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familyimages  > connect with the past > families of white earth, leech lake, fond du lac, and more > Rev. D. F. Porter Notebook
Courtesy of Archives, Minnesota Annual Conference, United Methodist Church, 122 W. Franklin Ave., Minneapolis, MN 55404. To search for images by keyword, look here http://familyimages.smugmug.com/keyword.
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familyimages > The story of the Pine Bend Indian Mission on the White Earth Indian Reservation as told by Duane Porter in his autobiography AN INTRODUCTION.... Courtesy of Archives, Minnesota Annual Conference, United Methodist Church, 122 W. Franklin Ave., Minneapolis, MN 55404
familyimages > Courtesy of Archives, Minnesota Annual Conference, United Methodist Church, 122 W. Franklin Ave., Minneapolis, MN 55404
familyimages > p. 2 I am Indian and white man both. I was brought up in a tepee and the white man's house. In 1832 there was one trading post at St. Paul, Minnesota, a few houses at Stillwater and at Taylor's Falls. In the year 1846 my father came to Minnesota. In the year 1850 I was born. About that time a few white men were coming into or Northern Minnesota country. They were loggers. In the year 1863, as a boy I worked for white men in the lumber camps and river log drives for four years.... Courtesy of Archives, Minnesota Annual Conference, United Methodist Church, 122 W. Franklin Ave., Minneapolis, MN 55404
familyimages > ....This account was written by Mr. Porter in his own handwriting. The author of this account was born on December 20th, 1850, in a log cabin on the site of the present city of Taylor's Falls, Minnesota, on the St. Croix River. Mother was a Chippewa Indian woman, and father was a mixed blood (Irish) from New York, engaged in the pineries along the streams. We lived for the most part in a birch tepee, subsisting on wild game, fish, maple sugar, wild rice and fruits. When my father was away from home we often had to gather water rushes for the edible roots, acorns, butternuts, hickory nuts, berries, a kind of wild potato, greens and the sap of birch and popular trees with which to feed the family. In the year 1852 my parents moved north to Pokegema Lake a few miles west of Pine City, where our family was brought up. There was an Indian Missionary by the name of Mr. Bouthwell. Soon after this time my mother learned to read in his school and joined the church. I was 14 years old at that time and will later relate my mother's conversion. We lived during my early childhood at the Indian village of Pokegama Lake, and when ten years of age the family moved to another Indian village called Chin. go. tw. stans, Minnesota, near where Pine City is now located. This was on the trail between Lake Superior and St. Paul, Minnesota. When I was 13 years of age my father broke his leg while logging in the woods and was badly crippled, so that I became the chief supporter of the family. I worked for 50 cents a day that summer on the Government road, and the following winter received $12.00 a month and my board in a logging camp. In the spring we drove the logs down the St. Croix River to Stillwater, Minnesota, and I returned home with enough money to buy a log house for the family. There was a large family of us and all we children had to work very hard and help provide for our parents and the younger children. The Indians around us had steady work in the lumber camps and on the drives. To own a log cabin was to live in fair comfort. A school and a post office were established in the village. But in 1873 when the road from St. Paul to Duluth was laid out, and Pine City was laid out, they were on the other side of the lake from our village and the people moved across the lake.... In the summer of 1878 I married and my wife is practically a full blood Indian woman.... Courtesy of Archives, Minnesota Annual Conference, United Methodist Church, 122 W. Franklin Ave., Minneapolis, MN 55404
familyimages > p. 2 ....In the year 1884 we moved to the Lac Courte Oreilles Reservation in Wisconsin and I was employed as supervisor of logging on Indian lands.... Courtesy of Archives, Minnesota Annual Conference, United Methodist Church, 122 W. Franklin Ave., Minneapolis, MN 55404
familyimages > p. 3 ....I answered "My good wife, Eliza, I belong to Jesus now.... That same summer I met Reverend Wright again....He had a mission not many miles away at the Indian village of Round Lake and induced me to move there with him and help in the missionary work.... In the summer of 1888, leaving the family at the mission, with a pack on my back, I struck out over Indian trails through the then wilderness a distance of 200 miles to Tower, Minnesota. There I bought a birch bark canoe and a few supplies and paddled 30 miles to the Indian village at the head of Lake Vermillion, at Wakinup Bay.... That winter I worked locating timber claims for white homesteaders, and in the spring was able to save enough money for my family to come out from the mission. I went back and brought them by train, trail and canoe to the village....Before my family came I had lived about in their tepees, eating with them and doing a great deal of visiting in order to gain their confidence. They belonged to the BoiseFort band of Minnesota Chippewa and few lived in log houses. Most of them lived in tepees.... Courtesy of Archives, Minnesota Annual Conference, United Methodist Church, 122 W. Franklin Ave., Minneapolis, MN 55404
