About Brinsmade

Village of Brinsmade , Normania, North Dakota

Portions as published in the Brinsmade Star 1915
Brinsmade was platted on October 7 1889 by Eugene.S. Rolfe, when the Northern Pacific was extended from Minnewaukan to Leeds, & is located on the southwest quarter of Section 6 in Township 154, Range 67 West, which quarter was the original filing of John H. Erickson. Rolfe a Minnewaukan attorney & state senator named the town to honor his friend, Rev. S. Brinsmade, a Congregational minister of Beloit, Wis. All but block 8 was sold to John S. Hubbard in January 1892. Ormsby McCorg was the first to open a store & elevator in the then new town, but burned out in 1891. The village was incorporated April 4, 1904. Accordingly officers were elected who met & organized into a local law making body, the first ordinance being spread upon the village record books dating April 4, 1904, and signed by G. Hofstrand as the president of the village board of trustees & J.R. McLaren was the first clerk. The officers were H.J. Haugan, president of the board, with Geo. W. Hopper & Chas. R. Bochne the other members; & R.P. Forest, clerk.

The history of Brinsmade is not unlike hundreds of other towns in the northwest & may be recorded in few words. The primary cause of its origin was the railroad, but the subsequent development & growth of population in the surrounding country rendered the market facilities it provided a necessity. The subsequent growth of Brinsmade was fostered & sustained wholly by the agricultural interests of the country tributary, & is not the result of any speculative or any fictitious agency; hence the advancement made was a gradual & steady move forward, step by step.