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Robert Bly
Robert Bly, Madison’ native son and Minnesota’s first Poet Laureate, donated the building he used as a study when he lived on his farm south of Madison. Heritage Day 2022 was used as a fundraiser to advance funds to preserve the Robert Bly Study. The Heritage Day program premiered the video documentary entitled Robert and Carol Bly, Literary Legends of the Prairie. The Study includes collections of Bly books, artifacts, and pictures about the state’s first poet laureate. The windows and siding have been replaced. We want to thank those who contributed to the fund, especially Robert and Carol’s children Bridget, Mary, Noah, and Micah, and Ruth Bly, Roberts second wife. New visual & auditory art objects have been installed in the exhibit, also.
“The studio was hauled over to the Lac qui Parle County Museum [in 1999] with Bly’s books and furniture intact. It is where Bly wrote ‘Silence in the Snowy Fields’ and where his four children played on the wooden floor, separated from their father by a curtain so that Bly could think.” Laurie Hertzel, The Poet Comes Home, Star Tribune, September 30, 2009.
Additional information is available at robertbly.com
Ethel Melom Dolls
It is a well-known fact that Ethel’s hobby is that of gathering PERSONALITY DOLLS and dressing them. She has only to see a picture of the clothes worn by her subject and then proceeds to copy, in miniature, the complete outfit worn, spending much time in sewing and taking great care with minute details. Many of these dolls have China heads resembling the particular person she wishes to commemorate, or honor, and the finished product is a true work of art.
This hobby began when Ethel was a young girl and asked her mother for a boudoir doll. Her mother directed her to a chest containing five dolls and told her she might dress them. Ethel readily complied, but did not stop with the five dolls. Instead, she kept on until she had dressed twenty-four dolls which she displayed in a glass China closet. Gradually, she accumulated character or personality dolls representing and resembling such personalities as Abraham Lincoln and his wife; Benjamin Franklin; Mrs. Tom thumb of the Barnum &Bailey world famous circus; and also, Jenny Lind, the “Swedish Nightingale” who was brought to our country by the Barnum & Bailey Circus. During the course of the years, the list has grown to include many contemporary and former notables, and she has in her possession dressed dolls resembling such famous people as: Dwight & Mamie Eisenhower; Helen Keller; Princess Grace of Monaco; “Mitch” Miller; Adrian Revere (Ellefson), a former Dawsonite; Mrs. Coolidge; Mrs. Eleanor Roosevelt; Mae West; Harpo Marx; Jimmy Durante; Lillian Russell (and a story about Lillian Russell clipped from the Chicago Tribune written in 1913); Will Rogers; Theodore Roosevelt; Winston Churchill; Carrie Nation; Queen Elizabeth; Sister Kenney; Madame Chiang Kai Shek; President Harrison; Babe Ruth; “Potato Creek Johnny” of Black hills fame; Clara Barton (Red Cross founder); Jackie Kennedy Onassis; Ignace Jan Paderewski; Madame Schumann-Heink (dressed in the original material of the dress worn by her on the occasion of the first time she sang in the Metropolitan Opera in New Your City); Mary Pickford; Grandma Moses; the famous Dionne Quintuplets of Canada; Tokyo Rose; Nils Bolstad (another Dawsonite); “Lady Bird” Johnson; Mildred Dilling, harpist; Charles Chaplin; Jackie Coogan; Margaret Graham of Montevideo, Uruguay; Liberace; Mrs. Richard Nixon; Lady Astor; Bigson Girls; Mark Twain; McGuffey Readers fame; Shirley Temple; Raya Garbousova, world famous cellist; and also many Military Personnel; John L. Mahlum, whose uniform was made out of his original uniform worn while in the service, and bearing the original Rainbow and other insignias which he had earned; William Mahlum in his original West Point uniform; General Douglas MacArthur, who was in charge of the Rainbow Division and others representing every branch of the armed services.
She also has a personality doll representing Maude Adams, famous actress of “Peter Pan” play, and incidentally has in her collection gifts from Maude Adams of a handkerchief, a dress, and her autograph.
Portrait dolls which Ethel has copied are: “Pinkie”, “Blue Boy,” Whistler’s Mother” and “Goya”, all of which are dressed precisely as pictured.
Among other interesting events, Ethel has had the experience of appearing on television shows on different occasions, to display her dolls, namely, WCCO television at Minneapolis, where she appeared on the program “Around the Town”; also, KDLO at Garden City, SD, where she appeared on two different occasions to display her dolls.
On another occasion she was requested to bring dolls representing books, for a 28th Annual Doll Show at the Minneapolis Public Library. The historic dolls in the exhibit included Mark Twain, General U.S. Grant, Queen Elizabeth, Theodore Roosevelt, and several others.
Among Ethel’s numerous memoirs and files of items collected are many autographs which are written on invitations, programs, dinner menus; she also has some original photographs of the various people for whom she has dressed the personality dolls. Among her autographs are those of Princess Grace (from whom she has also in her possession, an invitation to her wedding with the Prince, the invitation having been sent to Ethel by a friend); Clara Barton; Liberace; and numerous others of well-known status.
She also has a duplicate of a doll which she donated to Dave Elman of “Hobby Lobby” renown; Mr. Elman sold the original doll for the sum of $100.00, which was donated to the World War II effort.
Post Office Exhibit
Our newest exhibit is focused around the history of post offices in Lac qui Parle County. It features artifacts, pictures, and stories from many of the post offices in our county, particularly from the Louisburg Post Office which served the community for more than 100 years from 1888-1995.
