The Official Newspaper for Foster County

Articles written by Marvin Baker


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  • Upside Down Under: North Fargo's population boom...

    Marvin Baker|Dec 9, 2024

    We all know that Fargo is the state’s largest city and has been most likely throughout the state’s history. But now, we’re beginning to see that Fargo is larger than we think. The most recent population estimate puts the city of Fargo at 133,000. When the 2020 census was taken, the population was around about 125,000. So it has grown quickly in four years. But that’s not all. When we look at the Fargo metro, especially the city of West Fargo, we’re finding it’s making its way as a principal m...

  • Upside Down Under: North Dakota's film industry...

    Marvin Baker|Dec 2, 2024

    You probably know by now there’s a new movie coming out in late January called “Trapped,” that was filmed in North Dakota. It’s about sex trafficking and happened to be filmed in Linton. There have been several news reports about this movie and the director was recently interviewed on TV, but the segment didn’t specify whether the trafficking was happening in Linton or whether this was a starting point for the film. Regardless, it’s most likely going to be a good movie to watch and bring aware...

  • Upside Down Under: What's with the word salad?...

    Marvin Baker|Nov 25, 2024

    With November being high school football playoff time in North Dakota, there’s been a lot of talk about the teams that have gone through their respective divisions and onto the Dakota Bowl. As many of us know, high school football has been re-aligned again and there are actually six divisions of North Dakota high school football. They include AAA, AA, A, 9-man, 6-man and independent. And after looking at every team in every division, there are hyphenated community teams almost everywhere. S...

  • Upside Down Under: This might surprise you...

    Marvin Baker|Nov 18, 2024

    When we talk about immigrants in North Dakota, we’re often referring to people who came here in the late 1800s from Norway, Germany, England and Russia. Most of us today are descendants of those immigrants and we maintain that proud ancestry through festivals such as Norsk Høstfest in Minot, Sauerkraut Day in Wishek and the Ukrainian Festival in Dickinson. According to U.S. Census data, 40 percent of us are of German descent while 30.8 percent of us are Norwegian. The remaining 30 percent ar...

  • Upside Down Under: What an honor...

    Marvin Baker|Nov 11, 2024

    Often times we focus on the negative and how nothing seems to go right. Instead, we should always try to think of the glass as half full rather than half empty. Sometimes good things do happen to us, but we tend to live in the moment then forget about it. An event like that happened to me a couple of weeks ago and I want to share it with readers. I was invited to spend a morning with the staff at the Mystician, the Bismarck State College newspaper. When I got there, I met editor-in-chief Kayden...

  • Upside Down Under: Annoying and creepy...

    Marvin Baker|Nov 4, 2024

    There’s no doubt we’re having a mild autumn thus far. How many times do we go into the second half of October with overnight temperatures remaining above freezing or just barely freezing? And daytime highs, on select days of course, have been “hot” for this time of year, especially when the sun is shining. We’ll take it, right? We love an extended summer here on the northern Great Plains. But, there’s one problem with this scenario. On sunny days we see box elder bugs plastered on the sides o...

  • Upside Down Under: A euphoric feeling...

    Marvin Baker|Oct 28, 2024

    It isn’t often that journalists write about themselves, but in this case, it seems timely and necessary to describe something I’ve dealt with the past 6 1/2 years. On Friday morning the urology staff at Mayo Clinic declared me cancer free, and I’ve been switched to an annual checkup after three-month, then four-month and finally six-month visits. After getting that news, I wasn’t sure my mind or body could be that relaxed. I didn’t want to go dancing in the streets, but the relief was incredible...

  • Upside Down Under: A life well lived...

    Marvin Baker|Oct 21, 2024

    As I write this article, the family of Jim Hillestad was preparing for his funeral that actually took place the afternoon of Oct. 9. Normally this weekly article doesn’t focus on something like the death of someone or their funeral. It’s most often the opposite of that and is geared toward optimism, but in this case, I feel compelled to recognize Mr. Hillestad in this forum. Jim was no ordinary individual for a lot of reasons, most notably he was 104 years old when he passed away on Oct. 2. Sec...

  • Upside Down Under: An impressive lineup...

