{"id":4953,"date":"2013-09-26T13:24:48","date_gmt":"2013-09-26T18:24:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs2.davenportlibrary.com\/sc\/?p=4953"},"modified":"2013-10-07T13:39:22","modified_gmt":"2013-10-07T18:39:22","slug":"davenporters-of-note-ernest-carl-oberholtzer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/sc\/2013\/09\/26\/davenporters-of-note-ernest-carl-oberholtzer\/","title":{"rendered":"Davenporters of Note: Ernest Carl Oberholtzer"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n\n
\n
\"2272<\/a>

Ernest Carl Oberholtzer, 1955<\/p><\/div>\n

Ernest Carl \u201cOber\u201d Oberholtzer was born in Davenport, Iowa on February 6, 1884.\u00a0 His parents divorced when he was six, and he and his mother went to live with his maternal grandparents, Ernest and Sarah Carl, at 126 East 6th Street.<\/p>\n

When he was seventeen, Ober had a bout of rheumatic fever so severe that his doctor gave him one year to live.\u00a0\u00a0 However, Ober recovered enough\u2014and caught up on his schoolwork well enough\u2014to be accepted to Harvard.<\/p>\n

After graduating, and with prospects of a career in landscape architecture, Ober visited the Minnesota-Ontario border for a summer and soon decided that he\u2019d rather spend his life exploring, observing, and writing about the untouched wilderness of northern Minnesota.<\/p>\n

His stories captivated their audiences, as did his marvelous photographs of the area, some of which are archived in the Special Collections Center of our library :<\/p>\n

\"2268<\/a>

Quetico Provincial Park, 1909<\/p><\/div>\n

\"2282<\/a>

DuBrochet, Ontario, 1912<\/p><\/div>\n

When he was thirty-five, Ober bought Mallard Island, near Quetico National Park, and lived there for the next fifty years, lecturing and lobbying for the preservation of the land and the culture of the Ojibwa tribe, with whom he had become good friends.<\/p>\n

\"2279<\/a>

Mallard Island, Minnesota<\/p><\/div>\n

Although Ober never lived in Davenport again during his lifetime, he and his mother remained close until her death.\u00a0 She left him her house at\u00a0 35 Oak Lane in Davenport and a shop at 422 West Second Street. The income from the business supported him for the rest of his life.<\/p>\n

\"2273<\/a>

Ernest and Rosa Oberholtzer, c. 1920<\/p><\/div>\n

Ober helped form the Quetico-Superior Council, which was established to protect the area from developers and commercial businesses.\u00a0 He agreed to serve as president for the first few years, though his fellow members managed to kept him in that position for almost thirty.\u00a0 In 1934, President Roosevelt appointed Ober the leader of a Quentico-Superior Committee, giving him federal backing for his conservation work.<\/p>\n

To make a long, interesting story woefully short, Ober continued his preservation efforts\u00a0 throughout his life, and was instrumental in pushing through several laws protecting the natural resources not only for Minnesota, but for the entire country.<\/p>\n

On March 22, 1967, the Department of the Interior recognized his contribution by presenting him with their Distinguished Service Award\u2014the highest honor they can give a private citizen.<\/p>\n

Mr. Oberholzter died on June 6, 1977 in International Falls, Minnesota, and is buried in Oakdale Cemetery.\u00a0 His gravestone reads as follows:<\/p>\n

Ober<\/i><\/strong>
\nErnest Carl Oberholtzer<\/i><\/strong>
\nAtisokan<\/i><\/strong>
\nHis Indian name for Storyteller<\/i><\/strong>
\nFeb. 6, 1884\u2013June 6, 1977<\/i><\/strong><\/p>\n

_____________________________<\/p>\n

Sources:<\/em><\/p>\n

Historical Photograph Collection, Davenport Public Library<\/p>\n

\u201cOberholtzer Dies; Famed Naturalist.\u201d Davenport Democrat,<\/em> June 8, 1977,\u00a0 p. 30.<\/p>\n

Paddock, Joe. Keeper of the Wild: The Life of Ernest Oberholtzer<\/em> (St. Paul, Minn.: Minnesota Historical Society Press), 2001.<\/p>\n

Upper Mississippi Valley Digital Image Archive<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ernest Carl \u201cOber\u201d Oberholtzer was born in Davenport, Iowa on February 6, 1884.\u00a0 His parents divorced when he was six, and he and his mother went to live with his maternal grandparents, Ernest and Sarah Carl, at 126 East 6th … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[1075,407],"class_list":["post-4953","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-local-history","tag-carl-oberholtzer","tag-upper-mississippi-valley-digital-image-archive"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pd0CXc-1hT","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/sc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4953","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/sc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/sc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/sc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/sc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4953"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/sc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4953\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4960,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/sc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4953\/revisions\/4960"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/sc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4953"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/sc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4953"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/sc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4953"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}