Pierce County, North Dakota. A So\ivenir History. Pierce County North Dakota A SouVenir History Written by J. W. Bingham Published By J 905 The Pierce County Tribune flugby, N. D. DEDICATION. This Souvenir History is dedicated to the early settlers of Pierce County. Those who followed the star of empire in its V westward course and built themselves homes on the undeveloped prairies of Pierce County, that those who should come after them might live in a land of plenty and modern conveniences. It is written that the record of their hardships and achievements might be preserved and the results better exemplified. THE AUTHOR. BRIEF STATE HISTORY. **.^k AKOTA is an Indian name and signifies "confederated" or ''leagued together," and applied .Jr" originally to the Sioux confederation of Indians. The present state of North Dakota, together with that of South Dakota, was a part of the territory purchased in 1803 from France by President Thomas Jefferson, for the sum of fifteen million dollars and the assumption of certain claims held by citizens of the United States against France, which m.ide the purchase amount to twenty-seven million, two hundred and sixty-seven thousand, six hundred and twenty-one dollars and ninety- eight cents ($27,207,021.98), and was known as the Louisiana purchase. The bill incorporating the present States of North and South Dakota as Dakota Territory was signed by President Buchanan on March 2d, 1801. On May 27th, thereafter, President Lincoln appointed Dr. William Jayne, of Springfield, 111., as the first governor of Dakota Territory. The employes of various fur companies were the first white settlers of the Territory of Dakota. As early as 1808 the government established Fort Clark on the Missouri, at the mouth of the Knife river—a point about seven miles up the river where Lewis and Clark had in 1804-05 spent the winter and established what they called Fort Mandan. In 1811 Lord Selkirk built a a fort at Pembina on the Red River a short distance below the international boundary line. Fort 8 SOUVENIR HISTORY Pierre was built in 1829, and the first steamer ascended the Missouri River in 1830. In 1839 I.M'11. John C. Fremont crossed over the country from the Missouri to the James rivers, thence across the country to Devils Lake. Cotlin, the famous Indian painter, whose collection, the largest in the world, of pictures of noted Indian chiefs—now owned by the Government and on exhibit in the National Museum at Washington—traveled over the country in 1841. A majority of these pictures were painted from sittings in life. Capt. Pope's map of a trip to the Red River in 1849, and which is now on file in the war department at Washington, designates all the country around Devils Lake as a "salt water region," and Lieutenant Warner, who explored the "Dacotah" country under the direction of the Government in 1855, said the Territory was occupied by powerful tribes of roving savages and "is only adapted to a mode of life like theirs." Governor William Jayne arrived at Yankton, which was designated in the act organizing the Territory of Dakota, as the Territorial Capital, on May 27, 1801, and proceeded to the organization of a Territorial Government. Yankton remained the capital from that date until the second day of June, 1883, when it was removed from Yankton to Bismarck, which remained the Territorial Capital until the formation of the States of North and South Dakota. The Territorial Legislature passed an act in 1883 providing for the removal of the Territorial Capital from Yankton to a point designated by commissioners appointed for the location of the new capital. The following persons were appointed .as such commissioners, viz: Alexander McKenzie, Milo W. Scott, Burleigh P. Spalding, Charles II. Myers, George A. Matthews, Alexander Hughes, Henry 11- PIERCE COUNTY, N. D. Delong, John P. Belding and M\ D. Thompson The capital commission, at a session held in the city of Fargo, on the second day of June, 1883, located the Territorial Capital at Bismarck. The act provided that $100,000 and 100 acres of land should be donated to the State for Capitol purposes as a condition of the location of the seat of government. The citizens of Bismarck by voluntary subscription contributed 1100,000 and 320 acres of land. A bill known as the "omnibus bill" and which was an act dividing the Territory of Dakota into the States of North and South Dakota, and enabling the two Dakotas to formulate Constitutions, was approved February 22, 1889, and a constitutional convention was held at Bismarck, beginning July 4, 1889. A Constitution was formulated and submitted to a vote of the people of the State of North Dakota at an election called for that purpose, and to elect State Officers, October 1, 1889, There were 24,440 votes cast for and 8,107 against the adoption of the Constitution. The population of the State, according to the United