Radio waves offer a first hint that North Dakota's economy is humming. In the state's northwestern region, help wanted ads crowd out public service announcements for small-town harvest festivals.
Development of the massive Bakken Shale formation demands workers. North Dakota beckons north the nation's unemployed.
Pads carved out of wheat fields sprout derricks and belch gas flares. About 350,000 barrels of crude per day is being produced in North Dakota, and much more is expected to gush.
In comparison, Alaska is squeezing out less than 600,000 barrels a day, down from more than two million barrels per day in the early 1980s.
The U.S. Geological Survey says there are at least 4 billion barrels of recoverable oil in North Dakota, but other estimates indicate that it could be four to five times that. Even if the more modest estimates turn out to be true, it would be the second largest find since Prudhoe Bay's discovery in 1968.
The prairies of North Dakota boom with optimism. Alaska's tundra these days does not.
Contact Stephen Nowers at stephen(at)alaskadispatch.com and Amanda Coyne at amanda(at)alaskadispatch.com