Posted on May 22, 2001

For Better or For Worse:
The History of the Katharine Ordway Natural History Study Area,
Inver Grove Heights, Minnesota

Kelly M. Paulson

Abstract

The history of the Katharine Ordway Natural History Study Area (KONHSA), explains the development of a 278-acre preserve in Inver Grove Heights, Minnesota, owned and managed by Macalester College. The land contains many rare plant species and community types. Since its purchase in 1967, it has been a place of education, research, a tool for outreach, as well as a source of debate and frustration. The various uses and degree of success of KONHSA have been greatly influenced by the individuals involved with it; therefore, this is largely a history of people and the evolution of Environmental Studies at Macalester College.

"There is a little piece of the globe which is Macalester’s in a very special way.  It is not too well-known by the Mac’s [sic] themselves, the very people for whom it should be a matter of interest and pride.  This is partly because it is hidden away and partly because we have not given publicity to it.”

            --Richard J. Christman, Mac Weekly 24 January 1972

 “The history of the area was bumpy…it’s kind of a bumpy tenure that the area had.  And you don’t really hear much about Ordway anymore, near as I can tell.  No one really talks about it any more.”

            --Edward Hill, interview March 2001

 “We can chart our future clearly and wisely only when we know the path which has led to the present.”

            --Adlai Stevenson, speech in Richmond, Virginia, 20 September 1952

Author’s Preface: Methods, Documentation, and Acknowledgements

The information in this paper comes from a variety of sources.  A patchy archive, dedicated to information about the Katharine Ordway Natural History Study Area, exists in a file drawer in the Environmental Studies Office.  The Development Office provided a file of papers that were largely related to exchanges of money and land acquisitions.  Janet Ebaugh acquired a folder from Shelley Shreffler, which had a variety of documents.  Finally, Macalester College itself has an archive located in the DeWitt Wallace Library, where I pored over newspaper clippings, college publications, and college course catalogs.  Even with all these archival documents put together, however, it was difficult to create an accurate picture of the history of this area without consulting primary sources.  (I did learn from this crash course in archival work that sometimes holes in the archives speak for themselves; for example, a period with few records probably corresponds to a period that no one thought Ordway was important, or at least not important enough to save any documentation about.) 

The following people were instrumental as primary sources, whether they were formally interviewed or were useful as consultants to help give the project direction:[1] Richard Christman,[2] Mark Davis,[3] Janet Ebaugh,[4] Carol Gersmehl,[5] Alexander Hill,[6] Edward Hill,[7] Daniel Hornbach,[8] Deborah Kervliet,[9] Sharron Nelson,[10] Patty Pfalz,[11] Aldemaro Romero,[12] Shelley Shreffler,[13] David Southwick,[14] James Stewart,[15] and Elizabeth Svenson.[16]  It is also important to recognize that not all the endnotes in this paper are dedicated to citations only.  Endnotes will occasionally reward the persistent reader with juicy details that simply couldn’t find a place in the body of the text.  The appendices contain copies of some of the more interesting documents in Ordway’s history.  Most of them are mentioned in the paper, but it is nevertheless interesting to see them in their entirety.  Figures, including maps and charts, referred to in the text are found in the Environmental Studies Office, Olin Rice 249, Macalester College.

I must also emphasize that this is not the whole story.  Even with all the documents and interviews that went into the creation of this project, there are still stories left untold by this paper, and more to be written in the future.  However, with the materials I had, I attempted to be as fair and objective as possible, and I feel that this paper quite accurately reflects the story thus far, and hopefully it can be used to chart the direction of Ordway’s future.

Introduction

The Katharine Ordway Natural History Study Area (often abbreviated as KONHSA or Ordway) is a 278-acre[17] parcel of land owned by Macalester College.  Ordway is located in Inver Grove Heights, just south of Saint Paul, on the Mississippi River.  Beginning in the 1950’s, with the rise of ecology and environmental issues, Macalester College was keeping its collective eyes peeled for the possibility of acquiring a field station for the purpose of study, research, and prestige.  In 1967, Macalester finally realized these dreams, and purchased approximately 276 acres.  Since then, this land has been variously used, misused, and forgotten.  Ordway has been a source of some reputation: Macalester is one of only four liberal arts colleges in Minnesota, and the only college in the Twin Cities, to boast a field station.[18]  Thousands of people have used the area for education, recreation, and research.  On the other hand, the area has occasionally been a thorn in the side of faculty, administrators, benefactresses and benefactors, and caretakers.

I have researched the history of the Katharine Ordway Natural History Area from the time it was a mere dream to the present.  I will attempt, in this paper, not to present a comprehensive tome of all the documents and correspondence relating to KONHSA, but to provide a picture of how Ordway evolved, and how it fits in to the evolution of Macalester College in particular.

The Land

Native Americans, probably of the Mound Builders group (sometimes known as the Dakota), once occupied the land that we now know as Ordway.[19]  Near present-day Ordway is an area called Pine Bend, where archeological research by the University of Minnesota has discovered Native American artifacts, and it appears that there was a culture along the river that was quite dependent on the native mussel populations for food and other uses.[20] 

In 1852, the townships of Inver Grove Heights and Rosemount were settled, mostly by European immigrants of German and Irish heritage.[21]  With the arrival of European settlers, the impact on the land changed drastically.  From 1850-1870, it was used mostly for mixed subsistence farming.[22]    However, it soon became valuable property for rail transportation as well as residences.[23]  By 1871, according to the plat book of that year, two railroad lines, the Chicago Rock Island and Pacific Railroad and the Chicago and North Western Railway were already criss-crossing the land that is now Ordway.[24],[25] These railroad lines are still there and still carry trains through the land.[26]   Nearer the road, according to Richard Christman, there was once an electric passenger streetcar line that was put in  after WWI, about 1923, and which was abandoned in 1929 because of the stock market crash.  This streetcar went from St. Paul to Hastings and was evidently destined to continue to Rochester, although that portion of the line was never completed.  In fact, when the driveway at Ordway was blacktopped, they found a culvert buried under the drive that had been used under the old streetcar rails.[27]

The land has been grazed, cultivated, and harvested.  At one time (probably in the first half of the 20^th century) the land was “a holding area for shipping cattle to slaughterhouses in St. Paul…30-35 years ago you could see remnants of the old holding pens out there.[28]”  In 1919, the Rand family purchased the land, and after Mr. Rand’s death, the Hulmes purchased the land.[29]  Both of these owners[30] used the land for cattle grazing and small-scale farming, and there was also a Boy Scout camp[31] established by Mr. Rand on the property in the first half of the 1900’s.[32],[33]  According to Christman, the Hulmes harvested the watercress that grew near the spring[34] down by River Lake and brought it into the city on a truck to sell to restaurants and at the farmer’s market.[35]  In the 1950’s, the land was incorporated into Inver Grove Heights, and the increased taxes made farming even more impractical.[36]  In 1965, the City of Inver Grove Heights was formed.[37]

In 1967, Macalester College purchased the parcel from the Hulmes.[38]  Since the Macalester purchase, the land has been equally subject to human-effected changes, but this time with a different intent.  According to Christman, several prairie burns targeted at sumac control were performed with the cooperation of the Inver Grove Heights Fire Department in the 1970’s.[39]  From 1981-1997, most of the land was burned several times.  An intensive property-wide sumac clearance project took place in 1988, and prairie seeds were sown in several areas as recently as 1990.[40]

