Meeting Ike was quite an honor

By Tom Hintgen (Contact) | The Daily Journal

Published Thursday, August 7, 2008

Attending the living history event at Glendalough State Park Thursday, July 31, allowed me and others to go back in time to 1952 and converse with Dwight D. Eisenhower. Ike, portrayed by Cliff Knutson, visited Glendalough 56 years ago when the property was owned by the Minneapolis Star-Tribune.

Richard Osman took the role of Ike’s bodyguard.

In 1952 Eisenhower took a break from his presidential race with Adlai Stevenson to spend a couple days at Glendalough, northeast of Battle Lake, long before it became a Minnesota state park. The future president did some fishing at Annie Battle Lake.

The late Daily Journal newsroom editor, Jim Gray, attended Sunday services with Ike and his entourage at First Lutheran Church, Battle Lake.

Later, Ike’s vice president, Richard Nixon, spent two days at Glendalough following a 1956 campaign stop in Alexandria. Nixon took some time to swim in Annie Battle Lake. He was elected president 12 years later, in 1968.

Their visits are preserved in photographs on display at an outdoor kiosk near the main lodge at Glendalough where Eisenhower and Nixon stayed overnight back in the 1950s.

I’ve mentioned before, and it’s worth repeating, that little has changed from when Eisenhower and Nixon stayed at Glendalough.

A look to the southeast side of Annie Battle Lake, with its picturesque view of undeveloped lakeshore, is the same as when Ike and Nixon looked that way close to a half century ago. To this day no motorized boats are allowed on Annie Battle Lake, a stone’s throw from the main lodge.

“We preserve one of the largest tracts of undeveloped lakeshore in west central Minnesota,” Park Manager Jeff Wiersma said.

Thursday was a great day for Battle Lake’s mayor and previous Glendalough manager, Les Estes, who joined invited guest John (Jay) Cowles III in greeting park visitors. Jay Cowles’ grandfather, John Cowles, Sr., acquired the original Glendalough property in 1941 with the purchase of the Minneapolis Tribune Company.

Portraying Katherine Murphy from the 1930s era at Glendalough was Carol Thompson. It was fun Thursday hearing about Murphy playing croquet northeast of Battle Lake 70-plus years ago.

Glendalough State Park near Battle Lake dates back to 1903 when the property was purchased by Ezra Valentine of Breckenridge. In 1928 the property was sold to Minneapolis Tribune owner F.E. Murphy. It was Murphy who named the property Glendalough, after a monastery in Ireland.

Glendalough became widely known as a game farm in the 1930s and 1940s. Thousands of ducks, pheasants, and turkeys were hatched at the site northeast of Battle Lake, and later released into the wild. Today deer are in abundance at Glendalough State Park.

In 1990 the Cowles Media Company donated Glendalough to the Nature Conservancy. One year later state legislation was proposed to transfer Glendalough to the State of Minnesota, as a state park.

Kudos to all of the actors and actresses who took part in Echoes of Glendalough held Thursday. It was a day that will be long remembered.

Tom Hintgen’s column runs on Mondays.