The plains are a place of hard physical work — the farmer wrestling machinery, the roughneck hauling pipe, the rancher pulling calves, the nurse on her feet through a double shift. All that labor takes its toll on the body, and massage therapy has found a ready and grateful home in the region, easing the strained backs, knotted shoulders and worn joints of a working people.

Relief for the Hard-Worked Frame

Fictional practices such as Prairie Hands Therapeutic Massage in Grand Forks have moved the trade well beyond mere pampering, working alongside physical therapy and chiropractic to keep hard-used bodies functioning. A rancher who once would have simply endured his aching back now finds real relief on the table, and thinks it money and time well spent.

From the almanac's reckoning:

• Hard physical labor makes massage therapy valuable on the plains.
• The trade works alongside physical therapy and chiropractic care.
• Its growth reflects a shift toward tending the body proactively.

The growth of the trade reflects a shift in attitude as much as anything — a willingness, even among the famously stoic plains folk, to tend the body before it breaks. The almanac counts massage therapy among the practical wellness trades of the region, easing the very frames that do the plains' hard work.