point, the last outpost of settlement for those tens of thousands
who pioneered in the State, and through the years of its growth has
retained its first excuse for being, for it still serves as chief
distributing point for a large agricultural area. Farm implements,
foodstuffs, petroleum products, automobiles, and automotive equipment
to the value of more than $45,000,000 are handled annually.
Although from a North Dakota standpoint it is an old city, Fargo is
young enough to have a few of its founders still alive to tell of how
they first advertised their spindly little city by boasting that its
volunteer fire company, the Yerxa Hose Team, was the world's fastest;
or of how, in later years, Fargo gloried in being the "Gateway City"
to the "bread basket of the world," the fertile Red River Valley which
real estate agents compared to the valley of the Nile. The Valley is no
longer the intensive wheat-raising area it was, but the Fargo Chamber
of Commerce will tell you that this very fertile flat land, through
which meanders one of the few rivers that flow north, is literally
a land of milk and honey, and others no less cognizant of their
surroundings have changed the old slogan to the "food basket of the
world."
Because it is the distributing point for an agricultural State, changes
in farming methods have been reflected in the business life of the
city. With the introduction of diversified farming to supplement wheat
growing, Fargo became an important shipping center for grain, potatoes,
dairy, and poultry products. In 1936 it was the largest primary sweet
clover market in the world. Seed companies, creameries, a flour mill,
bakeries, and implement distributors are evidence of the relationship
between the city and the large farming area it serves. As late as
1927 Fargo was the world's third largest farm machinery distributing
point, and, although it undoubtedly does not retain this position,
as a shipping point it has become even more significant. A change in
freight rates granted in 1925 by the Interstate Commerce Commission
boosted Fargo volume. Two of the three railroads into the city are
transcontinental lines which, with their branches, cover almost the
entire State of North Dakota. Several "feeder lines" converge at Fargo
and in addition there are a large number of trucking companies. The
Minneapolis _Star_ said in 1936:
"Fargo stands in exactly the same relationship to the northwest
that Minneapolis has always stood.... The significant point is that
it is some 250 miles nearer the western point of consumption. Goods
that used to stop at Minneapolis for distribution now flow on to
Fargo to be piecemealed out."
The largest single part of the wholesale trade is carried on by
automotive distributors, including the Ford and Chevrolet Motor
Companies. Processing accounts for the next largest part of the city's
industry, and, although meat packing and creameries are important,
there is a constant increase in the manufacture of steel, wood, and
glass products. Fargo is likewise a banking and insurance center, and
has the home offices of two insurance companies.
Its situation, at the point where railroads first entered the State,
in what Stuart Chase has characterized as perhaps the richest farming
region in the world, has combined with the North Dakota Agricultural
College to make Fargo the natural agricultural headquarters for North
Dakota. Results of experimental work conducted at the college station
and its substations, extension work through 4-H and Homemakers clubs,
and judging of farm produce at State and county fairs by college
instructors, all contribute to the improvement of agricultural and
rural life in the State.
Fargo's percentage of home ownership is far above the national average.
Homes clustered around the business district are of early twentieth
century frame vintage, while farther out newer cottages and bungalows,
in English and Colonial style, behind small young trees and newly
sprouting lawns, are characteristic of the more recent residential
additions. Some of Fargo's finest homes are on Eighth Street South.
Fargo's public school system consists of 11 elementary schools, 3
junior high schools, and a senior high school; privately owned are
3 Catholic schools, a Lutheran school, 3 business colleges, 2 music
conservatories, and 5 trade schools. The first Protestant church
services in the southern Red River Valley in North Dakota were held in
Fargo, and now more than 30 denominations have churches in the city.
St. Mary's Cathedral is the seat of the diocese of the Roman Catholic
Church for the eastern half of North Dakota, and Fargo is likewise the
seat of the North Dakota diocese of the Episcopal Church.
The city's best-known musical group, the Amphion Male Chorus, composed
of Fargo and Moorhead, Minn., singers, has toured nearby cities and
eastern United States, giving concerts in New York and Philadelphia.
