On the Great South Bend of the Namekagon, a natural campsite was home to a band of Chippewa Indians and was long used by explorers, missionaries, and fur traders traveling the Namekagon route between the St. Croix and Chippewa rivers. In 1767 Jonathan Carver passed this way downstream on his way from Prairie du Chien to Lake Superior by way of the Namekagon, St. Croix, and Brule rivers. Henry Schoolcraft passed here in 1831 en route from Lake Superior to the St. Croix. During the 1870s, ox teams hauled logging supplies on the tote road from Stillwater to Veazie Settlement, located two miles upriver, where the great Veazie Dam impounded water for log drives down the Namekagon to Stillwater.