South Dakota
Contents of memorial to mountain man Hugh Glass revealed at Neihardt event • South Dakota Searchlight
WAYNE, Nebraska — A “reveal” of what a Nebraska poet hid inside a lonely monument a century ago revealed more of what Mother Nature could wreck over the span of 100 years.
On Saturday, descendants of John Neihardt revealed what they’d found inside an “altar to courage” that the poet and members of a fan club from what’s now Wayne State College planted in the rocky soil of northwestern South Dakota in 1923.
The homemade, concrete monument memorialized the courage of mountain man Hugh Glass, who was left for dead in August 1823 after being mauled by a grizzly bear but then crawled and limped 200 miles to get help.
Neihardt challenged students from Wayne State (then Nebraska Normal College) to return in 100 years to rededicate and open a time capsule he buried within the monument, which he said contained an “original manuscript.”
Drilled, chiseled into monument
His family carefully drilled and chiseled into the thigh-high monument last October after removing it from its location near Lemmon, South Dakota, where Glass was mauled.
But on Saturday they revealed that what they could retrieve from inside were still-wet fragments of a special Neihardt edition of a student newspaper, The Goldenrod, as well as pieces of Neihardt’s book containing his epic poem describing the heroic crawl, “The Song of Hugh Glass.”
Coralie Hughes, a granddaughter of Neihardt, said that despite the lack of a new work from Nebraska’s “poet laureate in perpetuity,” the family had accomplished its goal of fulfilling the “challenge” to open up the time capsule and not destroying the monument in the process.
“I was hoping for a personal note to the world from my grandfather,” Hughes said. “Maybe he did (leave one) because a lot of what we found was unintelligible.”
The paper fragments, when found inside a tin box imbedded in the concrete, were still wet, which she said may have been the result of several times when the monument was flooded.
The monument was originally built on dry, private ranch land near the confluence of two forks of the Grand River, but it ended up on the banks of a federal reservoir that flooded at least four times since 1953.
Hughes said the family was told by the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, which owns the reservoir, that the monument had to be moved if it was to be breached.
She said the family proceeded gingerly in drilling into the monument so as not to destroy it. The first thing to be discovered— using a snake-like video camera — were fragments of a pop bottle that contained a letter from two newlyweds— J.T. and Myrtle Young of Lincoln — who arrived too late to sign a document Neihardt said was signed by those present and placed inside a tin box.
The Neihardt family decided against trying to retrieve the glass fragments or trying to dig out all the paper fragments inside the embedded tin box for fear of destroying the monument, which was relocated to the John Neihardt State Historic Site in Bancroft, Nebraska.
Some papers remain inside the tin box, Hughes said, but they are just “crumbling” pieces.
“We didn’t want to keep going,” said Alexis Petri of Kansas City, who produced a short documentary on the family’s work to retrieve the monument.
Her documentary and the “reveal” were presented Saturday at the annual spring conference of the Neihardt Foundation held at Wayne State College. Neihardt graduated from the school, then called Nebraska Normal College, at age 15.
‘Wonderful to see something tangible’
The event focused on the saga of the almost forgotten monument, the taking up of the challenge by Wayne State professor Joseph Weixelman and his class to rededicate the monument and the eventual decision to relocate the monument to Nebraska.
Mary McDermott, who drove from Holdrege with her daughter to view the final chapter in the mystery of the monument, betrayed no disappointment that some rare manuscript wasn’t found.
“It’s wonderful to see something tangible from 100 years ago,” she said.
“I’m impressed that there was something still there,” said her daughter Alizabeth.
Marianne Reynolds, the executive director of the Neihardt Center, said the fragments retrieved would be sent to the Ford Conservation Center in Omaha for further analysis.
After that, she said, they would be put on display at the center in Bancroft. A kiosk is envisioned so that visitors can play the documentary produced by Petri, Reynolds added.
South Dakota
New list rates the most bipartisan members of Congress—and the least • South Dakota Searchlight
WASHINGTON — Maine Republican Sen. Susan Collins and Pennsylvania Republican Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick were the most bipartisan members of Congress last year, according to a newly released analysis from the Lugar Center and the McCourt School of Public Policy at Georgetown University.
The least bipartisan House lawmaker was Ohio Republican Jim Jordan, while Alabama’s Katie Britt, a Republican freshman, placed last among senators.