The current Katharine Ordway Natural History Study Area is a nearly 280-acre parcel of land including at least four distinct types of plant communities and frontage on the Mississippi River.  According to the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources’s Natural Heritage Program, the area encompassed by Ordway now contains diverse native plant communities, such as a dry prairie, an oak woodland-brushland, mesic prairie, and a black ash swamp.[41]  Several plant species that are endangered, threatened, or of special concern have also found a haven on the Ordway property, including tall nut-rush (Scleria triglomerata),[42] tick-trefoil (Desmodium illinoense),[43] tubercled rein-orchid (Platanthera flava),[44] kitten-tails (Besseya bullii),[45] and lilia-leaved twayblade (Liparis lilfolia).[46] According to Aldemaro Romero, “The area has been noted by the DNR as being the highest area of biodiversity for the entire [Dakota] County,[47]” and Elizabeth Svenson called Ordway “a jewel, it’s really a gem…it’s got one of the nicest remnant prairies in the Metro Area.[48],[49]”  Figures 1-5 are various graphic representations of Ordway, including air photos from different periods of the 20^th century, a topographic map, and a hand-drawn map; these are useful for visualizing the change through time as well as the geography of the area.

The topography and geology of the area were influenced greatly by the last great glaciation, which ended about 10,000 years ago.  The Mississippi River valley was carved out by the floods resulting from the melting glaciers, and most of the regional soils are glacial till.  The bedrock geology of southeastern Minnesota consists of Paleozoic marine shale and near-shore sandstone deposits,[50] and the larger surficial boulders that dot the Ordway property are also a result of what the melting glaciers left behind.[51]  There are a few temporary ponds and wetland areas at Ordway, as well as Pratt Pond, which contains water year-round. Indeed, for a relatively small area, KONHSA boasts a great variety of different types of landscape, which makes it an interesting template for educational and research purposes.

Ordway has frontage on River Lake, a 110-acre,[52] shallow backwater lake of the Mississippi River, and Macalester owns the peninsula that projects out between the lake and its river.  River Lake, once known as Kellerman’s Slough,[53],[54] used to be even more shallow before the dam was built near Hastings, when the water level was raised by about three feet.[55]  Currently, River Lake is at most three to four feet deep, mostly silted in, and full of carp but with little other aquatic life such as mussels. [56]  Macalester College also owns the peninsula that juts out into the Mississippi to create River Lake.  This peninsula is, during wet seasons, an island, and is essentially always an island in many ways since it is isolated and has very rarely been ventured onto.

In the late 1980’s there was a mayfly hatch on River Lake and in the nearby river; mayflies are indicators of good water quality, and a hatch like that one hadn’t happened since the 1960’s.  One such hatch occurred in 1966, during the Wabasha Steamboat Days carnival.  The results of this “indicator of river health” were disastrous (and disgusting, probably) for carnival-goers: “By 11 p.m., six inches of squirming insects covered the carousel.  45 minutes later, mayflies clogged the radiators of the diesel-powered generators, and the carnival shut down.[57]”  Studies of mayflies in the Mississippi from 1958-69 found that the critters were conspicuously absent from the Twin Cities all the way south to Lake Pepin due to the sewage inflow from the Twin Cities.  With the advent of better and more sewage treatment plants, the mayfly population increased, and the summer (June-August) of 1986 witnessed 22 large mayfly hatches on the upper stretches of the river.

The naturalist at Ordway in the mid-1980’s, David Clugston, found more evidence of the improving health of the Mississippi River:

Just this year [1987] I found a beaver lodge on the end of that peninsula and also some giant floater [mussels], which aren’t supposed to be here because of the water quality.  Those are hopeful signs that the water quality is improving, but we have a long way to go.  With the waste-treatment plant five miles upriver and 3M Chemolite downstream and a refinery upstream and one downstream, this isn’t the healthiest stretch of the river.  Everything that comes from the Twin Cities finds a resting spot here.[58]

The presence of the river and the backwater lake, plus the peninsula, all make the geography of KONHSA and its potential that much more interesting.

We must take a few pages to introduce the woman who made this story possible: Katharine Ordway, a great figure in the history of American land conservation.

Katharine Ordway was born 3 April 1899 to Lucius Pond and Jessie Gilman Ordway.  She was their only daughter, and the second youngest of five children.  At the time of her birth, her 37-year old father was already on his way to fortune working for a plumbing and heating firm, of which he eventually became President.  By 1905, he was nearly a millionaire.  Together with a friend, he bought sixty percent of the stock of a struggling mining company, Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing (now more commonly known as 3M), which went on to multiply his millions.[59]

Growing up in St. Paul, MN, Katharine enjoyed the sea of tallgrass prairie that still existed at that time, and was saddened to watch the prairie slowly disappear over her lifetime.  She attended the University of Minnesota, and graduated cum laude with degrees in Botany and Art.  Katharine Ordway also attended Yale Medical School before dropping the idea of a medical career.  Later in her life, she went to Columbia University to study biology and land-use planning.[60]  Her studies are early indications of her interests in ecology and land conservation. 

When her father died in 1948, she and her four brothers, including Richard Ordway, were left an $18.8 million estate.[61]  Finally, in her 50’s and 60’s, she had the resources to reinforce her beliefs in land protection, and eventually became one of the greatest private contributors to natural area conservation in American history, second only to John D. Rockefeller, Jr.[62]  Katharine was described by a friend as a quiet, delicate woman—“a bird fallen out of the nest.[63]”  She was a reserved woman, and modest: the fact that she was the donor who helped the Nature Conservancy purchase the large Konza Prairie reserve in Kansas was not revealed until after her death.  Katharine Ordway donated money that ultimately helped to save over 31,000 acres of Great Plains prairies[64] (as well as land in other parts of the country).  Alexander Hill, who knows the Ordway family quite well, said that Katharine Ordway was a very “forward-looking person” with respect to her early sense of need for land preservation.[65]  According to Christman’s understanding, she was quite frail and weak towards the end of her life, when she came to visit her namesake in Minnesota.[66]  She died in 1979.[67]

The Ordway-Macalester Connection

Richard Ordway, Katharine’s brother, served as a Trustee of Macalester during the era when members of all of St. Paul’s high-profile families sat on the Board.[68]  As a major stockholder in his father’s 3M corporation, Ordway fit right in.  Richard was a highly educated man, having attended St. Paul Academy and then Yale.  During the 1960’s, he was a prominent member (and often, the chairman) of countless organizations and committees in the Twin Cities, and in 1961 he was elected Chair of Macalester’s Development Council (which was founded in 1956, and had already raised $11,114,787 in its first five years).[69]  Ultimately, Richard was the one to request a donation to Macalester from his sister.

Richard Ordway’s daughter, Pondie Nicholson, followed her father on Macalester’s Board of Trustees, along with her husband, and they were followed by their son, Ford Nicholson, who is currently a Trustee at Macalester and also an alumnus.  According to Hill, the Ordways continue to have a “very strong” relationship with Macalester.[70]

In the Beginning (1966-1970)

Optimism and a sense of common, lofty goals for a field station characterized the early years surrounding the acquisition of Ordway.  The newly emerging field of ecology and the realization that land preservation is important coincided with a generous gift from Katharine Ordway, making the initial land purchase possible, as well as providing for a healthy endowment to keep the area running.  The Biology department and Macalester College as a whole believed in the necessity and utility of such a natural history area, for students from Macalester, other ACTC schools, and local elementary and secondary schools.  The area was also considered useful for research.[71]  However, the blind optimism of these proposals and the lack of any real management plan, combined with the excitement of acquisition, would eventually lead to politics and infighting regarding some of these unresolved issues.

