by St. Croix Scenic Byway on June 9, 2013
Logging and the Great Hinckley Fire
America was coming of age and lumber was needed to build the great cities and surrounding communities. The greater St. Croix valley had more pine and hardwood forests than could ever be used up in a lifetime (or so it was thought).
Many came to strike it rich, others came to steal what the land had to offer, but the unwise practices used in cutting the trees caused death and disaster—and acts of heroism that saved many.
Listen:
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
by St. Croix Scenic Byway on June 9, 2013
Point Douglas to Superior Military Road
The year is 1850 and Minnesota is a territory but not yet a state—there are no passable roads connecting St. Paul and Lake Superior. The US Congress has just passed the Minnesota Road Act to provide a vital land connection between the navigable waters of the Mississippi River and Lake Superior.
Even though the road was never fully completed it was used heavily to carry settlers and support commerce until railroads came to the region in 1870. About half of the original Military Road alignment still exists and the St. Croix Scenic Byway follows much of it.
Listen:
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
by St. Croix Scenic Byway on June 9, 2013
A Tale of the life of Chester Fisk—A Unique and Ambitious Man
Born June 1881, died January 1975—age 94 years, 7 months, 21 days. Lumberjack, River Pig, Mill Hand, Dam Builder, Woodsman, Hunter, Trapper, Walker, Husband and father to six children.
Listen:
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
by St. Croix Scenic Byway on June 9, 2013
Spoken by Rusty Barber, Vice Chairman of the Tribal Governing Board of the Lac Courte Oreilles Band of Ojibwe. Rusty is grandson of Bill Barber who guided former Minnesota and Wisconsin Senators Walter Mondale and Gaylord Nelson, respectively, on a canoe trip down the Namekagon River in 1965.
By 1968, Mondale and Nelson had authored and were successful in passing federal legislation to protect the Namekagon and St. Croix Rivers. The St. Croix National Scenic River was one of the first eight rivers protected under the 1968 Wild and Scenic Rivers Act.
Listen:
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
by St. Croix Scenic Byway on June 9, 2013
Each year in early December, Gammelgården Museum in Scandia celebrates Lucia Dagen. The celebration of Lucia brings light to the very dark days of December and marks the beginning of the Swedish Christmas season.
This is a recording of a brief Lucia Swedish prayer service held at Gammelgården in the Gammel Krykan, oldest Lutheran church in Minnesota, built in 1856. Each year following the prayer service a Swedish breakfast with traditional Swedish music is held in the Scandia Community Center.
Listen:
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
by St. Croix Scenic Byway on June 9, 2013
For most of its length, the St. Croix River is too deep to ford or walk across. As towns and connecting roads were built in the region, ferry locations and licenses to operate were established, making it possible to cross the river.
Of the ferries that once existed along the river, many of the sites that did not evolve into bridge locations are, today, canoe landings. One of the first ferry crossings noted was at the “battle ground” site at the head of Lake St. Croix (in Stillwater), and the longest operating ferry (over 100 years) was at Marine on St Croix.
Listen:
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
by St. Croix Scenic Byway on June 9, 2013
Steamboats
The first steamboat to make its way upriver to the Dalles of the St. Croix was the Palmyra. It had been chartered in 1838 to carry men, and supplies to construct a sawmill at St. Croix Falls. Steamboats were used to push rafts of logs down stream and to carry passengers and freight.
A large number of the best boats on the Upper Mississippi as well as those that navigated the St. Croix were built in St. Croix valley river towns—nearly every town can be credited with building at least one steamboat, if not many more. River business began falling off when the first iron horse entered the valley in 1870.
Listen:
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
by St. Croix Scenic Byway on June 9, 2013
Rivers: The St. Croix, Sunrise, Snake, Kettle and more.
The Dakota and Ojibwe used the rivers of the St. Croix valley for centuries—rivers supported hunting, fishing, harvesting wild rice, and migration between summer and winter camps.
Throughout the 18th century, extending into the early 19th century, the St. Croix and its tributaries brought settlers and lumber companies that cut the trees and floated billions of feet of logs, jamming rivers with logs on their way to sawmills farther down river. Rivers had once been the only means of transportation into or out of the region.
Listen:
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
by St. Croix Scenic Byway on June 9, 2013
November 11, 1940 Armistice Day Snow Storm in the Pine Barrens.
The day dawned mild and very wet, but by mid-afternoon we knew that all preparations had to be made for the coming winter, including the fall hunt, but deer season was two weeks away and game warden Chauncey Weitz kept a tight rein on deer poaching.
Listen:
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
by St. Croix Scenic Byway on June 9, 2013
The Sunrise Ferry was the only way for the people of West Sterling to get to Sunrise to buy groceries, except in the dead of winter when they could cross on frozen ice. The ferry had two pulleys and two chains that attached to a cable crossing the St. Croix River.
“We used poles and pushed the ferry to make it cross the river. In later years we attached a motor, but that was not reliable.” The ferry ran day and night, rain or shine, even hauling loads of moonshine.
Listen:
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
Logging and the Great Hinckley Fire
