From packing to prosperity
(continued)

"The workers came from the farms in the area, both Minnesota and North Dakota," remembers Dahle. "There were a lot of Norwegians, a few Russians and a little bit of everything else."

Some of the meat went to local markets, but most of it was shipped out in cold-storage rail cars to other parts of the country. Armour also operated a creamery, which sold milk, butter and eggs and later moved to Fargo.

During its 29 years in West Fargo, Armour had tremendous influence on the city and its growth.

Because the company would only rent houses in the village to its employees, others were forced to move south of Main Avenue. Those residents eventually created Southwest Fargo, incorporated as a village in 1937 and as a city in 1948.

The Armour plant was also the site of labor struggles and strikes as the AFL-CIO established itself during the middle '30s. One union strike in August 1938 lasted nearly 11 weeks.

"We went on strike, mostly to start getting recognition of our union," remembers Dahle. "We did accomplish something and we always got back to work."

Years of heavy production took a toll on the plant and parts of it were condemned by the government. Faced with extensive remodeling, Armour closed the plant in 1959 and moved its equipment to St. Paul.

A growing city

"In the early 1960s, the city was just beginning to grow," remembers Dahle, who took a job as Southwest Fargo's first city auditor when the Armour plant closed. "The growth started when they decided to put in sewer and water and pave the streets. Before that there was nothing but mud."




Just south of Main Avenue, looking east, in 1936.
Forum Photo File
In 1963, frustrated Southwest Fargo resident Millie Orth wrote:

"The streets in West Fargo have all gone to pot, / So don't try to drive on them because you cannot. / You have never seen such a horrible mess / And when they will be finished, it's anyone's guess."

About that time, many new homes were being built on the south side of Main Avenue.

"The city was really growing then, and it didn't stop," remembers Dahle.

According to census data, West Fargo was the state's fastest growing city in the 1960s, its population increasing by 53 percent from 1960 to 1970.

Part of that growth can be attributed to Siouxland Dressed Beef Co. The company announced in 1960 it would build a new cattle slaughterhouse and meat-packing plant near the Union Stockyards, which had enjoyed steady business just west of the Sheyenne River since 1935.

Though considerably smaller than the old Armour plant, Siouxland employed 300 to 400 people at any given time.

Siouxland changed its name to Flavorland Industries in 1973 and sold to Fargo Beef, later known as Held Beef, in 1980. Federal Beef Processors purchased the plant in 1987. Eleven years later and after controversy surrounding the plant's waste disposal and use of the city's sewer system, Federal Beef announced it would close. The plant stopped production Jan. 15.

During Siouxland's early days, Southwest Fargo's population began to swell and petitions were circulated to change its name to West Fargo.

In a 1967 election, the area south of Main Avenue became West Fargo and the area north of Main Avenue became West Fargo Industrial Park, a moniker never popular among its residents.

As Leonard J. Eid - a real estate developer who had purchased all of the Armour properties when the plant closed - sold the Armour homes to individuals, West Fargo Industrial Park residents argued for and won a name change, becoming the city of Riverside in 1974.

And in 1989, West Fargo and Riverside consolidated to become what is now the city of West Fargo.

All kinds of floods

With West Fargo's rapid growth from the '60s onward came the realization the city wouldn't have a future unless something was done to protect all those new homes and businesses from flooding.

In 1969, the Sheyenne River crested at 21.87 feet, flooding West Fargo and renewing interest in permanent flood protection for the city, of which 60 percent lay in the 100-year flood plain.

One option, construction of a dam at Kindred, N.D., had been studied for decades by the time Congress authorized it in 1970. But a new federal law requiring environmental impact studies for such construction halted the project, and the city flooded again in 1975.

In 1982, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers completed the study, recommending a system of levees and flood

The Union Stockyards building is shown in 1935.
Institute for Regional Studies, NDSU Libraries

diversion channels from Horace to and around West Fargo - instead of a dam at Kindred.

The Sheyenne Diversion was operational in 1993, just in time for that spring's flood. It removed West Fargo entirely from the flood plain, allowing development to spread west and south. Neighborhoods like the Charleswood area on south Sheyenne Street would never have been feasible without the diversion, which even kept the city dry during the massive Red River Valley flood of 1997.

A flood of a different kind came to West Fargo in 1972 with the opening of West Acres Regional Shopping Center along what is now Fargo's 13th Avenue South.

Although the new mall was located in Fargo's extraterritorial area, it lay within the West Fargo School District and thus provided a welcome tax source for West Fargo's schools.

The mall also brought a huge influx of people to the area, meaning more traffic through West Fargo and more people seeking homes in its growing residential sector.

West Acres' impact on West Fargo has become especially noticeable in the last decade, as major retailers like Menard's set up shop on the West Fargo side of 13th Avenue, blurring the border between the two cities.

What lies ahead

As West Fargo moves into the next millennium, it will continue to deal with its past.

The Sheyenne Diversion, which is working well by all accounts so far, is not yet completed. Water crises elsewhere have diverted attention and money from the project since 1993, but the channel must be stabilized if it is to withstand future floods.

Although the life of the city's waste system was extended by the closing of Federal Beef, waste disposal and water supply will remain concerns as the city's population - now estimated at 15,389 - continues to climb.

Defining how the city should grow in the 21st century poses another challenge, but City Planner Larry Weil says a comprehensive plan being developed this year will provide guidelines for future growth.

City Engineer Kevin Bucholz says although northern expansion could be a possibility in the distant future if the diversion's boundaries are changed, West Fargo's growth will continue south.

"In the years to come, we're looking to expand south of Interstate 94 and that will cause some controversy," says Bucholz. "When a city is growing like West Fargo is, you start getting growing pains, and one of those is 9th Street East - whether it will be an underpass, an overpass or an exit from the Interstate."

Despite the city's phenomenal growth, the apparent end of its major meat-packing era and the blurring of the lines that separate West Fargo from its larger neighbor to the east, the city is certain to retain its own unique character for years to come.

"We are and always will be tied to Fargo, since many people live in one community and work in another," Bucholz says. "But West Fargo is still a city in its own right and with its own identity."

(Historical information not specifically attributed was gleaned from the following sources: Forum archives, West Fargo Library archives, West Fargo Pioneer clippings, West Fargo city planning department, NDSU Institute for Regional Studies.)