Agnes M. Larson

Agnes Larson

From The White Pine Industry in Minnesota: A History (2007) by Agnes M. Larson

The white pine of the upper Mississippi was a magnificent tree. Sometimes it stood in the forest 200 feet high with a diameter of 5 feet; 160 feet was a more usual height, while many trees reached only 120 feet with a diameter of 30 inches.

The white pine grew in a variety of soils, but wherever it grew moisture was necessary. It grew luxuriously in heavy clay and loam soils, where it intermingled with the hardwoods. The white pine grew best in a soil that had a mixture of sand. Far north on the steep rocky slopes of Lake Superior it grew with the spruce and the tamarack. The white pine grew in river bottoms where there was good drainage, or where the rainfall was heavy, averaging between 26 and 35 inches. It stopped abruptly within about forty miles of the prairie country where the rainfall was less.

Biographical Notes

Birth: March 15, 1892, Preston, Minnesota
Death: January 24, 1967, Rochester, Minnesota

Historian and author Agnes Mathilde Larson earned a B.A. from St. Olaf College in 1916, a M.A. from Columbia University in 1922, and a Ph.D. from Radcliffe College in 1938. She received a fellowship for dissertation research from the American Association of University Women in 1932. From 1916-21 Larson was a high school teacher and principal in Walcott, North Dakota; Harmony, Minnesota; and Northfield, Minnesota. She was an instructor at Mankato State Teachers College (currently Minnesota State University, Mankato) from 1922-25; a history professor at St. Olaf College, Minnesota from 1926-60; department chairman from 1942-60; and professor emeritus from 1960-67. St. Olaf College in Northfield, Minnesota named a dormitory for her in 1964, Agnes M. Larson Hall.

Selected Works
The titles below link to the catalog record in MnPALS, the Minnesota Historical Society’s library catalog. Please click on your browser's back button to return.

• History of the White Pine Industry in Minnesota
• John A. Johnson: An Uncommon American
• On the Trail of the Woodsman in Minnesota
• When Logs and Lumber Ruled Stillwater

Additional Resources

• Search MNHS Library and Archives Catalog for author - Searches for works by this author in the Minnesota Historical Society’s library
• Minnesota Historical Society Collections Online
• Women of Minnesota: Selected Biographical Essays edited by Barbara Stuhler and Gretchen Kreuter