An Early Proposal

Although some sources say that Macalester was hunting for a field station since the 1950’s,[72] the first tangible and dated evidence of Macalester’s desire to do so is “A Proposal to the Charles F. Kettering Foundation for a Field Biology Laboratory for Macalester College,” from 21 November 1966.[73]  This five-page proposal aims to secure funding for a field station, and begins by citing the growing need for ecology and environmental study, especially in a college in a metro area.  Then it hints that “the college now, fortunately, has an opportunity to purchase 278 acres of land that meet all the needs of a field biology laboratory,” and goes on to describe the unique habitats which characterize this site.

“Ownership of the land and a grant for its development and use will put Macalester into the forefront of colleges in this increasingly important field,” the proposal predicts.  More lofty goals and predictions follow: “students will be able to do field work as a regular part of their course requirements and faculty members will be able to carry on meaningful research in environmental biology,” and predicts that “about 350 Macalester students would use the field laboratory each year.”  It also foresees the opportunity and necessity for shared use with “five other private liberal arts colleges” (the ACTC schools) and “elementary and secondary schools.”  The proposal dedicates an entire section to the possible ways that a field station could contribute to new and improved teaching and research methods at all levels, including a better ability to train teachers-to-be graduating from Macalester, which could make the school “a pace-setter among colleges in teaching and research in environmental biology.”  Finally, the proposal requests a grant of $300,000 over two years in order to “purchase the land and bring it into development and use,” adding that the Foundation would be kept abreast of the use of the area.[74]

This is clearly an optimistic proposal; however, some of its predictions were indeed proven correct in the decade that followed.  Apparently, this proposal did not secure any funds from the Kettering Foundation, since there is no further mention of the foundation in the archives and funding was ultimately secured elsewhere.  This document is useful, however, since it sets forth many standards for Macalester’s treatment of a field station.

Acquisition

It is not every day an institution has an opportunity to buy such a vast acreage with such a variety of ecotypes, so the hopes for a field station were not easily dashed.  Before the Kettering proposal was complete, John W. Seale, the College’s General Secretary, had already spoken with Richard Ordway,[75] the brother of Katharine Ordway and a trustee at Macalester.  A letter from Seale states that Richard had asked his sister

if she [Katharine Ordway] would make a gift to Macalester, and she indicated that she would.  He further stated that he was going to write to her that evening and tell her that President [Harvey] Rice and Al Cole [on the Executive Committee of the Reader’s Digest Association] would be in touch with her about a gift possibility…Dr. Rice wrote to her at once.[76]

In fact, President Rice wrote to Miss Ordway that very day.[77]  Evidently, his letter was effective, since less than a year later President Harvey M. Rice was writing to Miss Ordway at a hotel in Tucson, this time to thank her “very, very much” for her offer of $150,000 to purchase 275 acres of land.  According to this correspondence, it appears that Ordway had agreed to send $5,000 immediately in order to get an option on the land “and set the necessary steps in motion to purchase it and plan the steps for its use as soon as we can obtain it.[78]”

On 13 February 1967, a memo from President Rice landed on the desks of Dr. Edwin J. Robinson, Jr. (Biology Department Chair), Mr. John Dozier (VP of Financial Affairs at Macalester), Dr. Lucius Garvin (Executive VP of Macalester), Dr. L. Daniel Frenzel, Jr. (Biology), and Professor James Albert Jones (Biology).  This memo made known Katharine Ordway’s grant to Macalester to purchase land for a field station.  The land, Rice said, had been selected by members of the Biology Department as suitable for its laboratory and conservation potential; President Rice called the budding field station a “great new facility,[79]” and even signed the memo in purple pen; clearly the mood of the day (if the color of ink is an appropriate indication) was excitement and anticipation.

Less than two months later, on 3 April 1967, a deed was transferred from J.W. and Ruth E. Hulme to Macalester College.[80]  This represented the birth of Macalester’s 276-acre natural history area.  Thanks to the $150,000 gift from Katharine Ordway and a later matching donation by DeWitt and Lila Wallace (DeWitt of Reader’s Digest fortune), plus about $4,500 from Thomas Savage (the son of Louise Savage, whose father had been a trustee at Macalester and was of the Cochran family,[81] another big donor family and namesake of Cochran Lounge in the recently demolished Student Union), the area had the funds and endowment that it needed according to the original proposal to the Kettering Foundation.

The Wallace donation was part of a larger College fundraising campaign known as the “Challenge Campaign,” which began in 1963 when DeWitt and Lila offered Macalester $10 million if Macalester could raise an equal amount in ten years.  In fact, President Robinson was able to announce the campaign’s successful end over a year early—in less than nine years they had come up with $10,048,751 from 10,858 alumni and friends of the college.  Thanks to the nearly $40 million ultimately raised by this campaign (including matching funds), Macalester built a dozen new major buildings on campus (including Olin and Rice, the Janet Wallace Fine Arts Center, the stadium, the chapel, and others) and Robinson, obviously touched by the spirit of giving, said at the campaign celebration “the academic program is richer by…a host of supporting facilities and programs from the 280-acre Katharine Ordway Natural History Study Area along the Mississippi River.[82]”  Everything was coming up roses for Macalester, and for Ordway by extension, in those first years.

Gratitude and Naming

How to show gratitude for such a generous gift?  Since so many buildings and rooms on campus are named after prominent donors, it makes consistent sense that Macalester would name the new natural history area after one of America’s greatest conservation supporters, financially speaking.  Before a name was decided upon, a good deal of correspondence was exchanged between Macalester and Katharine Ordway.

Eddie Hill, Biology, remembers writing a thank you letter to Katharine Ordway, on the very typewriter that still sits in the Biology student reading room: “I remember typing that thing about three times, because it had to be perfect…couldn’t have any strikeovers, no white-outs, no erasures.  But I finally got it typed.[83]”  Obviously, it was important to please Katharine Ordway and make it known that Macalester was grateful for her generosity.

President Rice wrote to Katharine Ordway on 12 May 1967, thanking her profusely for her “wonderful gift of 500 shares of Minnesota Mining stock.”  Rice goes on to overuse the adjective “wonderful,” which ultimately becomes a bit patronizing.  The letter closes by asking Ordway if the college might name “this wonderful acquisition the Katharine Ordway Field Laboratory of Macalester College?[84]”  Evidently the usually shy and self-effacing Katharine Ordway decided to allow the land to be christened in her honor,[85] since on 6 June 1967 President Rice wrote to Katharine Ordway thanking her for her letter (of 1 June) in which she had indicated

that we may give your name to our wonderful outdoor biology and conservation area which you have made possible for us!  We shall call it the Katharine Ordway Natural History Study Area of Macalester College.This will give it a distinction and a definition, and at the same time an identification that I hope will be as pleasing to you as it has to us.[86] 

And so it was, or nearly so; the name did undergo some streamlining, and today it is known as the Katharine Ordway Natural History Study Area, or the equally unwieldy KONHSA, or the most common on-campus vernacular name: Ordway.[87]

Publicity

On 14 May 1967, an article appeared in the Minneapolis Star-Tribune with the headline “Macalester Buys 276 Acres of Land.[88]”  The next day’s edition of the St. Paul Pioneer Press reported that Macalester had purchased only 272 acres in Inver Grove Heights Township.  Let’s chalk this up to Twin City rivalry, and not worry about the numbers, although this time we are loath to admit that Minneapolis got it right.  The Pioneer Press went into somewhat greater detail, however, reporting that the site included “a 60-acre lake, a half mile of frontage on the Mississippi river [sic], a flood plain forest, an oak forest, several acres of prairie land, several ponds, two springs, and a marsh.”  The article further stated that Edwin J. Robinson, then Chair of the Biology Department, predicted the site would be used “by about 350 students a year for field study,[89]” the same figure cited in the Kettering proposal.

