Column: Here’s still another name for Albert Lea Lake

Published 12:00 am Friday, May 6, 2005

About 20 years ago Patrick &uot;Pat&uot; Sullivan of Albert Lea was in Schullsburg, Wis., looking at a microfilm copy of the Lafayette County Herald newspaper. He was doing research on his Sullivan and Harrington ancestors.

In the Thursday, June 5, 1856, issue he happened to see the headline of Albert Lea over a short news report.

Here’s that report exactly as printed 149 years ago. And as I’ll explain later in this column, there are several obvious errors and exaggerations, plus what’s certainly still another name for the city’s namesake lake.

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&uot;G.S. Rublee, lately one of the most enterprising and substantial farmers of Rock County, passed through our town a few days ago for the town of Albert Lea in Freeborn County, Minnesota. Mr. Rublee belongs to that class of men of whom the best of pioneers are made, robust and athletic, and possessed of an invincible energy and courage; the wilderness possesses attraction for him, for it woos the hand of labor and presents the undeveloped germs of wealth.

&uot;The town of Albert Lea has been laid out by Mr. Rublee at the head of

Lake Albert Lea, sometimes also called Lake McKenny, a beautiful lake a hundred miles west of the Mississippi, some nine miles long and from a mile to a mile and a half wide.

&uot;The town is built upon a claim made by Mr. Rublee, the land not being in market yet, and he has here a saw mill in operation, and is about putting up a grist mill.

&uot;We do not know how valuable the town property may be so far west; but we say success to our pioneers, may they scatter smiling and prosperous villages all along between here and sundown; and show as the fruit of their labors a rich and beautiful country reclaimed as the abodes of civilization.&uot;

The most obvious error is the name of G.S. Rublee. In reality, this is George S. Ruble. The 1911 history book says he’s &uot;the founder of Albert Lea&uot; and &uot;the second settler on this town site.&uot;

In his letter Pat commented, &uot;I’ve never seen any history mention that Albert Lea Lake was once called Lake McKenny. Could it be an error?&uot; As I’ll soon explain, this lake did have another name which was actually given to it by Albert Miller Lea in 1835. It certainly wasn’t Lake McKenny.

The exaggeration part comes from the size indicated for this lake, especially the width.

Schullsburg, Wis., by the way, is located about 25 miles east of Dubuque, Iowa, and just to the north of the Illinois state line. Rock County, Wis. is located still further east.

The major cities in this county are Janesville and Beloit. George Ruble farmed in the Beloit area before moving to Minnesota.

As I indicated earlier, the county’s largest lake originally had a different name. There’s no indication as to what the Indians called this place. However, when Albert Lea came through the area as the surveyor with the U.S. Army Dragoons in July 1835, he saw a white

(albino) fox by this lake. He selected the obvious name of Fox Lake for this large body of water.

This point is emphasized on a set of paintings by Lloyd Herfindahl at the Freeborn County Historical Museum which depict aerial views of the area in 1835

and 1858.

The 1835 version has the lake with the name of Fox, and the 1858 version has the name of Albert Lea for the same lake.

Here’s what happened in the years between 1835 and 1858 which resulted in this name change.

The change was made by a French immigrant, Joseph Nicolas Nicollet, who had been an explorer and map maker in what’s now Minnesota.

In 1841 Nicollet was in Washington, D.C. working on the official map of the Upper Mississippi region for the U.S. Bureau of Topographical Engineers. Albert Lea was also in the nation’s capital serving as the chief clerk at the War Department.

Nicollet contacted Lea to use his notes and maps from the 1835 trip. During one of their meetings Nicollet made the sudden decision to change the name of Fox Lake to Albert Lea Lake.

Nicollet died in 1843. His large map with this and other changes was approved by Congress in 1845.

(Feature writer Ed Shannon’s column appears each Friday.)