Heil is in close proximity to Leith, ND and a site visitor pointed out that we had mistakenly included these photos in the Leith Gallery. So, these photos are officially identified now — Heil, ND.
Heil is listed as a CDP (Census Designated Place) since it is not an officially incorporated town and as of 2010 had a population of 15.
We returned to Heil eight years later, during a crazy thunderstorm that gifted us some amazing, ominous storm cloud photos.
Photos by Troy Larson and Terry Hinnenkamp, copyright Sonic Tremor Media LLC
Ghosts of North Dakota 
handsome school building
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From the Northwestern Gazetteer & Business Directory, vol. XX (1916-1917) published by the R.L.Polk Co.; ” Heil: population 42. Morton County ( in late 1916 Grant County was formed out of the southwest “1/2″ of Morton County). A village on the N.P. Ry 13 mi. E. of New Leipzig. Has Reform, Lutheran and Evangelical churches, a bank, and a grain elevator. Henry Heil P.M. (?). F. & E. Lumber Co.; Farmers State Bank, J.P. Warner, Pres.; Heil Cash Store ( general store); Heil Equity Exchange, grain elevator; W. A. Wentz, hardware; Jno. Zacher, Jr., livery.”
I have found that such directories are incredible sources of information, but are not always 100% accurate. ( what is?!). -John Gallardo, Chico, California
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Both the Heil schoolhouse and church still seem to be in relatively sound condition, with viable roofs. I wish there was a group that I could contribute to that would see to it that the roofs were kept sound and leakproof. Any thoughts on this or knowledge? It would be a real shame to see them deteriorate like the Leith church has already, and so many other structures. Thanks.
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Norma (Kramer) Hellius? (a former teacher who lives south of Heil I think) & Janice (Kramer her cousin) Coffman? currently lives in Elgin took over the $ raising when a former teacher of mine Mrs. Ferderer passed away. They hold a rummage sale at the school every summer (in June I think) to raise money.
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Thanks, Rachelle. Do you know how I can contact them or someone who can for me? I’m in California. Thanks. ggary1888@hotmail.com
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Heil is included in the following “streetview” site, and may be on others, also. http://www.vpike.com. Using the free site you can go up and down the streets of Heil, and view, 360 degrees, the various buildings and landscape. Leith, also, is included. Really cool, especially when I live in California.
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I had a friend who attended a small catholic school (St. Anthonys, I think) near Heil. She remembered traveling with the nuns and passing the road sign, and the nuns would giggle. Eventually she figured out what was so funny. From a distance, and with comprimised vision, the sign appeared as Hell 15 ->. Kudos to Peggy Waddell for telling me this story many years ago. I will never forget it.
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St. Anthony is E. of Flasher (hwy 21) & south of Mandan.
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My son, Mark Pavicic, just called me to check out your website, as the school you have pictured in Heil is the school I went to as a first grader, living in Heil, North Dakota.
My father, Helmuth Abraham Theodore Voll, was the principal. He was usually called, H. A. Later he was an insurance salesman for Provident Life Insurance Company in Fargo.
I was born in 1929 in Kansas City, Missouri. About a year later we moved to Heil, North Dakota. My grandfather had a farm near Elgin, North Dakota.
At six, I was in the first grade at the school you’ve pictured. There were five of us first graders; no second graders
and two students in the third grade. One of them was my brother, Eugene Voll. The room looked very similar to the schoolhouse on display at Bonanzaville, with a stove in the middle of the room, desks and chairs were very similar.
My father, the principal, taught the junior high students in the second room on the right. On a few occasions he would allow me to ring the school bell. On an occasional Friday, if the weather was beautiful, he would allow all the students to go out to play baseball in the back of the school.
The town of Heil had only a few residents. From our house, on more level ground, I would need to walk up the hill,
past a farm, to get to the school. In Heil, there was a store for basic groceries, and a bar, and I believe, a postoffice across from the store. There was only one block of wooden sidewalk on only one side of the street; the side with the grocery store. I do remember, that the bar proprietor, sold ice cream bars, as my uncle, my father’s brother, on a visit to us in Heil, purchased an Eskimo bar for me.
