Parshall, ND

Parshall is a city in Mountrail County, North Dakota, within the jurisdictional boundaries of the Mandan, Hidatsa, and Arikara Nation on the Fort Berthold Indian Reservation. The 2020 census counted 949 residents. George Parshall founded the town in 1914, and the city’s prairie setting now carries the marks of reservation geography, oil-country roads, and nearby water. Parshall Public Schools operates an elementary school and a high school for the local community. The museum’s hilltop building gives the city a landmark visible well beyond the main streets.

The Paul Broste Rock Museum is Parshall’s signature address. Local farmer, artist, and collector Paul Broste built the granite-and-fieldstone museum, which opened in 1966 and holds rocks, minerals, fossils, polished spheres, and other specimens gathered from around the world. Arikara speakers remain part of the area’s living language community, and former NFL quarterback Randy Hedberg was born and raised here. Parshall is a northwestern North Dakota city where MHA Nation geography, school, geology, language, and prairie roads meet.