Central ND News

U.S. Senator Kevin Cramer (R-ND) participated in a beam signing ceremony on Wednesday to mark the significant progress on the construction of the Theodore Roosevelt Presidential Library in Medora. Construction began in the summer of 2023, and the library is slated to open in 2026.

“It’s hard for me as a former tourism director to exaggerate the impact the Theodore Roosevelt Presidential Library will have,” said Cramer. “You cannot overstate the impact that Theodore Roosevelt has had on the area, the state, the nation, and the world. The care and engineering that has gone into ensuring the integrity of the natural landscape that was so important to Roosevelt are as impressive as the man himself.”

In late 1883, President Roosevelt invested in a cattle ranch in what was then Dakota Territory. Following the deaths of his mother, Mittie, and wife, Alice, only a few months later in 1884, he left New York to grieve in solitude in the Badlands. Roosevelt famously stated, “I have always said I would not have been President if it had not been for my experience in North Dakota.”

The site of the library is positioned to overlook the South Unit of Roosevelt’s namesake national park, which was established as a memorial park in April 1947 and later designated as a national park in November 1978.

Earlier this year, Cramer joined fellow North Dakota Congressional Delegation members U.S. Senator John Hoeven (R-ND) and U.S. Representative Kelly Armstrong (R-ND) in introducing the Theodore Roosevelt Presidential Library Act to support library construction and artifact preservation efforts.