Found this beauty while unpacking an architectural drawings and blueprints donation to the Archives and Special Collections

This is a 1943 drawing of the Pi Beta Phi Sorority House in Vermillion, South Dakota.

I am unrolling and flattening one tube of drawings and floorplans every week and am hoping to have this donation ready for researchers next year.

University of South Dakota Women’s Basketball: 1900s

According to Herbert Schell’s book Clay County: Chapters Out of the Past, Chapter 15, and review of Coyote Yearbooks from the early 20th century, University of South Dakota (USD) men’s athletics boasted early on Base Ball, Track and Football teams. Little was mentioned regarding athletics among women students. Basketball at the University of South Dakota would develop helped by the construction of the Armory and Gymnasium in 1905. Not only did basketball become a colligate sport, but high schools also adopted the sport.

A striking photograph in the 1903 Coyote Yearbook pictures members of the 1902 Women’s Basket Ball (as the sport was called then) team. In the 1904 Coyote another photograph of the women’s Basket Ball team appears. In the 1908 and 1913 Coyotes, no mention is made of this women’s sport, but pictures show that women took “Physical Culture”.

Photograph from the 1903 Coyote Yearbook of the 1902 women’s basketball team.  

Images from the 1910 Coyote Yearbook. Drawings at the top demonstrate that type of outfits men and women wore playing basketball. The bottom photographs show scenes of the inside of the Armory building where basketball was played.

           A photograph of the Armory and Gymnasium from the 1910 Coyote.

To accommodate the larger student population and athletics, in 1929 a new Armory building was constructed which was used for basketball games until the DakotaDome was built in 1979. Finally, as USD moved into Division 1 status, the Sanford Coyote Sports Center was constructed in 2016 which allowed basketball and volleyball teams to have their own facilities.

Although there is evidence at the University of South Dakota that women played basketball in physical education classes, clubs and some intramurals but, it was not until the 1971-1972 season that USD Athletics included an intercollegiate Women’s Basketball team (https://goyotes.com/news/2020/10/2/fifty-years-of-coyote-womens-basketball). In the intervening years, the Women’s Basketball team gained a national reputation. In the 2019-20 season, the Women’s Basketball team was nationally ranked and became the undefeated Summit champions in 2021 and 2022.  Thus, it took over 60 years for the USD women’s basketball team to exist. It became one of the premier athletic teams at the University of South Dakota.

We mourn the loss of former Senator James Abourezk.

He represented South Dakota in the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate from 1971 through 1979.

Image of the humorous Fake Shaikh incident from the James G. Abourezk papers at the University of South Dakota which are located in the Archives and Special Collections. Abourezk is on the right.

Wilber Moore Stilwell banners by Veronica Knippling grace the John A. Day Gallery entrance

If you haven’t stopped over to the John A. Day Gallery in the Warren M. Lee Center for the Fine Arts to see the 37th Annual Stilwell Student Awards Exhibition, you have a few more days to do so.

Banners featuring Wilber Stilwell, the exhibition’s namesake, are on display on the main gallery doors. The banners were created by Veronica Knippling as part of a summer U.Discover research project in the Archives and Special Collections. These panels will be used for years to come and feature Stilwell as artist, educator, advocate, and inventor.

To read more about Veronica, her U.Discover project, and Wilber and Gladys Stilwell, see page 12 of Connections (also designed by Knippling) the University Libraries’ annual report and Undergraduate Research Project Contributes to USD’s Archival Library, Honors Former USD Art Educator.

The Wilber M. Stilwell papers are held at the Archives and Special Collections and are open for research.

Migratory Bird Conservation Act

Are you interested in the Migratory Bird Conservation Act of February 18, 1929? Peter Norbeck, while he was an U.S. senator from South Dakota, sponsored this bill, and his efforts are detailed in the Peter Norbeck papers located in the Archives and Special Collections.

Map from the Peter Norbeck papers.

The Home Management House

While working on the University of South Dakota (USD) Photograph Collection: Historical Series, I noted an image of a house labelled Home Management House. With some research, I discovered that the Home Management House was used as part of the Home Economics curriculum from 1957 through the spring semester of 1966 for senior level students. According to the course catalogue description, students taking the Home Management House course lived in the house for six weeks and dealt with “problems that arise in a home”.

As part of the College of Arts and Sciences, the Department of Home Economics was started at USD in 1913. In the 1930s attempts to eliminate it were thwarted. However, in 1966 Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences Elbert Harrington phased out the Departments of Home Economics and Applied Sciences, seeing them as vocational programs with possible duplications of programs at other schools of higher learning in South Dakota*.

Although USD Archives Home Economic files described in detail that with the dissolution of these two programs, furniture and other items were dispersed to several departments within the University, what happened to the Home Management House was not noted. The picture of the building in this blog was taken in January 1966 at the time the Home Economics Department was in its last semester.

Additional research indicates that the house currently exists as a single-family dwelling located 409 North Plum Street, not far from the USD campus. Few people remember that the structure was part of the Home Economics program of study at USD that lasted for over 50 years.

*Cedric Cummings, Robert C. Hildebrand, and Stephan R. Ward. The College of Arts and Sciences 1882-1982, A History. College of Arts and Sciences, 1982, University of South Dakota.

