The petition praying for the laying out of a County Road running from Black Duck to Turtle Lake was laid before the Board and the Board being satisfied that Thirty Days Notice had been given.Proceeded to appoint a committee to view Said Road.
All three commissioners, F.E.Dudley, J.P.Nygaard, and G.C.Gordon were appointed the committee to view the road.
At the same meeting, Robert Kettleson was engaged to survey the Black Duck Road, the road to run from Turtle Lake to Black Duck. On March 8, 1895, Kittleson [The clerk spells his name in two ways.] was voted $101.49 for surveying and making plates for the Fosston and Black Duck Roads.
The road did not run from Turtle Lake to the present town of Blackduck. Blackduck village was not platted until 1900. Even then, the village was a mile from the south end of the lake. When the commissioners in 1895 speak of Black Duck, they mean the township, not the village. The name of the township has been changed to Hines. Meetings at Black Duck were held at Commissioner Dudley's place.
On Motion it was voted that the following Bids [be accepted] for Cutting out one rod wide on the Black Duck Road beginning at the North East cor. of Sec 1 Town 149 Range 31 and Terminating at Turtle Lake
The amounts contracted for cutting and clearing varied from $11 to $35 per mile. The costs were higher on the Turtle Lake end than on the Blackduck Lake end. On Dec. 2, 1895, $ 200 was authorized for the road; and on Aug. 3, 1896, another $800 was voted.
Contracts on the Fosston County Road had specified that all stumps and trees be cut even with the ground. Although the minutes did not record that requirement, contractors on the Black Duck road probably did the same. The commissioners did specify that corduroying on the Black Duck Road should be sixteen feet wide and not less than four inches thick.
The road was also useful for those who wished to go from Bemidji to Black Duck. By 1896, Freeman Dowd, who had run the stage to Fosston, had begun a stage and mail route from Bemidji to Buena Vista to Langor, north of Blackduck Lake. William Hines, who settled south of Blackduck Lake, recalled early experiences for the WPA project:
I well remember the stage from Bemidji into this country and the rough roads it came over. The driver wold not let you ride unless you would let him strap you to the wagon, so you would not be bumped out. A friend of mine was thrown clear of the wagon when it hit a bump on a trip we made.
There must have been a good deal of traffic between Bemidji and Black Duck. Ernie Bourgeois reported that when he came to Bemidji in 1898, a better route was being surveyed to link up with the Black Duck Road because of sink holes along the more direct route between Bemidji and Blackduck. He remarks that "there was quite a bit of traffic up that way." (Mainly Logging, p. 24.) Bourgeois is talking about an alternate route, and since it ran from Bemidji it probably ran to the south end of Blackduck Lake.
The Black Duck County road seems to have brought about a relationship between Buena Vista and the township and the village of Blackduck. Early on, in 1897, the County Commissioners had met at LaBrie's stopping place in Buena Vista to discuss the Black Duck Road; then in July, 1896, Commissioner Dudley had been listed as a witness when Jimmy Cyr proved up his claim.(Beltrami Eagle, July 7, 1896) After the road was built, in 1900, a load of lumber was sent from Buena Vista to the new village of Blackduck for the Presbyterian Church which was being built. (Jepson. Blackduck 1900-1905, p.25) This could well have been a gift from the church or a member of the congregation at Buena Vista. The Reverend J.B.Astwell, pastor of the church at Blackduck, took services at Buena Vista in 1901 and was there for the dedication of the church in 1902. Edward LaBrie, who had run the Turtle Lake Hotel, opened a bakery in Blackduck in 1900. Also in 1900, N.T.Forthun, who had operated a store in Buena Vista and a stock farm, until the buildings burned, opened a restaurant and bakery in Blackduck.
With only one or two exceptions the first County Commissioners supported the building of roads, not the maintenance. Very likely, though they never recorded the thought, they expected the homesteaders along the route or those who used the trails to help with the maintenance. The county was not organized until 1897 and had little enough money. Most of that was spent on administration and roads.
Freeman Dowd, on his stage route from Bemidji to Langor, drove his stage along the Black Duck County Road to its terminus in Black Duck township. The road north to Langor was not on a trail which had been subsidized by the county. Still, the county road made it possible for him to get as far as Black Duck. For settlers and suppliers, it meant they could move directly from the railhead at Fosston into the newly opened country east and north of Buena Vista.
The roads [between Buena Vista and Black Duck] have been so bad that it has been impossible to get any mail over them the last two or three weeks. . . .H.A.Langord is running the postoffice full blast and the settlers are in hope that they will get their mail oftener. (Eagle, July 3, 1896)
Mrs. Lydia Wentworth, whose husband homesteaded on Blackduck Lake, related her experience on the early trail to a worker on the WPA historical project.
Mr. Wentworth and family moved to the homestead on Blackduck Lake. This being long before the country was settled and the advent of the railroads¸ the only way of traveling was over the Fosston trail and the "tote" roads leading to the different logging camps. Her husband had a span of ponies and a buggy and drove in over this trail, the trail growing less and less traveled as they followed it and finally ending in floating corduroy. The ponies, not being accustomed to this kind of road, became frightened and fairly "danced" along, nearly upsetting the buggy. This frightened Mrs. Wentworth and she, holding her baby in her arms, leaped out of the buggy and landed in the bog up to her knees in the soft mud. When asked by her husband why she did this, she replied, "I wanted to save the life of at least one of my children." She had two other children at that time.
Written by Carl Clauson, Senior Interviewer of WPA Historical Project No. 3769.
Mother had this homestead in the town of Popple and Dad wanted land also. He decided to go to Blackduck in Beltrami County, where they were opening stone and timber. He took a 160-acre stone and timber claim near what is now Hines.The problem was, of course, that they had to live at least five months on each homestead. They would live on Mother's homestead a while and then in the spring, usually, they would go to Blackduck to Dad's homestead. They would make the move with horses and as there were no through roads they went through swamps and woods. There was a road part way that went by Buena Vista. They always used to camp on top of a big hill at Buena Vista overlooking Lake Julia because mosquitoes weren't so bad on top of the hill -- more breezy. . . .
One trip I remember was when I was three years old and my uncle Helleck was with us. He had taken a homestead not far from the Gilstead place [on Gilstead Lake, southeast of Hines]. We were going through a swamp and the mosquitoes were like a swarm and they were stinging us. I cried and poor Alex tried to get me out of there. He took me on his back and tried to step from one kind of high spot to the other and finally got me to high ground. The horses couldn't pull the wagon through and they discovered the wheel had gotten caught in roots in such a manner they absolutely couldn't get it out; they had to unload that whole load of household things right there in the swamp and take off the wheel. They finally got the thing out and put together again, and we went on.
We camped on top of the high hill near Buena Vista. I cried because the mosquitoes were eating me up. Dad made a big smudge for the horses and a smaller smudge for the tent. Mother put the smudge in the tent and opened the flap and the mosquitoes all took off and she shut it real quick, and we got into bed.
The next thing I remember it was early morning and Mother took us all down to the Lake and washed our faces and hands in that cold water, and I cried some more. That was the last trip we made up there as a family.
North Country History, II.4 (1981), pp.49-51. © Hilda R. Rachuy
The Black Duck Road could only feed people into the area. They had to find other trails to get to their homesteads. J.W.Speelman's Eagle reported on Oct. 23, 1896: "We are reliably informed that there is a new road cut through to Gull Lake which shortens the distance considerable. This road leaves the county road at John Lyon's place."
By 1902, the Minnesota and International had reached the town of Blackduck, but by then the purpose for which the Commissioners had authorized the Black Duck County Road had been achieved -- the country was settled.