The 1967-1968 Macalester College course catalog mentioned KONHSA in the description of the Biology Department, calling it a “newly-acquired 270-acre[90] field biology teaching area near the campus, where teachers and students have ready access to natural aquatic and terrestrial habitats adapted to ecological study.[91]”  Since this description was written before Ordway had really been used by any classes, it is rather vague and noncommittal, yet it does sound quite optimistic.

The August 1967 edition of the Macalester Report shouted “College Acquires a Field Laboratory” on the front page, enthusiastically but a few months too late.  It calls Ordway a “long-sought biology laboratory…the finest for its intended use of any that the Biology Department has inspected since its search for such a facility began five years ago.[92]”  This orgy of positive publicity and goodwill was short-lived, albeit flattering; the politeness and PR were quickly usurped by internal and external politics.

Early Disagreements Regarding Ordway

While the initial proposals and mission statements contained therein were full of ideas and optimism, they were notably lacking realistic plans of how the area would be managed by the college.  One early example of the problem created by this lack of planning is illustrated by the following exchange of memos.  In June 1967, John Dozier wrote a memo to Dr. E.J. Robinson, in which he first thanks him for a tour of the area, then quickly gets down to the real reason he was writing to the Biology Department Chair: “to suggest the pro forma concept of operation for this property which I feel that we should follow.”  Dozier continues:

There seems to me to be no reason to set up any separate committee or administrative hierarchy to deal with the Field Station operation.  It seems clear that the program is a natural extension of the Biology Department, and that therefore all administrative matters should be handled by the department chairman and his staff.

After stating this, he goes on to recommend that Ordway’s maintenance should go directly through Physical Plant, as would any on-campus facility, and that they should “work out an estimated annual operating budget at an early date.[93]”  This certainly seems like a good idea, especially in retrospect.  This memo also started a tradition of the Biology Department having some management power, but very little responsibility for the upkeep of the area.

A few weeks later, a memo was sent from President Rice to Dozier, mentioning a memo from Dr. Garvin sent two weeks earlier, which has since disappeared.  At any rate, President Rice seemed concerned about the operation of Ordway; more specifically, who was responsible for overseeing this.  President Rice asked Dozier to arrange a mini-think tank with some other faculty members in order to develop a workable plan for the operation of Ordway before school started again in September: “since this activity and the grant which makes it possible are both pioneering ventures on our part in many respects, perhaps we had better formalize our understandings about the project and work out arrangements and procedures satisfactory to all concerned.[94]”  Clearly a great deal of the problem had arisen from miscommunications or a complete failure to communicate between academic departments and administrative offices.  Unfortunately, it appears by this example that many such disagreements about how to best run KONHSA were in place before the field station was even fully operational.

Nearly a year later, on 1 May 1968, Dr. E.J. Robinson wrote a memo to Dan Frenzel regarding a proposal to supervise Ordway as a committee.  He begins coldly:

I have explained to you, to no avail, that the administrative decision had long since been made that the area will be administered by the Biology Department, through the chairman [him/myself]…[I] believe that this department is in an especially good position in being solely responsible for the use of the area. This would not preclude a committee within the department.  However, I do not choose to delegate the responsibility I have in this matter…In the meantime, I retain the responsibility for the use of the area.[95]

FYI, in case some complaint should come to you.  Dan is continuously irritated that there is not a director (presumably, he thinks it would be him) and a committee to operate the Ordway Natural History Area like a full-blown, independent field station…No one else in the department has supported Dan’s repeated demands that a special committee be set up.  Three of [sic] the six biology faculty have no particular interest in the area, anyway, and don’t care how it is managed[96]…Dan has been consistent in NOT offering any suggestions for the development and use of the area, other than that a committee should be created.  It is quite possible that his prolonged irritation in not having his way in this matter will bring him to you.[97]

This is just one more specific example of the bickering that surrounded the area’s early history.  This also marks some of the first documented evidence of referring to Ordway as “the area,” which always seems to carry some resentful connotations.  These early disagreements seem to have inaugurated a tradition of miscommunication and passing the buck when it came to Ordway’s management responsibilities.

First-Year Usage

Despite the aforementioned disputes over how to run Ordway, Biology Professor Dr. James Albert Jones[98] was named the first Director of Ordway.  In the spring of 1967, even before the final boundaries and purchase arrangements had been made, there were about 85 Introductory Biology students using Ordway for lab studies.  In the summer of 1967, two seniors carried out independent research projects on River Lake.   During the 1967-68 academic year, over 770 Macalester students alone passed through KONHSA, in Introductory Biology labs, Field Zoology, Botany, Ecology, or as independent researchers.[99]  This was an impressive turnout for the first year of a new station that was not even fully furnished and was allegedly plagued by management problems.  It is also quite indicative of the enthusiasm and initiative of faculty and students regarding the potential of Ordway, and it is certainly impressive that E.J. Robinson’s press-worthy prediction of 350 students a year was more than doubled in the first year.

A building with an apartment and a lab was built on the Ordway property in 1969.  According to Biology Professor Eddie Hill, the building at Ordway was originally built to serve as a place for people to stay for a few nights; however, its practicality as a field station was actually compromised by its proximity to Macalester.[100]  In some ways, this is a problem that has continually plagued Ordway—it is just far enough away to be forgotten about, but not far enough away to seem as precious a resource as it really is.

However, the distance from Macalester did necessitate a position of Resident Naturalist, or Caretaker, or Assistant Director—by any name, this was a staff person who lived at Ordway and organized lab and class visits to the area.  This has always been a rather undervalued position.  “The people who were the caretakers, if you want to call them that, were in essence actually the directors—but they were called caretakers—they actually lived out there, and the reason was to keep vandalism at a minimum.[101]”  Of course, it is quite a job for one person to oversee nearly 280 acres (without fences or many boundary markers) plus the river frontage where it is difficult to control outside access.  The first person to move into the Ordway building and the Resident Naturalist position was a Biology instructor by the name of Miss Joan A. Sims.[102]

The summer of ’69, the first summer of full operation for Ordway, saw enthusiasm and interest pour in, again overshadowing the various quarrels regarding Ordway’s management.  Professor Jones carefully documented the utilization and overtures of interest.  In March, an announcement went out to all faculty regarding the opportunity for nineteen student research fellowships at the area, which promised to provide both the students and the faculty with a healthy stipend.[103]  A Scout leader wrote Professor Jones expressing interest in visiting the area to fulfill badge requirements.[104]  A teacher from Monroe Junior/Senior High School in St. Paul wrote Jones to thank him for hosting his students for a weekend, gushing: “Never have I, in the seven years that I have been teaching biology, observed the excited responses and behavior on the part of senior high school students that I did observe this past weekend.[105]”  One imagines that enthusiasm and utilization of the area must have been high those first years, probably thanks to its novelty (and the relative novelty of ecology as a discipline) and the publicity Ordway received.  Also in 1969, Ordway hosted elementary teachers for a summer institute in field biology.  Jones’s report also mentioned that the field station was received with interest and favor in Inver Grove Heights—from groups as diverse as the PTA, bird-watching clubs, and Boy Scout troops.[106]

