Old Crow Wing was one of Minnesota’s richest historic places. In 1768, the Sioux suffered a significant defeat here in their long struggle to regain central Minnesota from the invading Chippewa. A British fur trader wintered at the mouth of the Crow Wing River as early as 1771, and by 1823 the American Fur Company may have established a post under Allan Morrison. During the next two decades, he and others such as Benjamin F. ("Blue Bear") Baker, Clement H. Beaulieu, and William A. Aitken operated trading stations here. As the fur trade declined in the 1840s, Crow Wing became an outfitting center for the oxcart trains on the woods Red River Trail, which crossed the Mississippi here. In the 1850s, Catholic and Episcopal missions were established, and the village became headquarters for the powerful Chippewa chief Hole-in-the-Day. Crow Wing reached its peak in the 1860s, with a population of nearly 600 and about thirty buildings, including another mission operated by German Lutherans. Rotgut whiskey flowed freely, and brawling and robbery were commonplace. In 1868, the Indians were removed to the White Earth Reservation, and in 1871 the Northern Pacific Railroad bypassed Crow Wing and built to Brainerd instead. Within about six years, the old trading settlement had become one of Minnesota’s many ghost towns.