Pelican Rapids
Ethnic Concentrations
Driving the total length of the byway, the traveler will pass through 21 townships, all of which have their own unique stories surrounding the early frontier.
Talking Trail Audio Story
What’s In a Name?
Many of the township names (Dane Prairie, St. Olaf, Lida, Maine, Friberg, Erhards Grove) pay tribute to the distinct ethnic groups that settled the area. In fact, a tour around the Byway in the late 1800s would be like touring Europe.
“The influx of immigrants into Otter Tail County was so tremendous that for years there prevailed in the county three different foreign languages: Norwegian, Swedish and German. Actually, they were as common — or more so — than English.” (Otter Tail County: History in Brief, p. 11.)
The Immigrant Influx
In 1862 the Homestead Act attracted settlers to the rich fertile land of Otter Tail County. They came by ox-drawn prairie schooners, on horseback or on foot to stake their 160-acre claims.
Pelican Rapids is a community with a diverse cultural background. Native Americans lived and hunted here before recorded time. The first settler of Pelican Township, a young Swedish
immigrant named John M. Johnson set out on the oxcart trail; he built a dugout into a hill on the north side of his homestead and it served as his home for several years. Immigrants from the east began arriving in the mid-1800s from Maine, New York, Ohio and Pennsylvania. Many were Norwegians, who chose the rocky, forested hills of Pelican Rapids because the landscape “reminded them of home.” Over the years, immigrants to the area have included people of English, German, French and Italian origin.
Rearranging the River
Rearranging the River Other settlers were attracted when they saw the potential of the river as a source of water power. R. L. Frazee, the area’s first flour mill owner, took it upon himself to change the course of the river.
He hired a crew of men who dug a new canal so that swampy land along Broadway could be drained for new lots. By draining that land Frazee was able to build a bank, hardware store and post office. The present canal under the bridge along Broadway is not the natural course of the river but rather the result of Frazee’s efforts. Also, the street level of Broadway was raised. Evidence of the project can be seen in the low grassy lot on the west side of 10th Street and on the doors and windows that still exist in the basement level of such buildings as Riverview Place at 21 N. Broadway.
Frazee & Pelican Rapids
The New Immigrants
In 1970, Mexicans and Mexican Americans traveled to Pelican Rapids seeking employment in local industry. The Hispanics were followed by Vietnamese young adults in the late seventies and by Vietnamese and Laotian families in the eighties. The families who had to leave their countries because they worked for the United States during the Vietnam War found security and jobs here.
The first Bosnian refugees came to Pelican Rapids in 1995 and most recently Croatians, Sudanese, Kurds and Somali have also fled their war-torn countries to find homes and safety in Pelican Rapids.
A Lively Mix of Cultures
Today, local residents share their skills teaching English, tutoring, helping new immigrants learn new customs and find jobs and housing. Because of the immigrants, there are new kinds of food at the grocery store, new languages on the street, and new books at the library. This lively mix of cultures has truly made the small city of Pelican Rapids part of a much larger world.
