Memories of the Medora Musical

I arrived in Beach, North Dakota, as a cub reporter for the Golden Valley News and the Billings County Pioneer in June 1980. My first story assignment was a feature about the nearby musical in Medora, a restored town that had its hey-day in the 1880s. To this day, I can remember some of the jokes (Why do cowboys turn up the brims of their hats? So they can fit three to a pickup.) and some of the songs (I'm just a girl who can't say 'No.' and Marty Robbin's 'El Paso') that floated on the summer wind that night. The newspaper hired a young college kid to be a photographer. I don’t remember his name anymore, but I remember that he was from Park River, ND, and we traveled together in a little red pickup. At the Musical, I sat beside a family from Lemmon, SD. The mom was married to a pastor and she tried her best to “save” this Montana transplant right before the musical started.

Anyway, that was my introduction to the Medora Musical. Between the photos and my narrative, the weekly paper had a great spread about the Musical.

The Musical always ends with a patriotic number. 

By the next year, I had moved from Beach to Baker, MT. Whenever I needed to get out of town or entertain someone in Baker, I always made sure we went to Medora. The Musical just got better with the passing years. At the time, the stage wasn’t as nice as it is today and we didn’t have chairs, just benches to sit on.

A couple of years later I had moved from Baker to Glendive. When I took my future wife to the Musical, we picked one of those very busy nights and we ended up sitting on the hillside, on a blanket.

My mom and dad had the “enjoyment” of going to the musical with me several times when I was in my early 20s. Now they have an elevator to get you up and down the outdoor amphitheater in style, but in the early days, you had only a never ending flight of stairs that wound down the hill, which my mom despised.

By 1985, I had moved to Bismarck to work for MDU Resources, but my love for the Musical continued. John Stewart, who retired as the MDU vice president of communications in about 1987, joined the Theodore Roosevelt Foundation and helped raise money for improvements to the amphitheater. When it was completed, the Medora Musical had more than a facelift, it was a complete makeover. The fore-mentioned elevator and ample plastic seats made watching the Musical a true night of enjoyment.

Lots of people from Bismarck would come to Medora every night, so it didn’t matter when you went, there were always people you knew at the Cowboy Café or Ye Olde Ice Cream Parlor. When my boys were born, we made it a point to take them with us. One time, when Scott was a little baby, the hostess -- Chuck Wagon Charlie -- came out into the crowd and took Scott back with her to show him off to the audience. At the time, Scott was in love with his little hand and he admired his hand all the time. That was the case this particular night. He held out his arm and started admiring his hand. However, the audience was sure that the little baby was waving to them and they started cheering and applauding as Scott continued to admire his little hand.

Later that night as the musical continued, Scott fell asleep. When we were leaving the amphitheater and riding the elevator, the crowd was still whispering about the little boy who had waved to them from the stage.

As the editor of the employee magazine for MDU, I somehow got my name on a list of North Dakota media…mostly weekly newspapers. Anyway, the Foundation would send me an invitation every year to take my family for an all-expense paid vacation to see the Musical, stay at a Medora motel and take in any of the sites in town that we wanted to. We also got to eat at the various cafes and the pitchfork fondue all free of charge. Well, you can bet that we went to Medora every summer when the boys were growing up…and it was all free.

Over the past 33 years that I’ve lived in or near North Dakota, I’ve been to the Musical more than 30 times. Heck, there were some summers when I went to the Musical a half dozen times, especially when I lived in Baker, Beach and Glendive. I often had all the songs memorized by the time the summer was over.

I don’t know if I’ll get to Medora this summer or not, but if I don’t, I’ll still remember all the memories of the Musical when I drive by the exit to Historic Medora on the Interstate. Over the years, I’ve taken several nephews and both of my sisters to the Musical and I have promoted the Musical to all of my relatives. It’s one of the truly great events in the Flickertail State. If you have the opportunity to go, I would encourage you to attend. It will become one of your favorite memories. 

