Sherburne County Heritage Center Interpretive Plan Final Report 2005

Home Browse Search

Archie Larson, a large local buyer, but one among many others, purchased about 122,782 muskrats between 1942 and 1968 from local trappers. Larson purchased muskrats from trappers for about $2.00 each in the 1930s, then varied from fifty cents to $1.00 by the 1960s as demand dropped. Mink brought up to $50 each in the 1930s and about $25 in the 1960s. (Trapping information from Dori Northrop, "Orrock in Transition," Masters Thesis, St. Cloud State University, 1978 27-31) Trapping served as an important income stream for area farmers and youngsters. When the county placed a bounty on pocket gophers that left dirt mounds on area fields that sometimes damaged farm equipment and damaged trees in the Sand Dunes State Forest, local boys, like Arnie Engstrom, set traps to catch the animals. Arnie remembers buying his first pair of roller skates from money he earned by catching pocket gophers for the county bounty. (Arnie Engstrom during discussion in group planning session.) That's What They Said! —Trapping Near Meadowvale "Muskrats were abundant in the creek that wound through our meadows and in all the old beaver ponds that still held water through most of the summer. At first I went with Charles to his traps and learned how to set and fasten them on the banks of the creek close to deep water so the muskrat would soon drown when caught, but we did not weight our traps and often the poor muskrat suffered all night with a broken and mangled leg or twisted his foot off and left it in the trap. This worried us, but we could not think of any way to avoid it. Around the edges of the lakes we set traps under water at the bank burrows and staked them down so the muskrats could not reach the surface and were quickly drowned. But mink and skunks and coons and foxes we could not take without the cruel torture of mangled feet and we did very little trapping for such animals. (Vernon Bailey, "The Hiram Bailey Family: Pioneers of America and Early Settlers of the Middle West, 1928, p. 34) Theme statement Theme 2: Being on the edge where three ecological land types meet enabled easy transportation and access to natural resources and economic resources. Subtheme 2.1. Indian tribes recognized that the area that later became Sherburne County was strategically located on the edge of woodlands, prairie, and the Mississippi River, and the area became a contested borderland between the Ojibwe and Dakota people. Subtheme 2.4. Sherburne County's edge landscape included plentiful lakes, wetlands, and abundant wildlife that have been key to the areas' history and development. Contemporary visitor relevance 1. A large part of the Heritage Center audience is oriented toward outdoor leisure activities. The Intercept Survey, which picked -up the young family audience segment, indicated interviewees spent 45% of their leisure time doing outdoor activities. Sherburne County Historical Society Heritage Center Interpretive Plan, April 21, 2005, page 37