End of an Era

Logs were collected above the dam until they were needed at sawmills downriver, and large numbers were sluiced through the dam during the late 1800's. As rail transportation became more available and pine trees became scarce along the river, using the river and the dam to move logs to sawmills declined. The last log drive on the St. Croix occurred in 1912, ending the logging era in the St. Croix valley. A second phase in the dam's history began in 1903, when Northern States Power Company bought it to control the flow of water to the hydroelectric dam being built at St. Croix Falls, 11 miles downstream. In the 1940's, river users complained about the manipulation of water levels on the St. Croix River, and the Army Corps of Engineers ordered that Nevers Dam's gates remain open from June through October, ending its usefulness. After severe flood damage in 1954 made the dam unsafe, it was removed by NSP in 1955. Today, only a few submerged pilings, the icebreaker islands upstream, and the long dike on the Minnesota side remain, and the site is used as a hiking trail to the river and a place for fishing.

St. Croix Falls, Wisconsin · United States