An 1890 Traveller's View

In the last two decades of the 19th century, St. Vincent and it's neighbors were growing by leaps and bounds. Even from as far away as New York City, people could see that amazing things were happening on the developing frontiers of our country; they were coming of age.

From a New York Times archive article comes this excerpt, of a man traveling through our area in 1890...

At the Kittson County Fair held at Hallock Oct. 3, there were cabbage heads and cauliflowers which measured 22 inches in diameter, beets and turnips which weighed 20 pounds apiece, and potatoes a foot long. Eight-rowed white corn was shown which ripened on the stand, and savory peppers, large and pungent. Creameries are established at prominent points, and cheese and butter are produced in considerable quantities. A good deal of attention is paid to beef and horse stock. There are some flocks of sheep. The exhibit of fine stallions exceeded any similar collection on record elsewhere.

It is cheering to note the hopefulness which pervades the Red River Valley at this time. It seems to be the reflex of a like feeling which possesses the whole Northwest. There is no doubt that the entire region is on the threshold of another great advance. The promise is in the air. A remarkable business year is anticipated for 1891.

Impressions

Mary Agnes FitzGibbon

First impressions, as we all know, are important. Below are some first impressions of early Pembina/St. Vincent by travelers (not of the fur trade or military); the one thing they have in common is their attention to a particular feature that stood out like a sore thumb:

MUD

The frontier post, Pembina, is well known as the spot beyond which in 1869 the rebel Louis Riel, the "Little Napoleon" of Red River, would not allow Mr. McDougall, the "lieutenant-governor of Manitoba," appointed by the Canadian administration, to pass. Here we had a visit from the custom-house officers. They were good specimens of their different countries. The Canadian was a round, fat, jolly, handsome, fair man; the Yankee was tall, slight, and black-eyed, with a cadaverous look, increased by his close-fitting mackintosh and cowl. They did not give us any trouble, and I felt sorry for their lonely life, and the pounds of mud they had to carry with them everywhere.

Such mud! There is no wharf or planking of any kind, and all freight and baggage is landed on (or into) the muddy bank. Barrels rolled through it became unrecognizable, and were doubled in weight before they reached their warehouse. Men worked on bare feet, with trousers rolled to their knees, and the slippery, swashy look of everything was horrible. An Indian (not of the Fenimore Cooper type) leant against an old cooking-stove stranded on the bank, and an old squaw squatted on a heap of dirty straw, watching with lack-lustre eyes the disembarkation. A mile or two above Pembina is the American fort, with its trim barracks, fortifications, mounted guns, sentries, and some military life about it. Near it is the house built by Captain Cameron, when out with the expeditionary force in 1867...

From A Trip to Manitoba by Mary Agnes FitzGibbon

From:  "Minnesota and its Resources to which are Appended Camp-fire Sketches, or Notes of a Trip from St. Paul to Pembina and Selkirk Settlement on the Red River of the North", by J. Wesley Bond. Publishers, Redfield, New York (1854).