Around the turn of the last century, Park River was a thriving town situated at the intersection of the Park River and the Great Northern rail line, about 50 miles northwest of Grand Forks. Since the beginning of the town in 1884, all kinds of businesses had filled the lots on Briggs Avenue, forming a compact downtown where you could purchase virtually anything you might need.

F. Walstrom & Company, a large general store employing about a dozen clerks anchored the block. On a stroll down the boardwalk from there you would find stores selling hardware, drugs, groceries, meats, confections, clothing, jewelry, lumber, and firewood. Interspersed were businesses offering various services—barbers, a tailor, a doctor, a restaurant, a livery barn, a bank, a grain elevator, the Park River Gazette newspaper, and the “long distance telephone station.” There were also residences above some of the stores.

One hundred and five years ago today, on the last day of February 1901, seventeen years of downtown development was reduced to glowing embers in just three hours. The Grand Forks newspapers—The Daily Plaindealer and the Daily Herald—reported on the disastrous fire the next day, and the local photographer documented the smoldering aftermath.

The fire was discovered at about 8 p.m. in a hardware store in the middle of the block. A gas plant was the supposed source of the fire. Volunteer firefighters responded to the alarm, but “the flames spread with such rapidity that the department was powerless to stop their progress…The fire spread…devouring every business place in the block in both directions.”

“The flames then leaped across the street and claimed…every building in that block with the exception of the Bank of Park River and…J. Finseth & Company,” a hardware store. These were the only two brick buildings in the downtown area. Even a wood building between the two brick buildings was lost. The roof of the Great Northern depot, a block away, caught fire several times, but it was saved.

Early on, when it was apparent nothing could be done to control the blaze, firefighters and able-bodied residents worked to save the contents of buildings not yet engulfed in flames. They succeeded in saving a large quantity of goods. The Herald reported, “The night was a very wild one.”
By morning, a light snowfall whitened the black scene, and stunned townspeople stood around in small groups surveying the devastation while others picked through the rubble. The fires were out, but smoke was still rising from the ground all over the empty block. The Herald headline called it “The Work of Flames.”

Two days later the paper reported the citizens and merchants of Park River were “not discouraged,” and “will build a substantial city.” That they did. Before long both sides of the block were lined with bigger buildings…every one of them made of brick.

Fred Hultstrand was a professional photographer in Walsh County in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. His photos reveal what downtown Park River looked like before and after the fire. The Fred Hultstrand History in Pictures Collection is held at The Institute for Regional Studies at NDSU, and can be viewed online through the Library of Congress.

Sources:
“Fire at Park River” The Daily Plaindealer (Grand Forks) 1 Mar. 1901, p. 1.
“The Work of Flames” Grand Forks Daily Herald 1 Mar. 1901, p. 1.
“Not Discouraged” Grand Forks Daily Herald 2 Mar. 1901, p. 2.
http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/award97/ndfahtml/hult_home.html
http://www.lib.ndsu.nodak.edu/ndirs/exhibitions/pioneer/camera/about.htm

This text and audio may not be copied without securing prior permission from North Dakota Public Radio.