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My grandfather owned the bar, his name was Odell Hauck. He had a dance floor next to the bar. I talked to my mom and she cant remember a store there,but she said the bar was across the street from the post office.
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Your grandfather was our bus driver when we went to high school. First we rode in a wooden enclosure built onto the back of his pickup. Later he bought a yellow bus like you see today. We were the first rural kids to have a yellow bus to ride in. I went to dances on the wood floor (between the bar & grocery store (owned by Mr Benik) They called them bowery dances then (wooden floor with a woven wire fence around it. The bar in the former brick bank building that went broke in the 30s was across the street from the post office.
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You are a relative of mine. The Voll”s that lived on a farm E of Elgin were cousins of my mother’s (Haisch = her maiden name). She and my dad were married in that house and my uncle Henry Haisch went to work for your father (Provident Life Ins.) after he had taught the upper grades at Heil school a couple of years while living with us after returning from WWII.
The junior high students were taught in the room on the lower level of the south side of the building. This was no longer the case when I started 1st grade there in 1945. We used that room for 4H activities (after a major clean up my mother the 4H leader) when I was in grade school. We always played baseball S. of the school.
There was a furnace downstairs in the Heil school with lower 4 grades on the S. & upper 4 grades on the north side. The school with the stove in he middle may have been the one a mile+ N. of our farm where my mother taught when she met my father (a farm hand for Wes Henley).
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My Grandparents, Joe and Pauline Roll had a farm just south of Heil. My uncle still lives there today. They were very well known in the area because they had 21 kids. I remember going to the grain elevator with my Grandpa before it blew down in a storm years ago
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After the Wes Henleys (who lived 1/2 mi N of our farm) moved to Elgin the Joe Roll family moved the large Henley farm home to the Roll farmstead S. of Heil so they would have more home for their family
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Jessica, I am sorry to hear of the passing of your Uncle David. He was my mother’s Godson. We knew your Aunts and Uncles from church. We, the Binstock family, had 10 kids so our 2 families took up the first 4 rows at St. Theresa’s Church. My students at church and I prayed for David and all of your family today. Thinking of your family brought up so many beautiful feeling because they all shared joy in there smiles and jokes and I always enjoyed my time at Church visiting with them. I believe Bradley was my age.
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I remember Joe and Pauline, I was out at the farm alot,i went to school with
Roger and Bradley Roll. Also went hunting on there land.
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I remember your grandparents, also went to school with Roger and Bradley. Went hunting out on the farm.
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The school in Heil belongs to the Grant County Historical Society and the church was sold and bought by Steve Ketterling of Heil. The bowery dances are something we still talk about but the floor was south of the bar and the store and cream station to the north of the bar, the post office and body shop was across the street. At one time there were two banks. My husband went to Heil school until eighth grade and our daughters went there until the school closed as did the children of Joe and Pauline Roll. We farmed about three miles south west of Heil.
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Michael Heil, an immigrant from Rohrbach, Russia, helped build the Heil church. The following story about Heil, ND was written by Regina (Heil) Edinger.
