Date December 26, 2011Comments No Comments

Helen Hoover: Gunflint Trail author

The Gunflint Trail landscape has inspired many works of literature. Perhaps best known are Justine Kerfoot’s autobiographical books, but John Henricksson, Florence Jaques, and others have also written at length about the Gunflint Trail region. One author whose works you may have bumped into this Christmastime is Helen Hoover.

Hoover spent several years living in a small cabin on the south shore of Gunflint Lake with her husband, Adrian. The couple made the move from Chicago to the Northwoods in 1954. Helen, who had a degree in chemistry from the University of Ohio, left behind a successful career as a metallurgist; Adrian had been an art director. The move to the Gunflint Trail was motivated by the two’s desire to live closer to nature, but the move proved financially difficult. Without a steady income and nearly 50 miles removed from the nearest town of Grand Marais, the Hoovers struggled to survive that first harsh Minnesota winter.

To made ends meet, Adrian began selling cards he illustrated and other handmade trinkets. Helen started writing magazine articles. In 1963, her first book, The Long-Shadowed Forest, which recounted life in northern Minnesota, was published by Alfred Knopf. She would publish three more Gunflint Trail inspired books with Knopf: The Gift of the Deer (1966), A Place in the Woods (1968), and The Years of the Forest (1973). These books are still in print and today are published by the University of Minnesota Press.

At least two of Hoover’s books featured a seasonal theme. Her book, The Gift of the Deer tells the story of an emaciated deer who comes into the Hoovers’ backyard one Christmas eve. The Hoovers nursed the deer, who they called Peter Whitetail, back to health. In her children’s book The Great Wolf and Good Woodsmen, Hoover tells the story of the woodland creatures rallying to help an injured woodsmen on Christmas day. The Great Wolf and Good Woodsmen was republished in 1997 accompanied with woodcut illustrations by Grand Marais Betsy Bowen.

Eventually, the Hoovers sold their Gunflint Lake property and spent time in New Mexico before resettling in Wyoming. Helen died in 1984 at age 74 in Laramie, WY.

At Chik-Wauk Museum and Nature Center, you can view a display devoted to Helen Hoover in the reading corner. In the display, you’ll see some of the handcrafted goods Adrian made, first editions of Hoover’s books, and personal letters between Helen and Heston’s Lodge owner, Peggy Heston.

Date December 23, 2011Comments No Comments

Seasons Greetings!

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Date December 20, 2011Comments No Comments

Holidays On the Trail

The holiday season has always been one of the most enchanting seasons on the Gunflint Trail. With snow-capped trees, snowshoe and ski trails winding across frozen lakes, and snowbanks framing the road, a Gunflint Trail holiday has distinct storybook qualities.

One thing that’s sure to be covered during holiday conversations is the weather,  be it snowfall or the recent winter temperatures.

In A Taste of the Gunflint Trail John Patten remembers the early days of Adventurous Christians in the mid-Trail area were especially chilly:

Our first winter in the lodge was an adventure. It wasn’t far into December when the lack of cash flow caused us to abandon use of the propane heater and we relied completely on the wood stove to “heat” the entire lodge. It was no joke among staff members that you’d best hold your fork in your armpit a minute or two before inserting it into your mouth at breakfast, or it would freeze to your lips. We had a neighborhood Christmas Eve service that December, and upon apologizing for the lack of heat to all service attendees, Harry Nolan [owner of Sunset Point on Hungry Jack Lake] responded with an immediate “What heat?!”

On the other side of the spectrum, Florence Page Jaques recalled being shocked to find balmy temps on Christmas day during the winter she  spent with her husband, Francis Lee Jaques, on Gunflint Lake in the early 1940s. In her book Snowshoe Country, she wrote “It is thirty above! Scandalous! This isn’t the Christmas weather we are supposed to endure!”

No matter the temperature, getting the annual Christmas tree remains an important tradition for many Gunflint Trail families.

Florence Page Jaques remembers the search for the perfect Christmas trees  in Snowshoe Country:

At sunset Bruce [Kerfoot] and Lee and I started up the cliff trail to get a Christmas tree. It was a delight to have such thousands to select from, but almost impossible to choose among them. On a ridge we found a beauty, and I begged a tiny one besides. I’ve always wanted to have a Christmas tree for birds. Coming down, the spicy air and the great snowy landscape were so inspiriting that Lee and I surprised Bruce by bursting into carols. The lake was a giant mosaic in pastel colors as the sunset reflected on various surfaces. It was as if a rainbow had been shattered there.

Carlene Soderberg Krumpack, daughter of Carl and Elinor Soderberg who owned Soderberg Cabins, remembered in Taste the Christmas trees her family had in the late 1940s:

Our first Christmas tree had candles in candleholders that my mom bought. It was beautiful. The next Christmas my dad hooked a string of lights up to a car battery.

Marilyn Sly, a seasonal Gunflint Trail resident, remembered the Christmas she and her young family spent on the Gunflint Trail in a interview with the Gunflint Trail Historical Society. During their time on the Trail, the family  made their own decorations, strung popcorn and cranberries, cut down a tree, and attended a Christmas service at Okontoe around a potbelly stove.  “It was one of the most beautiful Christmases,” Sly said.

Do you have holiday memories from the Gunflint Trail? Be sure to share them in the comments.

Date December 12, 2011Comments No Comments

The longest bus ride in Minnesota

Is a school bus an important piece of history? If you live on the Gunflint Trail, then yes!

Schooling always presented a problem for Gunflint Trail families. Through the 1940s, children were sent to Maple Hill School, just outside of Grand Marais for their elementary schooling, boarding during the school week with area families close to the school. Eventually the Maple Hill school closed and homeschooling or boarding their children in Grand Marais during the school week was the only option for Gunflint Trail parents, although for a brief period of time, from 1946-1948, Grace Boissenin operated a one-room schoolhouse on Clearwater Lake for Gunflint Trail children.

Cheryl Dailey, daughter of Al and Mary Hedstrom, who owned End of the Trail Lodge on Saganaga Lake through 1965, remembered in an oral history interview with the Gunflint Trail Historical Society the experience of boarding in Grand Marais during the school week: “We’d pack our suitcases Sunday night and so however we got to town over the years, the school bus, Bud Kratoska [owner of Trout Lake Resort] used to come all the way up for us on Monday morning and we’d take our little suitcase and the suitcase would sit at the front of the bus, you know, right where you’d get into the bus and then we’d walk our suitcase down to wherever we were going, you know, staying, and then on Friday morning, we’d have our suitcase packed up and we’d go home.”

Jean Dailey of Seagull Resort drove the school bus from the late ’50s  through the mid 60s. She said in A Taste of the Gunflint Trail:  “It was quite a task to drive the Trail in the winter. Of course, it was not paved at that time. Many mornings I had to get up early to put an electric heater under the motor to get the bus going. It was often like driving in a tunnel as the snow was so deeply piled on the sides of the road.”

In 1960, when the Marks and their three daughters moved into Tuscarora Lodge, the bus began making daily trips up and down the Trail. Marie Mark remembered in Taste: “Joe [the bus driver] said he would retire when the last of the Mark girls graduated from high school. When we went out to meet the bus on that last day, it seemed to be pulling in slower than usual. To our surprise Lindy [our youngest] was driving the bus and Joe was sitting in a back seat.”

Heading to school remains an adventure for Gunflint Trail children, one that’s been highlighted in both an article by the Duluth New Tribune in 1988 and a feature by MPR in 2010. During a single school year, Gunflint Trail kids will spend 14.5 days on the school bus!


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