North Dakota has always been a state based primarily around farming. Thousands of tons of food is produced here every year. From wheat to corn, sugar beets to soybeans, and plenty of other things in between. North Dakota is also a place with a large amount of ranches. Cattle, sheep, and even bison are raised here by the thousands. Each year, the state produces millions of gallons of milk and many tons of meat.

Needless to say, ranching is an important part of the Peace Garden State and has been for well over a century. These rare, old photographs will show you this history like you’ve never seen. Let’s take a step back in time and take a look:

1. Cattle being driven to stockyards to be moved out of a drought area in the Dust Bowl times near Belfield, North Dakota.
Arthur Rothstein/yale.edu
2. A stockyard on the edge of the badlands in Medora, North Dakota. This photo was taken in summer of 1936.
Paul Carter/yale.edu
3. Sheep ready to be shipped off from a stockyard in Stark County, North Dakota in the mid 1930s.
Arthur Rothstein/yale.edu
4. Bringing cows into the town of Zahl, North Dakota to utilize the town's water pump in 1942.
John Vachon/yale.edu
5. A man feeding his pigs in Adams County, North Dakot in the winter of 1942.
John Vachon/yale.edu

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6. Men on horseback driving cattle near the buttes of the North Dakota badlands.
Paul Carter/yale.edu
7. Ranch hands gathering and hauling water for livestock on a farm near Dickinson, North Dakota.
Paul Carter/yale.edu
8. These ox carts were being used to haul goods to a railroad station in North Dakota in the 1860s.
Benjamin Upton/Wikimedia
9. After a long day of work, this tall haystack was produced on the plains of North Dakota.
NARA/Wikimedia
10. Loading chutes into a waiting train in western North Dakota in 1936.
Paul Carter/yale.edu

Do you or your family have any history in ranching in North Dakota? Check out more of the state’s history here – the best way to look into the past is with photographs, but video footage is even better!

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