South Dakota & North Dakota (Fargo, Bismarck: college, live in, shop)

[MJ1986]

I'll probably be bashed for this, but what do North Dakotans think of South Dakota?
How many of you have been to SD?
For me, I've seen about every part of ND, except for the NW part....(I-94 north & Missouri River west)
How many of you have been in SD?
I've been seeing a lot of ND license plates in Sioux Falls.
No bad stuff... I just wanna hear opinions/experiences.

[Roloff1976]

What's not to like about South Dakota?? We in Bismarck see lots of South Dakota plates as many North Central South Dakota shop and do business here. Many college age kids attend Bismarck State and Univ. of Mary. The farther North you go in North Dakota, they tend to see less South Dakota plates (but did notice lots in the Williston area...probably because of the oil boom and lots of young workers up there)...but Williston-Minot-Devils Lake-Grand Forks...probably see more Canadian traffic, Williston see's Montana plates, and Grand Forks see Minnesota plates. I think most North Dakotan's have visited the Black Hills and Deadwood at least once, if not more...for me...not Sioux Falls so much...only because I don't do any business there. But have heard it is a very nice city...and growing rapidly. We in ND like SD.

[davednorris]

Hi,

I liked SD. I lived in Rapid City a couple years. I really liked the Black Hill and Spearfish. I kinda think of ND and SD as one big Dakota.
I live in ND now.

Dave N.
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[MJ1986]

I love ND as well. I hope one day to visit the Williston/Minot area. I'm a ghost town buff...and have visited quite a few up there... like Arena & Merricourt. There are two guys that visit the ghost towns in ND... Here's a link:
GhostsOfNorthDakota.com

I really liked Bismarck/Mandan. There's a certain charm to it, I think. When I was growing up in SD, I only lived a few miles from the ND border.

Does anybody know what happened with changing the name of ND to just Dakota? Or was that just a crazy idea?

[Roloff1976]

Oh that was a little embarassing...it happened in 1989 I think...group proposed to get a bill passed for changing ND to plain Dakota...hoping people from out of state would look at ND differently...not as cold (north)...but the legislatures voted it down. It made national news and everything, but in a bad way...there were jokes, and newspaper and magazine articles joking about it. At one time (before ND and SD went their seperate ways) we WERE called Dakota. Sometimes, I think it would be nice if we were one state...we would be 1.5 million people strong, and would be able to share our assets...you know...SD has the beautiful Black Hills, Mt. Rushmore, badlands, ND has Theodore Roosevelt parks, north and south units, huge oil and coal reserves, BOTH states have wonderful recreation and fisheries with Oahe, sakackawea, Devils Lake, etc... apart, we are both unique, but together, we would have been even MORE unique.

[Old Surrender]

I hate South Dakota. It's in the way of my travel destinations in Nebraska and Kansas. If we could have a giant biopsy to remove it and put it, say, in an ocean that would be cool. It'll cut a few hours off my drive.

I kid, I kid...

[roundball]

ditto

[B.Lea.22]

I went on vacation in SD 2 summers ago. I really enjoyed it, the landscape was beautiful. I really would like to go back again if I get the chance.

[huttah]

I love driving in SD. I'm from Mandan and when a friend and I went to visit Mt. Rushmore this past summer, the scenery was just beautiful. And Rapid City has a Sonic, the first one I've ever seen! But Bismarck has the only Big Boy for miles and miles and miles, and many South Dakotans are damned to never knowing the deliciousness of a pizza burger flying style.

[MJ1986]

Huttah, I've seen Big Boy on the Food Network! How is it?
We have 2 Sonics in Sioux Falls...I'm sure they'll head up there to ND... Fargo, Grand Forks, and Bismarck would all be great markets for it!