A Day at the Custer House

Today while working at the Cavalry Post I only gave one tour of the Custer House because it rained all day which kept the tourists away. After giving my tour and waiting for more tourists to arrive, I helped dust the Custer House and read Thomas Paine's pamphlet Common Sense. Common Sense, a document that as it helped spark the American Revolution would also have been something that could have been read when solders occupied the post, although as many soldiers were immigrants literacy rates in the Army were around fifty percent.

Also recently we learned that from last year to this year we had an increase of 21% in tourism. This may be because many tourists from other parts of the country taking advantage of comparably low gas prices have decided to travel through the area. A small number of out of state workers have also told me that they are temporarily stopping in North Dakota to capitalize on this states economic successes while riding out other states economies failings. This increase in tourism has come at a time where the Fort Abraham Lincoln Foundation has fewer people working than were working last summer. This has meant many busy days of work. So although today was fairly uneventful, it is the exception rather than the rule for there to be so few tourists. Most days there are fairly large numbers of people coming to see history come to life.