Editor note: This post was compiled from some writings of my father, the late Glenn Hoplin. Much of this is his reflection on the 1930's. For those of us who did not experience it, the Great Depression is hard to comprehend. Not only was there widespread unemployment but the weather of the 1930's seemed to parallel the plagues of Egypt.
Lake Malmedal is a small lake about half-way between Lowry & Starbuck on the west side of Minnesota State Highway 114. I believe Lake Malmedal was named for the Christian & Anna Malmedahl family. Somewhere along the line the Scandinavian "dahl" became "dal". The Malmedahl's had 2 children: Carl & Berit. They immigrated to Ben Wade Township from Norway about 1871, sponsored by Ole Bjokne, who was a relative of Anna. In about 1873 they settled at the northeast corner of the lake.
However, by 1904, there is no evidence of a land owner by the name of Malmedal. The 1904 plat book shows land owners north of Malmedal as -- Jorgen Strandness, Troned Stavem, Hans Bjokne, Ole Stockland, Knute Gjerset, Hans Haugen, Hans Slette, Iver Tiegen and Nels Femrite. The 1910 plat book shows owners as -- Ole Olson, Knute Gjerset, Jorgen Staandness, Tronet Stavem, O. H. Slette, Edward Hedlin, Iver Tiegen, O. Odegaard, Nels Femrite. The 1915 plat book was the same as 1910.
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| St. Pauli Lutheran marriage records |
{Editor note: Gust was killed in 1918 in France and Gust F. Holden Legion Post 253 in Lowry bears his name}
There were two ways to get to Starbuck from Lowry. Well, actually 3. Local doctors would cross Malmedal Lake in the winter over the ice with vehicles with tracks to get to the Starbuck hospital, the major medical facility in the area. During these years Alma Holden was Dr. Gibbon's office help. The normal route was to go west to St. Paul’s Cemetery and south past Nels Femrite’s to what is now Co Rd 24 then east to Indherred Church and south to Starbuck. The other option was to go east, then south past Melvin Bjokne’s and Strandness’s to what is probably the location of Co Rd 24, then west to Indherred Church and south to Starbuck.
The 1930's was a time of extended drought. In 1934, Malmedal Lake was dry, the result of about ten years of less than normal rainfall. Many of the lakes in the area were very low and trees had grown up in the shoreline, some of the trees had trunks five inches in diameter, which indicates that the drought was for an extended period. For several years the crops were poor and livestock feed very scarce. Much of the grain was so short that bundles could not be made with a grain binder so the grain was cut with a mower winrowed like hay. The threshing machines were set up with the blower through the barn door and straw blown in the barn for livestock feed. Every growing green thing was used for feeding livestock.
The wind blew continuously and the days were desperately hot. The sun was a red ball at noon time because of all the dust in the air. The fences had drifts of top soil almost like snow drifts and the trash and tumble weeds caught in the fences. The wind and the heat seemed never ending. It is impossible for anyone to imagine the poverty that the drought and depression generated unless you had experienced the devastation. People helped one another and shared whatever there was.
The Strandnesses farmed the dry Malmedal Lake bottom. They had fences to pasture cattle and a field of flax. On July 4, 1935, it began to rain. Before the rain was over, Malmedal Lake was full and the crop destroyed. The Fourth of July celebration in Glenwood at the fair grounds found people stranded with water up to the floor boards of their cars. People had mixed feelings -- rejoicing that the needed moisture had come, but felt it should not have had to be in such biblical proportions.
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