wilkin County


 

lawndale

 

Lawndale: 46°33′25″N 96°21′37″W


Est: late 1800's


pop: Unknown


Township: Prairie View


Township pop: 215


Notes: Lawndale is located where County Roads 30 and 52 meet, between the towns of Rothsay and Barnesville. It’s just west of the intersection of Interstate 94 and State Highway 108, making it an easy point to spot while traveling.

everdell

everdell:  46°16′03″N 96°24′29″W


est: late 1800's


Pop: approx 5 read notes


Township:


Town population: 184


Notes: Jeff stopped to chat with me on the gravel road. Behind him is the farm he grew up on, which he still farms with one of his sons. The land around him makes up nearly the entire town—so we joked that he’s basically the mayor of Everdell. Nearby is the house where his mother, the oldest resident in Everdell, lives.

A brick in the ground marks the site of the old school that once stood there. Everdell had a post office from 1898 to 1933 and was named for Lyman B. Everdell, a local attorney.




    Brushvale

brushvale:  46°22′10″N 96°38′36″W


Est: early 1900's


pop: 2


Township: nordick


township pop:  77


Photos above: Bob and Mary live in the former St. Joseph’s Catholic Church, where Bob was baptized and active before it closed. They bought and renovated it in the 1990s with help from Bob’s family. Around their home, remnants of the old town still remain, including foundations, the main street sidewalk, and the old gas station pipe and my favorite an old iron fence post a tree trunk grew around.

            tenney

tenney : 46°58′15″N 96°32′50″W


est: mid 1880's


pop: ghost town


Township:  campbell


township pop: 68


Notes: Tenney is a ghost town in Wilkin County. Established in the late 1800s and once home to a post office, stores, a bank, and several homes, the town thrived briefly before steady population decline. Today, the only remaining structure is the grain elevator for the Wheaton-Dumont Co-op, a quiet reminder of the town that once was.


Great article and photos of the last standing buildings in Tenney click HERE.


      mccauleyville

mccauleyville:  46°26′30″N 96°42′28″W


Est: early 1870's


pop: unknown


Township:  mccauleyville


Township pop:  55


Notes: The McCauleysville post office opened in 1873 and operated until 1905. The community was named after its founder, David McCauley, who had previously served as post sutler, postmaster, and stagecoach agent at nearby Fort Abercrombie in the early 1860s and was there during the Dakota siege of 1862.

      childs

childs:  46°59′18″N 96°45′06″W


Est: late 1880's


Town pop: unknown


Township:  bandrup


Township pop:  143


Notes: The community of Childs took its name from local farmer Job W. Childs, who later moved west to California. The town once had its own post office and a stop on the Great Northern Railway, though both are long gone, with the rail station closing in 1956.