6 Fascinating Things You Probably Didn't Know About The National Buffalo Museum In North Dakota
By Leah|Published April 12, 2016
×
Leah
Author
Leah moved to North Dakota when she was 12 years old and has traveled from the Red River Valley to the badlands and many places in between. She loves small-town life and currently enjoys living on a small farm in the ND prairie. She's always had a passion for writing and has participated in novel writing challenges such as NaNoWriMo multiple times. Her favorite part about this job is recognizing small businesses that deserve a boost and seeing the positive affect her articles can have on their traffic, especially in rural areas that might have otherwise gone overlooked.
One of North Dakota’s most popular tourist attractions is The National Buffalo Museum in Jamestown, North Dakota. More specifically, everyone is drawn to the colossal statue that boasts the title of The Worlds Largest Buffalo, and the extremely rare albino buffalo that lives at the museum, White Cloud. The museum is packed with history and interesting tidbits that thousands of people have visited to see and learn. Even if you’ve been there before, here are a few things you may not have known about it.
1. The World's Largest Buffalo statue weighs almost 60 tons.
The sculpture was made out of cement and stucco around a steel frame. The sculpture was designed by Jamestown artist Elmer Peterson in 1959 and stood alone on his hill before the museum and Frontier Village were added in later.
2. The beautiful and very rare albino buffalo, White Cloud, is almost completely deaf and blind.
Albinism usually comes with partial or full deafness and blindness in almost any species. White Cloud herself is almost completely deaf and has limited vision. She is still able to roam freely with the rest of the herd with no issues, and acts like a normal buffalo.
Advertisement
3. The statue originally cost $8,500 to build - today that would be over $60,000.
Dakota Miracle is not a true albino buffalo like his mother is. He is a white buffalo. It is still very rare - the National Bison Association estimated that they happen in only one of every 10 million births. The museum managed to have another white buffalo out of a regular brown buffalo in the herd that was named Dakota Legend.
5. The world's largest buffalo statue was named "Dakota Thunder" through a contest - it is also the name of one of White Cloud's calves.
The contest was held in 2010 and it had over 3,500 entries. I'm curious to know what some of the other submissions were and what it might have almost been named!
Dakota Thunder shares the name with a miniature version of itself whose mother is White Cloud. The living and breathing Dakota Thunder is the same color as the statue.
6. White Cloud is also called by the Sioux translation of her name - Mahpiya Ska - and is very important to tribes from all over the country.
White Cloud is immensely important to many Native American tribes, as white buffalo are considered sacred. Many visit the museum to see her and offer prayers and receive blessings.
Definitely consider a visit to experience not only seeing the giant buffalo and the herd, but also to see the museum and the Frontier Village that are part of the attraction. It should definitely be on any North Dakota travel bucket list.
OnlyInYourState may earn compensation through affiliate links in this article. As an Amazon Associate, we earn from qualifying purchases.