    Marvin Baker|Oct 14, 2024

    Two weeks ago I was at Bismarck State College for an event and it had been 38 years since I was on campus. It has changed drastically, but it was fun to be back there if only for a few hours. When it was my time to speak, I started with asking a question. “How many of you are Bismarck High School graduates?” Approximately 10 people raised their hands of the roughly 60 in attendance. Then I asked them if they know who Weston Dressler is? They all said they at least recognized his name. Unf...

  • Upside Down Under: Invasion of the animals...

    Marvin Baker|Oct 7, 2024

    Just about anywhere in the state of North Dakota, there have been reports in recent years of unusual animal sightings. These are animals that through recent history, at least, haven’t been seen in the state. But from 2000 on, numerous witnesses have come forward to tell their stories of what they may have seen. • First of all, moose are not uncommon to North Dakota. They’ve always been along the northern tier of counties, most generally in the Turtle Mountains near Bottineau and in the Pembi...

  • Upside Down Under: To think they're volunteers...

    Marvin Baker|Sep 30, 2024

    Sept. 14 was an unusual day in our little Ward County community of Carpio. It marked only the third time there had been a parade there in the past 20 years. This time it was the fire department’s parade. The local first responders were celebrating 75 years as a fire department and as a spectator looking on, it was impressive. The Carpio department brought out all the big guns, but that wasn’t all. Donnybrook, Tolley, Burlington, Berthold and Minot Rural fire departments were all involved, hel...

  • Upside Down Under: Vermont's got nothing on us...

    Marvin Baker|Sep 23, 2024

    You may have noticed the leaves on the trees in your back yard beginning to change color. And as we go later into September, that foliage is becoming more intense and looks stunning. Granted, North Dakota doesn't have forests like other places do, so you can't just drive down a road and see what those in New England might see. But you can drive to certain places and see the same thing that is happening in Vermont, New Hamp-shire and New York, as well as parts of Michigan, Wisconsin and...

  • Upside Down Under: Norsk Høstfest is a foodie's paradise…

    Marvin Baker|Sep 16, 2024

    The festival coming up in Minot that celebrates all things Scandinavian is a lot more than just a party to celebrate Norwegian heritage. If you’ve never been there, you’re missing out on some of the best food you’ll ever taste. Numerous vendors have food items as you walk through the halls, but the Høstfest brings chefs in from Norway and Iceland to prepare signature dishes from those countries. It’s a foodie’s paradise. If you don’t go there for any other reason, go for the food. We often tal...

  • Upside Down Under: Growing vegetables in North Dakota...

    Marvin Baker|Sep 9, 2024

    Several weeks ago I was asked to give a presentation to a Christian women’s group about growing vegetables in North Dakota as well as talk about farmers’ markets and how they operate. It was a bit surprising to learn that many people in this group weren’t aware of what is happening in this emerging industry. Growing vegetables and taking them to market is much like operating a grain farm. Almost always, however, vegetable farms are smaller acreages. And, unlike grain farms, there is no elevator...

  • Upside Down Under: Haunted North Dakota...

    Marvin Baker|Sep 2, 2024

    We’ve all heard the creepy, campfire stories that scare us out of our wits. But there are actually documented accounts of the unexplained happening in various parts of our state. You can choose to believe it or not, but the people who tell these stories are quite serious. For instance, during Prohibition, tunnels underneath Minot were basically a haven for bootlegged booze and speakeasies. There was also crime in those tunnels because there was a lot of money changing hands. It is said that s...

  • Upside Down Under: Bismarck's metamorphosis...

    Marvin Baker|Aug 26, 2024

    I’m sure we’ve all been in Bismarck at one time or another. But, if you don’t live near Bismarck and don’t get there very often, the next time you do, you’ll most likely notice changes. The city of Bismarck seems to defy just about all of the rest of North Dakota and continues with a robust growth that has now pushed the city to 75,000 in population. I’m sure it doesn’t hurt that the state capitol is located there, but it also sits in a strategic location in North Dakota which makes it a na...

  • Upside Down Under: The best in the West...

    Marvin Baker|Aug 19, 2024

    On July 28, we attended the Medora Musical with our grandchildren. It’s always fun to get away from the monotony of our every-day routines to enjoy some taffy, ice cream and the musical. Since that Sunday night, a number of people have commented about the musical after we told them that we had attended. The first thing that should be mentioned is it’s amazing that there are people here in North Dakota who aren’t aware of the musical. In their defense, their often transplants who have come here...

