“This is a game changing gift for this transformative project,” Edward F. O’Keefe, CEO of the Theodore Roosevelt Presidential Library Foundation, said in a released statement.
Local and state officials and others met to coordinate planning to meet infrastructure and other needs that will come from increased visitorship to Medora when the Theodore Roosevelt Presidential Library opens in 2026.
Daniel Muus was named the first-ever chief development officer for the Theodore Roosevelt Presidential Library Foundation in Medora, and Kjersti Armstrong was named a board member.
A range of options being studied for the park include new and improved visitor centers in both the north and south units as well as at the Painted Canyon overlook.
The harvest of native plant seeds, including some taken from Theodore Roosevelt's Maltese Cross and Elkhorn Ranch sites, marks a "hands-on-the-ground" step forward for the future western North Dakota attraction.
Rob Walton, who is leading a new group of owners of the Denver Broncos, and his wife Melani pledged $50 million for the Theodore Roosevelt Presidential Library, recently reduced to $15 million. Does the Broncos purchase help explain the reduced gift?
The acquisition of 90 acres for the presidential library will be completed by the end of the month, with construction slated to begin the summer of 2023.
Moving the Roosevelt statue to Medora would allow us to use this wonderful piece of art to both provoke awe of the man's deeply important legacy in both our region, and our nation, and to draw attention to the more problematic elements of American history he played a part in. This art can still inspire, is what I'm trying to tell you, but not if the iconoclasts get their way and destroy it.
