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A Little Mosque on the Prairie
For those of you who are not familiar, the start date and end date of Ramadan changes from year to year. The Islamic calendar is a little bit different from the Gregorian calendar. In 2025, Ramadan is basically the entire month of March. But it used to be over the summer.
Some of you may know I'm a musician. I have done quite a bit of touring. And so there was a period of years where I would frequently be touring during the summer - during Ramadan. And I've toured quite a number of rural areas. So I have found myself in situations where it's time to break my fast and I'm in the middle of…rural North Dakota.
For those of you who don't know, usually the first thing that you do to break your fast in Ramadan is eat a date (the fruit) and water. There was this one time on tour where I found myself in the middle of rural North Dakota having to figure out how to break my fast just with what was available at a gas station. And I made the decision that the thing that was the closest to breaking my fast with a date and water was…Twizzlers! I mean, it's wrinkly, it's fruit-flavored (the legal definition of fruit here is a little squishy). So yeah, my North Dakota gas station iftar was Twizzlers and water.
The most interesting thing, though, is that I later learned that the very first mosque built in the U.S.A. is in…rural North Dakota. That’s right. Ross, North Dakota, population 89, is home to the very first mosque in America, built in 1929.
This claim comes with a little bit of an asterisk. Muslims have been in America for a long time, much longer than 1929. Most were people from West Africa brought to the U.S. as slaves or people from the territories of the Ottoman Empire who immigrated. However, these early Muslim communities generally did not have their own mosques. They congregated in buildings that also had other uses or prayed outside. Ross, North Dakota was definitely not the first place in the U.S. where Muslims congregated for Friday prayers. But the first building to be constructed new, with the express purpose of being a mosque, was indeed in Ross, North Dakota.
How did this come about?
The answer is: Syrian homesteaders. That’s right, at the turn of the 20th century, a community of Syrian immigrants began to settle in North Dakota, and they built a little mosque on the prairie. This community of people from Syria filed claims under the Homestead Act to receive farmland in North Dakota. Many people from Norway, Germany, Ukraine, and other parts of Europe had been doing the same since the end of the Civil War. However, due to the U.S. government’s institutional racism, Syrians only became eligible for U.S. citizenship in 1909, so Syrian homesteaders arrived to North Dakota later than their European counterparts.
The land made available to settlers through the Homestead Act was the result of the mass displacement and death inflicted upon Indigenous peoples. Many people forget that as the U.S. was fighting the Civil War it was simultaneously fighting multiple other wars against Indigenous nations. As the U.S. government claimed victory over the Southern Confederacy it also claimed victory over vast territories of Indigenous land. The federal government passed the Homestead Act in 1862, the railroad companies moved in, and westward expansion accelerated.
The Syrian community in North Dakota were a relatively late addition to this westward expansion and one that has largely been forgotten. Very few descendants of the original homesteaders are left in the area. The current Muslim population of North Dakota is estimated to be 540 people, or 0.1% of the state’s population. However, enough descendants retained a connection to Ross that, when the original building of the mosque was torn down in 1979, they raised funds to build a small memorial building in its place. This new building is rarely used for congregational prayer but serves as a museum and visitor’s center for the cemetery that is still maintained on the mosque grounds. Prayer rugs are still available for any visitors who choose to pray.
In 2016, a journalist who was covering the fracking boom in North Dakota stumbled upon this mosque and its history and wrote a feature about it in The New Republic. The journalist, Cary Beckwith, remarked at how striking it was to find a forgotten piece of North Dakota’s history while writing about a new chapter in the state’s life, one that was bringing more immigrants than the state had seen in a long time. Beckwith noted that while covering the fracking boom they had heard Spanish, Amharic, Bulgarian, and French Creole - but no Arabic. North Dakota, at the time was one of the states who voiced support for Donald Trump’s proposed “Muslim ban” and the governor of North Dakota had sworn to refuse Syrian refugees in the state. Beckwith documented that some of the workers on the oilfields were unimpressed with the historic mosque nearby, with one worker saying, “Somebody should blow that f****r up.”
As of 2025, the mosque is still standing. Google reviews from visitors are overwhelmingly positive, from Muslims and non-Muslims alike, who are touched and delighted to find such an unexpected landmark, learn about its history, and take some time for prayer or reflection. I hope it is still standing the next time I find myself in North Dakota during Ramadan. For me, it is a reminder of how disconnected most of us are from the history of the land where we live, and how much of that history is rural. To me, this little mosque in Ross, North Dakota is a reminder that rural America can be such a sign post, pointing to things past, things present, and things yet to come - for those who are willing to notice.
SOURCES:
https://newrepublic.com/article/128726/north-dakota-prairie-became-home-americas-first-mosque
https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/oldest-mosque-in-the-united-states
https://news.prairiepublic.org/show/dakota-datebook-archive/2022-05-02/first-mosque
https://worldpopulationreview.com/state-rankings/muslim-population-by-state
https://worldpopulationreview.com/us-cities/north-dakota/ross
This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lynrye.substack.com
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By Lyn RyeFor those of you who are not familiar, the start date and end date of Ramadan changes from year to year. The Islamic calendar is a little bit different from the Gregorian calendar. In 2025, Ramadan is basically the entire month of March. But it used to be over the summer.
