On the Mountains of the Prairie,
On the great Red Pipe-stone Quarry,
But he reappeared triumphant,
And upon his shining shoulders
Brought the beaver, dead and dripping,
Brought the King of all the Beavers.
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow wrote the song of Hiawatha in 1855 about the tragic love of the native hero of the Ojibwe tribe. Although Longfellow never traveled to Pipestone Minnesota, the region performed the poem in a pageant every year for 60 years. It was a big deal when they stopped. It is the kind of poem you’ve heard parts of recited, usually in very bad talent shows, but never read all the way through.
One of the great mysteries of my beaver life refers to this poem, which I was unaware had an exciting beaver-killing passage and a heroic beaver resurrection. Completely without any awareness of this, I had a collected volume of Longfellow in my living room just because it was a beautiful old book and Longfellow is an author who’s originals I could afford.
A meeting of California National Park service folks somehow happened in that livingroom when I was on the John Muir Association. 10-15 folks I didn’t know and never saw again came in uniform to meet at my table and discuss plans for an upcoming event. Lots and lots of pointed hats, and I might have joked about offering one at the beaver festival silent auction but the conversation was definitely not about beavers..
When the meeting was over I noticed that the pages of my book had been turned to a specific passage detailing Pau-puk-keewis changed into beaver.
“O my friend Ahmeek, the beaver,
Cool and pleasant is the water;
Let me dive into the water,
Let me rest there in your lodges;
Change me, too, into a beaver!”
The book had 400 pages or so. and no one said a word about it or was milling around during the meeting. I never knew whether it was an accident or whether it was done especially for me, and until I read up for this article I really wasn’t sure. Now I think probably one of those rangers had been stationed at pipestone monument and had heard or attended or even recited one of those 60 years of pageants.
Apparently Pipestone isn’t any better at living with beavers today.
Bounty brings in more beavers
Last year was a bad year to be a beaver in Pipestone County, specifically in the northern part of the county.
According to the Pipestone County Highway Department, bounties were paid for 68 beavers that were killed in Rock, Troy and Aetna townships in 2017. There were 47 beavers killed in Rock Township, 11 in Troy and 10 in Aetna.
Township officials said that’s more than in years past and that they’ve typically paid bounties. Troy Township hired someone to trap beavers because there was a beaver dam in the township that was causing water to back up near a road, according to Pete Sietsema, township chair, so that accounts for a higher number there.
Another factor that could be at play is that there was a higher price on the animals’ heads
Some townships have offered a beaver bounty for years to reduce the number of the animals, whose dams can flood roads, ditches and culverts.
Obviously trapping beaver year after year after year isn’t working for Pipestone. They keep spending more money and keep getting more beavers.
I guess they better just do more of it.
From the bottom rose the beavers,
Silently above the surface
Rose one head and then another,
Till the pond seemed full of beavers,
Full of black and shining faces.
