Can aging N.D. resist change amid immigration debate?
COOPERSTOWN, N.D. — Every other Wednesday at lunchtime, the Coachman Inn attracts what, in this sparsely populated part of the world, amounts to a crowd. They come for the kumla— the Scandinavian potato dumplings their grandmothers and great-grandmothers used to make.
It’s a lively scene that reveals a sobering demographic truth. The hands passing the pitchers of melted butter are weathered; the heads bobbing in animated conversation are mostly silver-haired. The kumla tradition is in danger of extinction. So is Cooperstown and many of North Dakota’s once-bustling rural crossroads.
“We simply don’t have enough workers,” says Orville Tranby, a community leader who in 1999 helped Griggs County, where Cooperstown is the seat, and neighboring Steele County win a 10-year federal grant to create jobs and stem population loss.
When developers proposed locating a dairy in the area, however, the community shot it down. A proposed hog plant is facing similar opposition. Tranby says it’s because some residents fear such facilities might attract a wave of Hispanic immigrants who could change the local culture.
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Can aging N.D. resist change amid immigration debate?
USA Today
