In the late 1800s, the first white settlers came to the area that is now the refuge, including loggers, ranchers, and market hunters. Loggers cut pine trees from the land and floated them down the Rice River to the Mississippi River, 20 miles to the west, and in the 1920s a sawmill was built on-site near the Rice River. In 1935, the U.S. Bureau of Biological Survey purchased over 18,000 acres to create a Migratory Waterfowl Refuge, and the area was also home to a Civilian Conservation Corps camp established in 1939. Today, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service manages Rice Lake as part of the National Wildlife Refuge System. The area surrounding Many Lake is rich in cultural history, with earthen mounds built by tribes during the Woodland Tradition between 500 B.C. and 1650 A.D., a historic Ojibwe village nearby, and an accompanying cemetery still in use today. American Indians have long come to the area in search of game and wild rice, which is still harvested each fall using traditional methods. The main road of the Wildlife Drive was once a branch of the Soo Line Railroad known as the Cuyuna and Iron Range, completed in 1910 and abandoned in the 1920s.