The basketball season is getting under way. Fans here in Jamestown will be cheering for the Jays and Jimmies while the residents of the surrounding communities rally behind their own home teams.

But back 101 years ago the residents of Jamestown had another team to cheer for.

In 1909 you could have been in the stands applauding the efforts of the Jamestown Cynosures.

That’s pronounced something along the lines of “sign o sure.” It was the team name of the Company H, the Jamestown unit, of the North Dakota National Guard. The team played a schedule against other guard units and even college teams from around the state as a fund raising effort for the company of soldiers.

The basketball squad wasn’t the only fund raising effort of the local militia. They even sponsored drama and comedy productions. They also sponsored the first air show in the community which lost them a bunch of money.

And they weren’t the only basketball team playing in Jamestown.

The Jamestown High School boy’s team was having a good season in 1909. They clobbered Bismarck 81 to 5. Things were a little different with the sports coverage back 101 years ago. The write up of the big game listed the chaperones that accompanied the team to Bismarck.

Also listed were the area members of the North Dakota Legislature, in session at the time, that attended the game and which of them bought the team supper afterwards.

The Jamestown High School girl’s team edged Valley City that same season. The write up in the paper included a notation the home team Jamestown girls treated their visitors to cookies and refreshments after the game.

You don’t see that type of sportsmanship anymore.

And it seems the Jamestown High School sports team didn’t have a nickname back then. All the articles I came across simply called the squads the “Jamestown High School” team.

Maybe they didn’t think they could match Cynosures.

And for those of you that are wondering, Cynosures is the French name for the constellation Ursa Minor. That’s more commonly known as the Little Dipper and contains the North Star.

Which, when you come to think of it, makes Cynosure not such a bad team name.

After all, could you imagine sitting in the stands cheering for the Jamestown Little Dippers.

This co lumn ran in the Nov. 16 edition of the Prairie Post.

They say there is nothing new in the world.

There is a scam that’s been going around the Internet for years where a thief contacts someone who has something to sell. The crook sends a check for more than the amount of the items saying it was the only check he had.

The victim is asked to cash the check, keep what they’re owed, and send the rest of the money back to the scam artist.

Of course the original check is no good but by the time the victim learns that their money is gone.

In our modern world of the Internet the thief and victim don’t even have to be on the same continent.

The same scam was going on 99 years ago. Of course there was no Internet back then so the thief and victim probably had to actually talk to each other.

And the thief was called a swindler, not a scam artist.

The swindler in this case would travel to a new town and check into the local hotel before paying a visit to the local music supply store. There he would pick out items like a new Victrola and a few other items that totaled up to about $250.

The newspaper articles of the day note the swindler seemed to prefer music stores but had no reason why.

He’d then give the store a check for $300 drawn on the James River National Bank of Jamestown. He’d ask the store for his change back, usually about $50, and tell them to keep the merchandise until they confirmed the check was good before delivering the goods to the hotel.

Of course when the store found out the check wasn’t good the swindler, and the change he collected from his bad check, were gone on to the next town.

The crime was committed in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Spokane, Medford, Oregon and Bismarck. The swindler used different names in many of the cases but was consistent in using a bad check drawn from the James River National Bank of Jamestown. The checks were embossed with a Protectograph. This device stamped the check with a maximum amount the check could be made out for and made the check look official.

This little story tells us a few things.

First off, even among criminals there is nothing new in the world. Just the same ideas even if they utilize different technology.

And a crook could travel a lot further on $50 back in 1911 than they can now.

This column ran in the Nov. 9 edition of the Prairie Post.

Much of the history of the Dakotas starts with the coming of the railroad to the region. The first trains to the region started the influx of people and began the chapter of the history books marked by settlement and expansion.

And that chapter started to come to an end about 50 years ago.

Or at least it was the beginning of the end of the passenger train part of that history.

Hearings were being held around the state in 1960 to determine if some of the passenger trains on the branch lines would continue to operate. It was not a decision left just to the corporate big wigs. At the Federal level the Interstate Commerce Commission held hearings and made rulings.

