BELLE FOURCHE—The Center of the Nation area is steeped in history, from its cattle-town roots and connections to Seth Bullock and ties to vaudeville performers and other figures from the past. Much of that history has found a home at the Tri-State Museum, where it is collected and preserved, inviting the community to come experience it. Now, another surprising connection to the past has joined the museum’s permanent exhibits—the story of famed Civil War nurse Mary Ann “Mother” Bickerdyke.
Bickerdyke was a widowed mother living in Galesburg, Illinois, when the Civil War began. She witnessed the terrible hospital conditions and essentially stayed on to improve them. She eventually became a field agent for the U.S. Sanitary Commission. The Library of Congress credits her with helping establish or improve roughly 300 hospitals and caring for wounded soldiers on 19 separate battlefields. “Mother Bickerdyke was a Civil War nurse, and there’s a statue of her in Illinois—she’s just famous, famous, famous,” explained Jada Udager, collections archivist. “A lot of stories written about her and her descendants are here.”
What makes a Civil War nurse exhibit relevant to the Center of the Nation? She has direct descendants living right here in the Belle Fourche area, and more spread throughout the tri-state area. Longtime Belle Fourche School District business manager Susan Proefrock is a relative of Mother Bickerdyke’s. “There are Bickerdykes in Camp Crook, Buffalo area—Harding County and Montana, and then Susan Proefrock—Mother Bickerdyke is her great-great-grandmother,” shared Udager.
Mother Bickerdyke’s son, Hiram, also brought the connection to the local area. According to the museum’s own exhibit, Hiram met Bruce Sebastian of Belle Fourche in 1877 and later settled on a Montana ranch. Generations of the Bickerdyke family have remained in Montana and the Harding County area. “One of her sons, Hiram, came here back in the 1800s, and he raised his family here, and they raised theirs here, and I think we’ve got five generations of them [in the area],” explained Udager.
Udager began archiving pieces related to Mother Bickerdyke and has developed quite an expansive collection. Some of the items found in the collection are family photographs, documents, silver pieces and historical materials about Mother Bickerdyke. Also, there are personal objects that belonged to Bickerdyke. The artifacts contained in the exhibit at the museum now come together to tell the story of her life.
In the display you will find a dried flower collection and moss cross that are said to have come from President Abraham Lincoln’s Illinois home garden in 1863. “They’re pressed in and I think she made them herself because she was a Civil War nurse, but the tape on the outside is all medical tape. So she must have put it between, I don’t know, not acrylic—it almost feels like a heavy plastic,” said Udager.
In another display, you will find three silver spoons that are said to have come to America on the Mayflower with the Rodgers family, ancestors of Mary Bickerdyke. A more recent piece of history on display is a certificate and medal honoring Mother Bickerdyke that were presented by the Daughters of the American Revolution in Hulett, Wyoming.
Udager enjoyed learning all about the Civil War nurse. “Well, General Sherman said, ‘She outranks me,’ and evidently they were in a field hospital, and some surgeon asked her where she thought she got her authority from and she said, ‘Well, the good Lord Almighty and if you have somebody that outranks that, I would like to see him.’ So she must have been a spitfire,” she said.
After Udager curated the collection from existing museum archives and donations given to the museum by the Bickerdyke family, they still needed a place to house the exhibit. Char O’Dea, chair of the Tri-State Museum board, stepped in to help Udager with the search for a case big enough to hold the collection. “It was really cool because I was looking for a case and Char O’Dea… was looking at the marketplace and everything—and retired Judge [Michael] Day and his wife, Mary, were moving… and they had this case that they were selling for $300, and Char said, ‘Well, would you want to donate it to the museum?’ And Mary said, ‘Oh, absolutely!’ So this was Judge Day’s mother’s,” explained Udager.
During the recent Center of the Nation 9/11 Remembrance Ceremony, Joe and Alicia Giaculli presented a framed American flag that was flown over the 9/11 Memorial in New York City to the city of Belle Fourche. That American flag now has the perfect resting place. Udager is holding the top of the Bickerdyke display case for the framed 9/11 American flag. She also moved items from beside the case so they could make room for the large model of the Twin Towers that goes along with the flag. It will sit on the ground beside the Bickerdyke display case.
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