For many people outside the state, North Dakota conjures visions of a remote, sparse, and seemingly inhospitable landscape, replete with ghost towns, scattered farmsteads, and settings reminiscent of the movie Fargo. Yet beyond this facile image lies a spectacular array of high-style, vernacular, ethnic, and modern buildings, a pragmatic architecture that reflects the setting and settlers of the Great Plains. A distinct -prairie mosaic- of houses, homesteads, and rural churches draws on the cultures of Germans from Russia, Norwegians, and Icelanders, and varied Native American groups such...