Eloise Ogden/MDN Clarice Bernsdorf, Minot, is shown with a blotter that was used at the former Leland-Parker Hotel in downtown Minot.

When Clarice Bernsdorf of Minot received a letter several months ago, she opened it and found it contained a blotter that had been used at the former Leland-Parker Hotel in downtown Minot.

Bernsdorf’s late husband, Darrell’s first cousin, Lawrence “Larry” Stewart, of Danbury, Conn., sent the blotter. He found it when he was cleaning out boxes and decided to send it to her, noting she might be able to give it to a local museum.

Stewart sent the blotter in March 2021. He died the following month.

“He worked at the Leland-Parker when attending college,” Bernsdorf said. She said his brother, Jack, Jack’s wife, Athena, and also their sister, Mary Ann, had worked at the hotel. Lawrence Stewart was a desk clerk at the hotel.

Once standing at the corner of Main Street and Central Avenue, the Leland-Parker was demolished a number of years ago. That corner now is the site of Artspace, a housing and retail complex in downtown Minot.

The late Lucille Parker of Minot lived in the Leland-Parker when she and Bill Parker were married in the late 1940s. In a 2013 story in The Minot Daily News, she said it was a nice hotel. She said they lived there for at least a couple years.

Bill Parker was the only son of Esther Parker, who was the only daughter of Clarence Parker, a prominent Minot businessman and rancher, and his first wife, Gertrude. Clarence and his sister, Lottie Parker, owned the Leland-Parker. All are deceased.

After Lawrence Stewart got his teacher’s certificate at Minot State, he went to the Army, taught school in California and then settled in Danbury, where he lived for many years. Originally from Sherwood, he used to visit North Dakota every Memorial Day to attend the services at Sherwood and the U.S.-Canadian border.

The blotter that had been used at the Leland-Parker remained in his family’s possession over the years.

Knowing its significance to Minot’s history, Bernsdorf said, “I plan to give it to the Ward County Historical Society.”