North Dakota

North Dakota joined the Union as the thirty-ninth state on November 2, 1889. With a total area of 70,703 square miles (183,121 square kilometers), it is the nineteenth-largest state. North Dakota lies in the western part of the northcentral United States and is bordered by South Dakota , Montana , Minnesota , and Canada.

Sioux and Ojibwa tribes lived in present-day North Dakota in the seventeenth century. European fur traders came to the region in 1738, and in the early nineteenth century the American Fur Company traded there as well.

Scottish settlers moved to North Dakota in 1812 and established the first white farming settlement. Soon, people of mixed ancestry, particularly Native American and European, joined the Scots. By 1872, most Native Americans were confined to reservations, and white settlers began arriving in large numbers. This was called the Great Dakota Boom, and it ended in the mid-1880s.

A drought chased away many of the original settlers, but they were replaced by Norwegians, Germans, and other European immigrants to whom the federal government had promised the opportunity to thrive if only they worked hard. The Second Boom occurred between 1898 and 1915.

Hardship and recovery

The 1920s brought more drought, bank failures, and political conflict, all of which led to a decrease in the state's population as residents packed their few possessions and moved in hopes of a better life elsewhere. The Great Depression (1929–41) made matters worse, but the postwar economy after World War II (1939–45) allowed North Dakota to prosper for several decades.

North Dakota suffered yet another drought that began in 1987 and lasted well into the 1990s. More than 5 million acres of land were destroyed or damaged, and flooding followed the drought in 1994. After that came more drought, again followed by floods in 2000.

North Dakota in 2006 claimed 635,867 residents, 91.5 percent of them white, 4.9 percent American Indian or Alaska Native, and 1.4 percent Latino or Hispanic. Twenty-seven percent of residents were between the ages of twenty-five and forty-four, and another 29 percent were between the ages of forty-five and sixty-four. Although English was the primary language, some residents spoke German or Spanish as their primary language.

Despite the extreme weather conditions, North Dakota has always been and remains primarily an agricultural state. Wheat production represented one-fourth of the state's total agricultural revenues in the early twenty-first century. Coal mining and oil drilling were industries that experienced growth in the state toward the start of the twenty-first century. The leading industries in the state included industrial machinery, food and wood products, and computer electronic equipment.