“When my parents (Michael Heil and Barbara Bauer) moved out to Heil, North Dakota in the fall of 1905 from Menno, South Dakota, they were accompanied by other settlers, the John Wuests, Heinrich Laubs, and Christ Hafner. Our first home in this new country was a three-room sod house which was located on Hafner’s land in which the three families lived either part or all winter. Christ Hafner had already built a shack on his claim so had a place of his own. My folks built the frame house which is still on the farm. It rained a lot that spring when we moved and it was cold as the house had just the frame up when we moved into it and it really was cold. There were no fences for the few cattle we had brought along and they would drift with the rain and had to be watched so they would not wander away. My father and brothers built a fence to put the cattle in at night. In the spring on quiet days, we could hear hammering here and there and were glad that someone else was moving out into the neighborhood. Our post office was in Elm, N.D., and stationed at the old Henry Heil place on the Antelope creek north of Heil, with a mailman bringing the mail from Old Leipzig. Later the post office was located at the Charley Davison farmstead. Mrs. Davison taught school for many years, and I went to school when she taught in the little schoolhouse which was located close to the Christ Rath and Christian Dietz homesteads. Mrs. Davison also taught some of my own children and her son, Vern, also taught some of my children. I think it was in 1908 or 1909 that the Northern Pacific railroad was surveyed and work was started. There were three camps up at the old Dietz place with many tents up, some for sleeping and others for cooking and eating. In those days they did not have the modern equipment and all machinery had to be pulled by horses and mules. John Edinger, my husband, ran one of the dump wagons with a team of horses for the railroad. In October 1910 the first train pulled in and that day my father (Michael Heil) said ‘Well today is a holiday. We are all going to see the first train pull in’. So we all went over to where the town of Heil now is, to see the train come in. It was a happy day for all the farmers, as the nearest railroad town up to that time was Glen Ullin.” (Written by Regina (Heil) Edinger, North Dakota-Elgin 50th Anniversary 1910-1960)
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MY MOTHER WAS BORN IN 1908 AND PASSED IN 2006 HERE IN SEBASTOPOL CA. HER LAST NAME WAS ZACHER. MY MOTHER HAD TWO SISTERS BEATRICE AND KATHERINE. THE FAMILY FARM WAS NEAR ELGEN EITHER CLOSE TO OR ON ANTELOPE CREEK. THE ZACHER BROTHERS, JOHN AND OSCAR, HAD FARMLAND NEXT TO EACH OTHER. I BELIEVE THEIR FATHER AND GRANDFATHER WERE BOTH PIONEERS IN THE ELGEN ANTELOPE CREEK AREA. CHRISTIAN ZACHER WAS ORIGINALLY FROM THE RUSSIAN COLONIES.
MY MOTHER TOLD OF RIDING HER FAVORITE PLOW HORSE TO SCHOOL EVERY DAY THEN DROPPING THE HARNESS TO LET THE OLD HORSE WONDER BACK TO THE BARN. GETTING TO THE SCHOOL HOUSE IN WINTER WAS A HARDSHIP FOR MY MOTHER AS THE SNOW WAS DEEP AND SCHOOL WAS A GOOD DISTANCE, BUT MY DEAR MOM ALWAYS RECALLED HER EARLY YEARS FONDLY.
WHEN MY MOTHER WAS 18 SHE RAN AWAY AND MARRIED A WONDERFUL BOY WHO LIVED ON A NEARBY FARM HIS NAME WAS CHARLES EDINGER. CHARLES WOULD SNEAK TO THE ZACHER FARM AND VISIT HER IN THE FIELDS AS SHE DROVE A TEAM OF FOUR HORSES PLOWING THE EARTH PREPARING IT FOR PLANTING, EVENTUALLY THROUGH THE YEARS THEY FELL IN LOVE.
MY MOTHER AND CHARLES HAD TWO CHILDREN, A DAUGHTER LA RAE AND A SON DOUGLAS.
THE OLD ZACHER FARMS MAY OR MAY NOT STILL BE THERE BUT IF THEY ARE I WOULD LOVE ANY PICTURES OR INFORMATION YOU OR ANYONE MIGHT HAVE.
SINCERELY
DARLENE FLINT
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I FORGOT TO ADD THE MOST IMPORTANT THING, MY MOTHERS NAME WAS SUZANNA ZACHER, SHE DID ATTEND SCHOOL SOMEWHERE NEAR ELGIN.
DARLENE FLINT
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Darlene, Charlie Edinger was the brother of John Edinger noted in the July 2 comment. Do you know where in Russia Charlie Edinger was born? Also, do you know who the woman is in this photo of Charlie Edinger? You can copy and paste this link into the address bar of your browser to look at the photo. http://mboster.com/pics/charlie_edinger.jpg
Mia
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MIA, I CAN’T SEEM TO BRING UP THE PICTURE OF CHARLIE. MY MOTHER CALLED HIM CHARLES, HIS MIDDLE INITIAL WAS R. HE WAS MY MOTHERS FIRST HUSBAND, THEY MARRIED ABOUT 1928 SHE WAS 18.