Some of you may know I'm a musician. I have done quite a bit of touring. And so there was a period of years where I would frequently be touring during the summer - during Ramadan. And I've toured quite a number of rural areas. So I have found myself in situations where it's time to break my fast and I'm in the middle of…rural North Dakota.
For those of you who don't know, usually the first thing that you do to break your fast in Ramadan is eat a date (the fruit) and water. There was this one time on tour where I found myself in the middle of rural North Dakota having to figure out how to break my fast just with what was available at a gas station. And I made the decision that the thing that was the closest to breaking my fast with a date and water was…Twizzlers! I mean, it's wrinkly, it's fruit-flavored (the legal definition of fruit here is a little squishy). So yeah, my North Dakota gas station iftar was Twizzlers and water.
The most interesting thing, though, is that I later learned that the very first mosque built in the U.S.A. is in…rural North Dakota. That’s right. Ross, North Dakota, population 89, is home to the very first mosque in America, built in 1929.
This claim comes with a little bit of an asterisk. Muslims have been in America for a long time, much longer than 1929. Most were people from West Africa brought to the U.S. as slaves or people from the territories of the Ottoman Empire who immigrated. However, these early Muslim communities generally did not have their own mosques. They congregated in buildings that also had other uses or prayed outside. Ross, North Dakota was definitely not the first place in the U.S. where Muslims congregated for Friday prayers. But the first building to be constructed new, with the express purpose of being a mosque, was indeed in Ross, North Dakota.
How did this come about?
The answer is: Syrian homesteaders. That’s right, at the turn of the 20th century, a community of Syrian immigrants began to settle in North Dakota, and they built a little mosque on the prairie. This community of people from Syria filed claims under the Homestead Act to receive farmland in North Dakota. Many people from Norway, Germany, Ukraine, and other parts of Europe had been doing the same since the end of the Civil War. However, due to the U.S. government’s institutional racism, Syrians only became eligible for U.S. citizenship in 1909, so Syrian homesteaders arrived to North Dakota later than their European counterparts.
The land made available to settlers through the Homestead Act was the result of the mass displacement and death inflicted upon Indigenous peoples. Many people forget that as the U.S. was fighting the Civil War it was simultaneously fighting multiple other wars against Indigenous nations. As the U.S. government claimed victory over the Southern Confederacy it also claimed victory over vast territories of Indigenous land. The federal government passed the Homestead Act in 1862, the railroad companies moved in, and westward expansion accelerated.
The Syrian community in North Dakota were a relatively late addition to this westward expansion and one that has largely been forgotten. Very few descendants of the original homesteaders are left in the area. The current Muslim population of North Dakota is estimated to be 540 people, or 0.1% of the state’s population. However, enough descendants retained a connection to Ross that, when the original building of the mosque was torn down in 1979, they raised funds to build a small memorial building in its place. This new building is rarely used for congregational prayer but serves as a museum and visitor’s center for the cemetery that is still maintained on the mosque grounds. Prayer rugs are still available for any visitors who choose to pray.
In 2016, a journalist who was covering the fracking boom in North Dakota stumbled upon this mosque and its history and wrote a feature about it in The New Republic. The journalist, Cary Beckwith, remarked at how striking it was to find a forgotten piece of North Dakota’s history while writing about a new chapter in the state’s life, one that was bringing more immigrants than the state had seen in a long time. Beckwith noted that while covering the fracking boom they had heard Spanish, Amharic, Bulgarian, and French Creole - but no Arabic. North Dakota, at the time was one of the states who voiced support for Donald Trump’s proposed “Muslim ban” and the governor of North Dakota had sworn to refuse Syrian refugees in the state. Beckwith documented that some of the workers on the oilfields were unimpressed with the historic mosque nearby, with one worker saying, “Somebody should blow that f****r up.”
As of 2025, the mosque is still standing. Google reviews from visitors are overwhelmingly positive, from Muslims and non-Muslims alike, who are touched and delighted to find such an unexpected landmark, learn about its history, and take some time for prayer or reflection. I hope it is still standing the next time I find myself in North Dakota during Ramadan. For me, it is a reminder of how disconnected most of us are from the history of the land where we live, and how much of that history is rural. To me, this little mosque in Ross, North Dakota is a reminder that rural America can be such a sign post, pointing to things past, things present, and things yet to come - for those who are willing to notice.
SOURCES:
https://newrepublic.com/article/128726/north-dakota-prairie-became-home-americas-first-mosque
https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/oldest-mosque-in-the-united-states
https://news.prairiepublic.org/show/dakota-datebook-archive/2022-05-02/first-mosque
https://worldpopulationreview.com/state-rankings/muslim-population-by-state
https://worldpopulationreview.com/us-cities/north-dakota/ross
This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lynrye.substack.com