Otter Tail County, Minnesota Genealogy

United States

Minnesota

Otter Tail County

Guide to Otter Tail County, Minnesota ancestry, family history, and genealogy birth records, marriage records, death records, census records, family history, and military records.

Minnesota Online Genealogy Records

Otter Tail County, Minnesota
Map
Location in the state of Minnesota
Location of Minnesota in the U.S.
Facts
Founded	March 18, 1858
County Seat	Fergus Falls
Courthouse
Address	Otter Tail County Courthouse 121 W Junis Avenue Fergus Falls, MN 56537 Phone: 218.739.2271 Otter Tail County Website

County Information

Description

The County was named for Otter Tail Lake and Otter Tail River. The County is located in the west central area of the state.

Otter Tail County, Minnesota Record Dates

Known Beginning Dates for Major County Records
Birth*	Marriage	Death*	Court	Land	Probate	Census
1870	1869	1870	1872	1867	1872	1836
Statewide registration started for births in 1900 and deaths in 1908. General compliance by 1915.

County Courthouse

Clerk Deeds Court has:

• Birth and death records from 1870
• Marriage records from 1869
• Divorce records from 1897
• Probate and court records from 1872

History

Parent County

• 1858--Otter Tail County was created 18 March 1858 from Cass and Pembina (Old) Counties  County seat: Fergus Falls
• For a brief history of Otter Tail County's name, click here, then select Otter Tail County.

Record Loss

There is no known history of courthouse disasters in this county.

Places/Localities

Populated Places

For a complete list of populated places, including small neighborhoods and suburbs, visit HomeTown Locator. The following are the most historically and genealogically relevant populated places in this county:

Cities
Battle Lake Bluffton Clitherall Dalton Deer Creek Dent Elizabeth Erhard	Fergus Falls Henning New York Mills Ottertail Parkers Prairie Pelican Rapids Perham Richville	Rothsay Underwood Urbank Vergas Vining Wadena
Unincorporated communities
Butler Carlisle Dunvilla Heinola	Luce Parkton Richdale Topelius	Wall Lake Woodland Park Wrightstown
Townships
Aastad Amor Aurdal Blowers Bluffton Buse Butler Candor Carlisle Clitherall Compton Corliss Dane Prairie Dead Lake Deer Creek Dora Dunn Eagle Lake Eastern Edna Effington	Elizabeth Elmo Erhards Grove Everts Fergus_Falls Folden Friberg Girard Gorman Henning Hobart Homestead Inman Leaf Lake Leaf Mountain Lida Maine Maplewood Newton Nidaros Norwegian Grove	Oak Valley Orwell Oscar Otter Tail Otto Paddock Parkers Prairie Pelican Perham Pine Lake Rush Lake Scambler St. Olaf Star Lake Sverdrup Trondhjem Tordenskjold Tumuli Western Woodside

Neighboring Counties

• Becker
• Clay
• Douglas
• Grant
• Todd
• Wadena
• Wilkin

Resources

Cemeteries

Tombstone Transcriptions Online	Tombstone Transcriptions in Print	List of Cemeteries in the county
Findagrave.com	Family History Library	Findagrave.com
USGenWeb	WorldCat	Billion Graves
MNGenWeb Archives		FamilySearch Places
Tombstone Project
Billion Graves
See Minnesota Cemeteries for more information.

Census

Historical populations
Census	Pop.	%±
1860	240	—
1870	1,968	720.0%
1880	18,675	848.9%
1890	34,232	83.3%
1900	45,375	32.6%
1910	46,036	1.5%
1920	50,818	10.4%
1930	51,006	0.4%
1940	53,192	4.3%
1950	51,320	−3.5%
1960	48,960	−4.6%
1970	46,097	−5.8%
1980	51,937	12.7%
1990	50,714	−2.4%
2000	57,159	12.7%
2010	57,303	0.3%
Source: "Wikipedia.org".

State Census

• 1865 - Minnesota State Census, 1865 at FamilySearch — index and images
• 1885 - Minnesota State Census, 1885 at FamilySearch — index and images
• 1905 - Minnesota State Census, 1905 at FamilySearch — index and images

Church

Most church records are held by individual churches. For contact information, check a phone directory, such as SearchBug or Dex Knows. Some denominations are gathering their records into a central repository. For more information about these major repositories, see Minnesota Church Records.

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

Church Ward and Branch Records

• Fergus Falls

Lutheran

Aurdal Lutheran Church, Underwood

• Records of the Aurdal Lutheran Church, Underwood, in Evangelical Lutheran Church in America database at Archives.com ($).

