In the mid-1990s, Lutheran Social Services of North Dakota began resettling significant numbers of displaced people from African countries and countries of the African Diaspora in the Fargo-Moorhead area. A booming economy that was largely spared by the 2008 Great Recession brought new residents from across the country, including many African Americans and secondary migration of African immigrants. The Black population of North Dakota tripled between 2010-2020.
New Americans
Our area’s Black community has a high percentage of immigrants. Our colleges have attracted international students and faculty since the 1950s, but the majority of our region’s sizable African and African Diaspora immigrant community came here as displaced persons over the last quarter century.
Fargo-Moorhead has been a refugee resettlement community for Lutheran Social Services of North Dakota since 1948. In 1996, changes in US government policy allowed more immigrants from African countries to find new homes here. The first families came from South Sudan and Somalia. Liberians from refugee camps in Ghana and the Ivory Coast arrived around the year 2000. Then came Oromo Nigerians and families from Burundi who had spent three decades in refugee camps in Tanzania. Most recently, our New Americans come from the Congo, or are reuniting with family in our area.
This region’s jobs, schools, affordable housing and safe communities have also drawn secondary migration from African immigrants who had initially settled in other communities. Liberians from Minneapolis and the east coast, and Somalis from the Twin Cities and San Diego come here seeking their American Dream.
Our area’s Black community has a high percentage of immigrants. Our colleges have attracted international students and faculty since the 1950s, but the majority of our region’s sizable African and African Diaspora immigrant community came here as displaced persons over the last quarter century.
Fargo-Moorhead has been a refugee resettlement community for Lutheran Social Services of North Dakota since 1948. In 1996, changes in US government policy allowed more immigrants from African countries to find new homes here. The first families came from South Sudan and Somalia. Liberians from refugee camps in Ghana and the Ivory Coast arrived around the year 2000. Then came Oromo Nigerians and families from Burundi who had spent three decades in refugee camps in Tanzania. Most recently, our New Americans come from the Congo, or are reuniting with family in our area.
This region’s jobs, schools, affordable housing and safe communities have also drawn secondary migration from African immigrants who had initially settled in other communities. Liberians from Minneapolis and the east coast, and Somalis from the Twin Cities and San Diego come here seeking their American Dream.
|
Unprecedented Growth
Our region’s Black community has grown exponentially in the last twenty years.This region’s booming economy, good schools, affordable housing and safe communities brought new residents from across the country, including many African Americans and Black immigrants. Between 2010 and 2020, Minnesota’s Black population grew by 46%, a rate exceeded by only five states. Number one on that list is North Dakota, which increased by 239%. Fargo-Moorhead’s African American community approached perhaps 200 people in the early 1900s. According to the 2020 census, 14,763 people in Cass County identify as African American/Black in whole or in part (8%), and 3,783 in Clay County (5.8%). |
My Journey, My Story
In 2011, our museum held an essay contest called My Journey, My Story for local New American kids, many of whom were in English Language Learning classes. These quotes come from those essays.
“They say it is like it was heaven, that everything is going to be ok, like no suffering. But now I understand. America is just a country that you have to make a better place for yourself, like going to schools and focusing on school.”
- Titus Doboyou
“From Congo to Fargo to me is Culture shock. As long I have been alive, there was war. When war started in my country I left when I was a little boy. I didn’t have parents because my parents died in war.”
- Yajuamungu Kiromba
"America is a very good country that most people don’t die of hunger. … In Africa they told us that the American is the land of opportunity for those who work hard, especially for the refugees like us who lost our everything in the war and left some of our family members in Africa, it gives us the chance to rebuild our life and help those who we leave behind.”
- Munsungit Jarso
“From now on, I eat anytime I want because I am free in America. I go to school and I thank God for everything that was done for me to give me a new life. All my life I will work for America and I will finish my school and plan my future after school in my life I want to be a lawyer. That is a story of my life.”
- Grace Sumbwa
In 2011, our museum held an essay contest called My Journey, My Story for local New American kids, many of whom were in English Language Learning classes. These quotes come from those essays.
“They say it is like it was heaven, that everything is going to be ok, like no suffering. But now I understand. America is just a country that you have to make a better place for yourself, like going to schools and focusing on school.”
- Titus Doboyou
“From Congo to Fargo to me is Culture shock. As long I have been alive, there was war. When war started in my country I left when I was a little boy. I didn’t have parents because my parents died in war.”
- Yajuamungu Kiromba
"America is a very good country that most people don’t die of hunger. … In Africa they told us that the American is the land of opportunity for those who work hard, especially for the refugees like us who lost our everything in the war and left some of our family members in Africa, it gives us the chance to rebuild our life and help those who we leave behind.”
- Munsungit Jarso
“From now on, I eat anytime I want because I am free in America. I go to school and I thank God for everything that was done for me to give me a new life. All my life I will work for America and I will finish my school and plan my future after school in my life I want to be a lawyer. That is a story of my life.”