  • Upside Down Under: What's happening with the dairy industry...

    Marvin Baker|Aug 12, 2024

    A couple of weeks ago KFYR-TV in Bismarck reported North Dakota now has only 29 grade A dairy farms, down from 53 in 2020. That seems unusual given that milk is the official North Dakota beverage. The number of dairy farms has been sinking for many years with no recourse to keep the industry from spiraling out of control. Back in the 1950’s there were thousands of dairy farms in the state. Thousands might be a little misleading because back then, any farm with 10 or more milk cows was c...

  • Upside Down Under: Leonard Peltier in the news again...

    Marvin Baker|Aug 5, 2024

    It seems like it’s been a long time, but Leonard Peltier is back in the spotlight for a couple of reasons. Peltier, a member of the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa, who is now 79, is serving two consecutive life sentences in a Florida prison for his role in a 1975 shootout on the Pine Ridge Reservation that left two federal agents dead. First of all, he was recently denied parole from the prison that is approximately 70 miles northeast of Tampa. He has now been in prison for more than 29 y...

  • Upside Down Under: North Dakota Olympians...

    Marvin Baker|Jul 29, 2024

    As the Olympics are beginning in Paris, there’s some interesting information that many people may not be aware of even though they may be sports fans. This is the third time since the modern Olympics began in Athens, Greece in 1896, that Paris will be the host city. The games were also held there in 1900 and 1924. It is also one of only three cities anywhere in the world to host the games three times. The others being Los Angeles and London. A total of 206 nations are represented at this y...

  • Upside Down Under: Where is the customer service?

    Marvin Baker|Jul 22, 2024

    There’s been a lot of chatter lately on social media about lack of customer service. It seems it doesn’t matter if it’s retail, wholesale, the service industry or even medical clinics. Why is this happening? The easy answer that has become a cliche is everybody is short staffed. Employees get stressed out when they are overworked. I get that. It’s happened to me numerous times in my career. But this seems to be happening to a lot of people “customers” and they aren’t happy about it. Yes, I’ve...

  • Upside Down Under: The highways are changing...

    Marvin Baker|Jul 15, 2024

    Have you ever heard of Interstate 27? It’s a freeway that currently runs north/south entirely in the state of Texas, from Amarillo to Lubbock. The length of 1-27 is 124 miles, but is about to change in a big way. An number of media, especially those in Bismarck, have been reporting that I-27 will be running through western North Dakota, from Bowman in the south, to Plentywood, Mont., in the north. In effect, U.S. Highway 85 is going to become I-27. It will also run through western South D...

  • Upside Down Under: Who is the most famous North Dakotan?

    Marvin Baker|Jul 8, 2024

    Lately, there have been a number of lists that have surfaced about who the most famous North Dakotan may be. There are several separate lists from Sports Illustrated to Forbes, but one thing is clear, on every list except for one outlier, the No. 1 person is the same – Josh Duhamel. Duhamel was born in Minot. His ancestry is German, and smaller amounts of Norwegian, French-Canadian, English, Irish, and Austrian (his last name is very common among Francophones in the world). Duhamel is an a...

  • Upside Down Under: Does polygamy exist in North Dakota?

    Marvin Baker|Jul 1, 2024

    A year ago Heber Jeffs was sentenced to five years in a Piute County, Utah court for first degree felony kidnapping of a 10-year-old girl he previously had in his care. When the girl’s mother sought to take her child back, Jeffs refused and fled Utah. He was later arrested in Minot, then extradited to Utah to face charges. Jeffs is the son of Warren Jeffs, the imprisoned leader of the polygamist Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. It was apparently a revelation from t...

  • Upside Down Under: Sask Power selects Estevan...

    Marvin Baker|Jun 24, 2024

    There was some new information that came out last week regarding the implementation of nuclear energy in Saskatchewan. Sask Power released a statement saying it has made significant progress in its search for a host site for the province’s first Small Modular Reactor facility and it is seriously close to the North Dakota border. The SMR is actually a small nuclear reactor and after studying this for at least four years, Sask Power has whittled it down to two sites, both near Estevan, Boundary D...

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