Pembina County, North Dakota


Pembina County is a county in the U.S. state of North Dakota. As of the 2020 census, the population was 6,844, and was estimated to be 6,588 in 2024, The county seat and the largest city is Cavalier. Pembina County is home to the Pembina Hills as well as Icelandic State Park and Lake Renwick which is 6 miles west of the city Cavalier.

History

For thousands of years, various indigenous peoples inhabited the area along the Pembina and Red rivers. At the time of European contact in the 16th century, the dominant tribes were the Assiniboine and the Lakota. The Ojibwe, also known as Chippewa, a branch of the Anishinaabe-speaking language group, gradually migrated west along both sides of the Great Lakes. They developed a long trading relationship with French trappers and colonists. Throughout the Red River of the North area, French trappers married Native American women, and their descendants continued to hunt and trap. A large mixed-race population developed, recognized as an ethnic First Nations group in Canada called the Métis. The Ojibwe and Métis generally supported the French forces during the Seven Years' War in the mid-eighteenth century against Great Britain.
With the British defeat of France and takeover of its colonial territory, the Chippewa learned to deal with a new trading culture. Armed with guns by trading and having adopted the horse from the Mandan and Hidatsa, by the end of the eighteenth century the Chippewa had migrated from woodlands to the Great Plains and begun to push the Lakota west before them. By the time of the War of 1812, the Ojibwe allied with the British against the United States, hoping to forestall European-American settlers' encroaching on their territory. With the settlement of the northern boundary with Canada, the Chippewa within the Dakota Territory were forced to deal with the United States. During the first half of the nineteenth century, the Chippewa had continued conflicts with the Lakota along the Red River, finally pushing them into present-day western North and South Dakota.
Father George Belcourt, a Catholic Jesuit missionary who served them, described their territory in 1849 as the following
We understand here, that the district or department called Pembina, comprises all of the country or basin which is irrigated or traversed by the tributaries of the Red River, south of the line of the 49th parallel of latitude. The prairies' rivers and lakes which extend to the height of land of the Mississippi, and the immense plains which feed innumerable herds of bison to the westward and from which the Chippewa and half breeds of this region obtain their subsistence, contains within their limits a country about 400 miles from north to south and more than five hundred miles from east to west.

The Métis used two-wheeled ox-drawn carts to transport furs to market along the Red River Trails, between what is now Winnipeg, Canada and Mendota or St. Paul, Minnesota. They also used ox-carts to transport food and shelter during extended buffalo hunts.
Over time, the Ojibwe were persuaded to cede much of their land by treaty to the US, which in turn sold it to homesteaders. They moved to relatively small Indian reservations within their earlier territory.
The precursor to Pembina County was a county of the same name in the Minnesota Territory, extending from the Upper Mississippi River to the western boundary of the territory. When Minnesota became a state in 1858, its western boundary was set at the Red River, and the land to its west was unorganized. A new Pembina County was established as part of the Dakota Territory in 1867. At the time it was a large territory, and in 1871 it was expanded to include much of the territory in what is now eastern North Dakota from Canada to the South Dakota border.
The Dakota Territory legislature created Pembina County on January 9, 1867, from previously unorganized territory. Its government was organized on August 12 of that same year. It was named for a Chippewa term for stab or stabbing. Pembina, the oldest European-American settlement in the future state, was the county seat. In 1911 the seat was relocated to Cavalier.
The county boundaries were altered in 1871, 1873, 1881, and 1887. It has retained its present boundaries since 1887. Between 1873 and 1881, eleven new counties were created from Pembina, including Cass County and Grand Forks County. Pembina took its current form in 1887, when Cavalier County was increased in size.
Icelandic State Park is located in Pembina County. The first Icelandic immigrant settlement in present-day North Dakota was in Pembina County in the late 1870s, when a colony of settlers from Iceland moved into the county from the New Iceland homesteads near Lake Winnipeg.
The first Icelandic settlements in what is now North Dakota were established in Pembina County in the late 1870s. Many of the immigrants came from New Iceland near Lake Winnipeg, along with other Icelanders who moved into the area from colonies in Wisconsin. The new settlers lived primarily in the so-called "Icelandic Townships" of Akra, Beaulieu, Gardar, and Thingwalla. The State Historical Society of North Dakota reported fewer than 3 or 4 non-Icelandic families living there in the early 1900s. Evidence of this heritage is found in several township and city names with Icelandic origins. Akra was named after the town of Akranes, near Reykjavík; Gardar was named for Gardar Svavarsson, who was reportedly the first Scandinavian to visit Iceland; and Hallsson was named for an early settler, Johann P. Hallson.
Icelandic State Park was established to preserve evidence of this early pioneer heritage.

Geography

Pembina County lies at the northeastern corner of North Dakota. Its northern boundary line abuts the southern boundary line of Canada and its eastern boundary line abuts the western boundary line of the state of Minnesota. The Pembina River flows eastward through the upper portion of the county, discharging into the Red River near the northeastern county corner. The Tongue River flows northeastward through the upper portion of the county, discharging into the Pembina shortly before the Pembina joins the Red River. The county terrain consists of rolling hills, etched by river drainages. The area is devoted to agriculture. The terrain slopes to the east and north; its highest point is on the lower western boundary line, at above sea level.
According to the United States Census Bureau, the county has a total area of, of which is land and is water. It is the 32nd largest county in North Dakota by total area. The lowest point in the state of North Dakota is located on the Red River of the North in Pembina Township in Pembina County, where it flows out of North Dakota and into the Canada–US border of Manitoba.

Major highways

Source:
As of the fourth quarter of 2024, the median home value in Pembina County was $123,544.
As of the 2023 American Community Survey, there are 2,959 estimated households in Pembina County with an average of 2.23 persons per household. The county has a median household income of $66,884. Approximately 8.9% of the county's population lives at or below the poverty line. Pembina County has an estimated 58.5% employment rate, with 22.9% of the population holding a bachelor's degree or higher and 91.9% holding a high school diploma.
The median age in the county was 45.5 years.
Pembina County, North Dakota – racial and ethnic composition
Race / ethnicity Pop. 1980Pop. 1990Pop. 2000Pop. 2010
White alone 10,188
8,978
8,058
6,947
6,096
Black or African American alone 5
14
12
21
27
Native American or Alaska Native alone 50
146
121
143
133
Asian alone 23
12
18
11
27
Pacific Islander alone ——0
2
0
Other race alone 7
1
4
3
22
Mixed race or multiracial ——108
96
296
Hispanic or Latino 126
87
264
190
243
Total10,399
9,238
8,585
7,413
6,844

2024 estimate

As of the 2024 estimate, there were 6,588 people and 2,959 households residing in the county. There were 3,492 housing units at an average density of. The racial makeup of the county was 93.0% White , 1.0% African American, 2.7% Native American, 0.6% Asian, 0.0% Pacific Islander, _% from some other races and 2.6% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino people of any race were 4.9% of the population.