Bonanzaville Full Village Tour

Completed in 2012, the Lucian Barnes Pavillion houses interior exhibit space, museum offices, collections storage, and an event center. Lucian Barnes was a long-time donor to the Cass County Historical Society and Bonanzaville and he had a ... Read more

PLAY VIDEO The Trangsrud Elevator was originally built near Kindred, ND as a grainery in the early 1900's by Amund Trangsrud and his son, Henry. In the 1920's, the elevator and 10,000 pound scale for grain were added.  The elevator stands ... Read more

In July 1871, work began on railroad tracks in what would become Fargo, North Dakota. Nearly a year later the first train crossed the Red River from Moorhead into Fargo and opened up the Dakota Territory to the rest of the country. As the t... Read more

The metal train shed was a gift from Burlington Northern Railway, which was formed in 1970 from several railways, including the Great Northern and the Northern Pacific. It houses Bonanzaville's four large railroad cars. The large NP #684 st... Read more

This building houses our horse drawn vehicles, including mail coaches, diary wagons, school busses, and even an antique hearse. Built in the late 1800's, the Myhra-Fredrikson Funeral Home in Davenport, ND purchased the hearse in 1905. The ... Read more

The Kathryn Depot was built by the North Pacific Railway Company around 1900 in Kathryn, North Dakota. It was closed in the mid- 1960s and moved to Bonanzaville in the years following. The Kathryn Depot now houses the Spud Valley Model Rail... Read more

The U-R Next Barber Shop began life as the "City Tonsorial Parlor" and was built around 1900 in Buffalo, North Dakota. W.J. Frederick operated his parlor there until 1909, when he sold it to Lewis Easton, a law enforcement officer. Even tho... Read more

The Maier house was built by John and Dora Maier, who were originally from Russia, south of Moorhead, MN in 1896. Their daughter Magdalina Maier lived in the home until her death in 1981. Magdalina's children wanted to fulfill their mother... Read more

This 1930's era building was the home of the Hunter Times newspaper out of Hunter, North Dakota. The first paper printed in Hunter, The Eye, ran during the 1890's. In the 1920's, the "Hunter Herald" ran until the building burned down. T... Read more

Fargo's first house was built by Henry Moore and George Mann in 1869, when Fargo was a tent city in Dakota's Territory. Initially the house was close to the river channel, in today's Island Park, but because of the annual floods, it was mo... Read more

The Furnberg Store was built in 1899 by Christian and Johanna Furnberg in Osgood, North Dakota, about 4 miles south of West Fargo. General stores like the Furnberg were the Wal-marts of thier day, stocking everything from clothing, to groce... Read more

This cabin is an authentic reproduction of the single-level log cabins of pioneer days. In this region, log cabins were most common near rivers, where there was an abundance of trees. A main feature of this cabin is the cast iron stove. Loc... Read more

This cabin was built by a group of Finlanders for Helmar and Emma Habberstad in 1874 near Kindred, North Dakota. Helmar had immigrated from Eidsvoll, Norway in the early 1880's. The family lived in the oak-log cabin until the 1950s when C... Read more

The South Pleasant Lutheran Church was built in 1890 in Christine, North Dakota. Services were held in the church until 2013. In 2015, the church moved from Christine to Bonanzaville to replace St. John's Church, which burned in a fire in 2... Read more

Built in 1989, this building is a replica of land office that once stood in Cogswell, North Dakota and was a project of the Bonanza Belles (an auxiliary group of Cass County Historical Society).  Land offices were vitally important to the ... Read more

From Buffalo, N.D., this bandstand stood in Buffalo Park and dates from around 1900. 