- Grace Sumbwa
|
Learn more with the video above.
|
Cass Gilbert’s Sudanese Church
Moorhead’s Episcopal Church of St. John the Divine is one of the oldest congregations in this region, dating back to the founding of the city in 1872. Since 1899, the congregation has met in a beautiful Elizabethan Gothic church designed by Cass Gilbert, the greatest American architect of his generation and the most famous architect in Minnesota history. Twenty-five years ago, the congregation was getting older and fewer in number and was in danger of closing. Then the Sudanese came. Starting about 1995, Lutheran Social Services of North Dakota began resettling displaced people from South Sudan. Eventually, about 600 Sudanese Americans found new homes here, and about 90% of them happened to be Episcopalians. Just when this historic church was about to close, it became the spiritual home of dozens of young families. Today, most of the congregation who worship in Moorhead’s Cass Gilbert masterpiece are Sudanese American. |
Rachel Stone - Youth Advocate and Moorhead School Board Director
Rachel Stone moved from Chicago to Fargo in 2002 to help her parents’ ministry. The mother of three boys was the first African American woman named Mrs. North Dakota (2004), Mrs. North Dakota International (2007), and Mrs. North Dakota Supermodel USA (2011). A career in modeling could have followed, but she felt her life’s calling was to be a youth advocate.
Rachel Stone worked in this museum for a time, but left to work and volunteer in the school systems of Fargo and Moorhead. She began serving lunches at Madison Elementary but she became a paraprofessional when students asked the principal if she could be their teacher. Other positions followed, and she developed the youth leadership programs P’s & Q’s Etiquette, Leaderlicious, and Leaderboard. Rachel Stone was elected to the Moorhead School Board in 2018 and served until 2023.
Rachel Stone moved from Chicago to Fargo in 2002 to help her parents’ ministry. The mother of three boys was the first African American woman named Mrs. North Dakota (2004), Mrs. North Dakota International (2007), and Mrs. North Dakota Supermodel USA (2011). A career in modeling could have followed, but she felt her life’s calling was to be a youth advocate.
Rachel Stone worked in this museum for a time, but left to work and volunteer in the school systems of Fargo and Moorhead. She began serving lunches at Madison Elementary but she became a paraprofessional when students asked the principal if she could be their teacher. Other positions followed, and she developed the youth leadership programs P’s & Q’s Etiquette, Leaderlicious, and Leaderboard. Rachel Stone was elected to the Moorhead School Board in 2018 and served until 2023.
“In my late teens, I vowed to become the big sister that I never had…I felt that I had to do something to be part of the solution and to help our young children break negative and unhealthy cycles. I fell in love with inspiring our young girls, and really wanted to do whatever that I had to do to reach them.”
- Rachel Stone
- Rachel Stone
What is P’s & Q’s Etiquette?
“P’s & Q’s Etiquette’s mission is to equip our youth with leadership skills by providing a variety of hands on, skills based, youth informed programs that empower students of color and disadvantaged youth to create and succeed on their path in life. Our vision is that all youth, with an emphasis on students of color in the Fargo/Moorhead/ West Fargo area, have access to opportunities, skills, and the ability to capitalize on opportunities that will help them reach their greatest potential. Our curriculum is designed on our D.R.E.A.M (D-Decide, R-Realize, E-Equip, A- Aim, M- Move) Rule.
P’s & Q’s believes in the ability to shape the youth in our community’s minds for greatness by teaching proactive measures such as emotional stability, looking at circumstances positively, embracing life’s experiences and self-love. These lessons also focus on entrepreneurship, community service and community engagement. The lessons are designed to get students reflecting on their own lives and who they want to become, and focuses on lessons that enhance their self-image, goal setting, communications, etiquette skills, networking skills and leadership skills.”
“P’s & Q’s Etiquette’s mission is to equip our youth with leadership skills by providing a variety of hands on, skills based, youth informed programs that empower students of color and disadvantaged youth to create and succeed on their path in life. Our vision is that all youth, with an emphasis on students of color in the Fargo/Moorhead/ West Fargo area, have access to opportunities, skills, and the ability to capitalize on opportunities that will help them reach their greatest potential. Our curriculum is designed on our D.R.E.A.M (D-Decide, R-Realize, E-Equip, A- Aim, M- Move) Rule.
P’s & Q’s believes in the ability to shape the youth in our community’s minds for greatness by teaching proactive measures such as emotional stability, looking at circumstances positively, embracing life’s experiences and self-love. These lessons also focus on entrepreneurship, community service and community engagement. The lessons are designed to get students reflecting on their own lives and who they want to become, and focuses on lessons that enhance their self-image, goal setting, communications, etiquette skills, networking skills and leadership skills.”
|
Johnathan Judd - Mayor and Judge
Johnathan Judd was born into generational poverty and raised largely by his grandparents in a Raleigh, NC, housing project. In 1991, he moved to Fargo for his Senior Year of High School. He was the only African American student in a class of 900. He was the first in his family to go to college, graduating from NDSU and UND law school. Johnathan married Tammi Fortney and became an active hockey and lacrosse dad for his 3 kids in Moorhead. He worked as an attorney, taught Minnesota Criminal Law and Procedure at MSUM, and served in administration at Minnesota State Community and Technical College. In 2018, as the underdog candidate, Johnathan Judd was elected mayor of Moorhead, a town that is about 90% white. Few mayors in history have had to deal with such a challenging first term - the tragedy of the Covid pandemic and its business closures, and the murder of George Floyd on the other side of the state. As crowds of protesters gathered in downtown Fargo on May 30, 2020, Mayor Judd encouraged fellow elected leaders and law enforcement officers to follow him into the crowd to listen to people. Mayor Judd gained much praise in leading our communities through these difficult times and encouraging conversations about tough topics like institutional racism. In January of 2021, Jonathan Judd was appointed District Court Judge of Minnesota’s 7th Judicial District. |
|
“We gotta go in the crowd. This is the time when leaders step up.”
- Johnathan Judd, May 30, 2020
- Johnathan Judd, May 30, 2020