Situated on the North Shore of Lake Superior in the U.S. state of Minnesota, Judge C. R. Magney State Park is a state park. It bears the name of Clarence R. Magney, a former Duluth mayor and justice of the Minnesota Supreme Court, who played a key role in the establishment of eleven state parks and picturesque routes along the North Shore. The Devil’s Kettle, a peculiar waterfall and rock structure where half of the Brule River vanishes into a pothole, is the park’s most well-known feature.
Geography
Situated on picturesque Minnesota State Highway 61, Judge C. R. Magney State Park is around 25 miles (40 km) from the border between Canada and the United States. The Brule River flows through the park for the final 8 miles (13 km), plunging 800 feet (240 m) and creating many waterfalls and cascades.
Gauthier Creek, a tributary of the Brule, enters from the west. A little marsh is drained by Mons Creek, an erratic stream that runs along the northeast edge of the park. There are three designated waterfalls in this Brule River section. Lower Falls descends 7 feet (2.1 m) over two steps at a distance of 1 mile (1.6 km) from the shoreline, right before Gauthier Creek’s mouth.
Devil’s Kettle Falls and the Upper Falls, which plunge 25 feet (7.6 meters), are a short distance upstream. Along with the last 1.2 miles (0.80 km; 800 m) of Gauthier Creek, the river passes through a steep gorge for 1.4 miles (0.40 km; 400 m) from Devil’s Kettle to Upper Falls.
The park’s lower part has only developed sections and trail access.: 54 The broad slopes that rise above the river valley characterize the untamed and hard-to-reach northern region. Within the park, these extremes result in an elevation shift of almost 1,000 feet (300 m).
The majority of the property immediately next to the state park is privately held inholdings, although the park itself is wholly included inside Grand Portage State Forest. Lake Superior moderates the park’s extremely variable continental climate, keeping the coastal parts 6–8 °F (3.3–4.4 °C; 3.3–4.4 K) milder in the winter and colder in the summer than the region’s interior. Winters are therefore often moderate and snowy.
Natural history
Geology
The park is covered with alternating strata of rhyolite and basalt that formed when the North American Plate started to fracture 1.1 billion years ago, during the Midcontinent Rift System. These strata have ferrodiorite intrusions close to the shoreline in the south and gabbro and diabase intrusions in the north.
A large basin was created by the rift itself, and sedimentary rock progressively filled it in. The rhyolite and basalt strata underneath the park have a dip of around 12° and are believed to have a total thickness of 4,800 feet (1,500 meters) due to the tilting of the volcanic layers on each side.
A sequence of glacial episodes blanketed the area with ice between 2 million and 10,000 years ago, scouring the bedrock and removing the accumulated rock in the huge basin. At the conclusion of the last glacial epoch, pockets of rock and soil were left behind when the glaciers melted and the basin filled with meltwater, creating glacial Lake Duluth.
Inland, flat portions of the park still have a layer of red silt containing clay minerals from this age. The glacial Great Lakes’ extent and depth were changed by the shifting arrangement of the retreating glaciers and the post-glacial rebound of the surrounding terrain.
A sequence of beach ridges, wave-cut bluffs, and terraces at various heights were left behind by the fluctuating lake levels. All along Minnesota’s North Shore, one may observe these land features; however, only Judge C. R. Magney State Park possesses the entire sequence, extending from the highest point of Glacial Lake Duluth to the level of Glacial Lake Nipissing, which is situated just above the present-day Superior shore. The rivers that flowed into the lakes fluctuated with the levels of the lakes.
At the southern end of the park, there are many identifiable historic stream beds and deltas. A former stream bed is located just across from the park entrance, and the campground is situated on a delta.
Devil’s Kettle
A remarkable waterfall called “The Devil’s Kettle” is the park’s most well-known feature. It is situated 1.5 miles (2.4 km) from the mouth of the Brule River. The river divides in two and flows around a rhyolite rock formation. The eastern flow continues downstream after crossing a 50-foot (15-meter) cascade in two steps. The western flow rushes into a pothole, where it is said to “disappear underground” after dropping at least 10 feet (3 meters).
It has been reported that tourists have dumped GPS trackers, ping pong balls, and sticks into the Devil’s Kettle and have not seen them come upstream. Legend has it that someone even pulled a car into the rift, although most critics have written this off as exaggeration as the Devil’s Kettle is completely unreachable by road.
These tales have given rise to conjecture that the canal may have had a different outflow into Lake Superior, or, even more improbably, may have plummeted well below the surface or been linked to a different watershed completely.
The Devil’s Kettle phenomenon was a well-known local enigma for many years as no adequate geological explanation could be provided. Large subterranean passageways can only form in porous rocks like limestone since the overlying rock is unsuitable for this purpose.
While some igneous rocks allow lava tubes to develop, rhyolite does not allow for the formation of such tubes, because the underlying basalt was not generated under the right volcanic circumstances and is too deep. Faults are not known to exist in the area, and even if they did, they would not be permeable enough to allow half of the river to drain.