The school was first built in 1895 in the Mapleton Township, a quarter mile east of John Dobrinz Farm. The schoolhouse was named after the Dobrinz family because they had 13 children who would attend the school. Martha Dobrinz eventually t... Read more

This home was built in the late 1800s on a bonanza farm in Mapleton Township. Mary Dodge Woodward lived in the home with her children from 1882 to 1889. Walter, one of her sons, had been hired to manage the 1,500 acre bonanza farm for their... Read more

This building originally served as the Hagemeister School #2, District 31, in Berlin Township from 1930-1956. After the school was moved to Bonanzaville it was used to house the original furnishings from the Cass County Courthouse from 19... Read more

The Hagen house was built in 1897 for Martin Hagen on a farm near Horace, ND. Three generations of the Hagen family lived in the home without running water or electricity. The house boasts a summer kitchen which was used for laundry, cookin... Read more

The Houston Mansion, a bonanza farm house, was built by David H. Houston in 1881 near Hunter, ND. Houston was a Scottish immigrant who, upon settling in the U.S., became a farmer, poet, and inventor. The elegant house included maple floors,... Read more

The building was constructed in the early 1890s in Arthur, ND, costly approximately $1000. It held church services, dances, graduations, plays, basketball games, and movies. Minstrel shows were held annually and showcased singing, dancing, ... Read more

Blacksmiths in the pioneer days provided shoes for horses, wagon wheel rims, chains, and plows to thier communities, as well as items for the household, like latches, hinges, and wrought iron gates.  This shop is the original blacksmith sh... Read more

This building was constructed to house Bonanzaville's large collection of early tractors. Tractors on display in this building span over 100 years and include manufacturers such as Case, Rumley, Chalmers, John Deere, Fordsons, McCormick Dee... Read more

The Transgrud House, from the same farm as the Trangsrud Elevator, was constructed around 1871. Amund Trangsrud emigrated from Norway to Cass County in 1870. Seven years later, he married Rikka Myrah and moved into this house where they li... Read more

Early agricultural technology as well as more recent inventions are housed in this building. Farm machinery implements ranging from threshing machines to plows to seeders, walking plow and diesel- driven tractors can be found in this buildi... Read more

The Pioneer Fire Company is a memorial to all firefighters of the area, past, present, and future. Firefighters from Fargo, West Fargo, and Casselton built the fire hall to replicate a fire station of the 1890s for the purpose of preserving... Read more

The Page Hotel and Brass Rail Saloon was built in 1889 in Page, ND. It offered comfortable sleeping quarters, meals, and live entertainment on the player piano. No alcohol was served in the saloon until the 1930s, because North Dakota ente... Read more

The Cass-Clay Cooperative Creamery Association was founded during the Great Depression and managed to survive through those challenging years through to today.  This building is a replica of the former creamery located in Kenmare, North Da... Read more

This building was originally constructed in the 1960's for use as the Fargo Auxillary Police Training Center, as well as a storage building for supplies and Auxillary owned vehicles. In its history is has also served as a polling place, a p... Read more

The Eagles Air Museum had over 20 air crafts on display, dating from 1911 to 1975. The oldest being the 1911 Curtiss Pushers, built 7 years after the Wright Brothers flight in 1903. In 1911 “Lucky Bob” St. Henry of Minot made the first... Read more

Bonanza farms had large crews of workers who helped with all aspects of farming, from planting to threshing, but women had an impact on bonanza farms as well. They were most often responsible for feeding the crews of 20, 30, or even 50 men.... Read more

This building houses a collection of over sixty vehicles from the early 1900's of automobiles to more modern vehicles.  Many of the vehicles were donated by Eugene Dahl and Lester Melroe who purchased a large collection of automobiles from... Read more

The building that houses the drug store is from West Fargo and was not originally a drug store. It was purchased and donated by a pharmacist, David Olson of Fargo. The building was moved to Bonanzaville in 1975 and the contents inside the... Read more

One of the most popular exhibits at Bonanzaville, the Telephone Pioneers Museum has been a staple here since 1972, when an old Tower City, North Dakota hardware store was converted by the US West Telephone Pioneers, who still care for the b... Read more