DETROIT [LAKES]
Detroit City, population 2,500, Becker county, the judicial seat of the county, is located on the main line of the Northern Pacific railway and the Soo extenstion, 200 miles northwest of St. Paul and 47 miles east of Fargo. It is an important station, serving as a distributing point for the large area of well settled agricultural country. It was incorporated as a village in 1880, and is governed by a board of village trustees, annually elected in February. The town is lighted by electricity, supplied with water works and has an excellent telephone exchange, an efficient volunteer fire department, an excellent high school and the best of school equipments and instructors. It is well supplied with churches, having eight organizations, each with its resident minister. These are the Baptist, Episcopal, Congregational, Methodist, German Lutheran, Swedish Lutheran, Norwegian Lutheran and Roman Catholic. There are several hotels. At the head of the list stands Hotel Minnesota, with nearly 100 rooms. This hotel is heated by steam, has electric lights, public and private baths, and all other modern appliances for the comfort and convenience of its guests. The transient rates are $2.00 per day, with suitable concessions to guests remaining for two or more weeks. In August, 1902, a syndicate of Detroit citizens purchased Hotel Minnesota. The building was thoroughly repaired and refurnished. New plumbing and a steam heating plant were put in. An addition with three large steam heated and electric lighted sample rooms and other conveniences were erected. The Hotel Minnesota company was incorporated with a capital of $40,000. In September, 1903, this company purchased fifteen acres of timber land having a fine frontage of 500 feet on Detroit lake, one-half mile from its hotel at the steamboat landing. Besides a number of special and general stores, workshops, etc., the town contains two banks, a planing mill, a merchant flouring mill, a creamery and a number of grain elevators. A weekly newspaper, the Record, is published. The principal shipments from Detroit are wheat, furs, produce, wood, ties, ice and mineral water.
The location of Detroit in the midst of a cluster of beautiful lakes and on the edge of the vast Red river valley and Dakota prairies makes it a popular summer resort. Its especial attraction is a chain of ten lakes connected by the Pelican river, and extending forty miles in a southwesterly direction. These lakes are surrounded by hardwood timber, and are in every way very attractive. They are being connected by navigable channels suitable for the passage of steam, electric and gasoline launches.
It is a clean, enterprising, prosperous town, with the best of schools and churches. Reaching southward is a chain of ten beautiful lakes. Four of these have been connected by channel and are now navigated by steamboats. The other six are to be also connected. On the shores of these lakes nonresidents have built about 100 summer cottages. These, with a number of hotels, help to make Detroit the favorite summer resort of the northwest.
Hotel Minnesota has been completely rebuilt and refurnished during the past year. Its accommodations are increased by a large addition. A reasonably correct idea of the house may be obtained from the view shown herein [not included]. It is kept open through the entire year. Has seventy-five sleeping rooms. For full particulars, address W. E. Boyd, manager. The other hotels at Detroit are the European, Waldorf, Sheridan, Lewis and Lakeside.
The Detroit lakes are on the line of the Northern Pacific railway, 200 miles northwest of St. Paul, and 47 miles east of Fargo, and 25 miles south of the White Earth Indian agency. They form a fire guard between the boundless expense of treeless prairie on the west and the Minnesota forests on the east. The country is of an intermediate character. Prairie, lake and forest mingle in the endless variety of its undulating surface.
Following are a few of the leading business men and firms of the town:
George D. Hamilton is the publisher of the Detroit Record, the main weekly paper of the county, and it is a credit to the town.
John K. West is one of the leading real estate agents in this part of the state. He has over 50,000 acres of improved farm lands, running from $5.00 to $40.00 per acre. Mr. West came here in 1881 and is one of the rustlers for Detroit.
Lee Connell is one of the leading saloon men and has been in business for five years. He came from New York state.
The house of Convers is the exclusive millinery and ladies’ furnishing house of the town, composed of three departments, millinery, ladies’ and misses’ dress goods and ready to wear suits. Mrs. Philip S. Convers is the proprietor. Mr. Convers is the register of deeds and official abstracter of Becker county.
The First National bank is one of the leading banks of the county; capital, $50,000; surplus, $10,000. Established in 1885 and does a general banking, real estate, insurance and first mortgage loan business, W. J. Morrow, cashier, is mayor of the city.
Whipple & Whipple are proprietors of a leading livery stable of the city and have been in business for seventeen years and have about thirty fine turnouts.
Blanding Norby company run the “Department Store” of the town. The building is 100x90 feet and filled with a fine line of goods. This store is a credit to the town.
A. C. Billou is the jeweler of the city and has been in business five years and has a fine line of diamonds, watches and jewelry.
The First State bank is one of the leading banks of Becker county; organized in 1899; capital, $20,000; surplus, $9,000, and does a general banking, real estate, insurance and first mortgage loan business. Jeff H. Irish, the president, is one of Detroit’s leading men.
Harry L. Johnston is proprietor of the main dray and transfer line of the town. He has been in business four years and in Detroit for thirty years.
S. N. Horneck & Co. are one of the leading dry goods firms of the town and have been in business since 1880. This firm runs a general store and have a very large stock of goods.
B. C. Emery is proprietor of the Detroit steam laundry and has been in business for two years and came from Minneapolis. This laundry has agencies in all the neighboring towns.
The Detroit Building and Manufacturing company do all kinds of woodwork, planing, matching and lathe work; also general contractors and builders. The members of the firm are Charles S. Randolph, W. C. Steffen and Frank L. Bolen.
