Visiting the Cabin Where Crazy Horse Was Killed
Tuesday, August 15 2023
Leaving South Dakota, I drove south to Fort Robinson in Nebraska, the site where the great Oglala leader Crazy Horse died. He was killed unnecessarily on September 5, 1877, at about 33.
- Published in Dispatches from the Road
Jackalopes, Black-Footed Ferrets and Big, Big Sky
Monday, August 14 2023
On Clay’s third day from Bismarck to Vail, he travels through Wall, South Dakota and visits the U.S. National Grasslands Visitor Center and Badlands National Park.
- Published in Dispatches from the Road
A Day With Three Extraordinary Missile Men
Sunday, August 06 2023
I spent the day with three extraordinary men at the Minuteman Missile National Historic Site learning the “on the ground” operations of Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles during the Cold War.
- Published in Dispatches from the Road
A Detour to the Home of American Writer Hamlin Garland
Tuesday, August 01 2023
As I continued my drive and not far into South Dakota, I visited the homestead of the Pulitzer Prize winning author Hamlin Garland.
- Published in Dispatches from the Road
The Forgotten Battle of Whitestone Hill, North Dakota
Monday, July 31 2023
My first stop was the lonely Whitestone Hill, a grass hill in south central, North Dakota. It is the site of the bloodiest battle in North Dakota history in 1863.
- Published in Dispatches from the Road
I Was First in Line To See the New Oppenheimer Film
Monday, July 24 2023
I sat in the theater Friday for three hours and was mesmerized. The film is historically accurate. Oppenheimer is one of the best movies I have ever seen.
- Published in Dispatches from the Road
Sorting Myth From Fact: Can We Truly Know Sacagawea?
Tuesday, July 11 2023
You cannot think about the Lewis and Clark story without trying to come to terms with Sacagawea. She is the most statued woman in American history. And she is one of the two most prominent Native American women in American memory. And yet, to borrow Winston Churchill’s famous description of the Soviet Union, “she is a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma.”
- Published in Dispatches from the Road
Inspiration and Nostalgia on Visiting My Alma Mater — Video Dispatch
Monday, July 10 2023
A short video I recorded recently on the campus of my alma mater, the University of Minnesota. I was a student there in the early 1970s and after class I often found myself at the base of Northrup Auditorium, incised with what I still regard as the perfect mission statement.
- Published in Dispatches from the Road
With the Lewis and Clark Trail Heritage Foundation
Tuesday, July 04 2023
As the editor of the Lewis and Clark quarterly journal, We Proceeded On, I attended the Lewis and Clark Trail Heritage Foundation annual meeting in Missoula at the end of June.
- Published in Dispatches from the Road
Reflections on A Colorado River Journey
Sunday, July 02 2023
Conditions are changing so fast in the Colorado River watershed that it is impossible now to keep up. I write this on April 14, 2023. In two successive days since I returned to North Dakota, my news feed has served up stories on Great Salt Lake.
- Published in Dispatches from the Road