conflicts dogged the trade. A Métis attack on the Dakota in 1844 closed the primary route entirely. A Red River ox cart train on its return trip north traveled instead to the growing town of Crow Wing, forded the Mississippi, and blazed a new route that passed through much friendlier Ojibwe lands. This route became known as the Woods Trail. Although it was considerably harder going than the other Red River Trails, it was decidedly safer. More traffic followed, particularly whenever relations with the Dakota were at their worst. The village of Crow Wing became the principal supply station on the Woods Trail. Allan Morrison began operating a ferry across the Mississippi at the north end of town. In the 1840s other traders set up shop as well. This was the center of a multicultural community, with numerous mixed-race families, and associated Ojibwe, French Canadian and American families in the area. Allan and his brother William Morrison, as well as the traders William Alexander Aitken, and Henry Mower Rice all went on to early prominence in the territory and state. Minnesota's Morrison, Aitkin, and Rice counties were named after them. Mower served as a state senator for five years and ran for governor in 1865. Clement Hudon Beaulieu, a Métis, also became a successful trader, running the American Fur Company's trading post. The American William Whipple Warren was bilingual and worked as an interpreter for Rice. Also of Ojibwe descent, he interviewed Ojibwe elders and completed his classic History of the Ojibway People in 1853. (It was published by the Minnesota Historical Society in 1885.) Warren married Mathilda Aitken, daughter of the fur trader William and his Ojibwe wife. Warren was elected to the territorial legislature in 1850. Several important Ojibwe leaders lived in Crow Wing, including Curly Head, Hole in the Day and his father, and Strong Ground. Henry Rice negotiated with them for logging rights to their land, and logging became a significant industry in Crow Wing. In 1848, the U.S. Army established Fort Ripley nearby. Reflecting success in the fur trade, in 1849 Clement Beaulieu had a house built in the popular Greek Revival style. Father Francis Xavier Pierz established a Catholic mission in Crow Wing in 1852, later headed by Lovrenc Lavtižar. An Episcopal mission was built in 1856, and a Lutheran church soon after. Two events brought Crow Wing's heyday to a swift end. In