Hugo
Hugo, originally Oneka, was settled in the early 1850s. Most of the population was and is French and French Canadian. In 1949, people were still speaking French fluently and some of the old French customs were still followed.
Oneka township was organized in 1870. It took its name from Oneka Lake, located near the center of the township. The name comes from the Dakota word “onakan,” which means "to strike or knock off,” as rice into a canoe. Nearby Rice Lake was once the resort of Dakota Indians who came from Mendota every summer to gather the wild rice, which they sold in St. Paul.
In 1856 the early settlers surveyed and platted land on Oneka Lake giving this town the name of Washington. Like many paper towns of those days, Washington never developed. The village of Hugo was established originally because the old Lake Superior and Mississippi Railroad (later the Northern Pacific) bypassed the village of Centerville, three miles west in Anoka County. The Post Office gave it the name of Centerville Station in 1874.
Francoise Klaen Kuchli came to America in 1853, along with her husband and brothers Joseph and Jacob Klaen – all natives of France. They settled first in Michigan, but by1872 Francoise and her husband had made their way to Minnesota. They established a store, hotel, and "sample room" at Centerville Station, the first business establishments in the village. By 1888 the village had a hotel, store and school.
In 1906, the original village limits were surveyed and platted. However, there was some confusion at the Post Office when delivering mail, between Centerville in Anoka County and Centerville Station in Washington Counny, and it was requested that the village be incorporated under a different name. The name Hugo was said to have been proposed by Michael Houle after the name "Houle" was rejected by the village.
Why Hugo? Some say it was named after the famous French author Victor Hugo, and others that it was named after Trevanion William Hugo, who was chief engineer of the Consolidated Elevator Co. in Duluth and former Duluth mayor (1900-1904), and who likely had ties to the railroad..
The first settler of the area was Lewis Semper who came in the fall of 1855. He and his family only remained for one year, selling out to Fred Jungblut. John Chester and Favette Tainter came soon after for the purpose of locating claims and putting up hay. They opened up a stock farm. Joseph (or John) Freeman was another early settler. Other early names are Dunn, Barnum, Hatch and Beecroft. The first road, connecting the settlement with St. Paul, was established in 1869.
By 1883 the village consisted of about four or five families. That year the Piette family settled there and set up the first blacksmith shop.
After the railroad came through Hugo, many early families made their living, at least in part, by cutting wood and hauling it to the railroad in winter. All the trains stopped here to refuel, and as the railroad heavily depended on wood, the Inter-State Lumber Company opened in Hugo in the early 1900s. A telephone office was established in 1905 and a bank organized in 1910.
Another large industry in Hugo is the Hugo Feed Mill, which was built in 1917.
There were two separate school districts at one time: Hugo and Oneka. The first school in the area opened in 1868, a year after the Hugo school district was established, with Ruth Miller as the first teacher. A new school was built in the 1900s, but by 1957, the district was absorbed into the White Bear Lake School district. Withrow Elementary was built in the southeast corner of the township.
The first church in the area was St. John the Baptist Church. Before that, people went to Centerville for church. Traeger's Restaurant was established in Hugo's early days and became a popular stopping place for travelers as well as a local night club. The restaurant and motel have since passed through several hands. In the late 1900s other businesses were established along the Highway 61 corridor, but for the most part Hugo has remained agricultural and is home to many horse farms.
The southwest corner of Hugo contains a portion of Bald Eagle Lake, which straddles the Anoka, Washington and Ramsey county borders. Development began around the lake in the 1880s. Shadyside, a ten-block area, was laid out adjacent to the railroad tracks on the shore of the lake in Oneka. Resort hotels sprang up to accommodate vacationers coming out from St. Paul. There has been some limited suburban development in the southern part of the city. New development is going in along Frenchman Road (Main Street) near the Interstate.
In 1972, Oneka township was incorporated into the city of Hugo. A new city hall was built in 2001.