Photo: South Dakota Historical Society
Scotty Philip’s buffalo herd in Stanley County.
SDPB1: Monday, Dec. 9, 8pm (7 MT)
James “Scotty” Philip, a pioneer South Dakota rancher, is often credited with saving the American Bison from extinction. His story is told in The Buffalo King, a production of Nowlin Town Productions. The program airs on SDPB1 Television on Monday, Dec. 9, at 8pm (7 MT). Philip, and his wife, a Native American, came to Dakota Territory in the late 1800s. He set out to save the buffalo from extinction by buying a small herd of 74 buffalo. By the time of his death in 1911, the buffalo herd had grown to more than 1,000. Buffalo
from his herd have been used to restock herds across the nation, including South Dakota’s Custer State Park. The Executive Producer and Director of the documentary is Justin Koehler, a native Scotty Philip of West River South Dakota, who grew up on a ranch not far from the town of Philip which is named after the South Dakota pioneer.
Photo: South Dakota Historical Society
Film Details Legend of Scotty Philip
Pioneers Hold on to History, Traditions What causes a region, a place, to imprint itself upon the people who are born and live there? What is the connection between landscape and memory? A new television documentary shows how a territory can endure in the minds of the descendants of those inhabitants after years, even after generations, have passed. At Home in Russia, at Home on the Prairie airs on SDPB1 Television on Wednesday, Dec. 25, at 5pm (4 MT). The program is one in a series produced by Prairie Public of North Dakota about the Germans from Russia who settled in our region of the Midwest. The documentary travels to an area typical of many German settlements on the Russian steppe – at one time a breadbasket of grain and other agricultural products. The Germans who settled the area are largely gone now, 6
Learn. Dream. Grow.
Photo courtesy Prairie Public
SDPB1: Wednesday, Dec. 25, 5pm (4 MT)
Immigrant family finds a home on the Northern Plains.
scattered in forced migration through difficult decades of political unrest and change. Many of these German-Russians settled in the Northern Plains. One of those families is the Kutchurganers, who lived in south Russia before journeying to the prairies of North America. The stories are told by the descendants of these pioneers.