NEWS for North Dakotans
Agriculture Communication, North Dakota State University
7 Morrill Hall, Fargo, ND 58105-5665

June 17, 1999

Tom Isern, Professor of History
North Dakota State University

©1998 Plains Folk

The homogenization of American popular culture, including popular culinary tastes, is Tocqueville's democratic nightmare incarnate. That's one good reason to fight back by celebrating the watering holes and provisioning points—the cafes, drive-ins, and taverns—of the Great Plains of North America. These are local outposts in the defense of regional culture.

The other reason, of course, is that when you travel the Great American Desert, you get thirsty and hungry and sometimes just lonesome. People need to know where to go for food and drink and comfortable surroundings.

That's why I've begun construction on a new Web site, a branch of the Plains Folk Web site, devoted to "Oases of the Great American Desert." This will provide information, photos, and consumer comments about good places across the plains, beginning mainly with ones in North Dakota. This will be nobody's official guide. The criterion for inclusion of an establishment will be that I like it.

"Oases of the Great American Desert" will not carry advertising. It will be purely a public service. I know by experience that the places I like, many readers of this column also will like. I will say that no establishment advertised in national media will appear in "Oases."

A few weeks ago I sent out a column about cafes, drive-ins, and taverns and heard back immediately from several readers. One of them—Susan Stensland of Buffalo, S.D.—advised me it was no use to look for a bar & grill better than the Corner Bar of Camp Crook, because none exists. That may be, but it's the search that keeps life interesting.

"It isn't just the food," Ms. Stensland says. "It's the fine, friendly people in Camp Crook, and Sandra and Lyle Sainsbury. I know all this because I was born and raised in the town, left there almost 50 years ago and just love going back."

Another correspondent, Helen Linhart, tipped me off about a good drive-in: "In Grafton we have a dandy one that has been in business for more years than I can remember. It is called the West Side Drive-In . . . owned by Darren Blanchard.

"I guarantee if you try their hamburgers, hot ham and cheese sandwich or their macaroni salad--you will want to come back for more. None of the shrink-wrapped stuff.

"This is a pleasant place to eat and the short wait for the food is made nicer by the pretty surroundings and the interesting flow of traffic on the highway."

That's Highway 17. The West Side is where you would expect to find it by its name, on the south side of the highway. Which is where I pulled in a week or so ago en route to Winnipeg. I got the Wagon Master (my rule being, always order the burger with the hokey name) and the mac salad. The gal in a T-shirt who brought the food wondered why I was taking her photo. Well, now you know.

And the West Side definitely will go into the "Oases" site. Along with the Corner Cafe in Buffalo, the Prairie Oasis in Cleveland (for the kuchen), the Drumstick in Bismarck, the Pastime in Hettinger, the Pastime in Marmarth (spelled it right that time!), Georgia's and the Owl in Amidon, the German-Hungarian Club in Dickinson, the Tommy Turtle Lanes in Bottineau, the Chieftain in Carrington, the Empress Cafe in Drake, the Office in Watertown, S.D., Willy's in Dilworth, Minn., and the Beer Jug Tavern ("Your Paddlefishing Headquarters") in Glendive, Mont.

And what others? Suggestions welcome if sent to me at Minard 412C, NDSU,

Fargo 58075-5075, or e-mail me at isern@plains.nodak.edu. Likewise welcome are consumer comments about the places I have named, or others. In the meantime, eat well.

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Source: Tom Isern (701) 231-8339

Editor: Dean Hulse (701) 231-6136