and stir. Heat 3 more minutes, stir, then heat one more minute. May also heat on stovetop.

Prune Filling

12 ounces prunes

1 cup sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla

1 teaspoon cinnamon

Cover prunes with water and cook until tender. Mash prunes and combine with other ingredients.

Streusel

1/2 cup flour

1/4 cup butter or margarine

1/2 cup sugar

1/2 cup finely-chopped coconut, optional

Use pastry blender to blend flour, butter and sugar together until crumbly. Add coconut, if desired. Sprinkle the mixture over kolache filling before baking.

Editor’s Note: This story is revised from the January/February 2015 issue of South Dakota Magazine. To order a copy or to subscribe, call (800) 456-5117.

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Our Water Stories

By Katie Hunhoff

The Muskegon was once hailed as the handsomest boat on Big Stone Lake. It capsized in 1917 with nine passengers aboard.

For a state once considered a desert, South Dakota has a lot of water, thousands of feet of shoreline and a veritable treasure chest of lake and river adventure stories — some dating back a century and more.

The Kampeska Monster is among the wackiest. Boat-builders at Lake Kampeska were building a steamer in 1886 when they reported seeing a”20-foot long snake-like creature.” They were not taken seriously until several days later when four prominent Watertown area businessmen claimed they also saw it.

The foursome said it swam for quite a distance before disappearing into the depths. Perhaps worried about their reputations, they admitted it might have been an unusually large lake sturgeon. Big-city journalists came to see for themselves. Some poked fun at the very idea of a Loch Ness on the prairie, but one writer concluded that,”sturdy, virile Dakotans were not given to superstitious fears.”

Some of our water stories are fun, but others end in tragedy. At Big Stone Lake on July 10, 1917, nine people stepped aboard an excursion boat called The Muskegon. They never reached the other shore. Heavy rain fell and then, said a survivor, it seemed that two storms met in the middle of the lake, capsizing the 60-foot boat.

A heart-wrenching struggle ensued, as passengers and crew tried to save themselves and one another. In the end, the captain and six passengers drowned, including two young sisters. A poet memorialized the dead with a long piece that included these lines:

Those were the ties severed

In those seven peoples’ lives

Lost on this boat Muskegon

Sinking to rise no more.

But the Muskegon did rise; it was pulled from the water and restored 10 years later by a wealthy businessman who renamed it the Golden Bantam. Today it is docked at a museum just across the South Dakota border in Ortonville, Minnesota, along with memorabilia and news clippings.

Not many South Dakotans have prospered as professional fishermen, but there was a time when you could make a living by clamming on the James, Big Sioux and Vermillion rivers. Button-makers wanted the shells in the early 20th century. Clams were so abundant in the James that a particular spot called Tuscan in Hutchinson County was dubbed the”Mother of Pearl Capital of the World.”

The clam industry dwindled in the 1940s due to over-harvesting, environmental changes in the rivers and, of course, the invention of plastic buttons.

Despite the placidity of today’s tamed Missouri, adventures still occur on its waters. In 1992 a young Yankton couple saw a small object with a yellow flag on top being pulled upstream by a nylon rope. The object kept disappearing and surfacing around their boat, until the rope got tangled in the propeller and killed the engine.

They began to be pulled upstream, backwards, and to the husband’s horror the boat was slowly being pulled down into the water. They traveled about 300 yards, with their transom only inches above the water’s surface before he was able to cut the rope.

Their experience was witnessed by other fishermen and was soon published in the Yankton paper. The city was abuzz with news of the river monster. Writer Marilyn Kratz concluded that a sturgeon, which can grow to 1,000 pounds, could have been the culprit.”Their slender body and long snout, covered with bony plates, would be a terrifying sight at that size,” she wrote.”They certainly would be large and powerful enough to pull a boat about their same size.”

Huge fish were also reported by dam-builders when the reservoirs were built along the Missouri. Some divers saw fish 15 feet long floating at the bottom of the muddy river. Mysteries are still unfolding on land and in the waters of South Dakota.