The Hinckley Fire was a major conflagration that burned an area of more than 400 square miles (1000 kmē), killing 418 to 459 people in the process. The fire occurred on September 1, 1894 and was centered around Hinckley, Minnesota. Several neighboring villages were also hard-hit by the fire. The main contributor to the fire was apparently the then-common method of lumber harvesting, which involved stripping trees of their branches, littering the ground with such detritus. The summer had been very dry, a factor that contributed to the fire. It appears that this was the second-deadliest fire in the history of Minnesota, surpassed in 1918 by a fire in and around Cloquet.
The story of the Hinckleyfire of September 1, 1894, is a tragic saga of destruction, terror, courage, heroism, and death.
A 37-mile segment of the Munger Trail memorializes the route the fire took between Hinckley and Barnum, the suffering and death it caused, and the devastation it wrought.
The HinckleyFire, by Antone A. Anderson and Clara Anderson McDermott.
With the coming of the railroad, the lumbering industry boomed and for twenty years, Hinckley was a growing, prosperous town with a population of 1,500.
Because of the dryness of the summer, fires were common in the woods, along railroad tracks and in logging camps where loggers would set fire to their slash to clean up the area before moving on.
Today, the HinckleyFire Museum interprets the story of the Great Fire and also of the rebuilding of the town and the area's natural progression into agricultural lands.
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