North Dakota - Discover the Spirit

Wednesday, the 16th, we visited my birthplace - Litchville, N. Dak. My father was pastor of a Reformed Church there from 1950 - 1957. Since I was barely six when we moved away, my memories of the tiny town of 200 ("More or less" as the town sign says) are sketchy at best. It didn't take a long time, however, to just drive around until we found the church and parsonage on the edge of the village. Amazingly, they looked about the same to me - even the inside of the church, although the little partitioned Sunday School room in the basement that I remember was no longer there. The three-story school building a  couple of blocks away looked very much the same, too,  minus the tubular fire escape on one side.

Stream & foot bridge - L. Yellowstone

Not far from Litchville is Little Yellowstone Park, an occasional picnic spot for my family when we lived in the area. The small stream that gurgles through the shady park provided a wading spot on hot days, but at home in Michigan, I have a little black and white photo taken of me when I was about 2 years old, at Little Yellowstone, wearing a camel hair coat. We must also have gone there 60 years ago on days when it was as chilly as it was this time. 

Pyramid Hill near Fort Ransom -
Built by ancient Tewackonians??
A Viking statue sits atop -
 not so ancient.

    Our campsite that night was at Fort Ransom State Park, 15 miles or so from Litchville. It's a small campground and we had our choice of sites since we were the only campers there. We chose the site nearest the Sheyenne River with still-red sumac growing nearby. Surprise find --- a working pay phone on the campground community board. The campground is named for the cavalry fort that existed nearby for a few years in the late 1870s.
     The landscape in central North Dakota in mid-October is an orchestra of monotones: straw -colored corn, grayed-out rusty oak leaves, grasses in ditches and wetlands in shades of brown, sienna, and tinges of red. The beauty of the landscape lies in its peaceful sameness.