States census, in 1870 was 2.405; in 1880 it was 30,909; in 1890 it was 182,719, and in 1900 it had increased to 319,140. " At present the population is estimated to be over 500,000. North Dakota has gained in population over four hundred thousand, or approximately twelve hundred per cent during the past twenty-four years and nearly two hundred per cent since it was admitted to Statehood. Altitudes in North Dakota range from 735 feet above the sea level at Pembina, to 2,577 at 10 SOUVENIR HISTORY Belfield. These are railroad levels and some of the Buttes in the western part of the state are several hundred feet higher. North Dakota has an area of 70,172 square miles and nearly 4,000 miles of railroad in active operation, with many new extensions and lines to be built this year. The assessed valuation of real and personal property of North Dakota—about twenty per cent of its actual value—is, approximately $155,000,000, and its actual wealth is nearing the billion dollar mark, without including its immensely valuable but undeveloped beds of lignite coal. TOPOGRAPHICAL FEATURES. Topographically North Dakota is a favored land. Comparatively a very small portion of its area of seventy thousand square miles is waste land. At a conservative estimate, ninety-five per cent of the total area is susceptible of cultivation and improvement Extending for a distance of twenty-five to thirty miles westward from its eastern boundary line its eastern portion comprises the western half of the great Red River Valley, too widely known and advertised to need any description. Scattered all over this interior section are hundreds of small lakes, ranging from a few acres to several square miles in extent The prominent feature of PIERCE COIBN 1'V, N. D. li this section topographically is Devils Lake, a very irregular shaped body of water some thirty miles in length and from one mile to ten miles it width. In this section also there are quite a number of hills or buttes rising to a height of several hundred feet above the surrounding territory. In the central northern portion of the State and extending across the international boundary line are the Turtle Mountains, which cover an area of nearly a thousand square miles and in genaral contour is somewhat in the form of a huge turtle. West of the Turtle Mountains is the Souris or Mouse Uiver and its tributaries, draining an area of many thousand miles in extent The Souris River enters the .State from the Territory of Assiniboia in Canada, and after crossing the State for a distance of a hundred miles or more, returns to the north and then north west, and .again entering Canada, finds its way eventually to the Hudson Bay. The Missouri River, entering the State about one hundred miles from its northwester,, corner, has a general southeastern course through the State into South Dakota The entire western portion of the State is drained by the Missouri and its tributaries, the most prominent of which, within the State, are the Yellowstone, Little Missouri, Cannon Ball and Knife Rivers. The Missouri has a deep valley from two or three miles to a dozen miles in width several hundred feet below the land on either side. The northwestern corner of the State is essentially a tableland, known as the Coteau du Missouri, and is quite broken and irregular in contour. The southwestern portion is also very irregular in contour and is varied by numerous precipitous buttes, rising 12 SOUVENIR HISTORY hundreds of feet above the surrounding country. The eastern portion of the State may be characterized as the greatest grain growing section of the country in the northwest, the central portion as an unequalled and rapidly developing diversified farming and stock growing section, and the extreme western portion as the great stock raising and mixed farming section of the State. We have no apologies to offer for the climate. It does not need any. As a matter of fact, North Dakota has a little the best climate of any State in the Union. North Dakota's climate is cold. We are frank to admit—colder than Arizona North Dakota's climate is warm, we might also admit—warmer than the great Canadian domain to the north of us. This State is in the same latitude as Northern Minnesota, Northern Wisconsin, Northern Michigan, Northern Maine. It is the same latitude as Montana, Northern Idaho and Washington. Its climate is incomparably more desirable than any of the sections above referred to, unless it is the western portion of Northern Minnesota, immediately contiguous to this State on the east, from the fact that it is drier than the climate of any of these States and the objectionable cold of North Dakota is much less severe than any of the States mentioned to the east of North Dakota, superior to that of Montana, Idaho and Eastern Washington, by reason of altitude, and superior to Western Washington because of its proverbial winter dampness.