At the state level the Public Service Commission got in the act.

The ICC held the first hearings and made a ruling. If they ordered the abandonment of passenger service on a line the PSC had 35 days to appeal or the service ended.

In the summer of 1960 the ICC ordered the discontinuance of passenger service from Bismarck to Streeter and from Jamestown to Leeds.

The hearing for the Streeter line was held in Bismarck while the hearing on the Leeds line was held in Jamestown. The Jamestown Sun reported the hearing in Jamestown was lengthy and well attended.

But it was tough to argue against the numbers.

The Northern Pacific was losing about $15,000 per year on the passenger service. That was based on an average number of passengers per year of about 2,500 over the last three years of operation.

The paper didn’t report any members of the public speaking on behalf of maintaining passenger rail service.

For the small towns it had to be an end of an era. Most of these towns were founded with the coming of the railroad. Many of their founding fathers would have arrived on those very early passenger trains.

But the world had changed. People traveled by cars and planes rather than trains and horse drawn wagons or buggies. In the end economics won out. Trains couldn’t run with an average of two passengers on each run. Times had just changed too much.

And while the small towns on the branch lines lost their passenger train service in the 1960s Jamestown and other towns along the old Northern Pacific mainline lost theirs in 1979 with the end of the North Coast Hiawatha.

Times were changing; while the Leeds and Streeter runs ended in 1960 the ICC was still considering passenger train service to Oakes, Wilton, Marion and McHenry.

I think we know how those decisions turned out.

As I mentioned in last week’s column John F Kennedy paid a visit to Jamestown in February of 1960. He was an assumed, if not official, candidate for the presidency he was elected to 50 years ago this week.

It was a trip into hostile territory for Kennedy. An earlier Jamestown Sun article had mentioned that 90 percent of North Dakota Democrats were in favor of Hubert H. Humphrey for the Democratic nod.

And the race on the Republican side was also unknown. Nelson Rockefeller and Richard Nixon were exchanging barbs as they vied for the top of the Republican ticket.

The trip to North Dakota was a whirlwind. Kennedy arrived in Bismarck a couple hours later than planned after filing last minute papers to get on the primary ballot in West Virginia. He spoke in Bismarck about the importance of rural electrification during a noon box lunch.

You have to keep in mind that in 1960 not all parts of rural North Dakota were connected to the grid.

Kennedy arrived in Jamestown at about 5:30 p.m. after a quick flight from Bismarck. He visits what is now known as the Anne Carlsen Center for Children but in 1960 was referred to as the Crippled Children’s School. He held a press conference at the old Gladstone, covered live by one of the community’s radio stations, and then was the featured speaker at a banquet at the Memorial Building.

An estimate 620 tickets were sold for the banquet for $4 each or two for $7; which gives you some idea of inflation. In 1960 you could have dinner with a future president for less than the cost of fast food now.

About 450 would be seated in the main auditorium with the rest seated in the “American Legion” auditorium downstairs. The unlucky banquet goers seated in the basement could view the proceedings through a closed circuit TV system.

Kennedy spoke about farm issues in Jamestown. He blamed the Republicans for threatened cuts to ag programs and the REA system.

He explained the Democratic Congress had saved the programs from the cuts of the Republican administration.

Even 50 years ago it was politics as usual.

Kennedy managed to win the Democratic nomination over Humphrey and Johnson in a convention in Los Angeles. Johnson wasn’t a declared candidate but always said he was open to being drafted. Kennedy went on to win the White House after the debates with Nixon, the first biggest political events nationally televised to that point.

And he became the 35th President 50 years ago.

And even though Kennedy visited North Dakota a couple more times before the election he didn’t carry the state.

With 90 percent voter turnout Nixon carried 55 percent of the vote. Nixon did better in Stutsman County where he picked up 57 percent of the vote.

Get out and vote. You are making history.