There’s a new entry in MNopedia, the indispensable guide to Minnesota history. It’s an overview of the Paul Bunyan Canoe Derby, complete with a timeline and turning points:
Turning Point: In 1948, Eugene Jensen and Tom Estes enter the race for the first time. Bill Smith of Minneapolis, meanwhile, purchases and uses a canoe from Jim and Bernie Smith, Ojibwe canoe builders from Ball Club, Minnesota, on the Leech Lake Reservation. Their canoe later informed Eugene Jensen’s thinking about hull shape, altering the course of North American canoe racing and design through the remainder of the twentieth century.
If you want to know more, check out the book: Pushing the River: An Epic Battle, a Lost History, a Near Death, and Other True Canoeing Stories
For more photos and film clips, here’s a talk I gave at the Minnesota Historical Society:
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And more:
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The final sprint, 1950:
Frank Bures 
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