Ross, Austin and Fur-ball

I could look it up, but I’m guessing the boys were about nine and 11 when we went to a summer church camp. At the time, attendance at summer camps was being promoted quite heavily in our church. Derek, Scott and I decided to attend a United Methodist camp at Lake Poinsett, near Watertown, South Dakota, because our pastor’s wife was going to be a counselor at the camp.

We left Mandan and drove to Aberdeen where we would spend the night. Upon arriving, we noticed that there was a park on the north end of town that had a bunch of Wizard of Oz statues. At the time, we didn’t know the park was in honor of Frank Baum…who had been a doctor in Aberdeen 40 years earlier. Baum wrote the novel, which the 1939 movie was based on.

Anyway, we reached Aberdeen, found our motel, ate at a Chinese restaurant and then went to the Wizard of Oz park before heading to the motel to swim and spend the night.

The next morning we drove to Lake Poinsett. On the way, we were passed by some people in a station wagon. When they passed us, they drove over a turtle on the highway. The turtle went flying as the car picked it and sent it airborne. We continued to follow the car all the way to the church camp. We paid particular attention to the driver…only to find out later that she was the “nurse” for the camp. Needless to say, we didn’t want to get sick there.

Another thing we noticed was this family with a little boy. After the family had checked the little boy into camp, we couldn’t help but notice the change in the parent’s attitudes. Suddenly, they were happy as a lark and nearly skipped back to their car where they drove off…free of the child…at least for a couple of days.

The little boy’s name was Austin. And we learned a lot about Austin over the next couple of days while we were at camp. Austin was a one-boy wrecking ball. He didn’t want to do anything that you were supposed to…it was if he was allergic to a schedule. Instead, he liked to break things. We made it a point to stay away from Austin and the camp nurse.

There was another boy that caught our eye. His name was Ross. I might be wrong, but it seemed like Ross’s mom had sent him to camp with his dad so they could get to know each other. Ross was a tiny, fragile boy with a pale complexion. His dad was a tall, overweight man. The two were different in nearly every way.

The defining moment, however, was at dinner. We were eating chicken and each of us was given one piece of chicken to start with. The promise was made that we could have more if we wanted it. Anyway, Ross not only devoured his chicken, he was licking any remaining shred of meat off the bones. When a young kitchen helper came by with a plate of full of extra chicken, he asked Ross if he would like another piece.

“Why, of course, he would,” I thought.

But to my astonishment, Ross’s dad said, “No, Ross doesn’t really like chicken.”

Boy, I didn’t see that coming. Like I said, I think they were trying to get to know each other better.

Our time at Lake Poinsett including swimming and canoeing in the lake, lots of activities and even a few sermons. One thing I remember was this young pastor trying to explain the word “abide” to a bunch of children. He finally said that “abide” meant to “hang out.” I thought it the writer of the hymn “Abide with me” might have turned over in his grave if he had been at Lake Poinsett that day.

There was another character at the camp. His name was Monte, and he put me in mind of my mild-mannered brother-in-law Rich Graves. Monte, however, had one really distinguishing characteristic. He was the hairiest man we had ever seen. You could have braided the hair on his legs and arms.

Somebody before us decided to call him “Fur-ball.” So we called him Fur-ball, also. Anyway, Monte had a beautiful voice and would serenade his side of the cabin to sleep every night with a song.

We didn’t really want to go to that side of the cabin because Austin bunked over there, but the thought of hearing Monte sing was too enticing. On our last night at camp, we went to hear Monte sing.

First, however, Monte had to calm Austin down and get him into bed…no easy task. Finally, though, Monte threatened him. He said that if Austin didn’t climb into bed, Monte wasn’t going to sing. It must have been peer pressure that finally got Austin between the sheets. And then Monte started singing a most beautiful song. When it was over, we went back to our side of the cabin knowing we had truly heard the voice of an angel.

The next day, we drove back to Mandan and I never went to another church camp. Heck, I didn’t feel I needed to…I had plenty of stories to tell about Austin, Ross and Fur-ball.  And the stories continue to this day.