Funkley has a storied history beginning as a logging town in 1903

I first started at the Bemidji (Minn.) Pioneer as an intern in the summer of 1996. That would begin six years as a news reporter, sports reporter and copy editor for a small, six-day-per-week daily newspaper in northern Minnesota. I wrote a large range of stories from multiple beats, to features to sports, my favorite being the coverage of the Red Lake Reservation High School basketball team named the Warriors. Here is a collection of my stories from my time at the Pioneer.

July 20, 1997

By Devlyn Brooks

Staff Writer

FUNKLEY -- The immense history of this little Beltrami County oasis, 30 miles northeast of Bemidji, is almost unbelievable when comparted to its actual size -- never more than 60 people.

But should the town dissolve into Hornet Township, never again to be known by the name of the attorney that platted it, Funkley will still leave a lasting legacy for those of the northland to enjoy.

Funkley's story begins in 1903 with its first-ever homesteader, Matt Fisher, who platted the village. He hired Bemidji attorney Henry Funkley to register the plat, and as the story goes, all Funkley asked for a fee was that the town be named after him. As one can see, the town complied.

For most of its early years, the town served as a stop for the Northern Pacific Railroad and as a commercial hub for logging camp residents who could not easily get to Blackduck to the south or Northome to the north.

According to one newspaper account, the town grew to about 50 families during the Great Depression in the 1930s, and supported a couple of stores, two hotels, three saloons and one church. Many of the town residents included those who logged for a living.

However, the town's population began to dwindle about the same time the logging industry did, and by 1953 the town was no bigger than 25 people. When the railroad pulled out of town, it suffered another blow.

In fact, Funkley's smallness has been about its biggest asset in the town's entire history, earning the citizens of one of Minnesota's longest tiny towns a trip to New York City in 1953 and to the Twin Cities in 1989.

In 1953, almost the entire town was flown to New York City and later to Washington D.C., free of charge as a reward for its work in cancer research fund-raising and sewing cancer bandages.

The 12 Funkley women and the eight women from the surrounding area who sewed the cancer dressings, were one of the American Cancer Society's 4,371 cancer-dressing unites in the U.S. But because of the town's 100 percent, whole-hearted effort, the Cancer Society and Pacific Mills, a maker of sheets and textiles, rewarded the community by paying for the New York trip.

Only two of the city's residents, hank Huffstutler and Richard Smith, stayed home to tend to the city's eight frame buildings. Smith said in an interview with a reporter he never went because of "bum" legs, and Huffstutler said he had seen New York 50 years earlier and he wasn't interested in seeing it again because all it was was a bunch of concrete.

The youngest member of the Funkley group was 11-month-old Nancy Nagel, who celebrated her first birthday during the trip, and the oldest was Mayor E.J. Woodin, 78. Even the village's dog, "Blackie," was invited on the trip.

After seeing the sights in New York, the group was unexpectedly flown to Washington, D.C. to meet President Dwight Eisenhower. However, Mayor Woodin never made the White House trip because the night before he slipped in his hotel room's bathtub and broke two ribs. He arrived home on a stretcher.

The second time the city was escorted to the "big city" free of charge was in 1989 when WCCO Radio paid for almost the entire town to visit the Twin Cities.

The radio station chartered a bus that drove to Funkley, picked up the rowdy bunch and brought them to the Cities. The next day, the town was featured on a two-hour WCCO Radio show, and was also treated to dinner at the Chanhassen Dinner Theatre and a Minnesota Twins baseball game.

The town had received the trip for being the smallest town in the state, even though technically the state's smallest town was Tenney, located on Highway 55 about 25 miles southwest of Fergus Falls near the North Dakota border. The radio station used figures from the 1980 census to calculate the smallest town, but the figures were outdated.

Funkley has perennially competed with Tenney for the title of Minnesota's smallest town, and the title has switched hands several times. Census figures in 1980 designated Funkley as the smallest, with 18 residents to Tenney's 19. By 1985, the towns were tied at 17. And in 1987, Funkley was back at the bottom with 15.

Since then, a head count shows Tenney's population has significantly dropped to four, and Funkley's looks like it may always remain above that. So now, even if Funkley survives, it will probably never regain the smallest town title.