MANDAN Historical Society

Working to Preserve & Promote Mandan's Heritage since 2004

Welcome

Membership

Activities

Ag Stn Centennial

History Harvest

TR-Coe Exhibit

WWII Exhibit

Museum & Office

Area History

Book: "Mantani"

The 1880s

Mandan Rodeo / Fair

School System History

The 1890s

The 1900s

1901 Pan Am Expo

1903 TR Visit to NDak

The 1910s

1910 Spring Flood

1911 Fair & Airplane Demo

1912 TR Whistle-Stop

The 1920s

Prohibition in Mandan

Mail Order Kit Homes

The 1930s

FDR Visit August 1936

The 1940s

The 1950s

1958 Lincoln Stamp FDC

Custer Drama / Trail West

The 1960s

The 1970s

The 1980s

The 1990s

1st of the 21st

2010-Present

Area Landmarks

Cary Bldg - Mandan Drug

CCC Camp Chimney

Christ the King Church

Collins Av Civic Bldg

First Lutheran Church

First National Bank Bldg

First Presbyterian Church

Great Plains Academy

Great Plains Expermt Stn

Lewis & Clark Hotel

Mandan Hill

Mandan Theatre

MV Produce Warehouse

Methodist Church

NP Beanery

NP "Colonial" RR Depot

NPRR Freighthouse

NP Rail High Bridge

Roughrider Statue

St Joseph Church

WWar Memorial Bldg

Youth Correctional Center

Gone Forever

Central School

Collins Ave Courthouse

Cummins Building

Deaconess Hospital

Eielson Field

Emerson Inst/Opera House

First St Federal Building

Havana Club

Hotel Nigey

InterOcean Hotel

Liberty Memorial Bridge

Mandan Creamery & Produce

Mandan Flour Mill

Merchants Hotel

NP "Queen Anne" Depot

Original Passenger Depot

Palace Theatre

Peoples' Hotel

Rock Haven

Topic Theatre

Young's Tavern

Heritage Homes

Altnow-Smith Home

Dunlap-Harris Home

Ellis-Uden Home

Freeburg-Esser Home

Lyon-Weigel Home

McGillic Home

Olson-Brick Home

Parkins-Cooley Home

Stutsman-Wyatt Home

Swanson-Reichman Home

Welch-Ness Home

Endowment Fund

Genealogy Links

Biographies A-C

J D Allen

Franklin Anders

Richard Baron

James Bellows

George Bingenheimer

Margaret Bingenheimer

Philip Blumenthal

Elijah Boley

Frank Briggs

Leo Broderick

William Broderick

Frank Bunting

Lyman Cary

James Clark

Henry Coe

Viola Boley Coe

Daniel Collins

Elizabeth Custer

George Custer

Biographies D-L

Alice Dahners

Henry Dahners

C E V (Charles) Draper

Esther Davis

Tony Dean

Joseph Devine

Ronald Erhardt

John Forbes

Palma Fristad

Gilbert Furness

Aloysius Galowitsch

Frederic Gerard

Zalmon Gilbert

Charles Grantier

James Hanley Jr

James Hanley Sr

Mary Harris

C Edgar Haupt

Michael Lang

William Langer

Albert Lanterman

William Lanterman

Richard Longfellow

Rolland Lutz

Hiram Lyon

Biographies M-R

George Marback

Gary Miller

Lee Mohr

Margaret Naylor

John Newton

Anton Ness

John Osterhouse

George Peoples

Arthur Peterson

Nels Romer

Hoy Russell

Walton Russell

Antonie Rybnicek

Ervin Rybnicek

Hynek Rybnicek

Biographies S-Z

Margaret Schaaf

George Shafer

Benjamin Shaw

William Simpson

Anna Knox Stark

Mary Stark

Benjamin Stephenson

J O Sullivan

John Sullivan

Era Bell Thompson

Andrew E Thorberg

Ida Thorberg

C L Timmerman

George Toman

Earle Tostevin

Edwin A Tostevin Sr

Edwin D Tostevin Jr

Walter Tostevin

Felix Vinatieri

A B Welch

Levon West

Frank Wetzstein

Harry Wheeler

Philomena Yunck

View Collections

Artifacts - Miscellanous

Newspapers

Pottery and Glass

Photos - Buildings

Photos - Downtown

Photos - Floods

Photos - People

Photos - Rail and Trains

What's New

Rock Haven / Bellow's Landing
In the early days of statehood, the main commercial transportation route was the Missouri River.  Even after the the advent of the railroad in the 1880s, the river still served as the main north/south route until the mid-1930s and the development of the national highway system.