Suggestions were already being made by Jones for improving the area, such as interpretive nature trails, a pontoon boat and small riverside lab, provision for a full-time caretaker plus a half-time employee dedicated to the management and direction of Ordway, the maintenance of a sizable budget, and even the possibility of a Sunday movie program.[107]  Indeed, a pontoon boat was purchased in 1970[108] and trails and guides were created in the 1970’s.[109]  However, the budget was taken for granted, and attempts to interest Macalester students in non-academic activities at Ordway (i.e. movie nights) have historically failed, as have attempts at creating anything permanent near River Lake (i.e. riverside labs) due to the impossibility of surveillance of that area, distant as it is from the main building.  And despite the foresight on the part of Jones that it would take more than one person’s dedication to effectively run KONHSA, the staffing of Ordway has not changed fundamentally since the original creation of the Resident Naturalist position.  The irony is that these suggestions were made over 30 years ago, when morale and money were high around KONHSA, and only some of them have been truly realized.

Budget

In recent years, Macalester College has been touted for its hefty endowment.  However, Macalester didn’t always have the luxury of throwing money around and building new buildings right and left.[110]  The KONHSA Field Lab Fund report, from January, 1969, does reflect a bit of this careless attitude towards money.  An initial investment by Katharine Ordway of $145,768.57 was matched by Mr. Wallace.  After numerous disbursements, including the purchase of the property itself, construction and furnishing of the building, a Chevrolet to shuttle students to and from the station, electric and utilities, and legal fees, there was still over $90,000 left.  This total does not even include the nearly $5,000 donated by Mrs. Louise Savage which had been designated for the acquisition of adjoining lands, which is mentioned almost as an afterthought.[111]  This inattentive attitude towards the use of the KONHSA budget would later be regretted, especially as Macalester ran into tough financial times in the 1970’s.

Professor Jones was not only busy with the direction of Ordway, but he was also doing some PR work with donors.  In October of 1969, Professor Jones wrote to Thomas Savage, thanking him and his mother for their contribution to Ordway in excess of $4,500 contribution to Ordway.  He stressed the importance of increasing the area’s size, since 3,000 (!) students (including college and elementary students) had used it in its first year, and that number was bound to increase (although this prediction turns out to be sadly mistaken).[112]  Professor Jones also wrote to Katharine Ordway herself in February of 1970 to keep her abreast of Ordway’s usage.  He mentioned that a pontoon houseboat had been purchased for use as a research vessel at Ordway, and he also hinted that he hoped Katharine Ordway would be able to come see the area that summer.  Jones also suggested that more land be purchased and a full-time naturalist be hired.  For this latter position he suggested a chemist (part owner of a chemical company)/ornithologist who was about to retire; however, he does imply that this position would be short term and would only last a year or two.[113]  The first part of his prediction was right: the man hired to fill this position was a chemist by occupation and a bird lover by all other description.  Regarding the length of the appointment, however, Jones’s estimate was way off, probably to the benefit of KONHSA.[114]

The Christman Era (1970-1982)

The lofty goals set forth during the late 1960’s were written in a context that could not have anticipated the financial crisis Macalester would encounter in the 1970’s.  Macalester College itself was lucky to survive this monetary drought, say nothing about the survival of Ordway during this decade.  Ordway’s ability to pull through this period of neglect was very much due to the dedication and hard work of the Resident Naturalist at Ordway during these years.

Enter Richard Christman

The period from fall 1970 to the spring of 1986 was very much characterized by the presence of one man: Richard J. Christman, who was the Resident Naturalist and Caretaker of KONHSA, and sometimes its only advocate, throughout these 16 years.  Christman had been an employee in the Macalester Chemistry Department from 1961-1963.[115]  From July 1970 to August of 1984, Christman dutifully wrote detailed Quarterly Reports discussing things that had been done and things that needed to be done at KONHSA; these reports also contained carefully recorded visitor censuses.  The story reflected in these reports becomes something of an allegory for this period itself: these reports progressively became shorter as he had less to say and began to realize that no one was really reading them, and eventually terminated in great frustration.[116]  Which begs the question, who was responsible for reading these reports?  Considering the souring relationship between Macalester and Ordway and the even more bitter financial situation of the College during these years, there was very little one man (however dedicated) could do.

It is important to understand what Christman is like, as he is a very influential force in the story of Ordway’s history.  Perhaps the best way for one to get a picture of Christman is through a few short vignettes from others who met him and worked with him; but first, the facts.  Christman got his degree in Chemistry at the University of Illinois.  He taught in the Chemistry Departments at Macalester and at Hamline University.[117]  In 1976 he described himself as somewhere between 40 and 60 years old,[118] which makes him between 65 and 85 now.  He still drives the red Volkswagen Rabbit that Shelley Shreffler remembered seeing at Ordway in the 1980’s.  He was married and had three children.  He ended up working at Ordway largely due to a happy coincidence of timing; he knew Al Jones from his previous employment at Macalester, and at the time that Jones was seeking someone to live in the new building and steward the land, Christman’s youngest daughter was finishing college and he felt free to take the opportunity.  He lived at Ordway during the week, and if his weekend was free of commitments there he would return to St. Paul to live with his wife at their home on Wellesley Street until she passed away in 1975.[119]  These are all the biographical facts Christman would disclose to anyone; he, like Katharine Ordway, is a rather modest individual.

Modest though he may be, Christman has left quite an impression on everyone who has met or worked with him.  According to Daniel Hornbach,[120] Christman was a slightly eccentric man with “long, flowing white hair” who always wore a Greek fisherman’s cap[121] and was always telling stories while an instructor was trying to teach a lab.[122]  Mark Davis’s[123] description made me a bit apprehensive about meeting Christman: “He had some real strengths.  There were some personality issues that offended some people.  I always got along with him fine, probably partly because I was male…[124] but he did do some wonderful things for Ordway.[125]”

Shelley Shreffler[126] gets the prize for best reaction when asked about Richard Christman.  I innocently and offhandedly asked her, “Just out of curiosity, did you ever meet Richard Christman?”  She replied “OH…GOD….YES!  …I did have the opportunity to meet him.  It was very difficult to meet him.”  She said that several times she looked out the window and noticed a red Volkswagen Rabbit sitting in the driveway, and an older gentleman standing at the edge of the drive, apparently birdwatching.  She finally figured that the man must be Christman, and she tried to talk to him several times, but when she approached he would quickly get in his car and drive off.  “Eventually,” Shreffler said,

I kind of snuck up on him—practically ambushed him—and made him sit down and talk to me.  What I found out is that he’s very much of a very very old school, a traditionalist, who didn’t think that a woman should be in the position that I was in, and he was quite up front about letting me know that he didn’t think I had any business being in that job.  And then it made sense why he was avoiding me.

