Highway 83 to Be Featured on South Dakota Public Television

Award Winning author Stew Magnuson and his book, The Last American Highway: A Journey Through Time Down U.S. Route 83: The Dakotas will be featured on an upcoming episode of South Dakota Public Broadcasting’s Dakota Life television show.

It is currently slated to air April 7 at 8 p.m. Central/9 p.m. Mountain.

Those outside of the SDPB viewing area can watch the episode live online at this link. http://www.sdpb.org/dakotalife/

A SDPB crew last September followed Magnuson for a half day from Murdo, south through White River country and down to Mission, where he was filmed giving a presentation at Sinte Gleska University.

Magnuson says: “I was glad that we could meet there because that stretch of the road from Murdo down to the Nebraska border is one of my favorite parts of Highway 83. Not only is the scenery beautiful, the area is renown for its history.” 

The book cover image was taken in this area, he adds.

As South Dakota Public Broadcasting’s number one rated locally produced show for the past 25 years, Dakota Life features interesting South Dakota people, places, and things. New episodes of Dakota Life are broadcast on the first Thursday of every month at 8:00 pm Central Time, 7:00 pm Mountain, from September through June. Reruns occur throughout the year and episodes are eventually aired on the RFDTV cable channel.

The Last American Highway: A Journey Through Time Down U.S. Route 83: The Dakotas is a nonfiction travel-history book that uncovers stories found along a road that bisects the states from north to south. Magnuson takes readers on a trip down the road and through the history of the Northern Great Plains. The famous and the forgotten are found in stories he discovers in the Dakotas.

The White River, just east of Hwy 83

Explorers Pierre de la Vérendrye, Lewis & Clark, Jedediah Smith, are all encountered along with Chief Spotted Tail of the Brulé Lakotas, TV sensation Lawrence Welk and rodeo superstar Casey Tibbs. Cold-blooded killers, homesteaders, ballplayers and rail barons from yesteryear meet today’s truckers, oil rig workers and ghost towns inhabitants as Magnuson launches his own Voyage of Discovery in a beat-up 1999 Mazda Protégé. Timed for release during the states’ 125^th anniversary year, The Last American Highway: A Journey Through Time Down U.S. Route 83: The Dakotas, is a love poem to the natural beauty of the prairie and the fascinating people—both past and present—found along the road.

Born and raised in Omaha, Nebraska, Stew Magnuson is the author of The Death of Raymond Yellow Thunder: And Other True Stories from the Nebraska-Pine Ridge Border Towns—Nebraska Center of the Book’s 2009 nonfiction book of the year, ForeWord Magazine’s bronze medal winner for regional nonfiction and finalist for the 2008 Great Plains Book of the Year. And The Last American Highway: A Journey Through Time Down U.S. Route 83: Nebraska-Kansas-Oklahoma. He is working on the final installment of the series that will focus on Highway 83 in Texas.

He also penned Wounded Knee 1973: Still Bleeding, an account of the controversial 2012 Dakota Conference at Augustana College, in Sioux Falls, S.D., where members of the American Indian Movement squared off against retired FBI agents.

Stew Magnuson is the author of The Last American Highway: A Journey Through Time Down U.S. Route 83: The Dakotas, and  The Last American Highway: Nebraska Kansas Oklahoma edition. Both are available online or in museums, bookstores and gift shops on Hwy 83.

To join the Fans of U.S. Route 83 group on Facebook, CLICK HERE. And check out the U.S. Route 83 Travel page at www.usroute83.com.  Contact Stew Magnuson at stewmag (a) yahoo.com