No member of South Dakota’s all-Republican, three-member congressional delegation ranked in the top 10 of either chamber, but all three were in the top half of the rankings. Sen. Mike Rounds ranked 20th in the 100-member Senate, and Sen. John Thune ranked 42nd. Rep. Dusty Johnson ranked 106th in the 435-member House.
The latest ranking of the most bipartisan lawmakers comes amid one of the least productive Congresses in the nation’s history and just months before nearly all House lawmakers and about one-third of the Senate face voters at the polls in November.
Maria Cancian, dean of the McCourt School of Public Policy, wrote in a statement announcing the new rankings that “while there is much room for improvement, I am encouraged to see some progress on cross-party collaboration.”
“In these deeply divided times, and with an increasing amount of misleading information online, we need tools like the Bipartisan Index more than ever — an evidence-based and nonpartisan approach for measuring how well policymakers work across the aisle to get things done,” Cancian wrote.
Lugar Center Policy Director Dan Diller wrote that it was “especially disheartening that all eight new Senators who took office in January 2023 ranked in the bottom 30 percent of Senate scores.”
“Bipartisan cooperation on legislation in 2023 was deficient by historical standards, though there were some marginal improvements in scores from the previous Congress,” Diller wrote.
The website with the rankings states that the “Bipartisan Index is intended to fill a hole in the information available to the public about the performance of Members of Congress.”
The Lugar Center, founded by the late U.S. Sen. Richard Lugar, a Republican from Indiana, “is a platform for informed debate and analysis of global issues, including nonproliferation of weapons of mass destruction, global food security, foreign assistance effectiveness and global development, energy security, and enhancing bipartisan governance,” according to its website.
The rankings take into consideration “the frequency with which a member of Congress sponsors bills that are co-sponsored by at least one member of the opposing party” and “the frequency with which a member co-sponsors bills introduced by members of the opposite Party.”
Who is the most bipartisan?
The top 10 senators were:
- Collins
- Michigan Democrat Gary Peters
- New Hampshire Democrat Maggie Hassan
- West Virginia Democrat Joe Manchin
- Texas Republican John Cornyn
- Nevada Democrat Jacky Rosen
- Alaska Republican Lisa Murkowski
- Kansas Republican Jerry Moran
- Indiana Republican Todd Young
- Montana Democrat Jon Tester
The top 10 House lawmakers were:
- Fitzpatrick
- New York Republican Marcus Molinaro
- New Hampshire Democrat Chris Pappas
- New York Republican Mike Lawler
- North Carolina Democrat Don Davis
- Puerto Rico Republican Delegate Jenniffer González-Colón
- Nevada Democrat Susie Lee
- Nebraska Republican Don Bacon
- New Jersey Democrat Josh Gottheimer
- Iowa Republican Zach Nunn
The Lugar Center and the McCourt School of Public Policy at Georgetown University wrote on their website that their “aim in publishing this Index is not to promote a specific legislative agenda, as is the case for many indexes, but solely the promotion of a bipartisan approach to governance.”
“The credibility of the Index is derived from the objectivity of its methodology; Index scores are computed formulaically from publically available data,” it states. “The Index requires no subjective assessment of specific legislative items.”
The least bipartisan House lawmakers following Jordan were New York Democrat Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Missouri Democrat Cori Bush, New York Democrat Jamaal Bowman and Missouri Republican Eric Burlison.
House Speaker Mike Johnson, a Louisiana Republican, ranked 423, but will likely be excluded from future scores since he has now occupied one of the top two leadership posts for at least six months.
The least bipartisan senators following Britt were Missouri Republican Eric Schmitt, Washington state Democrat Patty Murray, Wisconsin Republican Ron Johnson and Arkansas Republican Tom Cotton.
GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX
RAPID CITY, S.D. (KOTA) – Last year EMS in Rapid City responded to more than thirteen thousand calls, but what about times when someone didn’t need a full ambulance? That’s where mobile medic comes into play.
The program was created in 2013 but didn’t have its first active mobile unit until 2016.
“To have senior individuals who knew the streets. Who were out and could insert themselves out in the community versus taking a fire engine and an ambulance out of a fire station. Leaving those resources available for higher acuity emergencies,” said Ryan Marcks, captain of the Rapid City Fire Department’s mobile medic program.
The unit consists of a group of senior paramedics who go around town, focusing on underserved communities, and providing medical services to anyone in need to prevent 9-1-1 calls.
Marcks says it is a unique program.
“We’re the only program of its sort within the state of South Dakota. The next closest program is in Denver which is different than ours. Everyone focuses on the needs of the community,” said Marcks.