Theodore Christianson
Theodore Christianson was born in Lac qui Parle County, graduated from Dawson High School, and became the 21st governor of Minnesota. He was also the owner of the Dawson Sentinel newspaper and was also a lawyer.
Township Rooms
There are 22 townships in Lac qui Parle County, each with its own unique history. The museum has space dedicated to each of the townships.
Agassiz Township
Agassiz Township was established in March 1887 when it was broken off from Yellow Bank Township. A majority of voters of Yellow Bank Township agreed to divide that township into two separate townships. The Name of “Greeley’ was proposed in honor of early settler Horace Greeley Kincaid, but there was some opposition to that name, so it was named “Agassiz” as the area lies at the head of old geological lake Agassiz.
Arena Township
Arena Township was established December 1879. Petitioners asked that it be named “Eisvold”, but that name was already in use. The Minneapolis & St. Louis Railroad crossed the township with a station at Haydenville.
Augusta Township
Augusta Township was established in January 1880. The Minneapolis & St. Louis Railroad crossed the township with a station in Marietta.
Baxter Township
Baxter Township was organized before Lac qui Parle County was established. It was organized by Redwood County Commissioners in September 1871 when this area was part of Redwood County. It was named after H. A. Baxter, a resident of the area. It was first settled in June 1870. United Lutheran Church was organized in 1872.
Camp Release Township
Camp Release Township was probably organized by Redwood County Commissioners, perhaps in March 1871. It was named after the camp where captives of Indians during the outbreak of 1862 were turned over to General Sibley. A monument to the captives release is located on a 6-acre site in the township.
Cerro Gordo Township
Cerro Gordo Township was formed before Lac qui Parle County existed. It was the first township organized when the area was part of Redwood County. It included what is now Lac qui Parle Township. The name was suggested by Colonel McPhail who participated in the battle of Cerro Gordo during the Mexican War.
The first township meeting was in 1871.
The first school in the township was a Norwegian private school taught in the summer of 1870.
The first English classes were held in January and February of 1872.
Freeland Township
Freeland Township was established in April of 1879. A petition asked that the name be “Freedom”, but that conflicted with another township of that same, so it was changed to Freeland.
Garfield Township
Garfield Township was established in January of 1881. The first settler was Amasa Mehurin in 1873.
Hamlin Township
Hamlin Township was established in August 1879. A petition requested that the name be “Lone Tree”, but that name was already used in the state so it was named John R. Hamlin for one of the first settlers of the township. He settled in 1874 and died two years later.
Hantho Township
Hantho Township was established in 1878. Halvor H. Hantho, a Norwegian immigrant, was the first settler and the township was named after him. The first school was in Norwegian in 1877. A public school, School District No. 23, started in 1879. Halvor Hantho homesteaded on Section 15 in 1872. His brothers, Nels and Ole, later homestead on Section 13 in the township.
Lac qui Parle Township
Lac qui Parle Township was created out of a portion of Cerro Gordo Township in December, 1972. It is named for the lake that forms its northern boundary for eight miles. It contains the first village organized in the county which was named Lac qui Parle Village. That village was the first county seat of the county and published the first newspaper in the county.
Lake Shore Township
Lake Shore Township was established in February 1879. It is named for the fact that five miles of its northern boundary is the shore of Marsh Lake, through which the Minnesota river flows. The township had its first residents in 1874. The Great Northern Railroad crossed the township with a station at Louisburg.
Madison Township
Madison Township, and the town of Madison, was named by C. P. Moe after his former home of Madison, Wisconsin. The township was established in 1879. A settlement was platted in the township in 1884 on the new railroad line that was running through Lac qui Parle County. The town of Madison became the county seat in 1886 and the courthouse that had been in Lac qui Parle Village was moved to Madison.
Manfred Township
Manfred Township was established in February 1879. It was called “Custer” in honor of General George Custer, but changed to Manfred in 1884.
Maxwell Township
Maxwell Township is named for Joseph Henry Maxwell, a settler there in 1871. He was born in West Virginia and served in a West Virginia regiment during the Civil War. The township was established in July of 1878.
Mehurin Township
Mehurin Township, established August 1879, was originally called “Eden”, but that name was already in use. It was named Mehurin in honor of a family that settled there. Lucretia S. Mehurin, the first person to file on land in the township. Her father was Amasa Mehurin. The family was the only settlers there from 1873-1878.
Perry Township
Perry Township, established in October of 1879, was named for Oliver Hazard Perry, the victor of the battle of Lake Erie in 1813. There is a Perry Township in ten states. The Great Northern Railroad crossed the township with a station at Bellingham as its shipping and trading center.
Providence Township
Providence Township was named after the capital of Rhode Island and was settled in 1877 with the township established in 1878. There were two Swedish churches established in the township.
Riverside Township
Riverside Township was established September 1872. It was named for the Lac qui Parle River which meanders through it from south to north.
Ten Mile Lake Township
There was one a lake ten miles from the Lac qui Parle Mission (located on Lac qui Parle Lake) for which the township was named. That lake has since been drained. The area was settled in 1876 with the township organized in November of 1878.
Walter Township
Walter Township was organized in October of 1884. Petitioners wanted to name it “Berlin”, but changed it to “Walter”. The Great Northern Railroad crosses the southern party of the township with a station at Nassau. An early post office was called “Rosen” named for a priest of the Catholic Church established there. Walter Township was named for Henry Walter, the areas first settler and a county commissioner for Lac qui Parle County.
Yellow Bank Township
Yellow Bank Township was organized in January of 1878 after the Yellow Bank River which was named for its yellowish glacial drift.
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Email us at lqp@lqpcountymuseum.org
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