The Minnesota Department of Natural Resources (DNR) revealed in February 2017 that experiments carried out in late autumn of 2016 clearly showed that the vanishing water just flows back into the Brule River just below the falls. Two DNR specialists measured the water flow above the falls and several hundred feet (meters) below them at the recommendation of state hydrologist Jeff Green.
The near-identical values of the two measurements indicate that no water was being lost to any other exit. They said that the strong currents in the plunge pool of the kettle would be sufficient to keep down the majority of the material until it was crushed, which explained why the floating artifacts of the visitors failed to reappear.
In an attempt to pinpoint the location where the subterranean route re-joins the main river, Green and a colleague intended to carry out a dye tracing experiment when water flows decreased once more in the fall of 2017. However, the park administration dissuaded them from doing so, and they reluctantly concluded that the dye experiment was not scientifically required to verify that the water just rejoined the river below the falls.
Flora and Fauna
Judge C. R. Magney State Park has an elevation fluctuation of 1,000 feet (300 m), which is home to a diverse range of plants and animals. The park is home to a Laurentian Mixed Forest that is made up of both broadleaf and conifers. Prior to the arrival of European settlers, the Brule River Valley was primarily covered with white pine forests.
The park’s vegetation has been drastically changed by extensive logging and forest fires, with the exception of the steep, unaccessible ridgetops. Aspen and birch predominate in today’s secondary forest, which also includes areas of basswood, sugar maple, and white spruce. Particularly along Gauthier Creek, a few isolated stands of white pine have persevered on hilltops and in ravines. There are several of large northern white cedars by the river.
Numerous dense stands of white spruce may be found inland, which are the outcome of planting and ferocious natural reseeding following the extraction of timber. Numerous plant species that are absent from other parts of the park thrive in the microclimate that is created by the persistent mist surrounding the waterfalls.
The park is home to a variety of big species, including timber wolves, black bears, red foxes, white-tailed deer, and moose, especially in the isolated northern region. Snowshoe hares, martens, eastern chipmunks, groundhogs, and red squirrels are examples of smaller mammals.
Several additional raptor species migrate through the area, but broad-winged hawks, barred owls, and great-horned owls are common. The park is home to several warbler species’ nests. Salmon spawning flows occur in the fall, while rainbow trout spawning runs occur in the spring in the Brule River and its tributary Gauthier Creek.
Having spread into the area to take advantage of the plant regeneration during the logging period, white-tailed deer are not native to northern Minnesota. Up to 300 deer were reported per square mile in the 1940s and 1950s. Although the deer population has decreased as the forest has grown, they still present a management problem since they overgraze young trees of some species, changing the forest’s composition over time. The reseeded white pines in the park are surrounded by walled deer enclosures.
Cultural History
The river was known by the Ojibwe as Wiskode-zibi (Half-burned Wood River), which English speakers abbreviated to “Brule River” after it was directly translated into French as Bois Brulé. Fires were a major part of the park’s early history, therefore it’s possible that the name alludes to an early forest fire.
Despite the inferior quality of the timber, a series of fires in northern Wisconsin in 1892–1894 caused lumber firms to leave that region and move across Lake Superior to start harvesting the North Shore. A few miles west of the Brule River was home to the Red Cliff Lumber Company’s headquarters, and this was the period when much of the future park was being logged.
But the logging methods of the day also delayed the North Shore wood harvest, as in 1908 a destructive fire was caused by slash left on the ground for several dry years. For the following thirty years, the North Shore was plagued by fires and droughts. For a pulp mill in Grand Marais, the General Logging Company started collecting second-growth wood in the Brule and Cascade River basins in 1928. However, the company was once again shut down in 1931 after a severe fire destroyed 25,000 acres (10,000 hectares).
Entrepreneurs from Duluth formed the Naniboujou Club and planned an opulent lakeside complex with a 150-room lodge, cabins, bathhouses, tennis courts, golf course, and swimming pool, all powered by a hydroelectric dam on the Brule. The slowly regenerating Brule Valley came dangerously close to becoming an exclusive resort for the wealthy.
The club, which had around 600 members, bought 3,300 acres (1,300 ha) along the beach and intended to buy an additional 8,000 acres (3,200 ha) inland. After the completion of the Naniboujou Club Lodge in July 1929, the Great Depression began in October of the same year due to the Wall Street Crash of 1929. The lodge had many ownership changes and closures, and the last portion of the complex was never constructed.
The next people to live in the future park were homeless guys, not rich families. In order to give jobs and lodging to individuals who had been rendered homeless by the Great Depression, the state purchased 3,000 acres (1,200 ha) from the Naniboujou Club in 1934 and established a “transient camp” on the Brule River.
Initially overseen by the state’s Division of Forestry and called the Grover Conzet Camp after its director, it was turned over to the federal Works Progress Administration towards the close of 1936. The camp included three workshops, an office, a garage, a warehouse, a root cellar, and fourteen barracks. It also had two entertainment rooms, two bathhouses, a dining hall, and a bakery.
