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Newsletter from Montana
April 2006
As my interests expand into the Midwest, so does my newsletter.... Not
only that, but Public Television has approached me to make a 5-6 minute
mini-program about moving to the Montana-Minnesota area, based on my website, newsletters and interview. I do feel honored that they picked me from all the brokerage companies in West. This just goes to show that you were right choosing me as your agent :-)
The short documentary will be shown to 95 million people in their homes and also in most major airports around the country. I might have to get a larger telephone, good thing I hired all those agents...
But lets start with the new listings:
Here we have a 50' x 60' x 18' hangar at the Red Lodge airport; living quarters were added in 2004 - so you can live with your plane and explore the West! $ 285,000
The snow melted off my listing in northern Minnesota and we took some
aerial photos.
200 acres with a river running through it and State Forest on three
sides, planted to grass to attract wild life for hunting. Walleye galore!
$ 1,000,000 Open house 9-5 daily :-)
The
320 acres ranch north of Red Lodge
lowered its price to $ 1,900,000 Elk, moose, deer, antelope and gobs of game birds. Year round creek, end of county road privacy and close to Red Lodge. Ideal for a resort, but it
is productive hayground, as well.
When you travel this summer, I posted a
map of gas prices around the
United States. Right click on the county and it will give you the price
of gas there.
We found out that there are
low interest loans available for starting up a new business in Chouteau County, Montana. I am mentioning that, since the
Butcher Shop I have for sale for $ 85,000 happens to be located there. The Butcher Shop is near the Missouri River where the big elk herds roam. Chouteau County is named after the ship owner who pressed his ships on to
go to Ford Benton with his river boats, which were able to navigate in
shallow water. They just needed to get some rocks out of the way.... this
was an important step. With servicing Fort Benton, Chouteau opened up the
west to all the gold prospectors and fur traders before there was a
railroad going west. Fort Benton was a bustling city until the rail road
came along.
Regarding the Northern Pacific rail road, Jay Cooke's Gamble is a book,
written by M. John Lubetkin. He tells how Cooke's "gamble"
reignited war with the Sioux, rescued George Armstrong Custer from
obscurity, created Yellowstone Park, pushed frontier settlement four
hundred miles westward, and triggered the
Panic in 1873. In 1869, Jay Cooke, the brilliant but idiosyncratic American banker often referred to as the "financier of the Civil War," decided to
finance the Northern Pacific, a transcontinental railroad planned from
Duluth, Minnesota, to Seattle. The Northern Pacific Railway Historical
Association (NPRHA) is donating 160 copies of Jay Cooke's Gamble to
public libraries, historic societies and railroad museums in states
originally served by the Northern Pacific Railroad - Wisconsin,
Minnesota, North Dakota, Montana, Idaho, Washington, and Oregon.
"Few railroads have such a unique and interesting history,"
said Gary Tarbox, president of NPRHA. "Unlike most railroads, the
Northern Pacific was not built to fulfill an existing economic need, but
rather represented the era's optimism and the vision of its
founders." I am assuming Cooke City at the NE entrance of the
Yellowstone Park was named in his honor.
Cooke staked his reputation and wealth on the Northern Pacific, and was
soon whip-sawed by the railroad's mismanagement, questionable contracts,
and construction problems. Financier J.P. Morgan undermined him, and the
Credit Mobilier scandal ended congressional support. When railroad
surveyors and army escorts ignored Sioux Chief Sitting Bull's warning not
to enter the Yellowstone Valley, Indian attacks - combined with alcoholic
commanders - led to embarrassing setbacks on the field, in the nation's,
press and among investors. Lubetkin's suspenseful narrative describes
events played out across the nation - from Wall Street to the Yellowstone
- and vividly portrays the soldiers, engineers, businessmen, politicians,
and Native Americans who tried to build or block the Northern
Pacific.
The NPRHA, now in its 26th year, is a non-profit, 1,600 member
organization, actively, engaged in historic preservation and model
railroading. By giving Jay Cooke's Gamble' to public libraries and
historic societies, the NPRHA hopes to reawaken interest in the
rail-road's, and the area's, early history.
North Dakota is not very populated; I think there are about 630,000
living in the whole state. In the Northwest of the state, small towns and
counties have
land and lots to give away to the right people if they
promise to build; they are looking for 5,000 families with heads of
households between the ages of 25 and 45 and a portable job. While new
housing is in the $75-$100/square foot range, many existing homes can be
purchased for $40-$50/square foot. Energy prices are quite bearable. Food
prices are low and insurance rates are some of the lowest in the country.
Office space and warehouses can be rented very inexpensively and land,
which they have plenty of, can be purchased at very good prices. DSL high
speed internet or T-1 access is easily obtained everywhere. North Dakota
was mostly settled by Norwegians, but due to global warming, even North
Dakota has thawed out and the winters have gotten somewhat milder. Its a
great place to raise kids, virtually no crime and the people are
extremely friendly.
These are the communities that are part of the program:
City of Crosby, ND
Burke County, ND
City of Williston, ND
City of Ray, ND
City of Stanley, ND
Souris Basin
If job portability is not a possibility for you, plenty of
employment opportunities
exist in NW North Dakota. The unemployment rate is currently 2.6 - 3%. Construction workers, electricians, truck drivers and oil field hands are in high demand.
At any rate, it will get you out into the country on a shoestring.
If you are looking for a home-based business, Gina Rice
317-844-7634 might share hers with you. She is selling Arbonne products and would help you to get set-up.
Here you can find
jobs in Biology - they are not necessarily out in the country, though.