Community singing is popular in Fargo, and during the summer months
Island Park is the scene of outdoor concerts and singing contests. In
June each year the music-minded of the Red River Valley gather in the
city for the Valleyland Music Festival.
The agricultural college, always prominent in the cultural life of the
city, has become even more important in late years with the increased
number of college lyceum programs and the growth of the community
theater movement. The Little Country Theater, the outstanding players'
group in the State, has become a virtual authority on community theater
organization and has received favorable notice nationally.
The city is named for William G. Fargo, a director of the Northern
Pacific Railway and founder of the Wells-Fargo Express Company, and
its early history is closely linked with that of the railroad. In 1871
the announcement that a railroad would be built "from Lake Superior to
the Pacific Ocean" aroused much speculation as to where it would cross
the Red River, and the untouched land along the river suddenly became
populated. Three settlers, Jacob Lowell, Jr., Henry S. Back, and Andrew
McHench, formed a triumvirate and patrolled the Red from the mouth of
the Wild Rice to the Elm River from April to June 29 in an effort to
discover "the first indications of the railroad crossing."
Meanwhile, Thomas H. Canfield of the Lake Superior and Puget Sound
Company, a town site company auxiliary to the Northern Pacific, worked
with the railroad engineers in seeking the best point for the line to
cross the Red, since he wished to secure title to the land for his
company before it was snatched up by some speculator in the hope of
selling it to the railroad for a large sum. He and his engineers chose
the present crossing because it was the highest point on the river
and therefore in the least danger from floods. Andrew Holes, who with
his wife had been touring the country in a covered wagon, was sent to
Alexandria, Minn., to purchase the land on the east side of the river
from its homesteader-owner, Joab Smith. In order to locate on the lands
west of the Red it was necessary to plow a half acre of each section.
Aided by Maj. G. G. Beardsley, Canfield secured the necessary farm
equipment, hid it until Holes returned with the deed to the Minnesota
property, and by moonlight secretly made the required improvements.
On June 29, while on his patrol, Lowell found a "Farmer Brown" squatted
with three Scandinavian settlers on what became the Fargo town site.
Although Farmer Brown was clothed in well worn overalls with a brown
hat and hickory shirt and "sat with such ease and unconcern upon the
handles of his plow," Lowell doubted his being a farmer. He hastily
summoned Back and McHench, and the three, after a consultation,
located near Farmer Brown on July 1 and 2, 1871. Shortly afterwards
Farmer Brown's identity as Beardsley became known and a stampede of
settlers followed. Since Beardsley and his party were in the employ
of the Lake Superior and Puget Sound Company, and were not bona fide
settlers, their prior occupancy was disregarded and later, after much
litigation, the company withdrew its claim to the Fargo land, retaining
only the purchased Moorhead area.
In September 1871 G. J. Keeney was appointed postmaster of Centralia,
the little settlement that sprang up at the railroad crossing. Keeney
was also a lawyer and real estate agent and his office was somewhat of
a community center, according to one author, who wrote,
"He placed over the door of his 10 × 12 office the sign 'Post
Office', on the door the sign 'Law Office', and in the window 'Land
Office.' He raised lettuce on the earth roof of his log shack, and
decorated the inside walls with papers sent by the folks back home.
On entering, one was at once impressed with the air of cleanliness
and comfort which pervaded the sanctum of this enterprising limb of
the law, and it became a popular reading and rest room, but ... one
assumed a risk in becoming interested in a story as some chapter of
it was certain to be found on the ceiling."
During the winter following the location of the site, the settlement
divided into two communities. "Fargo on the Prairie", headquarters
of the Northern Pacific engineering department (near the corner of
Broadway and Front Streets), was a tent town, home of the railroad
engineers and surveyors and their wives and children. Although
crude, the tents of "Fargo on the Prairie" had all the luxuries and
conveniences that money could bring into the frontier settlement. In
sharp contrast to this was "Fargo in the Timber," a town of huts, rough
log houses, dugouts, and caves dug in the river banks, which stretched
along both sides of the trail leading up from the ferry crossing.
