College football’s champion will be decided this week with the Bowl Championship Series. Those of us from North Country realize that this is a sideline compared to the old tradition of awarding the Nickel Trophy between the winner of the football game that used to take place every year between North Dakota State University and the University of North Dakota.

UND was the traditional liberal arts university with the schools of medicine and law.  NDSU started as the agriculture and engineering school.  Only seventy-five miles apart, there was no end to intra-state snarling and barbs back and forth.  One of the top college rivalries of all time as determined by several national surveys, on and off the field, the Nickel Trophy was the heart of the conflict between North Dakota State (the Bison) and the University of North Dakota (the Fighting Sioux). 

The buffalo head nickel, with the mighty bison on one side and the image of a Sioux warrior on the other side is the perfect traveling trophy.  The trophy wasn’t an actual nickel - this one was special.  Minted in 1937, it weighs 75 lbs, is 2 inches thick, and almost 2 feet across.

Try putting that in a vending machine.

At UND, the Nickel is shepherded by their student government.  At NDSU, the Nickel resides in the custody of the Blue Key National Honor Fraternity - a group dedicated to service to their fellow man (motto: Serving I Live), though the group is also a focal point for school spirit.

The annual game between the two rivals came to an end in 2004 as the Bison moved up to Division I-AA athletics to meet the needs of a fast growing campus and demands from alumni hungry to build a better program and the Sioux chose to stay in Division II (at least for a few more years).

The Nickel Trophy went back and forth 65 times starting in 1938, with UND holding a slight edge in wins (35 to NDSU’s 30 - though as a proud member of the Thundering Herd, I hate to admit that fact).

The unofficial transfer tally of the trophy would be much higher.

There was the famous (infamous?) time that the Nickel was stolen from UND and pictures were sent for the next several months to the Fargo Forum.  The Nickel trophy in a tractor seat.  The Nickel trophy in front of Mount Rushmore.  The Nickel trophy in the Rockies.  The Nickel Trophy in front of the Golden Gate Bridge.  Then it vanished…until the Governor of the State of North Dakota got a 75 lb package shipped to him COD from California.

Yup, the Nickel was back.

Then there was the time that several NDSU students in maintenance garb managed to get the Nickel out of the trophy room at UND (essentially a locked vault in the athletic department) and smuggle it back to Fargo in time for homecoming.

That was the year that as a member of the homecoming court, I got to hold the Nickel at an after hour party…

UND had their moments too - ripping it off of the wall of the NDSU Student Union late at night.

As UND now makes the move to Division I-AA athletics, hopefully the rivalry and the tradition will be renewed.

Plus, since UND won the last football game, would be great to get it back down to NDSU where it belongs.

 (Tom Jirik wrote columns in several newspapers in Iowa from the late 1980’s to the mid 1990’s.  This column originally appeared in the The Boone Today)

Winds ship across the snowscape.

The only light comes from the twinkling stars and the hazy moon overhead.  It’s nearly midnight, yet the night is so bright that I can see for miles.  Yard lights twinkle in the distance, marking isolated farmsteads.

Winter here is humbling.

With our technological advances, our scientific and mechanical resources, and our knowledge, we are still no match for winter.  Her cold freezes our pipes and our cars.  Her ice coats our roads and sidewalks and power lines, breaking down our complex communication and electrification systems.  She is silent, long and sometimes deadly.

Most of our tourists-some of them friends and relatives- prefer to visit in the spring and summer, “when the weather’s better.”   They say they prefer to enjoy summer’s greenery, lazy summer rivers and the spectacle of endless rows of corn and soybeans.  Is it convience or fear that forces them to make that choice?

But there is also beauty in winter.

The tiny tracks of foxes, mice and rabbits cross the white snow.  Another world exists for them under the snow and under the ground.  Deer quietly slip from clearing to clearing pawing for grass.  They are like shadows in the moonlight flitting among the trees and brush.

Those trees and plants, seemingly dead, sleep until spring.  What awakens them?  Science may know, but to most of us it will remain a wonderful mystery.  For now, their icy branches rattle overhead in the cold winter cold, casting lacy shadows on the snow.

Icicles and frost hang form the trees and fences- tiny diamonds sparkling in the moonlight.  Barns and corncribs huddle under their mantles of snow, bracing themselves against December’s bluster.

What of humans?  We huddle in our houses, depending on our furnaces to keep summer’s warmth alive until spring.  Then we open windows and doors, allowing the warmth to escape.  In May it will surge out of those screened windows to warm the countryside, to call summer’s birds and to coax flowers from the cold earth.  But in December and January the wind is too strong and the cold too intense.  Summer must be locked inside.

