I just took a roadtrip to ND – Bismarck, then up through Minot, to Dunseith, Rolla, Walhalla……… While in Bismarck, we went out to Ft. Lincoln and from the roof of the bockhouses out there you can really see the extent of the flooding of the Missouri River. We drove up to Minot from Bismarck, but headed east on the 2 & 52 bypass south of Minot, so didn’t see the flooding right in Minot, but the flood-water west of Towner is amazing. I’ve seen water in that area before, but not like it is currently. We went north through Towner, Willow City, etc. The water level north of Towner is pretty scary, too. Willow Creek in Dunseith is at full capacity, too. My heart goes out to all the families affected by the flooding of their homes, farmland, etc. It does appear, however, that the ND ducks and geese are VERY happy this year!!

While in Dunseith, we paid a visit to my Uncle Darrel & Aunt Dorothy Fassett, who are back for the summer. Got a brief chat with Stella & Mark Schimetz, too. Always fun to go home.

Paula Fassett

From what I have understood from Vicki Metcalf the stone masons on this building may have been the Landsverks. We would really like to find some early pictures of inside to go by. If anyone out there can help with teller or dentist or dr. pictures we would like to put together a photo wall when everything is done. (Including photos of the gentlemen that built it) A redone back wall and a new roof and it should last for another 100 or more years. Karen

Group organizes to save bank building

Local Touchstones group brings in architect to examine the stone bank building; Inspection results in positive outlook for 1890s-era structure

The stone bank building on Bottineau’s

has stood for more than 100 years, and though it has started to crumble in places, it could be restored with relative ease, an historic architecture expert says.

“It’s a good project,” said Bobbi Hepper Olson, the Grand Forks architect who examined the 1890s-era bank from top to bottom on Thursday. “It just needs maintenance. All buildings need maintenance.”

Hepper Olson said the building is very sturdy, even though some stones around a back window have fallen from the façade in the past year and there is water damage in the interior. She led the restoration of an 1893 bank building in Buxton, N.D., that was in much worse shape, she said. Four years of work and about $220,000 of donations later, the Buxton bank is a community asset that turned out so well, Hepper Olson has added her office onto it.

She also is the consulting architect on the Coghlan Castle restoration project, a similar rough-hewn stone building outside St. John, N.D., which she tackled alongside Joe Whetter, a Bottineau stone mason. Whetter has agreed to work on the Bottineau stone bank project as well, and he affirmed Thursday that the building is basically sound.

“This structure is savable. I’ve seen buildings in worst shape than this one and those buildings were saved,” Whetter said. “When I worked on Coghlan Castle that building was ready to come down, but the group over there was able to save that one.”

The immediate need is to repair the stonework around the back of the building, Whetter said, estimating that would take him and his crew about two weeks.

Then there is the roof. The building needs a new one to make it weather tight and prevent further deterioration of the interior, Hepper Olson said.

That’s where a new nonprofit group, Touchstones, comes in. Headed by Karen Larson, Mae Streich and Sharon Kessler, the group has the promise of a 30-year lease on the building from its owner, Glen Swanson of Bottineau. Their goal is to repair, repurpose and preserve the building for future generations. Several other Bottineau residents, including Tim Davis and Dr. Larry Larson, have volunteered to join the project in an advisory capacity.

“People always ask me about the old bank,” Karen Larson said. Her store, Spectrum, is two doors down the street from the bank’s front door. “It seems a lot of people have a lot of curiosity about the building, and many have expressed concern since those rocks fell off the back last fall.”

That concern helped turn thoughts into action.

“Our first step was to get an architect here to determine the feasibility of restoring the building,” Kessler said. “We were braced for bad news, but Bobbi’s initial assessment is that with some work this building can stand another couple of hundred years.”

Now comes the hard part: fundraising, grant writing and grunt work.

“We’re really excited at the prospect of restoring this wonderful historic structure and making it part of a revitalized and vibrant

,” Streich said. “It won’t be easy, but nothing worthwhile ever is.”

Within a couple of weeks, Hepper Olson will submit a written assessment to the group that will include an action plan and cost estimates, but Thursday she gave Touchstones an initial fundraising goal: $100,000. She estimated that repairing the roof alone could run between $16,000 and $20,000. And the immediate stonework also will cost thousands of dollars.

But the effort would be worth it, she said. Bottineau’s founders “took a couple of years to build the bank and put a lot of thought and spirit into it,” she said, and that looking closely at the construction it’s obvious that the builders intended that this bank last several lifetimes. “We shouldn’t be the ones to let it go. This is a prime, visible location. It’s at the heart of

, the heart of this community.”

The architect noted that the Bottineau bank is in much better condition than the bank she restored. There the structure needed water, sewer and electrical service, it had no floor, no roof and needed a mold abatement. “You have a solid floor, a roof and no mold problem,” she said. The building also has functioning water, sewer and electric service.

Touchstones will begin writing grant applications this summer, and the group hopes to tap local sources to get enough funding to begin the most urgent repairs. They would also like to hear from anyone who has memories or photos of working or transacting business in the bank building, which subsequently housed lawyers, doctors, a dentist and other offices, but has been vacant for a generation.

Bottineau Mayor Doug Marsden toured the building on Thursday, too, and said it has been vacant his entire 13 years in office.

Touchstones’ goal is to turn the lights back on and see the building in use again. “We’re going to start a blog,” Kessler said, “so no matter where you are, you can check on our progress. We hope that anyone who feels a connection to Bottineau will help us with a donation of some kind.”

The group would welcome tax-deductible donations and historic information on the Bottineau stone bank sent to: Touchstones, c/o Spectrum,

.