THEY CAME IN EARNEST

West. West - Always pushing west. They came from their homelands in droves and for the promise of a better life. They came to farm, to mine and to raise cattle. Immigrating from Norway, Ireland, Sweden, Finland, Scotland and Germany, they landed by sea at “The Gateway to America” in New York; then ever westward by ship or rail to Minnesota, Chicago or Wisconsin and finally to settle in the great unknown.

With as many of their earthly possessions as they could carry by horse-and-wagon and fueled by the Homestead Act of 1862, they set out to claim their 160 acres and a slice of “The Promised Land”.  But the realities of life as a homesteader were far more difficult than the advertisements suggested and never could they have imagined the hardships that they would encounter.

As they migrated westward, they inevitably encroached on territories inhabited by Native American tribes, leading to sometimes bloody conflicts over land, resources and cultural differences. Although the soil was fertile, the unimaginably harsh climate made farming efforts extremely difficult. Crop failures and insect infestations were quite common. Scarcity of basic necessities like food, building materials and tools, especially in remote areas, made them rely solely on their own ingenuity and skills to survive.

Oppressive isolation was their constant companion. Initially confined to small rudimentary sod huts, they struggled to survive the long months of their first merciless prairie winter, praying there would be enough fire wood and food from the stockpile of their small fall harvest, to sustain them until spring. This strange new environment, so far from their world, was also a land of silence. Other than the interminable wind, the original settlers noted that there was barely a bird or insect (other than the unrelenting mosquitos) to fill the audible void. Faced with these challenges and armed solely with their courage, determination and faith, only the strong and resilient remained.

If they managed to survive their first winter, in spring they could begin planting crops and setting off to hunt for the ever-dwindling and over-hunted bison, deer and elk (the last bison in Montana was killed in 1887, and the last known wild bison in North Dakota in 1888). Then traveling still further west (or heading back to the east), they would seek to locate and harvest wood for what would eventually become their communities; homes, barns, schoolhouses, stores and churches.

What you see in these photographs are the physical remains of those early settlers as well as their descendants who came in the decades that followed. When and why were they abandoned and how is it that they, in all their fading beauty, have survived?  My aspiration to capture the “souls” of these buildings, is in some ways like chasing their ghosts; unearthing impressions of long-ago toils, people and experiences. I remind myself that all of these structures were once a part of someone’s “American Dream” and in that, I strive to honor these pioneers through my imagery.