Dakota Life

Located 45 miles west of Pierre, a ball field rises from a rural farmer-rancher community and captures the imagination of countless baseball fans.

In 1964, a retrorocket fired on a Minuteman missile at Site Lima-02, three miles southeast of Vale, South Dakota. This story tells a first-person account of the disaster.

The Bien family take pride in their efforts to conserve the natural heritage of this landscape at their family ranch in nearby Veblen.

A branch of the Sisseton-Wahpeton Oyate tribal government is working to preserve and archive stories and artifacts passed down from one generation to the next.

As a young artist studying under Oscar Howe, Bryan Akipa was launched on a new trajectory in life by a conversation about mallards.

We talk with veteran South Dakota journalists Seth Tupper and Jonathan Ellis to talk about polling, election integrity, and two new campaign ads from governor Noem. Plus, Dakota Life travels to Sisseton. We sit down with executive producer Brad Van Osdel to learn more about history and stories from the northeast South Dakota community.

Jeremiah Moreno is the lead singer for the Lakota drum group Stampede. His Leksi (uncle) Wilmer “Stampede” Mesteth and his Ciye (brother) Juan Mesteth have made their journey to the spirit world. Jeremiah commits himself to carry the Stampede drum name and preserving Lakota wisdom for the next generation. Featured performer at the 2022 South Dakota Arts Conference.

Sometimes in order to make art, you have to create the tools. Nobody knows that better than Clark Martinek, who has been working as a blacksmithing sculptor for most of his adult life.

Small town ingenuity has taken another form in downtown Redfield. Leo’s Good Food is a former bank building that has been repurposed into a restaurant, with the salad bar in the vault. And next door, a large retail space that stood empty for a while is now “Wild Roots”. Home to many small businesses not large enough for their own storefront.

Cyclone Flour was one of the brands distributed from the Redfield mill. A sack with the Cyclone design hangs from the balcony of the Spink County Mercantile. It’s just one of the seed and grain bags retired dentist and entrepreneur Clay Yeoman rescued. His collection marks an era when many small towns had their own local seed sellers and there was a golden age of Ag Country seed bags.