Anishinaa be Tales

Editor’s note: The stories recounted here are largely taken from the oral tradition of the Ojibwe and some written historical accounts.

The Lake Superior treaty creating the Grand Portage Indian Reservation was signed by the United States government and chiefs at Madeline Island near today’s Bayfield, Wisconsin in 1854. Before that, white people were not allowed to enter that vast area around Lake Superior and the Iron Range.

Minnesota, Michigan, and Wisconsin were all part of this treaty. However, people working for mining and logging companies sent scouts in to check out this vast area. One who went later on his own turned out to be a good man in his early twenties. Samuel (Sam) Howenstein moved from Ohio to the five Indian villages at the west end of Lake Superior today called Superior and Duluth. There, he married Mary Anakwad Cloud and began fishing and fur trading. He and his wife moved to Grand Portage and the surrounding area. They had four children, Eliza, Lizzie, Mary, and Bill. Samuel worked as a fur trader for a long time. He traveled hundreds of miles with native workers, and he spoke their language fluently. Many considered him the first settler in Grand Marais, which became a permanent settlement in the 1870s.

Sam Howenstein and as many as 36 fur makers made regular 250-mile-long trips to buy furs in 15 different small Indian villages like Saganaga, Basswood, and Lake Vermillion.

Shinibis was Sam’s top worker and guide. He later lived in various locations throughout Cook County and was the leader of the small village at Caribou Lake, in today’s Lutsen. He also lived in a traditional non-Christian village a short distance west of today’s courthouse. John Azhaweynce lived and healed another native using a powerful stone to defeat the illness now called cancer. From today’s Rochester, Minnesota doctors long ago traveled to Grand Marais to hear about the healing of their powerful stone, which is cobalt. Elders told me of the story and where the medicine men had gone to get it.

Sam Howenstein and his wife and children built the first house on the west side of Grand Marais Bay. He knew the Indians called Grand Marais “Kitchi bee to bee gam,” the Grand Twin Bays. The French had called it the grand marsh because seventy percent of the shore and a big pond on the east side were marshy. Sam hired Shinibis (the hell diver duck) to lead his long-distance journeys. Shinibis, after starting work with Sam, never touched a drop of alcohol again. On one trip, Sam and Shinibis set out to travel to Lake Vermillion. For 11 days, the two of them walked along the huge Messabi (giant) ridges, traveling north.

A winter storm engulfed them, and they ran out of food. They cooked the last of Shinibis moccasins and were starving.

Trudging along in the snow, they saw a Pine Martin in a trap. They had not eaten for three days, and they hurriedly cleaned and roasted the pine marten on a fire. It was said by them to be the best food they had ever eaten. By 1875 Sam and his family had built the only house on the west side of the bay in Grand Marais.

It was a time of depression.

They were waiting for a small ship to bring the supplies to their home. In December, the boat and crew tried to enter the bay; at that time, there were no breakwaters and wall to calm the waters. As they entered the bay, a prominent Northeastern wind came up, and the boat was stuck on a reef. All the big fishing skiffs had been pulled up onshore. Sam, with his son William, Jack Scott and John Morrison, jumped into a small boat and tried to row out and save the boat and crew. The North Easter kicked up stronger and blew the little boat carrying them men deep out into the lake. Sam Zimmerman Sr., my great grandfather, was trapping on the big hill over Grand Marais, called Maple Hill then, watched as the boat blew far away. Sam didn’t die until the 1950s, but he always remembered and re-told that story.

Later, in 1882 Sam Howenstein, Hazel Mayhew and Charles M. Wilson were appointed by Lake County as local commissioners. In this land that we call Cook County, people have lived under the French, English, United States and Michigan flags.

Finally, in 1883, a local government began in Grand Portage, also called Pigeon River Reservation, with three heritage chiefs under the Bureau of Indian Affairs government control. In 1889, the “Dawes Act” was passed, and Grand Portage lost over fifty percent of its land to white settlers. It wasn’t until 1903 the county— now called Cook County— was formed. Cook County was named after Colonel Mitchell Cook of Faribault, Minnesota. County commissioners were mad and against that name, but it stuck.

Sam Howenstein made a motion to fund the clearing of a mail carrier trail from Grand Portage to the Lake County line, and John Beargrease was hired as the dog-sled mail carrier. However, it was not until 1903 that Cook County began operating in full force.

Bridges and roads were slowly made, but electricity was not in many rural areas, including Grand Portage. There were still many Indians living in Chippewa City and Grand Marais; Charlie and Billy Hownestein, still deep in native blood, spoke their language fluently.

All of the bridges and roads were not fully completed. After 1889 the federal government took much of Grand Portage’s land. Later the federal and state government took over 90 percent of Cook County’s land. There were a few folks who knew what was planned for Cook County. More and more people were moving into Cook County, although as a county, it still has one of the least populations for a county in the state.

A white man moved to downtown Grand Marais and started a Chevrolet dealership. His name was Ed Lind, and he had a large garage. An Indian had died, and he let the people have the wake in this building. At an Indian wake someone must be with the body of the deceased all night. Many people attended and would speak or sing in their language. Also, Charlie and Billy Hownestein would play fiddles. The following day the funeral service was held at the church of Chippewa City (one mile east of Grand Marais) and then the deceased was buried in the Indian cemetery.

Before Cook County was legally formed, a white family from Michigan moved to Grand Portage. They had a son named Elliot, who married into Chief MeyMash Ko Waush’s family on my mother’s side. This is where I and my siblings Jack and Mary came from.

White people slowly came by ship to Grand Marais. Ted Wakelin bought and owned most of the land in Grand Marais. Later George Morrison, from Chippewa City, bought most of the land of the East Bay in Grand Marais. At that time, in the early 1870’s, no white people were living in Grand Marais.

It wasn’t just the Indians, but the white settlers quickly learned how dangerous Lake Superior could be. Gordon Lightfoot, a great singer, sang about the sinking of the Edmund Fitzgerald, which saw the ship sink November 10, 1975, taking its crew of 29 with it to the bottom of the lake. But, as I have said many times, the laws of nature and the Great Spirit are powerful.

In the 1970s, me, Spruce-Hen Everson and others cut down trees and cleared out the east side of the road to the Chippewa City Cemetery. Carved fence posts were still around some of the graves, and people remembered Ed Lind’s kindness and thanked him for using his downtown building. Ed’s daughter married a man, Chuck Futterer, who moved to Grand Marais to run the Chevrolet dealership and Chuck helped start the curling club.

His son Chuck Jr. went to school in Grand Marias. He became a teacher, principal and superintendent. Then, after living elsewhere, he moved back to Grand Marais and was the superintendent here until he retired. He and his wife still live here. Chuck Jr. and his siblings hold a curling bonspiel every year in memory of their dad.

Al Bramer was the direct descendant of Sam Howenstein. He became tribal chairman of Grand Portage in the late 1940s. His daughter Barbara Bramer married Dr. Roger MacDonald, who for quite some time was our only doctor in the county. Doctor MacDonald is still living, and he recounted his years as a physician here in a book.

The Hohenstein family played a significant role in shaping Cook County.