Steamboats used coal for fuel and when coal ran out, they used wood sometimes bought from farmers along the river.  One refueling point was originally owned and operated by James Bellows (future president of Mandan's first Village Board elected in 1882).  Originally known as Bellow's Landing, it was located seven miles northwest of what would later become downtown Mandan and included an icehouse.  Historical records suggest the area started to serve steamboat traffic as early as 1832 when the riverboat Yellowstone reached Fort Union.  Regular steamboat service on the Missouri began in 1860.
1894 Corps of Engineers River Plat
Click to Enlarge - 1894 Corps of Engineers River Plat
Click to Enlarge
However the harbor was renamed "Rock Haven" when the US government took over the operation in the late 1870s .  The Army Corps of Engineers made extensive riverside improvements, including adding dry-dock and boat repair facilities. It supported the supply ships for the US Army's frontier forts. It was credited as the best landing on the river.  Unlike most river harbors, the area was permanent and safe even during spring river ice breakup.

When the government designed a new building / Post Office for Mandan in 1912, space was included for the harbormaster's office.

Snag boats were a vital part of river traffic.  "Snags," usually trees, would catch in the river.   Stumps would be cut off and the rest to float harmlessly down the stream.  If the trees were too big they would be dynamited and cut in two.
The paddlewheel "Mandan" was a government snag-boat launched in June 1893 from from a boat yard in Yankton, SD.  It operated between Williston, ND and Sioux City, IA. Its mission was to keep the river channel clear to the many commercial boats that plied the Missouri. The steel-hulled snag-boat was equipped with ropes, pulleys, chains and large hooks, would move up steam, and in the manner catch the snags and pull them loose. 
1912 US Corps Engineers Snagboat "Mandan"
Well known boats of that era were many:  the freighter Josephine (constructed at the same time as the Mandan at Yankton), the Far West and the Jon Ordway plus a wide assortment of keel boats, dugouts, buffalo-skin bull boats and long flat bottom mackinaws.
1907 Mandan traversing Missouri River
1855 Steamship operating on the Missouri River
John D. Anderson was harbormaster at Rock Haven for over 25 years. But as the importance of steamboat transportation wained in the 1920s, the activity at Rock Haven slowed to a halt. 
Anderson's daughter Mary met and later married Charles Wunders.  Wunders spent over 35 years on the river as an engineer on the snagboat Mandan.  Eventually Wunders and his wife Mary retired to the Sioux City Iowa area.  

John Anderson finished his government career supervising bank stablization projects for the US Army Corps of Engineers, including the placement of rip-rap along the bank at Rock Haven.  He and his wife Alma (Bruns) lived at a residence at the harbor.  But after Anderson's death in 1934, Rock Haven was dismantled and sold.

1955 Rock Haven Reclaimed
The site was closed to river service and sold to the Zachmeier family who live near by. The southern portion of the property was sold to Montana Dakota utilities in 1953 for the utility to build a coal-fired power station i.e. Heskett Plant in 1954.

The MHSoc's museum and office is located at 3827 30th Avenue NW; PO Box 1001; Mandan, ND 58554
Contact us at info@mandanhistory.org


Last Updated 03/28
/23    ©  2007-2023  Mandan Historical Society   All rights reserved