Photograph of the Home Management House taken in 1966. USD Photograph Collection: Historical Series

The railroad reached Vermillion 150 years ago.

Southern Dakota was one of the first railroads in Dakota Territory, and the first to successfully operate in the area that would become the state of South Dakota. The tracks began in Sioux City in 1872 and reached Vermillion, Dakota Territory at the end of that year. In 1873, the tracks were completed to Yankton, Dakota Territory. 

Map showing Dakota Southern Railroad from Sioux City to Yankton.

Students arriving in Vermillion by train.

Six men standing for their picture at the train station in Vermillion, South Dakota.

All sources for this post are in the Archives and Special Collections.

Information from South Dakota’s Railraods [sic]: an Historic Context, by Hufstetler, Mark, and Michael Bedeau. South. Dakota State Historical Society, 1998. The book is the the South Dakota State Documents Collection. Map shown is a small portion of Territory of Dakota, by S. Augustus Mitchell, Jr., 1879. The map is in the Chilson Collection. Photographs are from the USD Photograph Collection and are also in the Digital Library of South Dakota.

Harold Edwin Brookman: A Beloved Engineering Professor

Harold Edwin Brookman was born on November 5, 1886, in Vermillion, Dakota Territory. He was the oldest of four sons born to Edwin and Anna Brookman. St. Claire Edwin (S.E.) Brookman and his twin brother Edgar were born in 1855 in New York and arrived in Vermillion in the early 1880s. The Brookman twins were millers and later instrumental in the development of electricity in Vermillion. Harold Brookman’s brother Lowell became a city electrician working for the city-owned power plant for several decades.

Harold Brookman was educated in Vermillion, attending the State University (University of South Dakota, USD) majoring in engineering. At USD the School of Engineering existed from 1907 until 1933. Brookman graduated in 1910 and was described in the 1911 Coyote Yearbook as an “athlete (football and track), engineering student and a lady’s man”. A photograph from that yearbook shows Brookman, captain of the track team, with a coyote pup on his lap sitting in the center of  his teammates.

Brookman went on to earn a master’s degree in engineering at State College in Brookings and became a licensed, professional engineer qualifying in drainage, architecture, heating, and ventilation, as well as mechanical engineering. He also studied art at the Trenton Art School. His family mentioned to me that in his spare time, Brookman painted and constructed scaled down exact models of wagons and stage coaches. During World War I, Brookman supervised the manufacture of materials for the Navy.

Harold Brookman was a member of the USD faculty since 1921 garnering honors for his work and admiration from President ID Weeks. When the School of Engineering ended, Brookman developed a program in Applied Science and was Professor and Chair until his retirement in 1959. As part of the program, he helped graduates find jobs or further educational prospects. When Brookman retired received the status of Professor Emeritus and continued to serve the University until his death in 1967.

A letter dated October 26, 1956, found in Brookman’s files in Archives and Special Collections (please see below) was written by President I. D. Weeks to Brookman. A portion of the letter stated “Your genuine interest in all of the University and willingness to do anything to contribute to its welfare has been an inspiration to me. My life has been enriched by being associated with you and I know this is true for countless numbers of students and faculty.”  Friends and associates honored Brookman by endowing a scholarship in his name. Moreover, Brookman Hall, constructed in 1963 was named after him.

Brookman designed the Danforth Chapel and helped renovate several buildings on campus. In a 2019 Volante article, his work on tunnels on the USD campus is described as follows: “Harry E. Brookman, professor of applied science and Brookman Hall’s namesake, designed the first tunnel in 1928 to carry power and steam lines from the old campus power plant to Old Main, a much more pacified purpose than protection from nuclear fallout. As the campus expanded through the next few decades, so did the tunnels underneath them.” (https://volanteonline.com/2019/10/underneath-the-u-the-strange-history-behind-usds-tunnel-system/)

Aside from his service to USD as faculty and university engineer, Brookman was an alderman for the City of Vermillion for six years. In 1929 he helped oversee the construction of the first swimming pool in Prentis Park. The vote from Vermillionites to go ahead with the project received only four more votes than the descenders! In 1936 Brookman designed the Prentis Park caretaker’s house constructed from wood taken from the Municipal Golf Club House.  

Brookman also contributed architectural drawings for a Progress Works Adminsitration grant submitted in 1934 by USD on behalf of the Dakota Hospital Association to construct Dakota Hospital. The Dakota Hospital Association got its money, but the construction of the building was under the auspices of USD that held the warranty deed. Brookman was City Engineer during the late 1930’s to early 1940’s. Brookman also served on the board of the Vermillion Chamber of Commerce. Harold Brookman died at the age of 80 years on October 7, 1967.

Thus, Professor Harold Brookman was a dedicated faculty member, supportive of his students, and honored by his colleagues. In addition, he served his community as alderman, Chamber of Commerce board member, and city engineer. Looking through his files at USD Archives and Special Collections, it was evident that Brookman was a student of history who believed that understanding the past would help prepare for the future.

Professor Harold Edwin Brookman (Photograph curtesy of David Gross)

Portion of a photograph showing Governor Kneip laying a wreath on December 29, 1971 in observance of the anniversary of the massacre at Wounded Knee.

Archives and Special Collections recently received 4 photographs of this observance.