Finally, though, Shelley felt she had won him over, and “He told me stories about some of the people, the neighbors from when he was there.  Then later I had the opportunity to meet some of the neighbors, and I’d hear lots of stories about Christman.  He has a very interesting place.[127],[128]”

An article in the Mendota Heights Sun entitled “Hemit [sic] guards a hideaway that’s an Inver Grove Trail nature study,” introduces Christman candidly and is graced by pictures of him holding a chickadee and sitting on “his favorite rock.[129]”  The word “hemit” in the headline is not a typo.  McKee introduces Christman, by his own description, as

being somewhere, chronologically, between the ages of 40 and 60, living by the philosophies of Thoreau and, because of his jocular nature about women’s lib, a hemit instead of a ‘hermit.’  Seeming to have an opinion on every subject imaginable and refusing to reveal anything about himself,[130] he looks very much the hermit type with his long white hair and blue jeans.[131] 

In describing what Christman did at Ordway, McKee wrote “he might be…sitting on his favorite rock taking in the spectacular view, feeding the birds, watching the white-legged mice that nest in the bird houses…or taking a walk.  He puts in 12 to 15 hours a day, he said, but which 12 to 15 remains his secret.[132]”  Certainly Christman was working overtime at Ordway, and for less appreciation than he probably deserved.  As he said, everyone wanted his job, but no one wanted his salary.[133]

The “Ordway Bulletins”

During his tenure at Ordway, Christman wrote at least 129 “Ordway Bulletins,” all numbered and dated from 1972 to 1985.[134]  These were page-long anecdotes, scientifically related vignettes, or just prosaic descriptions of the land or the changing seasons at Ordway.  Many people have commented on these and their enjoyment in reading them, even now.  There has been talk of publishing a compilation of them (as well there should be).  Christman said he’d often write these at night, inspired by something he had seen or experienced at Ordway, and was very modest about them.  When I mentioned how poetic they were, however, he reminded me of the dangers of anthropomorphizing, saying “I tried to stay away from that sort of thing [anthropomorphism] in them [the bulletins],”  and giving me examples: “when you see a hawk, you think ‘he,’ right?  And when you see an egret, you think ‘she,’ because it’s graceful and delicate—but actually they’re very hardy birds.[135]”

At least one of his Bulletins, entitled “A Death at Ordway,” was published in the Macalester Today magazine.  A bit of a departure from the institutional journalism one might be accustomed to, he recounts the story of the life and tragic death of “the lone Box Elder tree [that] stood in the grassland just 125 meters east of the field lab building.”  This is not in the least written with tongue-in-cheek; it is obvious that Christman sincerely felt a loss when this tree blew down and “the remains of this important part of the landscape returned to the earth by the processes which had begun many years before.[136]”

President Davis[137] sent a memo to Christman in 1977, commending him on his Ordway Bulletin entitled “Snowbound at Ordway,” and saying that it “immediately conjured up for me some of the great lines from John Greenleaf Whittier’s epic poem, ‘Snowbound: A Winter Idyll.’[138]”  For all of Christman’s modesty, it appears that I’m not the only one who finds his bulletins decidedly poetic.[139]

Christman was effectively the Resident Naturalist, the Caretaker, and the Director.  In practical terms, he may well have been the only person associated with Macalester College who took responsibility for Ordway during this period.[140]  Accordingly, he was the only person with much of a vision for the place.

In November of 1973, someone, presumably Christman,[141] gave a presentation to a Teacher’s Workshop entitled “Some Comments on Nature Establishments.”  This sets out something of an informal mission statement for KONHSA and all similar nature establishments, and also inflates the size of Ordway to “a little over 280 acres,” which seemed to be a common and convenient number to “round up” to.  Christman began by attempting to define Ordway:

What is a ‘natural history study area’???By way of definition, natural history is (or used to be) applied to zoology, botany, mineralogy and similar sciences; however, it is now commonly restricted to a more or less unsystematic study of these subjects…In many ways this is a very descriptive title for us although it is to be hoped that we are not completely UN-systematic about the studies performed at our study area.  Our actual purpose is to provide facilities as an outdoor laboratory for our Biology Department; at the same time there are other academic disciplines which can and do make use of the facility: Geography; Geology; etc.  We also encourage, incidentally, our sister colleges to share in the use of our facilities.  Our own college participates both as class units and as individual independent studies, a growingly [sic] popular endeavor at Macalester.[142]

This is an excellent summary of how Ordway was actually used during the period Christman was there, although he does neglect to mention the (quite prolific) use by community groups and pre-college students.  He then goes on to contrast the stated purpose of a “natural history study area” with that of a “nature center,” saying “a nature center has both instruction and entertainment as its raisons d’être.  This contrasts sharply with a natural history study area, whose principal—perhaps only—purpose is a scientific approach to an understanding of nature in its various attitudes.[143]” 

Claude Welch, Biology Department Chair from 1969-1978,[144] felt that Ordway was best used to “study the interrelatedness of living things and how this can be thrown off by man’s encroachment on the environment.[145]”  This is a particularly appropriate goal for a nature center like Ordway, which is not entirely pristine and is becoming increasingly swallowed up by the Twin Cities.[146]  Welch and Christman also agreed that Ordway should not be entirely public, or turned into anything park-like; however, “thay [sic] would like to see the site used more often by more people as a place to come for environmental education and, perhaps, just to get away from it all.[147]” 

Christman definitely had his opinions about how the area should be run, and since he was the Ordway Committee and the Caretaker and the Resident Naturalist all wrapped into one, he was able to implement his own ideas.  The aforementioned article in the Mendota Heights Sun reads: “There is a list of 13 rules and regulations regarding the grounds, with most pointing out the fact that every visitor and project must have the approval of Christman.”  Earlier in the article, he is quoted as saying “If you’ve got a goddamn shotgun or a goddamn snowmobile, you can’t come in.[148]”  These harsh words appear next to a photo of Christman looking kindly upon a chickadee resting in his cupped hands, a bird that he first trapped and banded in 1973 and which returned several times to visit him.[149] 

Others in the 1970’s felt that Ordway was not very useful for much except for education.  According to Eddie Hill, he felt that

The original intent was as a study area.  The original intent was to expose students to ecological principles, like, ‘ok, this is a prairie, this is a woodland, this is a river, this is what happens in these particular areas, this is how they look, this is the flora and the fauna that is associated with them in this particular setting.’  And that’s all it was ever intended—that’s all it could ever do.[150] 

Already, it seems, Macalester was forgetting about the proposals of the 1960’s, which incorporated multiple uses into the purpose of a field station, and seemed limitless in scope.  

Curriculum Changes

In the fall of 1970, a new course was added to the Macalester curriculum: Environmental Science 15, Interdisciplinary Course, which was also listed under Biology, Geology, and Geography.  The new Environmental Science program was coordinated by Mr. Webers and Mr. Lanegran, and the course’s only prerequisite was one course in the sciences.  The class was described as “a multi-disciplined introduction to the scientific aspects of the ‘physical’ environment.  The course will stress biological, geographical, and geological facets of the environment with contributions from the disciplines of chemistry, physics and economics.[151]”  Obviously, this was quite a bit to cram into a single class, but certainly a good foundation from which to build an academic program. 

Two years later, beginning in the 1972-1973 academic year, students could earn a Major Concentration in Environmental Studies.  Macalester College was one of the first colleges in the Midwest to offer such a program, so it was definitely a progressive and constantly changing field at the time.  In the 1972-73 Catalog, the concentration is described as an

interdepartmental major that focuses on man’s relationship to his environment…[it is] intended to improve students’ understanding of mankind’s role in the physical and biological world, and is established in the belief that there is a role in society for persons broadly trained in matters pertaining to the environment.[152] 

This revised program had a stronger mission; however, instead of listing any classes it simply refers interested students to one of three professors[153] for advising. 

