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Surrounded by Isle Harbor Township, the city of Wahkon, Minnesota is on the south shores of the eastern portion of Mille Lacs Lake in Mille Lacs County.

Prior to the arrival of white settlers, there was a Mdewakanton Dakota village there. When the Dakota were driven out, the Ojibwe village of Sagawamick occupied the site.

Wahkon was the earliest settlement in the Mille Lacs Lake region. Before the community was incorporated as a village, it was known as Pots Town, when it was formed in 1885. It was largely an Indian trading post. When a post office was established there in 1891, it became Lawrence. In 1901, another townsite was platted as Pottstown and, in 1907, the village of Lawrence was platted by the Soo Line Railroad. By 1910, Lawrence and Pottstown had grown together, and they merged to become one village, which was incorporated as Wahkon in 1912.

Wahkon was the Dakota name for the lake, although the Dakota applied it specifically to a small island about seven miles northwest of Wahkon, now known as Pelican Island or Spirit Island. Over time, it became associated with the lake, and then the region.

Today, Wahkon is reserved for the city, while the lake and region are known as Mille Lacs.

Robert and Ben Briggs, who built a log cabin near the Soo Line Depot, surveyed the land, and recorded the claims made by families moving into the area. The village became a railroad terminal and docking point for logging company steamers that transported lumber from points around the lake, and many of the village's early residents were loggers, lumberjacks, and people employed to operate the horse teams that filled the new village's streets.

Wahkon became a city in the 1970s after the Minnesota legislature made cities of all incorporated municipalities within the state.

Minnesota State Highway 27 is the main route through the city, connecting it with the cities of Isle, just over three miles northeast, and to Mille Lacs Kathio State Park and a portion of the Mille Lacs Lake Indian Reservation, to the west.

Wahkon has never been a large city, but its population has been relatively stable since 1920, when it first appeared on a census. Its peak population was 314 in 2000, while its low population was 172 in 1960. Wahkon has a total land area of 0.96 square miles.

The focus of this category is on the city of Wahkon, Minnesota. Websites representing the municipal government, as well as local schools, churches, businesses, organizations, events, and individuals are appropriate for this category.

 

 

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