Itasca State Park

About this park

Itasca State Park, established on April 20, 1891 by a margin of just a single vote in the state legislature, is Minnesota's oldest state park and one of the most historically significant natural sites in North America: it protects the headwaters of the Mississippi River, where the great river begins its 2,552-mile journey to the Gulf of Mexico as a stream narrow enough to walk across on a line of stepping stones. Historian and land surveyor Jacob V. Brower led the push to establish the park specifically to save the surrounding virgin pine forest from the logging that was rapidly consuming the region, and his tireless advocacy ultimately shaped the entire future of the Minnesota state park system. Explorer Henry Rowe Schoolcraft, guided to this spot in 1832 by Anishinaabe guide Ozawindib, coined the park's name by combining syllables from the Latin words for "truth" and "head" (verITAS CAput), and the park's human history runs far deeper still: the Itasca Bison Kill Site documents hunters who ambushed bison and deer here roughly 8,000 years ago, and burial mounds from the later Woodland Period can still be seen at the Itasca Indian Cemetery. Today the park spans more than 32,000 acres and includes over 100 lakes, with the historic Douglas Lodge, built by WPA workers, offering overnight stays alongside the park's campgrounds and cabins. Wilderness Drive winds past the 2,000-acre Old Growth/Wilderness Sanctuary, one of only seven National Natural Landmarks in Minnesota, and towering stands of century-old red and white pine still stand at Preacher's Grove, a rare surviving glimpse of the forest that once covered this entire region before commercial logging. Fishing across the park's hundred-plus lakes yields northern pike, walleye, bass, and the occasional muskellunge, and the park's popularity, consistently among the most visited in the state, means campsite reservations can be genuinely difficult to secure during peak summer season.