Part 57 (1/2)

BRAINERD

Is situated on the east bank of the Mississippi, and is a prosperous city The settle of the Northern Pacific railroad This road has a branch from Brainerd to St Paul

The railroad co shops; have expended large amounts in improvements, and employ in their business here nearly 1,000 h train arrived at Brainerd March 11, 1871

In 1870 several claims were made for purposes of speculation, and afterward sold to Mrs Hester Gilreater part of the city site was purchased of the government in 1870, by Hester Gilet Sound Coanized under the laws of Maine, and duly authorized by the laws of Minnesota, purchased Gilinal survey and plat of the town on Sept 25, 1871 The naiven to the nen in honor of Mrs

Brainerd Swift, wife of the first president of the Northern Pacific road In 1883 a new survey was inally covered with prince pine trees,as orna the first settlers we find the names of Charles Darby, E H

Bly, L P White, W P Spalding, W W Hartley, Stuart Seely, F W

Peake, S W Taylor, E B Lynde, John Bishop, T C Barnes, and John Martin The first per house, was built by Charles Darby, the next was built by Stuart Seely, and the third by L

P White E H Bly built the first store The Headquarters Hotel, subsequently destroyed by fire, was built in 1871 Many of the buildings of ancient Crow Wing were moved to Brainerd The Leland House was built in 1871-2; the Merchants in 1879 The post office was established in 1871, with S W Thayer as postmaster The county seat was removed to this place in 1871, and a court house and jail built by L P White, at an expense of 97160 The first e, that of Joseph Gronden and Miss Darby, occurred in 1870 A city charter was obtained Jan 11, 1873 The folloere the first officers: Mayor, Eber H Bly; aldermen, L P White, M Tuttle, W S Heathcote, Wm

Murphy, T X Goulett; president of the council, L P White

Brainerd has a court house, built at a cost of 45,000, and school buildings worth 45,000 The Northern Pacific depot and shops were built at a cost of 500,000, and the Northern Pacific sanitarium at a cost of 35,000 The sanitarium is a hospital for the sick or disabled employes of the entire line of road, and is supported by er is superintendent Brainerd has one steam saw mill with a capacity of 12,000,000 feet per annum, another with a capacity of 3,000,000 feet, and many fine business blocks and tasteful residences It has also electric lights, water works, and street cars, and is ress as a city

In 1886 a charter was obtained by Charles F Kindred & Co to build a dam across the Mississippi The dam has been completed at a cost of 125,000 It has a head of 20 feet, with sufficient flow to secure 25,000 horse power, and a boo a reservoir 121,000,000,000 feet of logs The whole city hts, water works, street cars, and Northern Pacific railroad shops, will be attached to this water power Crow Wing county contributed 50,000 in bonds to the building of this dam

Brainerd has an opera house, and is well supplied with churches, the Catholics, Presbyterians, Baptists, Congregationalists, Episcopalians, Lutherans, and Methodists having organizations and buildings

L P WHITE was born in Vermont in 1811 He was self educated He was ed in railroading until arriving at Brainerd, in 1870, where he built the first frame house His as the first white wo at Brainerd, Mr White has been the acting agent of the Lake Superior & Puget Sound Company, which has laid out all the town sites from Northern Pacific Junction to Moorhead with the exception of Detroit

ALLEN MORRISON was one of a fairls His father was born in Scotland, but erated to Canada, where he died in 1812 Two of the boys were in the English Navy, and killed at the battle of Trafalgar, in Egypt William Morrison, a brother of Allen, and several years his senior, was a visited the Territory as early as 1800, and was one of the party who discovered Lake Itasca, the source of the Mississippi river Allen's first visit to this region was in 1820, when he came to Fond du Lac, as a trader in as then known as the ”Northern Outfit” For several years he was associated with his brother Willia which time he was stationed at Sandy Lake, Leech Lake, Red Lake, Mille Lacs, and Crow Wing, and when the Indians were removed to White Earth, went there also, and remained until his death In 1826 he wasin the fall of 1872

She was a daughter of a member of the old Northwestern Fur Company, as a trader on the Saskatchewan, and died in Canada in 1812 Mr

Morrison was the father of eleven children Caroline, now in Brainerd, was married to Chris Grandelmyer in April, 1864 Rachel resides with her sister, Mrs Grandelmyer John J and Allen, at White Earth; Mary, the eldest, now Mrs J R Sloan, at St Cloud; and Louisa, now Mrs

John Bromley, at Northern Pacific Junction Mr Morrison died on the twenty-eighth of November, 1878, and was buried at White Earth, in the historic valley where he had passed so many eventful years His naotten In the first territorial legislature he represented the district e, and when the present county of Morrison was set off, the legislature named it in honor of this esteemed veteran pioneer

CHARLES F KINDRED, an active, enterprising citizen of Brainerd, is doing for his adopted city all that one man can do Mr Kindred, for ent of the Northern Pacific Railroad Coe of the resources of North Minnesota, which he uses to the best interest of the section in which he hasof the Kindred dam

CHAPTER XVIII

AITKIN COUNTY

This county consists of an oblong section, six towns in width, lying between Mille Lacs and Kanabec counties on the south, and Itasca on the north It is a heavily tiion, upon which the lumberman has drawn for hundreds of millions of feet of lumber, with but little apparent diminution in the quantity of the supply The whole surface is dotted with lakes and variegated with natural ood far lands Mille Lacs, in the southern part of the county, is the largest lake, and settle its shores Sandy lake is second in size It lies on the great portage route fro, by way of St Louis river to Lake Superior, and has been a noted point on that route for two hundred years The missions of the Jesuits, and later, of the Presbyterians and Methodists, had been located here and abandoned The fur trader and the Indian trader have made their headquarters here

Sandy lake has become historic The county contains about one hundred and three townshi+ps, which are drained chiefly by the Mississippi and its tributaries The Mississippi is navigable froama falls, a distance of over one hundred miles

Aitkin county was created May 23, 1857, but was not organized until July 30, 1872 The first officers chosen were: County commissioners, Nathaniel Tibbetts, chairister of deeds, Wm Hallstrom; auditor, W E Crowell; sheriff, Jae of Aitkin was organized into a town in 1873; N Tibbetts, chairh six townshi+ps of this county, nae 22 to 27, inclusive While the road was in process of building in 1870, Nathaniel Tibbetts e of Aitkin now stands, and built the first house, a hotel known as the Ojibway House, and the next spring built the Aitkin House He moved his family here in 1471 He was appointed the first postanization of the county The county and village of Aitkin were named after Wm A

Aitkin, as a prominent trader on the Upper Mississippi for a number of years