Pelican Rapids grew within a region shaped by frontier settlement, immigration, and the remaking of the local landscape. After Native Americans had lived and hunted there before recorded time, settlers were drawn to Otter Tail County by the Homestead Act in 1862 and came by ox-drawn prairie schooners, on horseback, or on foot to claim 160-acre homesteads. Township names such as Dane Prairie, St. Olaf, Lida, Maine, Friberg, and Erhards Grove reflected the ethnic groups who settled the area, and in the late 1800s Norwegian, Swedish, and German were widely spoken. The first settler of Pelican Township, Swedish immigrant John M. Johnson, followed the oxcart trail and built a dugout into a hill on the north side of his homestead, where he lived for several years. Other immigrants arrived from eastern states including Maine, New York, Ohio, and Pennsylvania, and many Norwegians chose the rocky, forested hills because they reminded them of home. Over time the area also drew people of English, German, French, and Italian origin. Some settlers were attracted by the river’s water power, and flour mill owner R. L. Frazee redirected the river by having a canal dug so swampy land along Broadway could be drained for new lots, allowing him to build a bank, hardware store, and post office; the canal under the Broadway bridge and the raised street level remained evidence of that work. In 1970, Mexicans and Mexican Americans came seeking employment in local industry, followed by Vietnamese young adults in the late seventies, Vietnamese and Laotian families in the eighties, Bosnian refugees in 1995, and later Croatians, Sudanese, Kurds, and Somali seeking homes and safety. Today Pelican Rapids remains a community of diverse cultural backgrounds, with residents helping newcomers learn English, adapt to new customs, and find jobs and housing, while the city’s foods, languages, and library collections reflect its lively mix of cultures.