The two communities had nothing in common and residents of one would
never be mistaken for residents of the other. The Timber used great
quantities of whiskey, and popping revolvers made the night dangerous.
The postmaster resorted to "double planking" the sleeping bunk of his
tent for safety, and it was well that he did, for in later years he
could show a board of the bunk with a bullet embedded in it.
A typical Timber sense of humor was displayed by the resident who, when
buying a load of wood from two young Moorhead, Minn., men, had them
haul it over to Fargo, and then drew his revolver and ordered the men
back across the river without troubling to pay for the wood.
The difference between Fargo in the Timber and Fargo on the Prairie
engendered a rivalry which both sides seldom neglected to intensify.
Once when a wagonload of potatoes arrived for Gen. Thomas L. Rosser
of the Prairie, residents of the Timber loosened the end-gates of the
wagon and shot off revolvers to frighten the horses. As the team
dashed wildly up the road, the potatoes rolled out of the wagon, to
be picked up with relish by residents of the Timber, for many of whom
those were the only potatoes obtainable all that winter.
On another occasion, as a sleigh-load of dressed turkeys and chickens
bound for military headquarters drove through the one street of the
Timber, with the driver muffled in a heavy buffalo-robe coat, residents
of that community gradually lightened his load, audaciously picking off
the fowls one by one, until all were taken. The driver did not know his
loss until he reached the mess tent.
Whiskey "in a tin cup" was generally supposed to be more enlivening
than if taken otherwise. One Sunday, as the time for church neared, a
disappointed minister found only a small group gathered to hear his
sermon. One of the men assured the clergyman, however, that there
would be more in a few minutes. Taking a bell, he went up and down the
street, ringing it and exhorting all Christians to attend an address by
Rev. O. H. Elmer of Moorhead, "whiskey in a tin cup to be served free
immediately after the service." A large crowd heard the sermon.
The law in early Fargo had its amusing moments. H. S. Back, justice of
the peace, after performing the first wedding ceremony, invested his
$3 fee in drinks for the crowd. The next day he tried his first case,
found the prisoner guilty, and fined him $15 and costs. Informed by the
prisoner's attorney that there was only $5 in sight, he changed the
fine to $5 and no costs.
At this time Fargo was still Indian territory, and the Lake Superior
and Puget Sound Company, hoping to regain possession of the town site,
informed the Government that residents of the Timber were illegally
located on Indian lands, and were also selling liquor. On the evening
of February 16, 1872, troops passed through the city and camped for
the night near General Rosser's headquarters on the Prairie. The
troops, it was said, were on their way west to fight Indians, but a
commotion before daylight the next morning awakened the Timber to find
soldiers stationed before the door of each dwelling. All residents
of the community were arrested and taken to the tent that served as
a temporary jail, and those for whom the soldiers had warrants for
selling liquor were removed to Pembina for trial. The others were
ordered to leave the city lest their property be confiscated and
burned and they be removed by force. They were not so easily defeated,
however, and appealed to the Government for their land rights. A treaty
was made with the Indians whereby the land was opened to settlement
and those residents of the Timber who were guilty of no other offense
were allowed to hold their land according to their original claims.
From a virgin prairie land where the Sioux battled the Chippewa, the
terrain around Fargo became a rich farming country, well peopled
and with acres of land sown to wheat. As late as 1868 the Red River
Valley was generally believed to be a barren country, and in the early
seventies Cass County was still a Sioux reservation. The first wheat
sown by the acre was harvested in 1872, and there was barely enough
grain to make bread for the few people in the vicinity. James Holes,
whose farm was one mile north of the Northern Pacific depot in what is
now Holes' addition to the city of Fargo, complained to the railroad
that the exorbitant freight rate of 30c a bushel from Fargo to Duluth
made wheat raising unprofitable for anything but local consumption.
Freight rates were reduced in 1873, and Holes' 175-acre crop brought
him nearly $5,000 in 1876 and by 1893 he was harvesting a 1,600-acre
tract.
Bonanza farms, demonstrating the profit in large scale wheat raising,
were largely responsible for the enormous increase in acreage and the
equally large gain in population through immigration.
