The old churches on the plains and prairies create a cultural landscape like no other, their steeples rise above the horizon as testaments to faith and community.
Preservation North Dakota and its partners have invested in the people and places and prairie churches that make North Dakota unique. In 2001 the prairie churches of North Dakota captured the heart of the nation, marking the shift from “most endangered” to “salvation.”
The book describes the decade-long project of Preservation North Dakota to document churches all over the North Dakota prairies and to assist in the preservation of 26 of those churches.
Funded initially by Save America’s Treasures and the J. M. Kaplan Foundation, Preservation North Dakota continues the funding assistance through its Grassroots Grants program. Prairie Churches is written by Lauren Hardmeyer Donovan, it has a foreword and epilogue by North Dakota State University Professor Thomas D. Isern.
It includes 54 black and white photographs and a gallery of 26 full-color photographs taken by John Toso.