By the next year, the Environmental Studies program was entirely the business of David Southwick, a Geology professor who had previously been involved in the Environmental Studies program, and who served as coordinator until 1978.[154]  The program description covered more than a page in the course catalog and set out a specific plan for completion of the major concentration in this field, which consisted of fourteen courses from Astronomy to Anthropology, plus a list of recommended courses and two of Environmental Studies’ very own classes, an introduction and a senior seminar.[155] 

In 1976, the introductory course had disappeared and was replaced by a junior year internship requirement.  The required courses were better articulated, again, ranging throughout all sorts of departments.  It is apparent that Environmental Studies was truly an interdisciplinary major.  In 1978, Professor J.A. Jones (former Director of Ordway) took over the Environmental Studies program and it became a full-blown major, instead of being listed in the back of the catalog with other interdisciplinary “programs.[156]” 

As Macalester fell deeper into the financial problems of the 1970’s, the crisis was reflected in the course catalog of 1974-1975 in several ways.  The Biology Department, along with others, shrunk in number of faculty and classes offered.  In the directory of the administration, many positions were listed as “to be designated,” instead of having a name, including the Director of Development, the Associate Director of Admissions, and the Director of Financial Aid.[157] 

Publicity in the 70’s

On 24 January 1972, an editorial appeared in the Mac Weekly, authored by Christman, alerting students of Ordway’s existence.[158]  An article about Ordway appeared in the Macalester College Bulletin in March.  This article invites alums to visit the area as well as disclosing that Christman’s salary was being supported by a gift from Mr. and Mrs. Allan Holbert (Mrs. Holbert, née Jill Irvine, is a niece of Katharine Ordway).  The Holberts made the gift “in recognition of the significant contribution to solving environmental problems” that KONHSA was making and to “assure its continued impact upon the field of ecology and conservation.[159]”  It is surprising that someone made a donation based on this premise, when the area was still young and had never been touted with having an “impact” on conservation. 

In March 1971, someone, again presumably Christman, gave a Seminar Presentation with slides in which he described the mammal, invertebrate, and plant studies which were happening at KONHSA.  He suggested increased use by classes for specimen gathering, as well as linking up with other nature centers,[160] another suggestion that appears to have been ignored. 

A March 1972 article in the Macalester College Bulletin definitely missed scooping the following story, “Ordway Nature Study Open,” by several years.[161]  A few articles appeared in the Macalester Today during these years, including the obituary for the Box Elder tree.[162]  Another article, entitled “Nature Center Wet and Colorful” was written shortly after the college founded its Environmental Studies Program, and touts some of the new inclusions of non-Biology uses:

under the guidance of David Lanegran…[Geography students can study] urban vegetation (plants brought to the cities by settlers)…or to learn under the guidance of David Southwick [Geology] how glacial deposits control the soil and development of vegetation on this particular site.[163]

The article invites all members of the Macalester community to visit Ordway via the “Blue Goose” shuttle bus[164] that made trips to Ordway twice a week.[165] 

Research Initiatives at Ordway During the 1970’s

Ordway has never been the site of a great deal of research, despite the fact that it was originally chosen to suit this purpose.  In fact, there have been those who have said that Ordway is not a particularly good place for research.  Since it is a “natural history study area,” as defined by Christman,[166] that implies that research can be rather informal and performed at any scale.  Because of the relatively small size of the area and the communities within it (i.e. large-scale prairie experiments are simply not possible[167]), research has been somewhat limited to projects of a smaller scale.  Others contend that the research possibilities are limited only by one’s imagination. 

The vast majority of the research that remains from these years was performed by Christman himself, the vocational ornithologist, as part of his long-term bird banding study.  He kept incredibly accurate records[168] and indeed had many return avian visitors, such as the chickadee he befriended.[169]  Jack Shields, a Biology professor, produced several long and comprehensive reports during July of 1972: research on the linear growth rate in woody plants and a distribution report on the flora of KONHSA; he also compiled a master herbarium for Ordway.[170] 

Despite the majority of anecdotal reports about Ordway, there were in fact a great many independent research projects being carried out at Ordway during this time, including projects by undergraduate and graduate students from other institutions.[171]  Christman’s quarterly reports were replete with updates about who was doing what sort of research, but it is unclear if anyone was reading these reports to get an idea of Ordway’s research potential.  One student, named Paul, did a January term project there that seems among the harder winter interim projects to take on: he tried to dig a well.  According to Christman, Paul was quite a character himself.  He often wore a muslin Slavic-style homemade shirt and would sing old riverboat songs while he worked. Evidently, Paul dug down about twelve or fourteen feet and hit moist ground, but never was quite able to get a bucket of water out.[172] 

Contrary to some current assertions about Ordway, there was plenty of serious research, involving larger universities and collaborations, going on during this period.  For example, a doctoral candidate at the University of Minnesota carried out an invertebrate-trapping study there, a behavioral study funded by the NSF was performed by a professor from St. Catherine’s and a Macalester student, and another U of M graduate student was studying sow bugs at Ordway for years.[173]  Eddie Hill did compile a list of Ordway-based research papers that had been filed in the Biology Department, which he sent to Thomas Savage.[174]  These projects include flora surveys, aquatic investigations in River Lake, and research on the relationships between snowmobile use and small mammal mortality.[175]  While Ordway was by no means teeming with researchers, there seemed to be little question that it was an appropriate and accessible place for a variety of projects. 

Opportunities to Expand KONHSA (or: How to Anger your Benefactors)

John Dozier wrote to Katharine Ordway on 18 October 1972 to let her know that “we have acquired an additional piece of land contiguous” to Ordway.  This purchase consisted of 

…approximately two acres of land[176] at the front of the property, which expands the frontage on County Road #77 from a single point on the road where the driveway comes into the area to 425.9 feet.  This will allow us to have a more gracious and effective entryway to the area. 

He also mentions that

we hope one of these days to be able to report to you the acquisition of an even larger piece of land in this area.  You will recall that part of our problem here is that the landowner here is tied up in a complicated estate settlement and it will be months, I am sure, before we can get final approval for any purchase.  We are, however, still optimistic and are working.[177] 

Dozier’s take seems to be opposed to Robinson and others who maintained that there was no land available for purchase.  A letter from President Robinson to Katharine Ordway on 16 November 1972 thanked her for her gift that helped to purchase “better frontage area” at Ordway and said that the remainder of her gift was being retained “awaiting opportunities to make additional purchases of land…but it appears that it will be sometime [sic] before any of the neighbors will be willing to relinquish additional acreage.[178]”

The same President James Robinson who had announced the triumphant end to the Challenge Campaign was suddenly faced with financial difficulties later in the 1970’s.  DeWitt Wallace withdrew his support, over thirty faculty were laid off—these were hard times indeed for Macalester College.[179]  However, there had been money given to Macalester and specifically earmarked for increasing the acreage of Ordway.  Throughout the 1970’s, there were at least two opportunities to purchase a substantial parcels of adjoining land which were conspicuously missed, leaving some confused and others angry. 