The influx of new settlers who came on the first train of the Northern
Pacific across the Red River June 8, 1872 brought law and order to the
city. Even the saloons felt the difference--one of them closed every
Sunday, and an admonition printed on its curtains read, "Remember the
Sabbath and keep it holy."
The Father Genin Mission House on the Red River above Fargo,
established in 1866, was the only place of regular Christian worship
until the Episcopal church was built in 1872. The first school was a
private one, presided over by Miss Mercy Nelson, aged 15.
As the Yuletide season of 1873 approached, Fargo residents laid
plans for a community Christmas celebration. A tree purchased for
the occasion was stolen, however, and at a mass meeting of protest
the suspected culprits, Moorhead, Minn., residents, were hanged in
effigy from the railroad bridge. Next morning a mock funeral was
held; a locomotive and boxcar draped in mourning proceeded slowly to
the bridge, the effigies were cut down and buried in a snowdrift.
That night the tree was returned. It was set up at 27 Front Street,
and decorated with silver half dollars, one for each child under 14.
A locomotive headlight was used to illumine the tree. Most of the
children had never seen a half dollar, as the coins, intended as
souvenirs of the occasion, were new at the time.
Although there was traffic on the Red River as early as 1857, not until
the railroad crossed the Red, and Fargo became the southern terminus
of river transportation, did steamboating boom. In the season of 1872
three steamers of 100-ton capacity reported carrying 1,000 passengers
and 4,000 tons of goods on trips north. Bonanza farming brought greater
need for transportation of grain and merchandise and by 1879 river
traffic was at its height. There were several boatyards at Fargo,
and Government engineers were employed in clearing and improving the
channel of the river. The Kittson Line, owned by the Hudson's Bay
Company, was the largest line on the river. It successfully outlived
all competitors and enjoyed a monopoly a large part of the time. The
income from a single eight-day trip of the steamer _Sheyenne_ from
Fargo to Fort Garry (Winnipeg, Manitoba) is said to have resulted in a
profit large enough to cover the entire cost of building the steamer
and the three barges it towed. Construction of the Great Northern
Railway northward through the Red River Valley in 1880, however,
inaugurated the decline of river transportation at Fargo.
By 1880 the city had a population of 2,693. An interesting
cross-section view of the community is given by Finlay Dun, a British
agricultural expert who toured the Red River Valley in 1879:
"In Fargo, built of stone and brick, there are already three
good hotels, and another in contemplation; rather too many
drinking saloons; a concert and ball room, where recently a grand
subscription ball was given for which gentlemen's tickets were
stated to be $25. There is a courthouse and two portly courteous
judges, and a provost marshall or commandant of police, all those
important officers holding their appointments from year to year;
a successful daily newspaper, two corn-merchants, a thriving
school, while preparations are being made for building churches.
An Opera-Comique is in successful operation ... (and) from an area
of many miles the dark-visaged farm-fellows with slouch hats, many
with blue guernseys, some lumberers in red flannel jackets, and
occasional Indians, and many half-breeds, congregated in large
numbers to this opera-house in Fargo.... The immense and varied
collections of agricultural implements are strikingly indicative of
the breaking in of new lands. The light wagons are drawn by horses,
mules, and oxen, but the ox teams are rather the most numerous."
Even as he wrote, Fargo was rapidly changing from a frontier village
to a city, for he says, "But Fargo is a metropolis compared with the
'primordial cells' of towns budding at roadside stations...." While
almost everyone in the city owned a buffalo-robe coat, and one of the
duties of locomotive engineers was to use their steam whistles for fire
alarms, a horse-car line was in operation during the winter of 1879
and 1880; unfortunately the track layers failed to prepare a firm bed
for the rails and when spring came the track disappeared into the mud.
Early in the city's life William G. Fargo offered a premium of $500 for
the establishment of a newspaper to be called the Fargo _Express_. In
order to secure the bonus A. H. Moore and Seth Boney started a paper
under that name in June 1873, but payment was withheld for the reason
that it was printed on the press of the Glyndon, Minn., _Gazette_.
