Wow, Wow, Wow -- The Story Behind the Story -- Annabelle Homes -- Bakken, North Dakota, USA

I posted a story some time ago on Annabelle homes but today I was sent a story on the background to that story.

Awesome.

One day last November, Minneapolis architect and developer Dean Dovolis walked into a pizza shop in Stanley, N.D., owned by city councilman Dennis Lindahl.

"I went right to my pizza-delivery map on the wall and showed Dean what land the city had available," recalled Lindahl. "Dean was the 418th developer who had come to us. I know, because the city coordinator logs them all. Dean sketched out a plan, but he also wanted to listen. He wasn't talking about building houses and what he needed. He was talking about us taking charge of our community, our future, in the middle of this oil boom.''

Lindahl asked Dovolis to come to the city council meeting with him that night.

Nine months later, Dovolis, through his development company Annabelle Homes, broke ground on a $10 million-plus development of more than 50 single-family and town-house units, and a small office-retail complex. It's the single largest development ever in Stanley, a town of about 1,400 in the oil patch of northwestern North Dakota.

Nine months later; sounds like ... and planned at that ....