familyimages > p. 4 ....in the second summer I spoke to the people about helping to build a tabernacle.... ....My own mother and brother and his family had moved to the village and they also accepted Christ. (Later on I shall relate my mother's conversion.)... One fine day in September we saw a steamer coming up the lake and to our great surprise it stopped and a large company of white people came off the boat. After having a picnic dinner they all came up to the tabernacle and held a service....At the close of the meeting my mother came forward and threw her arms about my neck, saying, "Oh, my son, I have found the Saviour. I thank God He has called you to preach the gospel. Forgive me for all I have said against you." Courtesy of Archives, Minnesota Annual Conference, United Methodist Church, 122 W. Franklin Ave., Minneapolis, MN 55404
familyimages > p. 5 We wept in each other's arms. She had not spoken to me for two years. She had been a Christian for forty-five ears, at least she thought she was. My preaching did not suit her. She wasn't converted until that day.... ....In the village was one Ah-be-dad-sung, a medicine man, highly respected and feared... ....One of my many converts that summer was Joe Baptiste, who later built a church at Sawyer, Minnesota. That winter I had to support myself and family while preaching. Several deer and moose fell to my rifle, besides a lot of small game. I sold the moose head for $25.00 which helped me et clothes for my family. In the spring I built myself a log house and cut down timber or logs from the woods for a church building. Courtesy of Archives, Minnesota Annual Conference, United Methodist Church, 122 W. Franklin Ave., Minneapolis, MN 55404
familyimages > p. 6 ....Later in the fall I decided to move to an Indian village on Pelican Lake. All our earthly possessions I was able to put in one pack on my back. We traveled four miles by foot, then six miles by water in a canoe, then two miles more by land brought us to the village at the east side of the lake....we went on up the lake where some of my relatives lived.... ....My cousin Joe Gheen and wife came down to the beach early in the morning....We stayed two weeks with our cousins....Then my wife and I took a job cooking for a lumber company, saved money and went back the following summer to the mission and held camp meetings in July. For some time I had felt the urge to seek out and preach to those who had never heard the Word of God. One fine day my wife and I made a small pack of extra clothing, blankets and food and started by canoe for the country along the Rainy River which forms the boundary between Minnesota and Manitoba, Canada. We traveled down the Little Fork in the Rainy River, making several portages around the rapids and after many days journey reached a small Indian village on the Canadian side near the mouth of the Rainy River. Here we rested a few days and went on up the Rainy River past what is now International Falls, Minnesota, to another Indian village on the Canadian side. These two villages were served by Episcopal Missionaries, so we continued our journey up Rainy Lake, turning off on the Minnesota side into Rat Lake. At the inlet of Rat Lake there were some prospectors for gold. I got a job cutting cord wood for them and earned $20.00 in two weeks. Using the money to buy supplies, we set off Courtesy of Archives, Minnesota Annual Conference, United Methodist Church, 122 W. Franklin Ave., Minneapolis, MN 55404
The story of the Pine Bend Indian Mission on the White Earth Indian Reservation as told by Duane Porter in his autobiography

AN INTRODUCTION....

Courtesy of Archives, Minnesota Annual Conference, United Methodist Church, 122 W. Franklin Ave., Minneapolis, MN 55404
> The story of the Pine Bend Indian Mission on the White Earth Indian Reservation as told by Duane Porter in his autobiography AN INTRODUCTION.... Courtesy of Archives, Minnesota Annual Conference, United Methodist Church, 122 W. Franklin Ave., Minneapolis, MN 55404
The story of the Pine Bend Indian Mission on the White Earth Indian Reservation as told by Duane Porter in his autobiography

AN INTRODUCTION....

Courtesy of Archives, Minnesota Annual Conference, United Methodist Church, 122 W. Franklin Ave., Minneapolis, MN 55404
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Keywords: porter history minnesota white earth pine bend
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