The Digital Press at the University of North Dakota publishes high-quality scholarly works on the history, culture, and society in North Dakota and on the Northern Plains.

The History of North Dakota

Elwyn B. Robinson

Elwyn Robinson’s History of North Dakota continues to stand as the definitive history of the state despite being published over 50 years ago.

The Digital Press at the University of North Dakota in collaboration with the Chester Fritz Library at the University of North Dakota, where the open, digital edition is hosted, and through the generous support of the Northern Plains Heritage Foundation, the North Dakota legislature, the North Dakota University System, and the family of Elwyn B. Robinson.

Download or purchase the book here.

Codex

Edited by Micah Bloom

Micah Bloom’s Codex examines the fate of books in the aftermath of the 2011 Minot flood. It is an ambitious project that flows across a wide range of media (digital text, video, hardcover, and paperback), embraces archaeological sensibilities, and speaks simultaneously to universal and profoundly local experiences.

The book is available in both an expanded, color digital download and in a trade paperback (coming soon!). Both versions bring together Bloom’s haunting imagines with nine essays exploring our own engagement with physical books, the history of the book, and the events surrounding the 2011 flood in Minot, North Dakota.

ISBN-10: 0692978267 | ISBN-13: 978-0692978269

Download or purchase the book here.

Haunted By Waters: The Future of Memory and the Red River Flood of 1997

Edited by David Haeselin

The twentieth anniversary of the Red River Flood of 1997, which devastated the town of Grand Forks, North Dakota and surrounding areas, gives a new generation of Grand Forksers and Red River valley citizens the occasion to look backward so that they can look forward. Taking stock of how the city and its people have changed in these last twenty years offers us a new chance to envision the future of Grand Forks and the Red River Valley. What’s more, we hope that this book can extend the lessons learned through the recovery to others coping with their own unique disasters.

ISBN-10: 069288257X | ISBN-13: 978-0692882573

Download or purchase the book here.

The Bakken Goes Boom: Oil and the Changing Geographies of Western North Dakota

Edited by William Caraher and Kyle Conway

With contributions from Carenlee Barkdull, Karin L. Becker, Sebastian Braun, Nikki Berg Burin, Angela Cary, Kyle Cassidy, Heidi Czerwiec, Simon Donato, Rebecca A. Dunham, Julia C. Geigle, John Holmgren, Heather Jackson, Ann Reed, Andrew Reinhard, Richard Rothaus, Melissa Rae Stewart, Jessica Sobolik, Laura Tally, Ryan M. Taylor, Bret A. Weber, Joshua E. Young

In 2008, the Bakken went boom. Thanks to advances in hydraulic fracturing, oil production in western North Dakota exploded. As the price of oil went up, so did the oil rigs. People came from all over the country (and the world) in search of work, and cities and towns struggled to keep up. This book is about the challenges they faced. It is about the human dimensions of the boom, as told by artists, poets, journalists, and scholars. It captures the boom at its peak, before the price of oil fell and the boom went bust.

This is the only book on the Bakken to bring together such a wide range of voices. It captures a fascinating moment in the history not only of North Dakota, but of global oil production. It sheds light on the impact of oil on local communities that, until now, had not attracted much interest from the outside world. And it shows how North Dakotans, both old and new, have found ways to address the challenges they face in a turbulent, changing environment.

ISBN-10: 0692643680 | ISBN-13: 978-0692643686

Download or purchase the book here.

The University of North Dakota and The Great War

North Dakota Quarterly Reprint Series

This volume documents the range of attitudes toward World War I on the University of North Dakota campus as well as the various contributions from across the university to the war effort. The centerpiece of the collection is Wesley Johnson’s recollection of his time in the trenches in France. This volume also features articles by renowned historian O.G. Libby, Sociologist George Davies (UND’s first Ph.D.), UND Law Professor Hugh Willis, and nursing alumna Hazel B. Nielson. This book brings these articles together for the first time and provides a engaging group of sources for the casual reader, historians, and students alike.

Complete Book (pdf) | North Dakota Quarterly

The War with the Sioux

Karl Jakob Skarstein

Translated Melissa Gjellstad and Danielle Skjelver With contributions from Dakota Goodhouse and Richard Rothaus

The Dakota War (1862-1864) ranks among the most overlooked conflicts in American History. Contemporary with the American Civil War, the Dakota War featured significant fighting, tactical brilliance, and strategic savvy set in the open landscape of the Northern Plains in Minnesota and North Dakota.

Karl Jakob Starstein’s The War with the Sioux tells the story of the Norwegian immigrants, American soldiers, and Lakota and Dakota Indians as they sought to protect their ways of life. Translated from Norwegian and supplemented with new introductions by Melissa Gjellstad, Richard Rothaus, and Dakota Goodhouse, this work draws upon newly studied sources in Norwegian for life on the Northern Plains during these tumultuous years. Skarstein’s work makes an important, new contribution to the growing body of scholarship on this conflict and offers an accessible and surprisingly intimate view of the conflict from the perspective of Norwegian settlers in the region.

ISBN-10: 0692496173 | ISBN-13: 978-0692496176

Out of Print