Rowland Gardner had led a group of settlers into the region in 1856, and he built this cabin in July of that year.

On March 8, 1857, a band of renegade Wahpekuta Sioux who had been alienated from the tribal structure attacked the Gardner family and other settlers in the immediate area in an incident known as the Spirit Lake Massacre.

Led by Inkpaduta, the band of outlaws raided both Indians and white settlers for a period of about 30 years.

[2] The massacre accelerated the U.S. government's removal of the remaining Sioux from Iowa and Minnesota, and it slowed the rate of settlement in the region for a period of time.

Abbie Gardner-Sharp published an account of the massacre, and was able to gain possession of the cabin that she ran as a museum.