The Grand Portage Band of Lake Superior Chippewa, whose reservation lies at the far northeastern tip of Minnesota’s Arrowhead region along the shore of Lake Superior, has taken a big step closer to being whole again.
The band celebrated the return of three land parcels, totaling nearly 90 acres, at a ceremony and community luncheon Monday. Officials say it’s the largest return of Grand Portage tribal land in recent history.
The purchase was facilitated by a $1.2 million grant from the Duluth-based Lloyd K. Johnson Foundation, which generated much of its wealth from a series of controversial deals dating back to the late 1800s through which members of the Johnson family acquired numerous parcels of Grand Portage land.
“This is a great day for Grand Portage,” chairman Robert Deschampe said after signing a proclamation declaring March 16, 2026 as “Land Return Day.” “This is going to go way into the future. When we talk about seven generations, this is what we’re talking about, getting our land back for them."
In 1854, the Grand Portage Band of Chippewa signed a treaty with the U.S. government, along with the Fond du Lac and Bois Forte bands. The treaty ceded more than 5 million acres to the federal government. The Grand Portage Band got a 47,000-acre reservation at the tip of what is now Minnesota, along with the right to continue to hunt, fish and gather in the ceded territory.
But just a few decades later, the government began dividing up the reservation and selling it off to timber and mining interests. Federal allotment laws also took land out of communally-held tribal ownership, and assigned parcels to individual band members.
“When they did that, they began carving away at the spirit of our people and our culture, piece by piece,” said elder and former tribal council member John Morrin. “That created a lot of trauma within us as human beings, and we’re still trying to deal with that trauma today.”
Morrin thanked the foundation for funding the land return, which he said does much more than restore the band’s land base.
“You’re also restoring part of our spirit as a people,” Morrin said.
By the early 1900s, the Grand Portage Band had lost about half its reservation. Much of that land was acquired by members of the Johnson family, prominent Swedish settlers in nearby Grand Marais.
“The Johnson name carries a complicated history with our people,” said Deschampe. “Many of our band members know the history well. It is still recent, and it is still felt.”
Lloyd K. Johnson was a prominent lawyer and businessman from Grand Marais who died in 2006. His father and uncle held key positions in the Cook County land department at the time that federal allotment policies began to split up Grand Portage land. That put them in prime position to scoop up land cheaply from band members — or in some cases without any money exchanging hands, the band said.
“Many of them lost it because they didn’t pay taxes on it,” said Erik Torch, executive director of the Lloyd K. Johnson Foundation. “Perhaps [they] didn’t understand it. They didn’t work in a cash-based economy, and they lost that land.”
In 2022, Torch said the foundation started digging into the “hard truths” of how it acquired much of its wealth. Then they learned that a related family trust still held three parcels of former Grand Portage land. Last month, the foundation finalized the $1.2 million grant to the band so it could purchase the land back from the trust.
“It’s the single largest grant we’ve ever made, and it’s just so appropriate that, given the history, that it’s to Grand Portage,” Torch said. “This land has finally come home after too many years away.”
The land returned to the band includes 80 acres of forested land within the reservation that was lost to the band through the allotment policies of the late 1800s and early 1900s.
It also includes Francis Island on Lake Superior, part of the Susie Islands along a historic canoe route connecting Grand Portage and Isle Royale. The band said it lost the land when the U.S. government gave it to Minnesota as state school trust lands.
The returned lands also include Paradise Beach, a five-acre parcel about 10 miles south of the reservation on Lake Superior.
“It’s part of reclaiming our territory,” said Deschampe. “In 1854, when we signed these treaties, we were allotted 5.2 million acres to hunt, gather and fish. And as of now, we’re down to less than 20 percent of that land that’s accessible for tribal members to exercise those inherent rights.”
During the community luncheon, Grand Portage secretary and treasurer April McCormick read aloud a passage in the Ojibwe language, which she learned to help express the significance of the moment.
“Mewinzha gigii-kimoodimigonaan i’iw aki.
Long ago the land was stolen from us.
Noongom dash odazhenaawaa.
But today they are returning it.
Miziweyaa nawaj gidishkoniganinaan.
Our reservation is more complete.
Mewinzha nindaanikoobijigaanibaninaanig ogaa-bagosendanaawaa daa-bi-ezhiwebak.
A long time ago, our elders (who are no longer living) had hoped this should happen here.”
For the past several years, the Grand Portage Band, along with other tribes across Minnesota and the country, have worked to reacquire lands that were lost or stolen, and rebuild tribal homelands.
The Grand Portage Band has now restored more than 98 percent of its reservation to tribal ownership. Deschampe said he won’t be satisfied until the band holds all its land again, and restores that spiritual connection.
“We’ll keep working and continue working to get land back for Grand Portage,” he said. “We’re on a roll.”