On 6 December 1972, per instructions of Ray Carter, Ordway’s attorney, 125 shares of Katharine Ordway’s 3M stock had been sold, at a value of $82.75 per share: a total of $10,343.75,[180] the proceeds of which were donated to Macalester.  The next day, President Robinson wrote to “Messrs.” DeWitt Wallace and A.L. Cole regarding Katharine Ordway’s support of KONHSA.  It seems that the previous December, Wallace, Cole and Robinson had been to visit Katharine Ordway, which had earned Macalester $25,000.  He also notified them of the recent $10,000 gift (evidently, he rounded down this time) and suggested that they “apprize her of your appreciation of her gift on the basis of this ‘confidential’ communication.[181]”

A 17 December letter from President Robinson to Ordway opens with the somewhat tactless paragraph: “In each of the last two Decembers, you have made a generous gift to Macalester College in [sic] behalf of the Ordway Natural History Study Area.  It is my hope that you might do so again this year.”  After that, he goes on to boast about the newly created Environmental Studies academic program and the way Macalester has responded to the energy crisis, having “reduced electrical and fuel consumption nearly 20% without interfering with instruction.”  He closes: “You will find few colleges as ecological and conservative minded as this one.  We would be grateful, therefore, for a 1973 gift of $25,000 to assist us in our program to educate students in preservation and protection of natural resources.[182],[183]”  Macalester shouldn’t have been surprised to receive a phone call from Katharine Ordway in response to the letter from Robinson.  During the call, she “expressed the hope that the money might be used for additional acquisitions of property, but in the event that none was available, stated that the money could be used for such purposes as the President felt appropriate,[184]” and that “she was particularly interested in acquiring prairie lands at the current time.”  Katharine mentioned that she appreciated the two reports which had been sent to her (by Christman, undoubtedly) regarding work done at KONHSA.  She “expected to be able to make further contributions to the Center next year, but that she was committed to prairie acquisitions this year.[185]”

A few years later, some fiery correspondence was exchanged between our Miss Ordway and Thomas Savage.  First, on 17 June 1974, Savage wrote that his mother had bequeathed $10,000 to Mac upon her death in 1968 because her father was a “trustee in the era of Dr. Wallace.”  He says that Macalester had agreed to match funds with Savage in order to enlarge KONHSA.  Since that promise had been made, Macalester had missed opportunities to purchase parcels near the Ordway land, including 100 acres to the north, which were later saddled with an airstrip and a small factory (where they manufacture pontoon boats[186]).   “There is apparently a complete lack of interest on the part of the college administration in adding to the natural history area,” Savage proclaimed; using words like “deplorable” elsewhere in the letter, he also implied that Christman himself was not happy with how KONHSA was being managed.  Savage also suggested that he and Ordway meet with “key members of the Macalester faculty and administration.[187]”  Katharine Ordway wrote him back in a week, agreeing that it was “deplorable,” and reiterating that she had given $10,241 on 6 December 1972 and another $5,000 on 5 April 1974, but had never been told what these sums had been used for.  She told Savage that she had written to President Robinson to express her concern, but that she was leaving the country until mid-July and would be unable to come to St. Paul anytime in the near future.[188] 

On 18 Nov 76, Eddie Hill sent a memo to Alexander (Sandy) Hill, VP of Development, notifying him of the sale of the 122-acre Leitch estate, which bordered the south side of the Ordway property.  He even attached a sheet with several different options for purchasing parts or all of the land.[189]  Sandy Hill replied eleven days later with the disheartening news that

Our relations with Katherine Ordway (the most likely donor for additional purchases) have not been that good, because of information she has received about under use [sic] of the area by Macalester.  What we really need from Miss Ordway is an endowment so that we could properly use the area; i.e., money to provide transportation, etc.[190]

Looking back on those days, perhaps buying land was a bit much to expect from a College in financial duress; it seems that at one time Macalester was under pressure to sell Ordway.  According to Eddie Hill, “there was never really a lot of heavy pressure to get that land [the Leitch estate], to expand the area, as far as I was ever able to tell.  There was some pressure to sell it…to a developer, but that never came about either.[191]”  According to Alexander Hill, the Leitch estate was passed up for financial reasons rather than due to a bad relationship with Katharine Ordway; in fact, during the 1970’s, many of the large family contributors withdrew support from Macalester pending its survival as an institution.[192]  Still, we must believe that Katharine Ordway was rather unhappy about the dismissive attitude with which Macalester treated her.[193]  One only has to compare the air photos included in Figures 3-5 to see that both the parcels to the north and south of Ordway have since been quite developed. 

Richard Christman commented on Macalester’s thinly veiled exploitative attitude towards donors during the 1970’s and recalled several anecdotes.  He remembered Thomas Savage visiting Ordway with a representative of the Macalester administration.  After a short walk, they were sitting inside and Christman listened to the Macalester representative hinting that Ordway could use more donations.  As we know, Mr. Savage was not terribly happy with the way his previous donations had or had not been used, and according to Christman he replied, “All I hear is ‘we need more money, we need more money.’  I still want to find out what happened to the other money!” 

In another instance, Mrs. John Ordway was visiting, and after a brief trot outside (she was getting older and couldn’t walk much) Christman, Ordway and other Macalester administrative folks reconvened inside.  Christman remembers Mrs. Ordway taking out a cigarette and lighting up, and “the other people were aghast.  I said ‘I’d like a smoke Ms. Ordway!’”  Christman always did seem to enjoy taking the mischievous route.  A final recollection seems particularly devious—Christman recalled members of the faculty and administration rolling out a genealogical chart of the Ordway family which encompassed about four generations.  He said that while it wasn’t blatantly stated, the intent was rather clear: oh, this girl is about two now, but when she’s in her twenties maybe we can get some money from her.[194]  Unfortunately, while part of this attitude was probably a symptom of the desperate financial situation, it can’t have done anything good in the way of donor relations. 

Did Katharine Ordway Ever See Her Namesake?

Already in 1967, in the initial series of thank-you letters, President Rice had expressed an interest in hosting Katharine Ordway at the area to show her around the field station as well as the main campus.  Professor Jones, in a letter to Katharine Ordway on 18 February 1970, mentioned that she ought to come visit that summer.  A letter from President Robinson to Katharine Ordway mentioned that Mrs. John Ordway, Sr. had recently visited Ordway and was given a tour; “She seemed to enjoy herself immensely, and undoubtedly has seen you in the meantime,[195]” hinting that perhaps Katharine herself ought to visit.  Katharine Ordway also expressed interest in visiting, in a 4 March 1974 letter: “I hope to be in Minneapolis in the early spring and will surely go out to the Ordway Preserve. I have enjoyed so much the letters that Dr. Christian [sic] has sent out to those interested.”  A handwritten note on the margin brackets this paragraph and says “does not occur;” which presumably refers to Katharine Ordway’s proposed visit.[196] 

Further correspondence was exchanged between Christman and Macalester later in the month regarding the possibility of Katharine Ordway dropping by in “early spring,” which Christman says is

…indefinite—and who could predict it in Minnesota? –but perhaps that lady is inclined to translate seasons into terms of those existing in her current habitat, viz. Connecticut.[197]  I’m just suggesting that some comment of this would be worth while now rather than risk her visiting here when things are too inclement to make a reasonable visit out of it.[198] 

Evidently this was promising, however, and to the end of receiving Katharine Ordway at the area named after her, there were preparations made such as fixing the lab floors, tidying up, and putting in trail marker posts.