Growing Up in North Dakota : A Memoir [Paperback]

Philo T Pritzkau (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: December 31, 1996

"Growing Up in North Dakota" is a vivid story of the pioneer period of the state's history. Here are stories of horse and buggy days, haying, harvesting, and thrashing; and of hard times, long winters, and one room schools.

Editorial Reviews

Review

...gives a vivid account of pioneering and farming on the prairie in the first 20 years of the 20th century. -- Dorothy Hoobler, Oxford University Press, New York City

Philo Pritzkau's recollections of growing up in North Dakota, near Burnstad, reads well. -- Ken Rogers, The Bismarck Tribune, Bismarck, ND

About the Author

Philo T. Pritzkau was born in 1902 in a sod house build by his immigrant parents near Burnstad, North Dakota. Before his retirement in 1972, he was Professor of Education at the University of Connecticut. Patricia MacLachlan, internationally acclaimed for the praire story, "Sarah, Plain and Tall, is his daughter.

Product Details

• Paperback: 103 pages
• Publisher: Germans from Russia Heritage Collection, North Dakota State University Libraries; First edition (December 31, 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0962977764
• ISBN-13: 978-0962977763
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 5.8 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 5.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,098,486 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Growing up in North Dakota: A Memoir, June 28, 2005

By 

Mr. Michael M. Miller - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Growing Up in North Dakota : A Memoir (Paperback)

Book review by Carol Just Halverson, St. Louis Park, Minnesota

There once was a person who grew-up in North Dakota and dreamed about traveling to places with a different landscape of mountains and valleys, lakes and trees and bustling cities where excitement waited at every turn. That person left the prairie in search of place, found a new geography and settled down. After a few years, memories of the broad North Dakota horizon with it's trademark golden grain fields and stands of sunflowers in tall salute beckoned that person to listen once again for the distant call of the Western Meadowlark.

Whether you are the person longing to revisit the North Dakota prairie, or you are lucky enough to live there, plan to read Philo T. Pritzkau's recently published novel, Growing Up in North Dakota: A Memoir.

Pritzkau, retired Professor of Education at the University of Connecticut, is the son of German-Russian immigrant parents who homesteaded near Burnstad, Logan county, North Dakota in 1886. Born in 1902, Philo T. Pritzkau's first twenty years were spent on his parent's homestead and, while the text is written in the 1990's, it is the memory of Pritzkau's prairie youth that supplies every detail in this narrative of life in the first decades of the 20th century on the North Dakota prairie.

Anyone with the mildest curiosity about rural life at the turn of the century will not only enjoy, but can expect to learn a great deal from this memoir. Pritzkau doesn't assume his reader knows or understands farm or ranch life and painstakingly describes every step of rural life as he knew it. He includes details of the planting to harvest cycle, identifying various crops and their planting sequence, the haying and raking process, threshing, hauling, storing and selling grain, care of livestock, breaking horses, bartering eggs and cream, and the importance of the family poultry, garden and canning regimen. I value my rural North Dakota roots and the experiences of my ancestors more after reading Pritzkau's first person account of farm life.

Pritzkau doesn't stop there. He pays homage to both parents of their role in shaping his life, their support of his desire for higher education and keen interest in local and national politics. He also writes about his rural school experience and the mentors within his community who encouraged him to learn the critical thinking and debate skills that prepared him for a life-long career in the academic community.

Lest you think this memoir paints a portrait of a charmed life, think again! Pritzkau does not "sugar coat" rural life. He tells of year-round hard work from dawn to sundown, but there is no "poor me" message here, rather a dignified acceptance of his life as it happened.

The Pritzkau household was a dedicated partnership with a firm commitment to the land and each other. Father Pritzkau's dreams for his farm were balanced with mother Pritzkau's conservative opposition to debt, mirroring many successful farming endeavors across the prairie where partnership meant husbands and wives had a voice in the decision making process.

My favorite chapter, "Building the Granary" takes the reader from father Pritzkau's earliest dreams of a new granary to the finished product that remains standing today. While describing in detail the building process from start to finish, Pritzkau emphasizes the teamwork required by the entire family and the pride the family took in the finished product. He writes, "the basement walls are as strong today as they were when built over seventy years ago. That granary is really a monument to Dad's determination to build something that would last."

Root cellars, butchering, food ways, repairing harness, religion, hilarious tales of early family automobiles all await Pritzkau's readers. It is no surprise that his daughter, author Patricia Pritzkau MacLachlan, most famous for her novel Sarah, Plain and Tall and made-for-television movie of the same name, credits her father as the inspiration for many of the prairie stories in her own writing.

Perhaps all who read this book will be inspired to identify and share their stories and like the author will feel the life and landscape of the prairie in their soul. Philo T. Pritzkau shares his soul in Growing Up in North Dakota: A Memoir. It is good reading.

Carol Just Halverson, storyteller, writer and oral historian, grew up on a farm in LaMoure County, ND. Her company, LIFETIMES, a video-communications business, helps others identify and document their family stories.

5.0 out of 5 stars Growing Up in North Dakota : A Memoir, July 7, 2011

By 

WmCl - See all my reviews

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This review is from: Growing Up in North Dakota : A Memoir (Paperback)

This book was a wonderful true to life look into the lives of a German-Russian immigrant family who came to America during 1886 to claim the land of the homestead act. Their son Philo the author, was one of their youngest; born in North Dakota in a sod house his family built when they arrived as they needed shelter before the harsh North Dakota winter set in. With not many trees available it was a home that they knew how to build from living in their former county of Neu Danzig Russia which was much like North Dakota. Philo wrote that they did later build a wood house, barn and a grainery that was quite ingénues in its application.

Philo writes a lot about his older brothers, father and his mother's cooking and how hard they worked to eke out a living. Philo tells about his school days in a one room school house with his sister Lilly and how as young children they took a horse or walked to school even in the harshest of winter days. Philo also tells of his many adventures in his North Dakota home.

I loved all the family photo's in this book and there are several of Philo and his family.

Dr. Philo T Pritzkau was in his 80's when he wrote this book. Philo had a Doctorate in Education received from Columbia University and he was a Teacher, School Principal, Professor of Education at the University of Connecticutand and authored several books.

I loved reading this short book, as Philo was a cousin through his Mother Elenore Engel-Pritzkau.

Philo lived to be 102 years old and even in his advanced years he was a man with a great sense of humor and a vibrant personality.

Philo T. Pritzkau's only child and daughter, took after her father Philo as a story teller and Patricia Marie Pritzkau-MacLachlan, is an award-winning author herself of many children's books, possibly the most well known is the "Sarah Plain and Tall" trilogy.