Gwinner, ND

Founded in 1900, Gwinner is a Sargent County city about 85 miles southwest of Fargo. Its defining institution arrived in 1947, when Bobcat established its first manufacturing facility here. The Gwinner factory complex now covers 750,000 square feet and makes loaders, utility work machines, and attachments; Bobcat also maintains product-engineering operations in town. That factory gives a small prairie city an industrial footprint that reaches well beyond its residential streets. The city had 924 residents in the 2020 census, so the plant's scale is unusually visible within this small agricultural town and its surrounding fields.

Outside the plant, Gwinner's economy joins manufacturing with agriculture. The city lists the farmers elevator, Bobcat dealership, repair shops, bank, coffee shop, and golf course among its local businesses. Residents also have city parks, a swimming pool, fitness center, nine-hole golf course, and bike paths. Highway 13 and the railroad corridor connect these pieces, with the plant, school, and Main Street businesses occupying the same compact community.