The first church services here were held in a schoolhouse, and a pioneer tells of how these meetings were faithfully attended by an old Indian "clad in great dignity and an old nightshirt." Jamestown's first church, the Presbyterian, was erected in 1881. The first resident Roman Catholic priest arrived the same year, and resided in a rectory that measured 14 x 22 ft. Although there were many places in the State where Catholic church services had long been held, Jamestown in September 1889 became the first seat of the diocese of North Dakota.
In 1879 a group of local businessmen organized the James River Navigation Co. Of their first steamer, the Belle of Richmond, the St. Paul Pioneer Press said, "The craft is composed of a steam-whistle, an engine the size of a teakettle and a little boat under it." Ice put a stop to river navigation that fall, and in May the following year the initial trip of a new boat that had been built during the winter proved unsuccessful.
The fertile James River Valley land has produced such bountiful crops that between 1875 and 1900 farmers often paid for their lands in two years. A writer of that time says that "though North Dakota didn't have granite bluffs and waterfalls for its beauty, a land that would yield twice its cost in the first year would look rather beautiful to most men."
Maxwell Anderson (1888-), Pulitzer Prize playwright (1933), and Curtis D. Wilbur (1867-), Secretary of War in President Coolidge's cabinet, once attended school in Jamestown.
The two leading institutions of Jamestown overlook the city from the river bluffs on both sides of town. To the SE. is the State Hospital For The Insane, with its handsome buildings and beautifully landscaped grounds, a little city within its 2,000 acres of farm land.
Jamestown College, on high bluffs (L) on the northeastern edge of the city, is the oldest, and only private, college in North Dakota. Founded by the Red River Presbytery in 1883, it was the first school in the State to offer normal school training for teachers. A plan for construction in semi-Gothic style has been followed, with the result that the buildings present a pleasing and uniform campus group.
On the campus is Voorhees Chapel, one of the finest college chapels in the Midwest; it is built of reinforced concrete, Bedford stone, and mat-faced Menominee brick. The interior is constructed with huge hammer beams of Gothic type, and there are two high Gothic windows. The chapel is also used for musical and dramatic performances, as the intent of the institution is to make this building the center of college life and associations.
Klaus Park, at the southwestern edge of the city, with entrances on Elder and Willow Aves., consists of 26 acres of heavily wooded land lying between the James River and Pipestem Creek. It was donated to the city by the heirs of Anton Klaus, prominent pioneer affectionately known as "the father of Jamestown." An outdoor swimming pool is supplied with warm artesian water. Preserved in the park is one of the original millstones used in Jamestown's first flour mill built by Anton Klaus in 1879.
Nickeus Park (equipped playgrounds), at the northern end of 5th Ave., is in a loop of the James River. It was donated to the city as a memorial to a pioneer Jamestown attorney, by Mrs. Fannie B. Nickeus, his widow.