J. L. Ketten & Co. are dealers in bicycles, guns and stoves, and run a general repair shop and have been in business for three years and have been in town thirteen years.
E. F. Harris is proprietor of the Central meat market, the leading market of the town, and has been in business for twenty-one years and handles a fine line of meats.
William E. Boyd is manager of the Hotel Minnesota, the first class house of the town. This is the best hotel in this section, and Mr. Boyd is the right man in the right place.
The Wilcox Lumber company are the leading lumber merchants in this part of the country and were established twenty-five years ago. Mr. Taylor, the treasurer and manager, has been on the Detroit school board for eleven years.
MacGregor Drug company are one of the leading drug firms in this part of the state. Charles MacGregor, Ph. D., manager, is one of the leading business men of the town and takes pride in his store and stock of drugs and chemicals. He is a graduate of Washington, D. C., in 1891.
F. S. Courtright runs one of the fine saloons of the west; has been in business for three years and handles a good line of goods.
John Rahm is one of the leading liverymen and runs the Red barn. He has some very fine turnouts and careful drivers.
Reid and Wackman are the main dealers in building material, farm implements and vehicles of the town, also steam heating, plumbing and well fittings; have been in business since 1886.
Dr. J. B. Carman is a pioneer physician of the county; came here in 1879 and is a graduate of Montreal. Is surgeon for the Northern Pacific railway and proprietor of Carman’s pharmacy, one of the leading drug stores. Mr. G. A. Engbretson has charge of the drug store and is a practical pharmacist.
Charles G. Sturtevant can give you abstracts of all lands in Becker county and has the only complete set of government plats and filings in Becker county.
Hamilton & Sturtevant are the main real estate firm of the town and have been in business for fourteen years. This firm has over 50,000 acres of farm land in Becker county and know every foot of the county. Any further information wanted of this county you can write this firm and they will send you all advertising matter, also sectional maps of the county.
Becker is a large agricultural county in central Minnesota, and lying within the limits of the attractive park region. It has a rolling, well grassed surface, embracing hardwood forests, prairies, oak openings, lightly timbered tracts, open brush lands and numerous natural meadows, interspersed throughout with lakes and streams, forming many charming landscapes. Its western townships, bordering on the Red River valley, are mostly prairie, with occasional groves of hardwood. The timber is excellent, and consists of oak, maple, birch, basswood, ash, poplar, ironwood, elm, box elder, pine and tamarack.
The soil varies in localities from a black loam to a loamy sand with a clay subsoil, and is extremely productive. The climate and soil are suited to the growth of wheat, oats, barley, rye, flax, corn, potatoes, sugar beets, sorghum, beans, hops, garden vegetables and small fruits. Wild strawberries, raspberries, plums, blueberries, high bush cranberries, grapes and hops are plentiful. The native grasses (bluejoint, redtop and other varieties) are rich and abundant, and timothy, clover and millet are successfully grown.
The soil varies fro sandy to clay loam, with little of any area that is not profitable farm property. In this region improved farms are worth from $25 to $50 per acre, the latter figure being placed on very choice improved farm property.
East and northwest of Detroit there is a belt of lighter soil covered with scrub or heavy timber, the region being well supplied with lakes. This country offers more unimproved farm land than any of the sections to the south. Here unimproved lands can be had for $7 to $9 per acre; and farms with more or less improvements at from $10 to $25 per acre. These farms of lighter soil are proving very productive, the yield per acre of small grain, potatoes and root crops comparing well with those on heavier soils. In fact the boast of many of these light soil farmers is that they are exceeding the heavier soils in bushels per acre.
Cattle, horses, sheep and hogs do well, and stock raising and dairying are profitable industries. Creameries are operated at several points, and dairy products find ready sale. This region is especially well adapted to general farming. The producer can rely upon profitable average yields of all agricultural products every year. A general failure of crops has never occurred. Even in the lightest crop season the yields are large enough to afford a reasonable profit.
The country is well watered by numerous rivers, lakes and springs of purest quality of water. It contains more than 300 lakes, abounding in black bass, pickerel, lake trout, whitefish, pike and other game fish. Excellent timber is abundant for building, fencing and fuel. Lumber is cheap. Large quantities of cordwood, railroad ties and posts are marketed at the railroad stations and sawmills.
Dairy farming has proved, in most of our eastern states, very profitable. Minnesota, all things considered, has no superior in the United States as a dairy farming state. Our soil produces clover, timothy hay, alfalfa, blue grass and all other tame grasses that are produced within our temperate belt. We have the purest water, and it is well known that in a climate where human beings are healthy, cattle also do well. A carload of butter and cheese is worth more than ten times the value of a carload of wheat, and our farming lands here can be bought for less than one-fourth of what they are selling for in the Connecticut valley, New York or Pennsylvania, it is very easy to calculate how much more profitable dairy farming can be made here than in the eastern states.
Just a word to the homeseeker coming to this country. If you want a good farm and cheap, one you can raise anything from a potato to No. 1 hard wheat on, good schools for your children, good churches, good markets, good water, buy a ticket over the Northern Pacific railroad from St. Paul and stop off at Detroit and look over Becker county and you will never return. Land is cheap now, but going up fast, so this is the time to buy.
Source:
The Saint Paul Globe
Wednesday Morning, March 22, 1905
Volume XXVIII, Number 81, Page 7