Chapter Six

Chapter Six – Lewis and Clark Senior Style
Williston

Throughout our trek up the Missouri, each town we visited was prettier, the roads less trafficked, the countryside more fertile and the hotels nicer than we had expected.  Every component of the trip had been a positive experience, but that was about to change.  We were on our way to Williston, the town nearest the confluence of the Yellowstone and Missouri Rivers, where Lewis and Clark reunited on their return trip from the Pacific coast.  Up until five years ago Williston had been exclusively a farming community of 12,500 people.  In 2008 oil was discovered and by 2013 the population had at least doubled, maybe tripled.  Our last evening in Medora, we were cautioned that we better have reservations if we hoped to find a decent hotel room in Williston.  Of course, we had no reservations and Russ got on the computer that night trying to find a hotel.  Every chain hotel he Googled was booked.  Finally, he booked a room at the “Grand” Williston, which was the only hotel with a vacancy.  (Already a bad sign)

We started out early the next morning because Russ wanted to see the confluence of the Yellowstone and Missouri Rivers that afternoon, stay the night in Williston, then move on to our next destination.   It was only a 130 mile drive to Williston from Medora, and we chose to take the state highway.  The route passed through the previously small farming community of Watford City, where oil had also been recently discovered.  As we approached Watford City we saw the occasional

Oil Derek

oil well and storage tank in the middle of the grassland.  Soon we had our first sign that our leisurely trip on the back roads of the mid-west had changed.  All kinds of trucks, some carrying equipment, others transporting oil drums were speeding in both directions along the once quiet two lane highway.  There was every kind of truck imaginable, and they were all in a hurry.   Finally, we reached Watford City and it took us forever to get through the town as trucks were backed up in all directions trying to get through the stop lights.  The town was dominated by rows of oil storage tanks instead of the grain silos of Kansas and South Dakota.  Stretching for miles on both sides of Watford City we saw rows of portable housing, usually trailers, sometimes new, other times old and worn.  The town was growing too fast for housing to keep up with the demand. 

When we finally reached Williston, the clusters of portable housing and multitude of speeding trucks increased tenfold.   The truck drivers all had a mission, and we were overwhelmed and shrunken in their midst.  We couldn’t find the hotel though we kept re-crossing the location identified by the address on our GPS.  Russ finally called the hotel and the clerk responded that the hotel sign Said Airport International Inn, even though the hotel was called the Grand Williston.  We found it and Russ stopped in front of the tired old one story motel waiting for me to get out of the car.  Checking into the hotel was always my job.  I didn’t move to open the car door as I glanced at the group of roughneck oil men standing outside of the hotel smoking cigarettes. 

Okay, for those of you who don’t know me, I am no snob, but I do live in a country club golf community where the smokers at least congregate behind the pro shop, not in front of it.  Staying in a hotel side by side with roughneck oilmen was way out of my box.  I turned to Russ and said, “let’s rethink this”.  He looked surprised, “what do you mean”?  Thinking fast I responded, “what if we cancel our hotel reservation, go directly to the Yellowstone/Missouri confluence, then drive straight to our next destination”.   Russ replied, “the next stop is a six hour drive”.  I didn’t have any problem with a six hour drive to get out of this town, but I didn’t want to be argumentative.  Russ was clearly set on staying, so I got out of the car and smiled and nodded at the smoking men on my way into the crowded lobby.  Waiting for the two overworked receptionists, were split lines of potential guests, some of them couples, which relieved me a little.  

I registered, accepted our room keys, and Russ and I loaded the luggage cart with our “stuff” then wheeled it into our room.  The bed had clean linens, but the curtains were sagging and the carpet was ragged, stained and no longer attached to the doorway to the bathroom.  The carpet in front of the sink was splattered with a white gunky substance and the door was riddled with nicks and holes.  I couldn’t help a mild shudder and commented on the filthy carpet.  Unfortunately for me, Russ said we could put up with anything for one night.  We did.  Like I said the linens were clean and I never walked on the carpet without shoes.

After unloading our ‘stuff’ we headed out for lunch.  Russ has excellent instincts for choosing restaurants and suggested Don Pedro’s Family Mexican Restaurant, which we had passed on our way to the hotel.  I questioned choosing a Mexican restaurant in North Dakota but kept silent.  The building was nice, but the menus were worn with blurred photographs of the food items.  The restaurant was nearly half full even though it was nearly two o’clock in the afternoon.  Another symptom of a booming economy.  I chose a salad to be safe.  The waitress was efficient and pleasant and quickly brought our food which was beautifully presented and delicious.  Russ holds his record for good choices, and when he checked Trip Advisor that evening he discovered it was the number one restaurant in Williston

After lunch we headed for the confluence of the Yellowstone and Missouri Rivers, which was about twenty miles from Williston.  At the first intersection heading out of town a truck carrying some kind of long beams was turning left into the lane next to us.  It was crossing in front of us, going too fast for the turn, and Russ could see that it was going to hit our car if the driver kept turning at the same angle.  Russ looked in the rear view mirror and no one was behind us, so he jerked the car into reverse and backed up to keep the truck from hitting us.  He may be a senior, but he can still move fast when necessary.

Russ battled the trucks on the highway until the final turn-off down an isolated road to the Missouri-Yellowstone Confluence Interpretive Center, which was run by the State Historical Society of North Dakota.  The Interpretive Center housed exhibits on the early settlement of the area along with exhibits on fur-trapping .  The only references to Lewis and Clark were journal quotes etched on the walls.  The location of the confluence of the two great rivers should have been the site of a city except that the land was owned by the military due to the location of nearby Fort Buford.

Missouri-Yellowstone Confluence

 

We walked out to the overlook and admired the meeting of the two rivers looking much like they did two hundred years ago.  Trees flourished at the site which was untouched by civilization.

Nearby was another tourist site, Fort Union, a fur trading center established nearly twenty years after Lewis and Clark’s journey.  The fort was meticulously rebuilt on the exact footprint it occupied
when it was the market center between fur traders and Native Americans between 1822-1867.  The residence of the Bourgeois (Head of the Trading Post) dominated the interior of the fort.  Smaller
buildings housed the workers, traders and the occasional visitor.  It is interesting that the leaders in the fur trade could live in such magnificence in a land still primitive and unsettled.

Fort Union Exterior

 

 Fort Union Interior

We returned to our hotel and went out to dinner at the Wildcat Pizza parlor, which served delicious pizza.  Both our meals in the town had been excellent as well as the service.  At the hotel I asked the receptionist at the desk if I could have an extra decaf coffee for morning, and she gave me three.  Everyone we met had been courteous, but the dynamic in the town was hectic and aggressive.  In the morning at breakfast we saw tables of workers and managers, mostly men, but an occasional woman.  They were earnestly discussing the plans for the day’s labor.  It was interesting to observe that the truck drivers and workers were not rude, merely determined and focused. 

As an historian I couldn’t help think that in Williston, I was seeing a microcosm of American perseverance and knowhow at work.  It was interesting that I was making the observations on a trip following in the footsteps of men (and one woman and child), who pioneered the discovery of American resources.  In every town that was built where Lewis and Clark had passed, American ingenuity and ambition had tilled the soil or built mining, steel, railroad or oil towns.  As a people, we are aggressive initially, but efficient and often cordial if someone is not in our way (like waiting innocently at a red light).