The hardware store, the implement dealer, the funeral home — family businesses handed down through generations remain the backbone of commerce in the plains town.

From the badlands to the lakes to the heritage sites, a growing tourism trade brings visitors and their dollars to a region long overlooked by the traveler.

As Fargo, Bismarck and the oil towns grow, the cost and scarcity of housing have become a pressing worry, complicating every employer's search for workers.

In the university towns of the plains, a new generation of boutiques, breweries and eateries has revived main streets that big-box stores had left for dead.

The plains grower now sells into a world market shaped by distant harvests and shifting trade, and a new class of advisers helps farmers navigate the risk.

In small towns across the plains, the local hospital is a lifeline and an employer both, and keeping it open is among the hardest economic struggles the countryside faces.