State, federal and community leaders have set out final preparations for the 4 July grand opening of the Theodore Roosevelt Presidential Library, the first US presidential library built with mass timber, with a 1,776-drone show, free national park entry and a five-day Medora A250 festival now confirmed for the holiday weekend. That is according to North Dakota Governor Kelly Armstrong, who gathered the briefing in Medora and reaffirmed his 7 April executive order mobilising state agencies for America 250 events, including the library opening.
Casting the briefing as central to the state’s biggest tourism moment in a generation, Armstrong positioned the opening as the anchor event for the ND250 programme running across North Dakota through July. “We want residents and guests to enjoy this celebration safely and confidently,” Armstrong said.
Armstrong and Lauf walked the project site with the library and Medora Foundation teams ahead of the briefing, with crews still threading interior fit-out across the 96,000-square-foot building less than two months out from the 4 July grand opening. The walk-through took the delegation along the new entrance paving, through the auditorium build-out and across the main exhibition floor before the press conference convened on the wooden deck overlooking the Badlands butte.
Theodore Roosevelt Presidential Library Executive Director Robbie Lauf set out opening-day plans, with the 1,776-drone show keyed to the founding year staged alongside an immersive exhibition programme inside the 96,000-square-foot mass timber building. The drone show will be a first for a US presidential library opening, with the choreography sized to the 1776 reference Lauf has built into the broader weekend programme.
Theodore Roosevelt National Park Superintendent Rachel Daniels announced the reopening of the South Unit Scenic Loop Road, with free park entry granted across the 3-5 July weekend to align with the library opening and ND250 holiday programme. Theodore Roosevelt Medora Foundation CEO Clarence Sitter outlined Medora’s A250 Week, a 2-5 July festival of free programming tied to the holiday weekend, with Tourism and Marketing Director Sara Otte Coleman briefing the same gathering on visitation trends and the broader economic contribution of the state’s travel sector.
The Medora gathering has been called the largest in the North Dakota Badlands since Theodore Roosevelt National Memorial Park was dedicated in 1949, with Wood Central reporting in March that approximately 40,000 people are expected across the $450 million project’s five-day opening programme. Wood Central understands state law enforcement has been folded into the policing plan for a town of 160 permanent residents, with three resident officers stretched well beyond normal capacity by the holiday weekend influx.
It comes as construction crews have driven the 93,000-square-foot mass timber structure across its final fit-out phase, with Mercer Mass Timber’s roughly 1,800 cubic metres of cross-laminated timber and glulam cubic metres of cross-laminated timber and glulam delivering a total carbon benefit of 3,031 metric tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent, the same as powering 320 homes for a year.
Wood Central understands that every living US president will attend the dedication ceremony on 4 July before doors open to the 40,000 visitors anticipated across the five-day programme, with North Dakota’s tourism agencies operating under Armstrong’s 7 April executive order through to the opening weekend.
