DICKINSON

city, seat (1884) of Stark county, western North Dakota, U.S., on the Heart River. Founded in 1880 on the Northern Pacific Railway and originally called Pleasant Valley Siding, it was renamed in 1883 for Wells S. Dickinson, a former New York state senator. Early Russian and German settlers were attracted to the vicinity by a Roman Catholic mission. Dickinson is the trading centre for a large agricultural area that produces livestock, wheat, and dairy products. The city's economic activities include livestock marketing and meat-packing, creameries, furniture manufacturing, an oil field, and a steel prefabrication plant. Dickinson State University was opened there in 1918 as a state normal school. Patterson Lake, impounded by the Dickinson Dam, a part of the reclamation plan for the Missouri River valley, is just west of the city. Inc. 1919. Pop. (1990) 16,097; (1994 est.) 16,190.