New Rockford, ND

Welcome to New Rockford, ND
Photo montage: children holding hands and running through a field, bales of hay on farmland, a young couple with a baby in the park, the sun shining on a field of wheat

Community Living and Giving

New Rockford Area Betterment Corporation Assistant Director Jessica Dillon and Executive Director Sarah Smith Warren worked with NR Park District, the Babe Ruth Committee and dozens of volunteers to host the 2014 State Babe Ruth Baseball Tournament in New Rockford
New Rockford Area Betterment Corporation Assistant Director Jessica Dillon and Executive Director Sarah Smith Warren worked with NR Park District, the Babe Ruth Committee and dozens of volunteers to host the 2014 State Babe Ruth Baseball Tournament in New Rockford


Submitted by Sarah Smith Warren, August 11, 2014

It was nearly two years ago that my husband and I decided to move home. After college and grad school and jobs and traveling, we realized something was missing from our lives – a community, a place to belong.

I knew that I would get a chance to be a part of a community when I accepted the position of Executive Director at the New Rockford Area Betterment Corporation (NRABC). I wanted to be able to give something and serve a purpose. But what I didn’t fully understand was what the community would give to me - a whole new extended family and a sense of place.

You know you truly love something when you can accept all the bad with the good and it’s when others accept your flaws that you know you belong. For the past two years, both professionally and personally, I’ve experienced the good, the bad and the ugly, as well as the incredible and the inspiring.

I’ve had the opportunity to work with amazing people who give and give to projects for no other reason but for the good of the community. I’m pretty sure people run the other way when they see me coming, since I’m always asking for a favor, selling a raffle ticket or signing them up for a committee, but actually the amazing thing is that most don’t run the other way. They smile and say “sure” or “of course!” or my favorite answer “yes and do you want to buy some Pizza Corner Pizzas for my kid’s fundraiser?”

My very first day on the job, Jamie Risovi came into my office, introduced himself and told me that New Rockford should host the Babe Ruth Baseball Tournament and NRABC should apply. So I started asking favors that very first day on the job, calling the few people I knew like Elliot Belquist, Connie Soderholm and Eric Myhre and they all said “of course!”

To host this tournament, a first for New Rockford, would be an honor for several reasons. Our home team, the SNR Black Sox would be in the tournament, great baseball would be played on our beautiful field, we would get to welcome hundreds of fans, teams and visitors into our community and any proceeds raised would go back to youth baseball and field improvements.

For the past two years, a very committed group of volunteers, the New Rockford Park District, myself and my assistant director Jessica, talked and convened, researched and had meetings, then wrote grants and letters and strategized and made phone calls, laughed and argued and then bought each other beers. After two years of planning, New Rockford was ready to host the 2014 State Babe Ruth Tournament.

So since some say baseball is a numbers game, I want to share a few with you: 5 days of tournament play with 14 games; 8 teams with 15 coaches; 13 host families feeding and feeding and feeding 120+ baseball players; 36 Tournament Sponsors; 2 extraordinary mothers making 100 pounds of BBQ meat; an excited Myhre Clan working over a dozen shifts; 9 dedicated kids pandering 50/50 raffle tickets; 2 Baseball Booster Concession Gurus and 54 concession workers serving 500 bottles of water and 820 buns; 23 gate workers; 13 pop-up canopies; 100 Metrodome seats installed by 5 dedicated baseball fans; 185 baseball cupcakes decorated by 2 teenage girls and an entire Allmaras family; 6 announcers; the 1 and only Gary Lindquist; 7 scoreboard operators; 19 banners; 12 field and ground crew; 14 players of the game; 16 balls signed by Travis Hafner and 2 Championship teams all in 1 incredible community.

I always say I don’t like math, but these numbers really mean something to me. These parents, these kids, these volunteers - they give their time, their energy, their knowledge, their hard work. They all left a piece of themselves out at the baseball park. They don’t do it for a paycheck. They don’t do it for recognition. They do it because this is their home, their family, their community and even if they have enough Pizza Corner Pizzas to eat for a year, if you ask they will still say “of course!”

This site maintained by the New Rockford Area Betterment Corporation.