A Young Town

Snowflakes sparkle on this sunny day like stars in the night.







Frostbite Falls, Minnesota, is a fictional small town created for the “Rocky and His Friends Show.” Rocket J. Squirrel, better known as "Rocky," and his pal, Bullwinkle J. Moose cartooned their way to popularity during the 1960s. But after living here a while, it’s pretty easy to see that Frostbite Falls is a parody on the real-life town of International Falls.

Rainy Lake and Rainy River, with their many islands, contain the boundary between the US and Canada. Near Frostbite Falls are the fictional Veronica Lake and an island called Moosylvania, of which Bullwinkle was "Governor." The U.S. claims the island is part of Canada, and Canada claims it is part of the U.S. Bullwinkle vacations in Moosylvania because "after two weeks here, anyplace else feels like Heaven."



Perhaps this unnamed island in Rainy River, seen from the north end of Ninth Avenue, is the writer’s inspiration for Moosylvania Island. Perhaps gray squirrels like Rocky dart about on it as they do here on the mainland, looking for nuts they squirreled away in the fall, and can’t quite remember where.






So much happened here before any town was—so many snowstorms, squirrels and native people—that to talk about the town’s history seems like discussing yesterday. Yet, here you have it—“old” buildings of a town that began around 1905.

The Bauscher Brothers still have their name faintly visible on the meat market (left photo), now a coffee house. Built 100 years ago, a few of the old meat hooks still drop from the ceiling. Ice from the lake cooled the meat all summer, stored in straw. And the wood-burning water heater in the basement—well, it’s gone. But the owner likes to talk about the “old” times when the mill was young. The old ways of birchbark canoes and French-Canadian Voyageurs taking beaver skins to Europe, well, those are “really old.”






Today, the nicer houses overlook the river—Americans to the left, Canadians to the right, as you look westerly or downstream. You can view them from Riverside Drive, but don't park on the north side on odd days or the south side on even days, lest you be considered snow and heaped up along the side.