| Summary: | Governor's State of the State Address, January 1989 1899 "I congratulate you, gentlemen, and through you I congratulate the entire Slate, on the prosperity which during the past several years lias blessed our broad domain and rewarded, the patience, industry and enterprise of our people. The suffering of the pioneer has been turned to joy; the struggle with untamed nature has at last borne fruitage. " --Governor Frederick Fancher NORTH DAKOTA CELEBRATES A HERITAGE Two months and ninety-nine years ago, President Benjamin Harrison signed a proclamation giving birth to our state, North Dakota. Before that, since 1861, this land had been part of Dakota Territory. The new North Dakota Centennial Blue Book provides an excellent, concise history of the land we love. That history was written by the late Larry Remele of the State Historical Society of North Dakota. J recommend that you read it. As the Blue Book indicates, long before statehood, there lived on these prairies a noble Native people. Distinct Indian groups were here when the first White explorers arrived. These were the Dakota or Lakota nation (called Sioux by those who feared them), Assiniboine, Cheyenne, Mandan, Hidatsa and Arikara. Later arrivals included groups of Chippewa (or Ojibwa), with Cree, Blackfeet and Crow frequenting western buffalo ranges. Contact between the Indians and the Euro-Americans was largely peaceful. But, in many ways the arrival of the White Man brought controversy and tragedy. The Indian people experienced hardship, and their culture was forever changed. Like the Native people before them, the pioneers who settled Dakota Territory and later the infant state of North Dakota were also faced with hardship. Dakota's first Legislative Assembly, on November 20, 1889. Governor Miller said: "Our undeveloped resources of wealth are beyond computation, and far exceed the most sanguine hopes. The judicious application of that capital which such resources must attract, intelligently and harmoniously cooperating with the tireless energies of our people, cannot fail to work out for the new state of North Dakota a grand destiny." Our young state enjoyed a period of growth and development. Much of the expansion paralleled the completion of the railroads. Later, as the Blue Book indicates, an economic depression started with the 1920 collapse of wartime prices for grain. Farmers went broke. A short time later, during the Great Depression of the 1930s, heavy farm debt loads and low commodity prices caused a crisis of farm foreclosures and bank failures. Following decades of relative prosperity, farm prices in the late 1970s again fell, after many farmers had expanded their operations and gone deeply into debt. More recently, we have been hit by a decline in oil prices, followed by the devastation of last summer's drought. As we pause during this Centennial year to review our history, we can't help but recognize that times of economic difficulty have brought progress through change. But there has always been a high level of optimism about the future of this prairie land. North Dakota's first governor, John Miller, envisioned a grand destiny when he addressed North Since statehood, we have seen an evolution in the structure of our government. We have seen change in political movements. We have seen change in every area of our society. Through change has come progress. Page 2
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