Wosters's Writings

I first learned about Missouri River perimeter roads – Highways 1804 and 1806 for us locals - during a legislative committee whose members were arguing over the proper level of funding for such roads.

That was in the early 1970s, if I recall correctly. The fight was over spending to improve the condition of roads that run along the Missouri River. It was all part of an ambitious plan to commemorate the Lewis and Clark trip by allowing people to drive from, I don’t know, St. Louis, maybe, to western Montana on fine, smooth highways that paralleled the gently meandering course of the river.

The vision they saw, at least the people in that first committee hearing I remember, was of a roadway congested with tourist traffic (but not so congested that the smiles left the faces of the tourist dads, moms and kids in those cars flowing along the path once traveled by Lewis and Clark). The carloads of travelers would stop at every town they passed, and every town they passed would become a tourist magnet on the order of Wall Drug Store. The roads would bring prosperity, progress and farm-to-market produce.

Well, it wasn’t easy to put money into perimeter roads when the main highways needed work. And the perimeter roads didn’t pass as many cities as some tourists might want to see in their travels.

Even so, the road system draws some motorists today. For many years, I’ve driven parts of the perimeter road system whenever I could manage. My favorite way to get to Chamberlain is to leave Highway 83 just south of Fort Pierre and take the road past Antelope Creek and Iron Nation and Lower Brule. If the weather has been dry, there’s a decent, although unpaved, cut-across road that goes from east of Malfunction Junction down past my old farm and on into Oacoma.

Of course, that route can eat up the time, so when I’m in a hurry, or when I have a carload of folks I think might not be as thrilled about winding and swooping and dipping over the trail as I am, I stick to the four lane down to the interstate or Highway 34 through Fort Thompson and on in from the north.

When I have a chance to travel north to Mobridge or Selby – or even Wakpala and Kenel - I prefer the perimeter road. It’s in fair shape – last time I drove it - it has little traffic and it offers a fine change of pace from the more-traveled run out on Highway 14 and up Highway 83. It has a number of places where a motorist is required to come to a complete stop and other 90-degree corners that demand a lot of braking. Sometimes a person can fall in behind a combine or some other large piece of farm machinery. It isn’t a road for the impatient, and I don’t take it if I think I don’t have the time for a casual drive. When I do have time, it’s a relaxing, contemplative trip, and many times I arrive in Mobridge much fresher than when I left Pierre.

I particularly like driving through the Akaska area and recalling the Super Bowl Sunday back in 1980 when a party of fishermen were startled by a four-engine DC-7 aircraft landing in a field late in the day. As the story developed, the airplane contained something like 25,000 pounds of Colombian marijuana, and the pilots were supposed to have landed in New Mexico or some distant place.

The fishermen parked pickups to block the airplane’s path and took the valve stem from one of the plane’s tires.

Later, the airplane was flown to Pierre. The marijuana bales were trucked to the capital city, I believe. They were stored for a time, and then burned at the city landfill. I was one of the reporters who witnessed the bonfire, and I heard the jokes about the Capitol Lake geese making extra trips out to the area corn fields, trying to quiet their over-sized cases of the munchies.

That bit of history alone should draw some curious travelers onto the perimeter road.