Valley City attraction gets land donation

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Kari Lucin / The Sun Joe Stickler, who started building Medicine Wheel Park in 1992, sits in the park’s new addition, donated by AgCountry Farm Credit Service Thursday.

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VALLEY CITY, N.D. — Visitors may not see a change after Thursday’s donation of two-thirds of an acre of land to Medicine Wheel Park — it was already landscaped with the blessings of donor AgCountry Farm Credit Services.

“That slice of land faces the road,” said Joe Stickler, who created the park and organizes the volunteers who maintain it. “If someone doesn’t know about the park, they’re going to see something (from the road).”

Stickler began building Medicine Wheel Park in 1992 on land owned by Valley City State University. It had once been a golf course, but Stickler, now chairman of the mathematics, science and health and physical education division at VCSU, had other plans.

“I always was aware of the cycle of seasons and solstices and equinoxes as a child,” Stickler recalled.

While he was teaching an astronomy class, he told his class about American Indian astronomy, and decided it was time to build the calendar he had long been planning.

Now Medicine Wheel Park features two solar calendar replicas, a model of the solar system and perennial flower gardens, as well as an American Indian burial mound complex and a trail system.

Approximately 60 volunteers work together to maintain the park each year, putting in 500 to 600 hours of work.

Though the sliver of land AgCountry donated is relatively small, it is significant, because it is located on a prominent slope facing the road.

Tourists searching for the park are often told to “go until you see boulders,” and the boulders located on the slope are highly visible. Stickler and his volunteers, many of whom are VCSU students, had already started planting on the slope, with AgCountry’s permission.

It is a riot of color, set among boulders, rock edging and decorative grasses, with day lilies, datura, chrysanthemums, irises, chives, dame’s rocket and blanket flowers.

To donate the slope, AgCountry and Stickler had to go through proper university channels, including the State Board of Higher Education.

“It was pretty easy getting through the channels when someone’s giving you something,” Stickler said.

At a brief ceremony recognizing the AgCountry donation Thursday, Stephanie Mayfield, director of the Valley City Chamber of Commerce, praised the university for creating the park and AgCountry for its donation.

“It is just a great addition to our wonderful community,” Mayfield said. “More and more tourists have been asking how to get here.”

Also speaking at the gathering were Curt Van Dyke, regional vice president for the Western Region for AgCountry, Steve Shirley, president of VCSU, and Marv Langerud, AgCountry’s senior vice president of producer marketing.

“We are very pleased we could make a contribution to (the park) and we hope to be good neighbors for a long time,” Langerud said.

Sun reporter Kari Lucin can be reached at 701-952-8453 or by email at klucin@jamestownsun.com

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