St. Columba Mission

St. Columba Mission. . , The first Minnesota mission to be named for Saint Columba was built by James Lloyd Breck in 1852 at Gull Lake near the present-day Brainerd. It was the fourth Episcopal church established in Minnesota. , The initial group of Chippewa Indians arrived here from Gull Lake on June 14, 1868, to begin life on the White Earth Reservation which had been created the year before. In the fall of 1868 they were joined by John Johnson or Enmegahbowh, a Canadian Indian who had served at the former mission on Gull Lake. The first religious service in Becker County was conducted that fall by Enmegahbowh, who was ordained the following year. He is said to have been the first Indian to be ordained by the Episcopal church in the United States. , The second mission church of St. Columba, built of logs in 1868, stood several miles north of the present town of White Earth. It was replaced in 1871 by a frame church, located near the present site and consecrated by Bishop Henry B. Whipple in 1872. The present church was built in 1980. Enmegahbowh is buried in the nearby cemetery.