Minnesota’s Iron Range – A History Of Family Legacies
By Deborah Locke, Information Officer, Minnesota Department of Natural Resources
Both of Jody Popesh’s grandpas worked at the Soudan Mine located in northern Minnesota’s Iron Range – because that is what Iron Range men, mostly men, did back in the day. Her Grandpa, Frank Popesh, Sr., worked the Soudan Mine until it closed, and then went to the Ely mine. He contracted silicosis of the lung (black lung) and stopped mining. A later job took him to nearby Bear Head Lake State Park where he helped to construct the park campground. Today his granddaughter helps manage that campground, as assistant park manager for almost 14 years.
“I can guarantee you that he never thought his granddaughter would help manage that site more than 50 years later,” Jody said. “Iron rangers are super proud of where we are and who we are. My grandpa would be proud to know that he helped develop the park and campground that I intend to retire from.”
Those familiar with the Iron Range understand the work ethic and fierce loyalty of Range residents, which dates to the 1800s. By 1920 more than 100,000 people from 43 countries lived on the Iron Range, according to Mnopedia.
Unions sprang up to address harsh working conditions and poor pay. Jody remembers when a DNR staffer suggested during her internship that she should aim for a management position. “Coming from a mining family with labor background – the idea was insulting,” she said. “I was a little offended. I was wrong.”
Fresh out of college in 1999, she got an internship with the Soudan Mine, helping visitors into the elevator cage and then getting them settled in the underground train for a mine tour.
She also spent a couple years with the Minnesota Conservation Corps working for several different DNR divisions, learning skills along the way, and then found her way to the Parks and Trails Division. Jody’s first seasonal DNR job was as a parks worker at Bear Head Lake State Park where decades earlier, her Grandpa Frank helped construct a campground.
Today she loves her job, defining herself as both a park ranger and an Iron Ranger. She is proud of her former co-workers who are advancing through the division. When stress sets in, she does rounds on foot, listening to visitors, answering questions, renewing her energy.
An aesthetic hobby, orchid hunting in the forested country of the far north, also renews her energy. The state’s most well-known orchid is its state flower, the beautiful showy lady’s slipper, one of 43 orchid species that grow in spruce and tamarack bogs, wetlands, wet prairies and woods.
“I found a ton or orchids this year,” she said, noting fewer numbers of yellow and pink lady’s slippers. Other orchid finds this year: calypso, heart-shaped twayblade (first ever found), ramshead, hookers, dragons mouth, early coralroot, northern bog orchid – and the leaves of rattlesnake plantain.
Orchid hunters are a lot like bird watchers: they’re willing to drive and then walk a distance to see something rare and beautiful. They also know names that most of us have never heard before and can identify a rare bloom immediately. Jody, with camera in hand, also keeps an eye out for grass pink, spotted coralroot, striped coralroot, purple fringe, and small round leaved orchid.
Her dad, Frank “Buddy” Popesh, Jr., retired as a blacksmith for an open pit mine and then took a seasonal position as a buildings and grounds worker at Lake Vermilion-Soudan Underground Mine State Park. Her mom, Katy Popesh, worked as a parks worker at Soudan Underground Mine State Park before it combined with Vermilion State Park.
As a little girl, Jody noticed green DNR trucks and decided then that one day she’d work for the DNR. She grew up in Soudan and received a BA in environmental studies from the University of Minnesota, Duluth. Her dad Buddy loved the outdoors and was thrilled to get a building and grounds job. He called his daughter one day and said guess what? I drove a four-wheeler today clearing trails and got paid for it!
Jody, the granddaughter/daughter of miners, the teacher, administrator, conservator, protector, laughed. Dad and daughter both found their way to where they belonged.
Currently the Soudan Mine tours have been discontinued due to flooding. For information, please google the Lake Vermilion-Soudan Underground Mine State Park website.
Images courtesy of the Minnesota DNR.