Marcks added the program is also cost-effective.
“It’s a cost savings for the taxpayers. Instead of sending an ambulance and a fire engine to an unknown problem, we can send a highly trained paramedic with the same equipment to that situation and get there before anyone else,” said Marcks.
Marcks says he and his team, during a regular shift, will encounter everything from someone being intoxicated to life-and-death situations where someone isn’t breathing. He added the job is rewarding.
“Knowing that, after I have left this planet, something I’ve done has made a lasting difference. That’s, it’s a good feeling. We work very closely with the Police department and all city entities. We all work very very well together towards a common goal,” said Marcks.
See a spelling or grammatical error in our story? Please click here to report it.
Do you have a photo or video of a breaking news story? Send it to us here with a brief description.
Copyright 2024 KOTA. All rights reserved.
South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem has been banned by two more tribes, leaving her unable to enter 20% of her state.
Six tribes total have now barred her from their reservations, with the Yankton Sioux Tribe and the Sisseton-Wahpeton Oyate Tribe voting last week to invoke their sovereign right to exclude her from their lands.
They joined the Oglala, Rosebud, Cheyenne River and Standing Rock Sioux tribes, which banned her earlier this year. Three tribes in the state who have not yet done so.
Noem has been trash-talking Indigenous Peoples and reservation life, alleging publicly that tribal leaders were neglecting children and the poor in favor of catering to drug cartels on their reservations.
“We’ve got some tribal leaders that I believe are personally benefiting from the cartels being there, and that’s why they attack me every day,” Noem said at a March forum. “But I’m going to fight for the people who actually live in those situations, who call me and text me every day.”
While reservations have been seeking solutions to crime problems, tribal leaders were stunned at her accusations.
“How dare the governor allege that Sioux Tribal Councils do not care about their communities or their children and, worse, that they are involved in nefarious activities?” Oglala Sioux Tribe President Frank Star Comes Out said in April.
The Sisseton Wahpeton Oyate Tribe said Noem was banned for statements and actions deemed “injurious to the parents of tribal children,” KELO-TV reported.
Also offensive to tribes is Noem’s desire to send razor wire and security personnel to Texas to stop migrants from trying to cross into the U.S. from Mexico.
The governor was already facing criticism revealing in her memoir that she shot a 14-month-old puppy for misbehaving, along with a “disgusting, musky, rancid” goat her family owned. She detailed the killings in her memoir released last Tuesday, describing how wirehair pointer Cricket got the death penalty for being aggressive and untrainable.
With News Wire Services
Indiana basketball’s Kel’el Ware feels Mike Woodson prepared him for NBA success
President Biden approves Presidential Major Disaster Declaration for parts of Iowa after storms
People Magazine names Topeka’s The Weather Room as the most beautiful restaurant in Kansas
Kentucky Gains Commitment From Winter Juniors Qualifier Charlotte Driesse (2025)
Louisiana House committee advances bill to ban consumable THC products
See it: Tesla crashes into Columbus convention center at 70 mph
Colorado Rockies game no. 116 thread: Zac Gallen vs José Ureña
Fox News Politics: Georgia the whole day through
Death of missing Oregon girl found in stream ruled homicide
At least 2 dead as tornadoes hit Alabama, damage homes across Southeast
Speaker Johnson rips 'atrocities' against Trump at Manhattan hush money trial
The Take: What’s behind Georgia’s ‘foreign agents’ protests?
Despite state bans, abortions nationwide are up, driven by telehealth
White House walks diplomatic tightrope on Israel amid contradictory messaging: 'You can't have it both ways'
Pro-Palestinian university students in the Netherlands uphold protest
-
Politics1 week agoHouse Dems seeking re-election seemingly reverse course, call on Biden to 'bring order to the southern border'
-
Politics1 week agoAnti-Israel groups accuse Chicago, DNC of trying to ‘protect’ Biden from protests at 2024 Dem convention
-
World1 week agoSpain and Argentina trade jibes in row before visit by President Milei
-
World1 week agoGerman socialist candidate attacked before EU elections
-
Politics1 week agoFetterman says anti-Israel campus protests ‘working against peace' in Middle East, not putting hostages first
-
News1 week agoUS man diagnosed with brain damage after allegedly being pushed into lake
-
World1 week agoGaza ceasefire talks at crucial stage as Hamas delegation leaves Cairo
-
Politics1 week agoRepublicans believe college campus chaos works in their favor