One man who is not mentioned on the list of 100 famous Montanans is microbiologist
Maurice Hilleman. He grew up in Miles City and has saved more lives than any other living scientist. His credits include preventive vaccine for mumps, measles, rubella (German measles), chickenpox, bacterial meningitis, flu and hepatitis B. In 1971, came his crowning achievement - one shot, followed by a booster, which protects children against three different diseases - measles, mumps and rubella. It is now the cornerstone of pediatric health in the United States. Today Hilleman's measles vaccine alone prevents an estimated one million deaths around the globe every year. Hilleman, who holds a Ph.D. in microbiology from the University of Chicago, has also made notable discoveries in basic science. He figured out the pattern of genetic changes in the flu virus, enabling epidemiologists to give people advance warning of pandemic flu, and his discovery of an unknown monkey virus in the early 1960s eventually led scientists to find the most common genetic mutation involved in human cancers.
He was born in Miles City, a former frontier town on the high plains of southeastern Montana. His mother died during his birth, along with his twin sister. Maurice had seven older siblings and was raised by relatives on a farm at the confluence of the Yellowstone and Tongue Rivers, not far from where Custer had made his last stand against the Sioux four decades earlier.
By Hilleman's time, the Indian wars were over, the Northern Pacific Railroad had been built and most of the buffalo eliminated. But Miles City, named after an Indian fighter, Gen. Nelson A. Miles, was still a dusty cow town. On the family's farm, Maurice and his siblings tended cattle and chickens, cut hay, raised vegetables, made horseradish and fashioned brooms that they sold in town. "In Montana, things got done," Hilleman says. "You put up a barn, a fence, a gate. These were project events. Then everybody would go out, get a fresh bucket of water, sit on a log and pass around a cup to celebrate. It's the same feeling you have when you get a vaccine licensed."
Billings Clinic is bound and determined to become the best in the Nation; it is the largest employer in Billings, Montana. At its core is a multi-specialty group practice of over 200 physicians and non-physician providers. It is a not-for-profit organization; governed by the community, with physician leadership at all levels. Its structure is similar to that of the Mayo Clinic. The Billings Clinic is a 'community of physicians' working together in a collegial manner toward their mission of providing outstanding health care, education and research in our region and the nation. Their goal is to be recognized as the health care organization providing the best clinical quality, patient safety and service experience in the nation.
The downtown
Billings Clinic campus consists of a 272-bed hospital that includes a 14-suite Family Birth Center and a 15-bed Transitional Care Unit as well as the Billings Clinic, the region's largest multi-specialty group practice. Off of the main campus are branch clinics which include Billings Clinic Heights, Billings Clinic West, the Wellness Center and Aspen Meadows Retirement Community. Primary and specialty-care clinics are located in Bozeman, Colstrip, Columbus, Forsyth, Miles City and Red Lodge, Montana as well as Cody, Wyoming.
One problem the Billings Clinic will not fix is the missing bark on your fruit trees after a winter with high snow cover. Rabbits feed on the thin bark and damage the cambium layer. This is a single cell layer where cell division takes place to produce xylem and phloem cells (wood and bark) and causes the increase in diameter of the trunk. If the cambium is damaged then wood or bark will not be produced and movement of solutes (sugars) will not take place the following summer. A girdled tree may leaf out following the damage but will most likely die in a year or two. If the tree is small (under 1 inch diameter) then it is best to cut off the tree just below the damaged area and it should re-grow. If it is between 1-2 inches in diameter then cut it off and graft new scion into the stub end of the tree. If over 2 inches then you can do bridge grafting, which is done in the spring after growth has begun and the bark can easily be lifted (slipping) from the wood. This is typically between April I5 and May 15.
Both of these methods require the following materials; a sharp knife (jackknife works well), small nails for tacking scions to the tree, a light hammer, a nail set, a saw for trimming the old thick bark, a shovel or trowel if damage is below the soil surface, a heavy scrub brush for cleaning excavated bark, dormant or fresh cut scions for bridges, and asphalt grafting compound or asphalt wound dressing.
These techniques will end up with twigs encircling the trunk (every inch or two around) but eventually they will grow together and should save the tree. If you need help, call RICK ABRAHAMSON Clay County, Minnesota, Extension Educator1-800-299-5020 or send him an
email.
You can also find a good description of these and other
grafting techniques on the
Clay County Extension Website.
Red Lodge, Montana was picked for the
Main Street program along with a few other communities around Montana. The Legislature got involved last spring, making Montana the 39th state with a Main Street program. The program was established on a national level in 1977, when downtowns began dying with the advent of shopping malls and abandoned historic buildings were being torn down in favor of new development.
The program is based upon four building blocks: leadership, marketing, design and economic restructuring. Participating communities do not receive grants, but they are eligible for consulting services and other statewide assistance, and must raise money for improvements and new projects themselves through local government, downtown businesses, fundraisers or other means. The
main street program is designed to have a larger net gain for downtown businesses, to create jobs and of course to make downtown more attractive. Our city administrator, Rod Proffitt wrote an EDA grant for Red Lodge, which was funded, and it is that money that supplements the first year for Main Street here in Red Lodge, I think they will start to re-implement the old fashioned street lanterns first, most of our old buildings have already been restored to their original splendor and downtown is usually packed with tourists.
Check out our
listings around Montana, and listings with
lake or riverfront among the gently rolling hills of Minnesota
I will stay in Montana until the end of summer, but my husband is licensed in Minnesota and will be happy to show you around over there. If you are in the market for a large tract of land or ranch, there will be an airplane available in both locations to take a bird's eye look.
I found
a little tidbit; it shows how you see your home, how your buyer sees your home, what the appraiser thinks of it and how much the tax assessor likes it....
Have a wonderful month of May until my next newsletter!
:-)
Best Regards,
Dorothea Lowe, Broker
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