Flandrau State Park

About this park

Flandrau State Park, originally established as Cottonwood River State Park, sits on the edge of New Ulm along the gently meandering Big Cottonwood River, its 840 acres encompassing wooded river bottoms, oxbow marshes, oak-shaded bluffs, and open grassland within easy walking distance of downtown. A Works Progress Administration camp operated here during the late 1930s and early 1940s, leaving behind handsome stone buildings that remain some of the finest examples of WPA-era park architecture in the entire Minnesota system, and the entire park is consequently listed on the National Register of Historic Places. During part of the 1940s, that same former WPA camp served an unusual second purpose as a World War II German prisoner-of-war camp, a genuinely striking chapter in the park's history before the buildings were eventually converted into today's modern group center, complete with eight cabins, a dining hall, and a separate swimming pond. The Civilian Conservation Corps also built a dam here, impounding roughly 200 acres of reservoir on the Big Cottonwood River, though repeated flood damage in 1947, 1965, and 1969 eventually led the state to remove the remaining dam structure in 1995, letting the river run free through the park once again. The state legislature renamed the park in 1945 to honor Charles E. Flandrau, who helped draft Minnesota's first constitution, served on the state's first Supreme Court, and played a prominent role defending New Ulm during the U.S.-Dakota War of 1862. Today the park's sand-bottom swimming pond, stocked with rainbow trout, along with its network of flat valley-floor trails and more challenging bluff routes, make it one of the most consistently popular state parks in southern Minnesota throughout the summer season.