I’M NOT SURE WHERE IN RUSSIA HE WAS BORN BUT I WILL ASK MY NIECE (CHARLIES GRANDDAUGHTER) HOPEFULLY SHE WILL KNOW. I’M ALSO TRYING TO FIND INFORMATION ON THE CHRISTIAN, OSKAR AND JOHN LOU ZACHER FARMLAND IN THE ELGIN AREA. JOHN WAS MY MOTHERS FATHER,
I WOULD LIKE TO SEE THE PICTURE OF CHARLES, IF THERE IS ANY WAY YOU CAN E-MAIL IT TO ME HERE IS MY ADDRESS. darleneofgraton@yahoo.com
AS SOON AS I FIND OUT WHERE CHARLES WAS BORN I WILL LET YOU KNOW
THANK YOU MIA
DARLENE
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THE WOMEN IN THE PHOTO WITH CHARLES EDINGER IS MY MOTHER SUZANNA MARIE ZACHER
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Darlene, I am Fonda Rieger – Daughter of Jeanne Zacher – youngest child of Oscar Zacher. My parents bought the farm from Oscar. We lived there until 1968 when we moved to Oregon. Indeed – many fond memories and some photos still around of the home Christian built out of mud and stone. If you would like to chat more or see photos – ftosharbear@yahoo
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My great grandmother was from Heil. Her parents were Michael and Barbara Heil. Her name was Sara and she was married to Leonard Moos. They lived in Carson.
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Although my birth record says I was born in Carson, ND.
My grandparents lived two miles north of Heil on a farm.
I was born on that farm as well as some of my cousins.
Fred Finck was my grandfather. The farm I think is still
the property of a Stern. My mom’s sister was married to
a Stern so my cousin is related to them. He was born there
as well.
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The roof of the house in the distance, on the right side of the church chimney, used to be the post office for the village of Elm, during homesteading days.
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The roof of the house in the distance, on the right side of the church chimney, used to be the post office for the village of Elm, during homesteading days. A smokehouse, built during that time using local rocks, still stands behind the house.
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I’M STILL NOT SURE WHERE MY MOTHER SUSANNA ZACHER AND HER SISTERS WOULD HAVE GONE TO SCHOOL. THEY LIVED AT THE OSCAR AND JOHN ZACHER FARM ON THE ANTELOPE CREEK. I KNOW SHE RODE ONE OF THE PLOW HORSES TO SCHOOL AND IN THE WINTER IT WAS A STRUGGLED TO GET THERE.
ANY IDEAS WHERE?
DARLENE FLINT
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This is so neat my Great grandparents were Michael and Christine Heil. My grandpa Arvin Heil was born in Heil, ND. He recently passed away last year he was 101 years old and is dearly missed. We are Germans who migrated over from Russia. I have so much history on this town, the boat papers of their journey, homestead papers, maps. My grandpa was very found of Heil, ND and we were told countless stories about his childhood, family, and friends in this community. He went to school in this school house and was baptized in this church shown here. He once said he paid a child 10cents to ride his bike back in the day and he also was picked up in a wagon to and from school. I have so much to share. If anyone has specific questions please email me at amyheil.ah@gmail.com
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I love all this history! I’m Cheri Silver Pinkus, the grand daughter of Carl and Eva Silver who owned the General Store in the 1920’s and 1930’s. At that time the sidewalk was in front of it and on weekends people would go there for ice cream and sit on the benches outside I’ve been told. My grandparents came over from Russia and was the only Jewish family there. Any photos would be greatly appreciated!
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I am a distant Heil. My grandmother was Alice Edinger. She married Michael Guzilak. They came to Washington state and had 3 daughters. I was born to Jean Guzilak in Seattle. I don’t know much of the family history but would love to know as much as I can. Flwrgerl45@aol.com
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