Theodore Roosevelt National Park, North Dakota

Wherein Moominmama endures brutal heat in North Dakota but pays her respects to the originator of our national parks, Theodore Roosevelt...

It was 103° upon my arrival in Theodore Roosevelt National Park -- it's a shock to get out of an air-conditioned car into that kind of heat. But I counted myself lucky because it had reached 108° the day before.

These badlands, beloved of Theodore Roosevelt, are remarkably green despite the heat. The winds here have blown dirt and seeds onto the mounds and buttes over time, allowing plants to grow where most badlands remain barren. 

These buttes are also surrounded by massive grasslands. With the life-giving Little Missouri River nearby, even big Cottonwood trees have a chance in this landscape -- and they are surely a blessing when the sun blazes!

Moominmama arrived shortly after the brand new Theodore Roosevelt Presidential Museum opened. Designed by a Norwegian architectural firm, it draws inspiration from the surrounding badlands in some lovely ways. 

Consider the colors on this badlands cliffside in the northern section of the national park. Then look at the colors along the lobby walls just inside the presidential museum's entrance below.

There are other aspects of the design that connect with the local environment. It's a long and low structure like the rolling hills and includes a roof planted with grasses and prairie flowers. 

The museum was well worth the visit, giving Moominmama a much deeper picture of President Roosevelt (hereinafter TR; he never liked "Teddy"). Interested in the natural world since childhood, he was a birder and lover of wild things all of his life

He came to North Dakota in his 20s to bag a trophy bison only to discover there were few of the animals left. Though he did eventually get his trophy, he would later support efforts to restore bison to the Great Plains. He also came to appreciate the importance of habitat preservation, a perhaps lesser-known reason for his push to create national parks, forests, monuments and wildlife preserves (unlike our current president, who just stripped habitat protection from the Endangered Species Act.) 

It's near the town of Medora where TR kept a small cabin after his initial hunting trip in 1883. (It has been moved into the national park near the visitor center.) In 1884, TR returned, devastated by the double loss of his wife and his mother -- and leaving a baby daughter behind for his sister to raise.

The presidential library doesn't shy away from TR's contradictions. Our national parks may be his greatest gift to us, but he was also quite the imperialist, eager to claim other lands and bring American "civilization" to the lesser natives. 

He fully embraced the Monroe doctrine, seeing the Americas as ours to colonize. He was a racist but supported women's suffrage, labor rights and fought against political corruption.

TR was also a daredevil, leading the charge to take a hill in Cuba, and later, joining a difficult expedition in the Amazon. An injury on that expedition nearly cost him his life. 

Shot in the chest during his (unsuccessful) 1912 presidential campaign, he refused care for over an hour to deliver his speech. Fortunately, the bullet was slowed by the 50-page speech and a glasses case inside his jacket, protecting his heart and lungs. Surgeons left the bullet in his chest rather than risk removing it. 

Having struggled with asthma as a child, he was determined to be physically tough for the rest of his life. And it was here in North Dakota, living on Elkhorn Ranch, that he first proved his toughness, investing in cattle and riding the range, herding and branding his cattle with fellow cowboys. 

It only lasted two years. His final year as a rancher was a devastating one, a severe drought followed by a brutally cold winter. The cattle died in droves. Roosevelt gave up the ranch the following fall, returned east and resumed his political life. 

He remarried, threw himself into fighting during the Spanish-American War, then became the beloved father and president we remember, where he set aside some of the most beautiful places in the United State for the benefit of generations to come. But he always spoke of North Dakota as a place that had shaped him and prepared him for the presidency.

Moomminmama wanted to see what Roosevelt saw at Elkhorn Ranch. The ranch itself is gone but the park service owns the parcel where it once stood. Moominmama got to see the badland hillside that TR saw from his veranda and stand near the river that ran by his Cottonwood-log home.

The parking area is about three-quarters of a mile away, and as I walked in, I saw a hawk's feather on the path. Remembering that TR was a birder, I picked it up and brought it with me to the ranch. 

There I found a flat stone near where the house once stood, and I left the feather there, mindful of the way Native people might leave a similar gift for a leader they respected.

Moominmama has spent more than five years visiting many of this country's national parks, monuments and forests, amazed and awed at the beauty of our diverse landscapes.

My life would not be the same without the efforts of Theodore Roosevelt. This visit to Elkhorn Ranch felt a pilgrimage and my offering, a simple way to say thanks.