On January 1, 1874, the Fargo _Express_, the first paper actually
printed in Fargo, was published and received the promised bonus. From
a combination of the _Express_ and seven later papers has emerged
the Fargo _Forum_, today leading the newspaper field in Fargo and
the State. The _Normanden_, a Norwegian weekly, successor to the Red
River _Posten_ established in 1886, is the only foreign language paper
published in the city.
Fargo had a private college as early as 1887, but when North Dakota was
preparing for statehood in the late 1880's, and each of the various
cities in the State was trying to annex at least one State-maintained
institution, progressive Fargo citizens succeeded in getting the
promise of an agricultural college. There was one close call, when
only a veto by the governor averted transfer of the school to Valley
City, but in the fall of 1889 Fargo saw the opening of the North Dakota
Agricultural College. The prairie-land which had been designated as
a campus boasted not one building, so rooms were rented from Fargo
College until 1891, when the administration building was erected.
On a hot windy day in June 1893 the most severe fire in the city's
history broke out on Front Street. Burning almost the entire business
section and northeast part of the city, it left many homeless.
Although the four to five million dollar loss was a serious setback,
the fire marked the end of the wooden era, and rebuilding with brick
began at once. For many years a fire festival was held on June 7 to
celebrate the anniversary of the event which resulted in so many civic
improvements.
Four years later, March 31, 1897, the Red River, dammed by an ice jam
north of Fargo, began rising, and continued until April 7. Conditions
became appalling. Residents who had moved from the first floor of their
homes were forced to leave for still higher spots via second story
windows. Merchants carried their stocks up to top floors and attics,
and groceries and the necessities of life were delivered by boat. When
the Great Northern and Northern Pacific railroad bridges were in danger
of being swept away, locomotives and threshing machines were run out on
them to hold them down. The Fargo _Forum_ wrote,
"A. N. Hathaway's family left Island Park by crawling out of the
second story windows. Colonel Morton decided that discretion was
the better part of valor and retreated ... from his Oak Grove
residence Saturday night. Passengers from the east this morning saw
three horses and four cows on the roof of one barn."
Later the paper complained editorially when Congress appropriated only
$200,000 for flood sufferers in the Mississippi and Red River Valleys,
saying, "Fargo before the world begging for a handout.... It wouldn't
buy a good dose of quinine for each resident of the inundated district
to stave off the chill he's sure to have." When the waters had subsided
it was found that 18 blocks of sidewalk and 20 blocks of wooden street
paving had floated away. During the flood and the six weeks while the
debris was being cleared away and the damage repaired, the _Forum_ was
published without interruption. A temporary office was set up with a
threshing machine engine furnishing power to operate the presses, and
deliveries were made by boat.
The attractions of open farm lands and expanding industries brought
thousands of settlers to North Dakota, and by the turn of the century
Fargo had a population of 9,589. Important among the industries listed
in a 1901 paper were two harness and horse collar factories, one of
which issued a 300-page catalogue of its merchandise. One of the larger
wholesale houses was Brown's Bicycle House on Broadway at N. P. Avenue.
The city was taking on a metropolitan air. An opera house, seating
1,000, was built in 1893, and belonged to the "Bread Basket Circuit"
which included Winnipeg, Grand Forks, Crookston, and Brainerd, with
headquarters at Fargo. Fargo was a favorite "stopover" for theater
companies, and among the celebrities who thrilled those early audiences
were Mrs. Fiske in _Becky Sharpe_, and Blanche Walsh and Chauncey
Olcott in _A Run Away Girl_. In 1899 an item in the _Record_, a
magazine published in Fargo, remarked, "It is considered quite the
thing to drop in at the Coffee House on Broadway ... between one and
five p. m. and spend a few moments drinking coffee and chatting, etc."
This fad may have been due to the divorce colony which flourished in
Fargo then. A 90-day divorce law was in effect, and the city became the
temporary abode of many wealthy people who came to establish residence
and obtain a separation from their mates. Lawyers, hotels, cafes, and
bars did a rushing business.