Unfinished Business

Unfinished Business

Author: Prairie Public May 9, 2026 Duration: 4:26
Two conferences of regional scholars, one in Lincoln, Nebraska, the other in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, have taken the future of the Great Plains as their theme this spring. This sort of thing makes me uncomfortable. I can mouth off about the future like anyone else, but when I take up my tools as a historian, I have to say, the future is not my business. Heck, I’m not even sure the present exists.

The written essays of historian Tom Isern, long enjoyed in regional newspapers, find a new voice in the Plains Folk podcast from Prairie Public. This isn't a sweeping historical documentary, but a series of intimate, thoughtful commentaries rooted in the everyday rhythms and deep memories of the North Dakota plains. Each episode feels like a conversation with a neighbor who has spent a lifetime observing and cherishing the details that define a place-the shared meal of a fall supper, the weathered boards of a homestead, the collective energy of a barn dance. The podcast moves beyond geography to explore the intangible character of the region, asking what it means to live and persist here. Listening, you'll hear stories that connect the past to the present, finding the extraordinary within the ordinary landscape. It’s a quiet celebration of the patterns, traditions, and people that shape this particular corner of the world, offering a gentle reminder that a sense of place is built from countless small, enduring things. The Plains Folk podcast provides a regular moment of reflection on the culture and society of the plains, one carefully crafted story at a time.
Author: Language: English Episodes: 23

Plains Folk
Podcast Episodes
Cooking with Olive Johnson [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 4:11
An old friend left an orphan cookbook on our doorstep, and it proved to be of more than passing interest. It is a centennial cookbook from the town of Lignite, near the Canadian line, published in 2007. It is a rich regi…
Aurora [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 3:42
Since publication of Thom Tammaro’s new book of poems, Aurora, by North Dakota State University Press, I have been present at two venues where Thom read from his work. He reads his work well (not a given among poets and…
Lilac Days [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 4:35
Finally I found it, this song people were telling me about; found it in the Alfred G. Arvold Collection of the Institute for Regional Studies, at NDSU. The song, written by an NDSU graduate, James Golseth, is “Lilac Days…
New Life Will Arise [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 4:54
There is this group of people that gathers now and then in a converted gas station in Rapid City for what they call the Morning Fill Up. The agenda is to have a conversation with some interesting thinker with ideas about…
The Hungry Bachelor [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 4:14
Christmas Eve, 2015, on the Montana Hi-Line, somewhere near Glasgow, in a one-room school called Willow Bend. Miss Miller had prepared her pupils well, and the local correspondent declared their program “a success.” Then…
Wisdom from the Warden [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 4:10
Early in his new memoir from North Dakota State University Press, Tough but Fair: Reformation of a Prison, Memoir of a Warden, Winston Satran recounts a great escape. Ten prisoners broke out of the North Dakota Penitenti…
When Our Fields of Flax Are Blooming [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 4:45
If you are familiar with the face or name of Henry R. Martinson, it is likely because of the classic documentary film of 1978, Northern Lights, about the early days of the Nonpartisan League in North Dakota. In which, th…
Charlie and Cedric [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 4:59
Exploring the sandhills countryside in search of something, I stepped into a white frame Lutheran church along the road and found, on a table in the entryway, for reason unknown, an old, slender booklet, unrelated to chu…
The Spelling Bee Craze [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 4:30
In Dakota Territory, the outbreak of spelling bees in the late 1880s was commonly referred to as a “craze.” Since publication of The Hoosier Schoolmaster in 1871 the craze, epidemic, or infatuation with spelling bees, as…
An American Spectacle [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 4:30
“The spelling bee at the Baptist church Tuesday evening was quite a lively entertainment,” so says a press report from Jamestown in April 1885. “Rev. S. N. Griffith acted as umpire, Professor Clemmer conductor and Profes…