These rambling thoughts come as we zip down a deserted highway somewhere near the Minnesota border.  These holiday trips are becoming familiar as family and friends disperse across the country.

In our mobile bubble of warmth we are safe from the cold night outside.  My wife sleeps comfortably in the seat next to mine.  The dim lights of the dashboard cast a glow on her peaceful face.  The glittering beauty of the countryside outside and the warm feeling inside tell me that all is well.  It’s been a Merry Christmas and it looks to be a happy new year.

I reach over and turn off the radio, content to listen to the wind and the wheels.

(Tom Jirik wrote columns in several newspapers in Iowa from the late 1980’s to the mid 1990’s.  This column originally appeared in the The Boone Today in January 1989)

The season’s worst storm dumped more than 23 inches of snow in Fargo, N.D. in less than 24 hours last week, prompting the closure of highways, schools and businesses.

On the heels of the storm, an arctic cold front slammed into the Red River Valley that spans the Minnesota-North Dakota border.  The front sent temperatures plummeting to 30 degrees below zero with wind chills of -60 and -70 degree range.

Where’s my bus ticket?

I’m homesick.  When I heard the weather report for Fargo, I was ready to go.  My hometown is only 70 miles from Fargo.  It only received 18 inches of snow, but it was colder.

Why doesn’t it snow here?  Why doesn’t the temperature ever go below zero?  Why can you take the boy out of Minnesota, but not take the Minnesota out of the boy?

I put up with 105-degree heat this summer.  I didn’t complain.  I suffered through nights when the temperature didn’t dip below 90 degrees.  I didn’t whine.  I survived, but I didn’t like it.

Why didn’t I complain or whine?  Because I was dreaming of sub-zero temperatures and mountains of snow.  I was imagining the crunch of icy footsteps and the roar of snow blowers and snowplows.  I was waiting for winter.  I’m just a winter kind of guy.

So here it’s winter and all we’ve got is piddly-squat.  Nothing.  Zero.

We’ve had a couple of ice storms, some rain and a little slush that tried to masquerade as snow.

It didn’t ‘ fool me.  Those feeble attempts can’t convince me that this is winter.  No sir, I’m waiting for the biggie.  Mid-Iowa’s gonna get dumped on and I’m gonna love every minute of it.

But wait. It’s already halfway through January.  By the time our January thaw gets over, it’ll probably be March.  And before we know it the temperatures will be back up in the 90’s.  I can’t stand it.

I want my winter.  I paid taxes here.  Part of those taxes go to support State Climatologist Harry Hillaker.  If he doesn’t deliver I’d say I’m not getting my money’s worth. C’mon Harry, can’t we have just a little storm?  I’d settle for a mere 12 inches or 14 inches.  How about 8 or 10?

I’ve got a contingency plan.  I’m heading to Minnesota in February.  The weather there will be great.  There will be 30 inches of snow on the ground and it will be drifted and piled higher than you can imagine.  The wind will be wild.  A stiff 40 miles per hour out of the north would be about right for February.  If it’s mild out, the temperature will certainly be at least 10 degrees.  If I’m lucky, we’ll get in a couple of -45 degrees.

I can’ t wait.

If you are nice to me I might send you a post card.

 Goodbye to the year that was.  2008 will be one to be remembered, as they all are, for their tragedy and triumph, for their comedy and their sadness.

Hello to the year that is here.  Welcome 2009 - for as bad as life seems today, with the turning of the calendar, it seems like a little seed of hope is reborn for the coming year.  Perhaps John Wayne said it best, “Tomorrow is the most important thing in life.  Comes into us at midnight very clean, it’s perfect when it arrives and it puts itself in our hands.  It hopes we’ve learned something from yesterday.”

If nothing else, today, New Years Day, is a day about choices.

We can chose to live in the nearby - to live our life filled with the daily fears and dreads.  To fall to the same failings, the same weaknesses that we have fought, or we can chose to be something better.

We can choose to fight the demons, to be the men and women we were meant to be.

But with that seed of hope that is planted on this New Years Day, we must also hope for a bit of patience.  For change, in the world, in our country, in our families, in our lives, comes slowly.  Inch by inch, battle by battle, the task of building a better life, a better world is won slowly, over days, weeks, months, years - over life.

Hopefully, we have learned a few things from the previous year - from the previous years - some things that we can carry forward with us.  Lessons learned, battle scars worn proudly, forgiveness asked and granted - all with a renewed sense of purpose as we move forward.

As this day, this year, comes to us at midnight, may we have learned something from our yesterdays, so that we can make our lives, our country, and our world a better one for our selves and our children.  May we make the choices in our daily lives to make it a very happy New Year.