On This Date in Minnesota History: October 22

*October 22, 1907 – The Duluth Herald reports on this date that “bids will be received by [Cloquet’s] City Clerk Joseph Loisel to erect a brick pump house at the reservoir at Spring Lake, according to the plans and specifications on file in the office of the city clerk. The concrete walls of the reservoir and the covering of the springs has (sic) been finished, and the digging of an outlet for the overflow is under completion. There is yet about 300 feet of ten-inch pipe to be laid to complete the pipe line to the city, and when this is laid, the ditch of the main pipe line filled in, and the pump house built, the work of getting water to the city will have been completed.”¹

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Original Cloquet Water Tower

The Cloquet water tower that survived the 1918 fire was a part of this new water system. In its August 8, 1908, issue, about six years after the idea of a water system for the city was first presented, the Cloquet Pine Knot announced that the "big pressure tank has been finished this week and on Wednesday about 3 feet of water was pumped into it, the intention being to fill it for a test."

¹Duluth Herald; “Brick Pump House, Bids Invited by Cloquet for That Part of Water System”; October 22, 1907; p. 11.
²Photo taken by Pamela J. Erickson. Released into the public domain Oct. 22, 2013, as long as acknowledgement included.