Dorothy, the Root Beer Lady

For the second summer in a row, I took advantage of living in Minnesota to conduct genealogy research locally.

In 2021, Lucia and I drove to Grand Rapids, Minnesota, where we obtained the probate file for Mrs. Caroline S. King, aka “Lena” King, at the Itasca County Courthouse in Grand Rapids, Minnesota.^[1]See the post here.  Fred A. King (1857-1920) and Caroline “Lena” S. Miller (1860-1932) are my second great-grandparents (2GGs).

This past summer, we traveled back to Itasca County Courthouse in Grand Rapids and obtained the probate file for Fred and Lena King’s daughter, Mrs. Mabel Vermilyea (1885-1938), my great grandmother.

However, this post is less genealogy and more personal history.^[2]A subsequent post will detail the genealogical findings.

In making the trip to Grand Rapids, we decided on a longer 3-day road trip because I wanted to introduce Lucia to northern Minnesota and especially the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness.  So we drove to Ely, Minnesota and spent a couple days there.  Ely is the primary jumping-off point for canoeing, camping and fishing adventures in the wilderness.  I had not been to Ely since my Dad and Uncle Doc took their four sons there on a fishing trip in 1968!  Lucia was suitably impressed, of course, and we plan future trips to the region.

While we were in Ely, I noticed a museum called the Dorothy Molter Museum.  That didn’t make an impression, but then I noticed its website is www.rootbeerlady.com!  I thought, “No way!  Can that be the same lady I met on canoe trips as a teenager?!”

It is!  My brother and sisters and I all attended a survivalist-style canoe camp as teenagers, located on the Gunflint Trail, close to the Canadian border.  Many of the canoe excursions from this camp would pay a visit to Knife Lake where this woman called Dorothy brewed her own root beer.  It was considered kind of a milestone during our canoe journeys.  I visited twice, once in 1967 and again in 1968, and I believe that my three siblings likely visited as well.

It was a memorable experience.  The root beer was unusual – definitely not commercial-tasting – but very good, as I recall.  Dorothy lived all alone on an island on Knife Lake.  I was reminded after reading the website that she was the last private individual allowed to live in the Wilderness until her death in 1986.

The featured image at the top of the post is a photograph I took in August 1967 showing Dorothy’s root beer still and the iconic painted canoe paddles she was famous for.

I was so surprised to discover a museum in Ely celebrating Dorothy, the Root Beer Lady, as we called her.  I quickly drove over from our lodge to visit.  An employee mentioned that Dorothy’s original journals were displayed in the corner, if I wanted to find my name!  I had to think a second to remember which years were involved.  I grabbed the Summer 1967 journal … and voila!  Within minutes, I found my 14-year old signature in a list of campers from Voyageurs Landing.  There I am: Steve Jonnes, Stillwater, Minn.  The date was 4 August 1967.  Kinda cool.

Of course, I had to buy a case of the root beer.  It was better than I expected, so as a treat for my brother and two sisters, I sent a case to each of them for Christmas.  Merry Christmas, siblings!