4/28/2009:
"No Dakota for me," Mr. Cooper exclaimed in 1878. "I crossed the entire territory, from east to west... and I am free to say that I would not give the shadow of a lamb's tail for all the Dakota dirt we passed over."
Within months of making his brash statement, Thomas E. Cooper was scouting out homestead sites in Walsh County, Dakota Territory. He found a perfect spot in the Park River valley. But Walsh County in 1878 could be a lonely place; there were few neighbors and long winters. The lack of regular mail service didn't help matters. Mail arrived by steamboat from Grand Forks at the nearest post in Kelly's Point, 20 miles away from Cooper's homestead! A local Swedish resident walked to Kelly's Point to collect the mail, but the distance, snow and lack of a formal road made delivery sporadic and eventually it stopped altogether.
Thomas Cooper knew if the surrounding community was to grow, a regular postal line would be necessary. He drew up a petition to the Post Office Department asking for three new post offices and then hit the trail, travelling on foot through the March snow drumming up signatures. Cooper's neighbors were anxious for regular mail service and everyone wanted the post office located at or near their home.
But he had already settled on three locations. One would be located near his home; he hoped to be appointed postmaster. He later explained how he came up with the name. "In selecting a name...myself and family proposed several, writing them on paper, to see how they would look and sound." They toyed with Grand Crossing, Glenwood and Lock Port, in recognition of Mrs. Cooper's maiden name. Neighbors even suggested Coopertown.
Finally Cooper stumbled on a winner. He explained, "I, being in the fruit tree business and intending to plant out a nursery, and perhaps engage in grafting fruiting trees...wrote ‘Grafton.' This Mrs. C. approved, as her parents were raised in Grafton County, New Hampshire."
At the suggestion of locals, the second post office located about six miles east of Grafton would be named Park River; not to be confused with the present-day Park River west of Grafton. For the third post office, Cooper consulted a group of Swedish residents living northwest of Grafton. They requested the name Lyons, but Cooper forgot and instead penciled in the name Sweden, as the proposed postmaster was Swedish and well-respected.
With locations, names and signatures completed, Thomas Cooper forwarded the petition to Washington and within a short time received approval. On this date in 1879, the Park River and Sweden Post Offices were established, followed by Grafton a month later. By July of 1879, regular mail service from Kelly's Point to Sweden via Grafton commenced. For local residents it provided an important, but short-lived link to the outside world. Once the Great Northern Railroad arrived in Grafton a few years later, both Park River and Sweden post offices closed.
Dakota Datebook written by Christina Sunwall
Sources:
Collections of the State Historical Society. Vol. 2. Bismarck, ND: Tribune, State Printers and Binders, 1908.
Collections of the State Historical Society of North Dakota. Vol. 1. Bismarck, ND: State Historical Society of North Dakota, 1906.
Lounsberry, Colonel Clement A. Early History of North Dakota: Essential Outlines of Americans History. Vol. Complete in One. Washington, D.C.: Liberty Press, 1919.
Snortland, J. Signe, ed. A Traveler's Companion to North Dakota State Historic Sites. Bismarck, ND: State Historical Society of North Dakota, 2002.
Wick, Douglas A. North Dakota Place Names. Bismarck: Hedemarken Collectibles, 1988.