In Touch with Prairie Living, January 2025
By Michael M. Miller
Nancy Promersberger Novak, Fargo, N.D., prepared an interesting paper, “The German-Russians: Homestead in North Dakota,” for her HMFE 362 class at North Dakota State University in May 1972. Our appreciation to Nancy for permission to use text from the paper.
Nancy writes, “The German-Russian people who settled in North Dakota in the 19th Century represent a group that brought with them a distinct way of life and an unusual housing style, one which they adapted to the Midwest prairies. They have an interesting history and their homes, especially the early clay homes in North Dakota, reflect their history and their values.
“Little has been written about these people and their original homes. Many of them are now in ruins in North Dakota. Others are abandoned and soon to be razed. Still others have been modernized and are being lived in, often by descendants of the original homesteaders.
“The United States Homestead Act of 1862 required that the settlers live on their tract of land. For these homesteaders, this was a great change from living in their dorf or village in South Russia with neighbors.
“The German-Russians liked the plan of their dorf and the closeness of neighbors. It was common in the Black Sea area to have the home, shed and barn under one roof. At the center of the community was the church. This was always the best building in the community.
“In America, they missed their colonies. It was strange for them to live individually on their homesteads but they eventually realized how much easier it was to care for their fields this way. Communities grew on the prairies but the dorf plan was seldom repeated in America.
“The brought with them their basic housing style from Russia. The first-generation German-Russians in America lived in houses very similar to those they had inhabited in Russia. As they had done in Russia, the Germans built their homes of materials that were readily available. There was little wood on the prairie or in the Ukraine region. For many settlers, the first home they built on the North Dakota prairie was made of sod.
Monsignor George Aberle writes in the book, From the Steppes to the Prairies, “It was a simple matter in putting up the walls of the sod house, which only required a breaking plow or spade to cut out the sod out of the virgin prairie and piling it up to the required height.”
“Lumber was very expensive to buy. These homes did not stand up well in the strong winds and were temporary until a finer, clay home could be built. It is the clay home that is most typical of the German-Russian people in North Dakota.
“The clay was used in three different ways by various settlers. One method was to pile up stones using a clay mixture for mortar and then to plaster the inside and outside with a smooth finish of clay. The outside plaster was mixed of yellow clay and fresh cow manure. Straw was mixed in as a binder. The inner plaster was a mixture of lime and sand.
“The most common method found in North Dakota was the use of clay bricks. These were also used extensively in the Ukraine. Clay was mixed with manure and chopped straw. It was then pressed into wooden brick-sized molds. After a few days in the summer sun, they would be dry and ready to use.
“The walls of the clay brick home were between 1.5 and 2 feet thick. Both the inside and outside were plastered and often in the Ukrainian national colors, yellow and blue. The roof was of wood frame with one large beam down the center. Willows were often piled on the beams, with sod and clay on top. Some repair was usually required each year and this was traditionally the woman’s job.
“The clay structure was very well adapted to the prairie environment. It was sturdy and the clay was an excellent insulator. The home was warm in winter and cool in the summer. Because of the prevailing northwesterly winds on the prairie, the home was built facing into the wind. This meant that the back of the home always faced north. There was usually one window on the north side. This was in the kitchen. The west side had one window.
“On the south side was a wood frame entrance called a ‘vorhaus.’ This was an anteroom use to store extra things and provided an entrance way. This anteroom entered directly into the kitchen. The kitchen was a combination kitchen, dining room, bed and utility room.
“At the heart of it was a large clay oven. This often supplied the heat for the entire home. Baking was done in this oven. Both dried manure and twisted hay were used for fuel in the oven. The oven was constructed of clay bricks and in some cases had a length of five feet and a height of five feet. Sometimes the ovens were designed with long ledges that provided warm sleeping benches for the older folks.
“The children’s room was on the opposite side of the kitchen. There was little privacy for any family member. In summer months, the boys might move out to the lofts in the barn to sleep.
“One of the most unusual features of the German-Russian homestead was the presence of the summer kitchen. This was a small wood-frame building with a factory-made stove or a homemade clay baking oven. Baking was done in the summer kitchen. The main home was used only for sleeping during the warm weather.
“The barn and shed were usually clay structures also. If they were joined to the house, they were usually on the east side.
“Simplicity is descriptive of the way of life of the early German-Russians in America. They were thrust into a new environment that was thousands of miles from their former homes. They adapted well because that was their nature. They transferred as much as possible of their housing style from Russia to America. Here, they made adaptations but they remained a unique ethnic group for many years.”
An excellent example of the German-Russian construction is the Welk Homestead State Historic Site, birthplace of Lawrence Welk. Father William C. Sherman and NDSU students photographed many houses from 1972 to 1977 in central and western North Dakota. More than 4,000 photographs of the Sherman Collection, are available at digitalhorizonsonline.org.
For more information about donating family histories and photographs, or how to financially support the GRHC, contact Jeremy Kopp, at jeremy.kopp@ndsu.edu or 701-231-6596; mail to: NDSU Libraries, Dept. 2080, PO Box 6050, Fargo, N.D. 58108-6050; or go to www.ndsu.edu/grhc. You may also contact me directly at michael.miller@ndsu.edu or 701-231-8416.
January column for North Dakota and South Dakota weekly newspapers.