To help the community of Bowman survive, keep business at home, and provide jobs, the town has morphed a grocery store into the library and a lumberyard into a museum.

For decades, “downtown” was the hub of the economic and social lives of rural residents across North Dakota. But today, these same downtowns are struggling to maintain their vitality. Seeking to reverse years of decline, visionaries are taking steps to revitalize their communities by rehabilitating old buildings and putting them to new uses, helping small towns preserve their identity and quality of life. Old To New: Remodel, Restore, Revitalize showcases some of the new ideas being implemented today and their implications for community leaders. As one rehab leader said, “Nothing’s ever going to be 200 years old, if you don’t let it get to be 100 years old.”