Welcome to the
Southwestern North Dakota Digital Archive

This project is a partnership of the Southwestern North Dakota Museum Foundation, the Stark County Historical Society and the City Of Dickinson.

The goal of the project is to create a digital archive primarily based on the collections of the historical society and foundation that will document life in Southwestern North Dakota. Additional materials will be sought from the community as well. If you have a photo or item related to the area that you would like to contribute, please fill out the form here, https://dmc.omeka.net/contribution

The images in the archive are primarily the work of two studios in Dickinson, North Dakota: The Osborn Studio and the Presthus/Horstman Studios. The collections are voluminous. At the time of its donation, the Horstman collection was housed in over 37,000 envelopes. Likewise the Osborn Collection includes tens of thousands of negatives and prints. We hold these items in public trust in order to preserve them for generations to come.

Beginning in 2012, the staff and volunteers at the Dickinson Museum Center scanned the first images of the collections, and have carried on with the project and now have over 40,000 images available online. The names given are often the name of the person who registered or paid for the photographs. If you can identify any of these people or places by name, please leave a comment and we will add it to the description. You may also email us at info@dickinsonmuseumcenter.comĀ 

If you are interested in finding out more about an image or in purchasing a copy, please email us at info@dickinsonmuseumcenter.com . We offer stretched canvas prints of varying sizes as well as smaller sizes printed on photographic paper. The sales of these prints help to support the costs of this ongoing project.

The Stark County Historical Society also has a website featuring a selection of writings about the area and its people, https://schs.omeka.net/