Prairie Dog Town

by Curt Arens

On most Tuesday afternoons, teacher Joan Faith stays two hours after school to help community volunteers cut fabric and stitch together cuddly versions of Lynch, Neb.’s (pop. 276) mascot, the prairie dog, or “Lynch Dawgs” as they’re known locally.

“We have a good time visiting and kidding each other about the personality of each of the prairie dogs we make,” says Faith, who has taught at Lynch High School for 31 years.

Scorned by ranchers because of their burrowed holes in local pastures, black-tailed prairie dogs made quite a fuss around here 200 years ago when Capts. Meriwether Lewis and William Clark and their expedition discovered the noisy ground-dwelling rodents while passing through the region on Sept. 7, 1804, on their epic journey across the continent.

Near Old Baldy, a treeless conical hill seven miles north of present-day Lynch, members of the expedition spent an entire day trying to coax a prairie dog, which they called a “barking squirrel,” out of its underground burrow. They eventually succeeded by pouring water down the hole.

One of the live prairie dogs they captured made its way downstream to St. Louis and eventually to Washington, D.C., and President Thomas Jefferson the following spring when a few men were sent back with botanical and scientific specimens collected during the expedition up the Missouri River. The rest of the group proceeded on to the Pacific Ocean.

With the bicentennial of the Lewis and Clark expedition this year, Lynch residents are positioned to tell about the town’s prairie dog heritage.

LeRoy Purviance and his wife, Kathy, Lynch natives and owners of Ponca Valley Oil Co., first broached the subject three years ago by developing a webpage touting Lynch’s Lewis and Clark ties. “Everybody laughed,” Purviance says. “But we hired a young local high school student, Robert Vesely, to develop the website (www.lewisandclarktrail.cjb.net).”

Since then, the prairie dog has caught on. Retired Niobrara, Neb., minister Sandy Carpenter and his wife, Donna, boast a 4-foot chainsaw carved prairie dog in front of their business, Grandpa’s Country Cafe. “I’ve had lots of people stop by just because they saw the prairie dog,” Carpenter says. So the Carpenters have fun with their “dog,” dressing him up with earmuffs and scarf for comfort on crisp mornings.

At Purviance’s urging, Faith designed the original Lynch Dawg and enlisted volunteers to create copies of the furry rodent—1,000 of them so far—and sell them across the country.

It takes three to four hours to make each individual “Dawg,” Faith says. Some are thin and some are fatter, depending upon who is stuffing and stitching. The volunteers that range in age from the very young to over 80 years old take turns at different aspects of production. “We find a job for everyone who shows up,” Faith adds.

Proceeds from the sales go toward Lewis and Clark-related community projects such as the development of a new recreational-vehicle park and construction of an overlook along a county road near Old Baldy. Purviance says the additions are needed to accommodate the large influx of tourists following along the Lewis and Clark trail. “We know we can’t handle everyone, but we’re going to do the best we can,” he says, noting that the town is planning a large “old-time carnival” celebration on Labor Day weekend to mark the anniversary.

“It takes a lot of work to build pride in a little community,” Purviance adds. Lynch residents have done their share, keeping the 50-year-old Lynn Movie Theater in town alive by utilizing volunteer help and supporting their 20-bed Niobrara Valley Hospital in an age when viable rural hospitals are hard to find.

Despite their poor reputation with ranchers, prairie dogs have given Lynch residents a point of pride—and a mascot—linked to one of the nation’s greatest journeys of discovery.

Now, that’s something to bark about.

Curt Arens is a farmer and freelance writer and photographer at Crofton, Neb.

first appeared: 4/11/2004