John Beargrease, undated Courtesy of the Cook County Historical Society - Superior, Minnesota 
John Beargrease: North Shore mail carrier
The US Congress ordered the beginning of mail service from Superior to Grand Portage, Minnesota, in 1855, but service was spotty. John Beargrease and his brothers came to the rescue. They began covering a regular mail route between Two Harbors and Grand Marais in 1879.
Since 1980, the John Beargrease Sled Dog Marathon has attracted competitors and racers from the United States and around the world. Beginning in Duluth and running 400 miles along the north shore of Lake Superior to the Canadian border, the Beargrease is one of the longest, most grueling race routes outside Alaska.
The race takes its name from an Ojibwe mail carrier named John Beargrease, who was born in 1858 and grew up in a wigwam on the edge of Beaver Bay, the first white settlement on the North Shore. John was the son of Moquabimetem, who also went by the name “Beargrease,” a leader who settled in the area with a small group of Ojibwe to work at Beaver Bay’s sawmill.
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