Theodore Roosevelt Presidential Library reaches final stages of construction

MEDORA, N.D. — The Theodore Roosevelt Presidential Library (TRPL) in Medora, North Dakota, is in its final stages of construction and is expected to finish in time for the grand opening on July 4.

Roughly 100,000 square feet and sitting on 93 acres outside of Medora, the TRPL has been under construction since the summer of 2023. It has been a long journey for the TRPL team to get where they are now. Getting the project off the ground has involved many steps throughout the years: choosing architecture firm Snøhetta in 2020 to design the library, getting approval from Congress later that year to acquire the land and finalizing the purchase in 2022. The library is expected to be finished no earlier and no later than the current deadline.

“We will be squeaking into the deadline,” said Jenn Carroll, director of facilities, grounds and sustainability at the TRPL. “We’ll be working right up until the very end.”

Construction of the library is almost complete with workers already starting to polish the floors to the entrance of the TRPL’s west building. The library will be split into two halves: an east building and a west building connected together by a roof. The east building will house the employee offices, classrooms for visiting students on field trips, and an auditorium that meets all the requirements to host a presidential debate. The TRPL team hopes that a presidential debate will take place there in 2028, but until then they’re excited to invite children from across the state to visit.

“We have a goal of getting every fourth grader in North Dakota out to visit the library,” said Marcie Woehl, manager of public programs and education at the TRPL.

The west building will be where the museum portion of the library will be. Part of the space will be a more traditional exhibit section detailing former president Theodore Roosevelt’s life along with experiential galleries meant to immerse visitors in specific moments. The latter will include a full-scale model of Elkhorn Ranch to recreate his time in the Badlands and an obstacle course for visiting children to represent how the children living in the White House at the time turned the attic into their own little playroom.

One of the most important rooms of the museum will be the one showing the reason why Roosevelt decided to live in the Badlands. In a dark room where nothing else is displayed, visitors will be able to see the journal that Roosevelt kept and the entry he wrote the day that both his mother and wife died. Having been kept away from the public at the Library of Congress, this will be the first time the journal has ever been on public display.

Woehl said that she’s looking forward to that room specifically.

“That’s definitely one of my favorite components because it’s so representative of T.R.,” she said. “It recreates the feelings he was working through.”

Roosevelt’s journal will be one of many artifacts that the library is gathering from organizations such as the Smithsonian, Library of Congress, and National Park Service. Yet, the TRPL will not only be important for its role in teaching history. The TRPL team has emphasized that they want the library to be sustainable and make a contribution to preserving the environment. Above the parking lot are canopies with solar panels and below are geothermal wells. Together, they produce more energy than the library will need to function, allowing the TRPL to feed extra electricity back into the grid.

Dorvall Bedford / The Dickinson Press

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Even the roof will contribute to preserving the environment. The library will have a walk-able green roof planted with native flora, which involved six years of people gathering the plants and propagating the seeds, according to JE Dunn Construction vice president Marc Mellmer.

Preserving the Badlands is something that the TRPL team takes pride in.

“It’s going to be one of those places that is breathtaking to be at when all of this is in bloom in the summer,” Marcie Woehl said. “We’re really doing whatever we can to create a better environment across western North Dakota.”

While JE Dunn, a construction company headquartered in Missouri, has been leading the TRPL’s construction, the creation of the library has involved the partnership of other companies local to North Dakota. Among the many contributors include West Dakota Oil, Roughrider Electric Cooperative, Prairie Lumber Company and Dickinson Ready Mix. Mellmer, a Dickinson-native, said it was necessary for JE Dunn to work with local companies since it’s not viable for a single company to dig, pour concrete, do the roofing and accomplish everything else by itself.

“Those days are really gone — almost completely,” Mellmer said. “No construction companies are coming in and doing all of that work themselves anymore.”

“Our pitch to all of the contractors was ‘this is your opportunity to create history,’” Mellmer added. “This is our legacy that will live on for generations to come, and we got to be a part of it.“

Dorvall Bedford / The Dickinson Press

But creating history is no easy task, Mellmer realized. Working on top of the plateau, construction workers had to deal with wind, rain, mud, snow, extreme cold and extreme heat. Mellmer worried about the construction every day since the start.

“It’s like you’re building a jewel box in one of the roughest conditions you possibly can,” Mellmer said.

The TRPL team sees the library as an opportunity to bring more traffic to Medora and attention to the region. While Medora might be one of the most popular tourist destinations in North Dakota in the summer, most stores close down in the winter and the town becomes quiet. The TRPL is expected to be a place people can visit in Medora year-round, providing new jobs, a place to eat, and educational opportunities.

“Our vision is that we would have people visiting from around the world,” Carroll said. “We hope to really be an asset to the community moving forward.”

“It’s going to be life changing for so many people,” Woehl added.

With the TRPL nearly reaching completion, staff are looking forward to working in their offices soon. According to sustainability coordinator Addison Olson, the team has worked in trailers and even in a local restaurant over the years. She said: “We’re excited to have our home base finally.”

Woehl, who has been part of the team since September and has been watching the project since 2014, is excited that the countdown to the grand opening is now in the double digits. She’s proud to have played a part in the building of something that she believes will last centuries.

“What a gift, what an honor, it’s so cool,” Woehl said. “How often do you get that privilege in your lifetime?”