Pine River Railway Depot

Pine River Railway Depot. , The arrival of a train in a small town was an important event, bringing new settlers, visitors, mail, news, and goods faster and more often than in the days before the railroads. Pine River wasn't the only place in Minnesota that changed once the railroad came. In 1860, Minnesota had no railroads. Twenty years later, more than 3,000 miles of track crisscrossed the state. The railroads played an active role in attracting immigrants and encouraging settlement. If not for the railroads, it might have been hard to convince people to settle in places like Pine River.

The railroad, when built in 1894, opened much of north central Minnesota to logging, provided access to and settlement of the area, and accounted for the development of many area communities such as Nisswa, Pequot Lakes, Jenkins, Pine River, Backus, and Hackensack. Minnesota's State Historic Preservation Office validated the depot's historical significance when it determined in 2001 that the Pine River Depot was eligible for listing on the prestigious National Register of Historic Places. This is the only property in Pine River to ever receive this designation. HGN is working on having a National Register nomination prepared for the building.

The Pine River Railway Depot has been, and will continue to be, a highly visible, recognizable and historic Pine River landmark. The original depot building was built in 1895, with various additions and alterations thereafter until about 1913. Since 1913 it has remained essentially unchanged, except for the removal of the canopy over the open-air waiting area that extended off the south end of the building. A recently completed restoration project has completely restored the depot to its 1913 appearance, including the reconstruction of the canopy. This restoration project has preserved an historic 115-year-old building; and helped preserve a significant piece of local history.

The Pine River Depot was built in 1895 by the Brainerd and Northern Minnesota Railroad (B&NM) as part of a new railroad that ran from Brainerd to Leech Lake (on what is now the Paul Bunyan Trail). The depot, the oldest building in town, is eligible for listing on the National Register of Historic Places. Throughout ninety years of continuous operation, from 1895 to 1985, it served business and industry and welcomed travelers and settlers. So many immigrants came to this area by rail in the early 1900s that the depot has been likened to an "Ellis Island."

The community of Pine River got its start when pioneer settler George Barclay, a veteran of the Civil War, opened a trading post here in 1873. In 1878 he married Ammarilla Spracklin, the first white woman to live in this area. Their 160-acre Pine River Ranch soon embraced a farm, halfway house, store, and logging camp.

The B&NM was originally built in 1892 from Brainerd via Lake Hubert through Stony Brook Station (on Upper Gull Lake) to Spider Lake. One little known branch, the "Rob Lake Spur", extended northeasterly from the mainline to within about six miles of the Barclays' Pine River Ranch. The massive pine harvest on this rail system in the winter of 1893 earned the B&NM the reputation of being the "greatest logging railroad in the world."

In 1894, the B&NM abandoned the Spider Lake line in favor of a more-advantageous route that passed northward from Lake Hubert directly through Barclay's ranch. In anticipation, the Barclays built a hotel on what is now the site of "Station 371." When the railroad arrived in August 1894 the company opened a temporary office in one of Barclay's ranch houses. The following year the B&NM built a one-room depot on the mainline across the road from Barclay Hotel.

After Barclay was murdered in the lobby of his hotel in 1898, Ammarilla Barclay partnered with an entrepreneur named Jefferson Dawes to plat the Village of Pine River on the Barclay Ranch property. The streets and avenues accommodated the existing buildings and were laid out in relation to the railroad and not the compass or the river.

The B&NM railway depot predates the platted village by three years. By the time of Barclay's death the depot had already been expanded to include a freight room, a waiting room, and a wooden-deck station platform. The railroad itself had ten locomotives, over 675 logging cars, and 58 assorted "other cars" and operated a rail system that reached from Brainerd to Bemidji. As trains carried off the pine forests, the cutover lands were opened to farming and settlement. The steel rails brought boom times, and the population soared. Like its neighboring rail-based communities, Pine River became a vibrant destination.

The Minnesota and International (M&I) gained control of the railroad in 1901 and extended the mainline to International Falls. The new company placed greater emphasis on passenger and freight service and made several changes to the Pine River Depot. The final major alterations were made in 1913 when a canopy and women's waiting room were added and station platform was rebuilt as a closed structure paved with bricks.

The M&I operated the rail line and depot through 1941 when management passed to the Northern Pacific. Burlington Northern took over in 1970. The last train passed through Pine River in July 1985, and the depot was abandoned that same year. Beginning in 2000, a grassroots effort led by Heritage Group North resulted in the preservation of the depot. In 2009 the historic depot and platform were relocated to a new site just across the mainline track (the Paul Bunyan Trail) from the were they stood for 114 years.

In its heyday, the Pine River Railway Depot was a hub of business and of a radiating network of new roads. It was a magical place where one could gawk at steam engines, send telegraphs, mail letters, ship or receive freight, greet friends or relatives, or begin a journey to anywhere in the world. Restoring the depot has given it new life and purpose in the town that it helped to create.

This project has been made possible in part by the Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund through the vote of Minnesotans on November 4, 2008. Administered by the Minnesota Historical Society.