Old Crow Wing, Minnesota

[1] Old Crow Wing's strategic location also made it attractive to European traders, the first of them recorded shortly after the close of the French and Indian War in 1763.

Many of the fur trappers and traders were Métis, the biracial descendants of Ojibwe women and French, Scots and English men.

Over generations, the Métis have developed as a distinct ethnic group in Canada, with characteristic cultural patterns, and they have won recognition of political status.

Since the Red River Trails crossed territory of the Dakota, the Ojibwe's traditional enemy, conflicts dogged the trade.

A Red River ox cart train on its return trip north traveled instead to the growing town of Crow Wing, forded the Mississippi, and blazed a new route that passed through much friendlier Ojibwe lands.

Several important Ojibwe leaders lived in Crow Wing, including Curly Head, Hole in the Day and his father, and Strong Ground.

Father Francis Xavier Pierz established a Catholic mission in Crow Wing in 1852,[5] later headed by Lovrenc Lavtižar.

In 1868, the United States resettled the Ojibwe, including Clement and Elizabeth Beaulieu, to the White Earth Indian Reservation in northwestern Minnesota.

In 1871, the railroad magnate James J. Hill decided to route his Northern Pacific Railway over the Mississippi River at Brainerd, ten miles to the north and bypassing Crow Wing.