Fergus Falls

• Records of the American Lutheran Church, Fergus Falls, in Evangelical Lutheran Church in America database at Archives.com ($).

Grace Lutheran Church, Erhard

• Records of the Grace Lutheran Church, Erhard, in Evangelical Lutheran Church in America database at Archives.com ($).

North Immanuel Lutheran Church, Pelican Rapids

• Records of the North Immanuel Lutheran Church, Pelican Rapids, in Evangelical Lutheran Church in America database at Archives.com ($).

South Immanuel Lutheran Church, Rothsay

• Records of the South Immanuel Lutheran Church, Rothsay, in Evangelical Lutheran Church in America database at Archives.com ($).

Trifoldinghed Lutheran Church

• Records of the Trifoldinghed Lutheran Church, Otter Tail County, in Evangelical Lutheran Church in America database at Archives.com ($).

Trinity Lutheran Church, Pelican Rapids

• Records of the Trinity Lutheran Church, Pelican Rapids, in Evangelical Lutheran Church in America database at Archives.com ($).

United Norwegian Lutheran Church, Underwood

• Records of the United Norwegian Lutheran Church, Underwood, in Evangelical Lutheran Church in America database at Archives.com ($).

List of Churches and Church Parishes

• FamilySearch Places
  

Emigration and Immigration

• 1912 - 1956 - Minnesota Passenger and Crew Lists, 1912-1956 at FamilySearch — index and images

Land

The county register of deeds keeps land records once the land was transferred to private ownership. Abstracts and indexes for these records are generally available at the county courthouse.

Land records for Minnesota are listed in the Place Search of the FamilySearch Catalog under:

MINNESOTA, Otter Tail – LAND AND PROPERTY

Local Histories

Local histories are available for Otter Tail County, Minnesota Genealogy. County histories may include biographies, church, school and government history, and military information. For more information about local histories, see the wiki page section Minnesota Local Histories.

• John W. Mason, ed. History of Otter Tail County, Minnesota : its people, industries and institutions, with biographical sketches of representative citizens and genealogical records of many of the old families. Indianapolis : B. F. Bowen, 1916
  
• Tweton, Jerome D. The New Deal: At the Grass Roots. St. Paul, MN: Minnesota Historical Society Press, 1988. Print.

Maps

Click a neighboring county
for more resources

• FamilySearch Places:Cities and Towns- How to Use FS Places
• Family Maps of Otter Tail County, Minnesota Genealogy (land patent maps) at HistoryGeo.com ($). Free surname search.

Military

Military History:

Listing of individuals from this county for these wars:

• World War 1
• World War II 
• Korean War
• Vietnam War

World War II

• 1940-1945 - Minnesota, World War II Draft Registration Cards,1940-1947 at FamilySearch — index and images

Naturalization and Citizenship

• 1872-1962 - Minnesota Naturalization Records and Indexes, 1872-1962 at FamilySearch — index

Newspapers

Additional newspapers abstracts can sometimes be found using search phrases such as Otter Tail County, Minnesota Genealogy newspapers in online catalogs like:

• WorldCat
• FamilySearch. Do a Otter Tail County, Minnesota Genealogy Place-name search for these and other records in the FamilySearch Catalog (For instructions see, FamilySearch Catalog Place-name Search).

Obituaries

• 1865 - 2006 - Minnesota Obituaries 1865-2006 at FamilySearch— index and images

Probate

Probate records may include, wills, bonds, petitions, accounts, inventories, administrations, orders, decrees, and distributions. They may include the decedent’s date of death, names of his or her spouse, children, parents, siblings, in-laws, etc. See Minnesota Probate Records for additional information.

Online Probate Records

• 1801 - 1999 Minnesota Wills and Probate Records 1801-1999 at Ancestry.com — index and images $

Taxation

Minnesota tax records complement land records and can be used in place of censuses before 1820 or to supplement the years between censuses. Because only persons who owned taxable property were listed, many residents were not included in tax lists. There may also be gaps of several years in the tax records of some counties. For more information, see the wiki page Minnesota Taxation.

Vital Records

Vital Records consist of births, adoptions, marriages, divorces, and deaths recorded on registers, certificates, and documents.

A copy or an extract of most original records can be purchased from the Minnesota State Registrar of Vital Records, the County Clerk's office of the county where the event occurred], order electronically online ($) or download an application for Minnesota Birth Certificate and Death Certificates Applications to mail.

See also Minnesota Vital Records or How to order Minnesota Vital Records. For information about restrictions and costs for certificates, see the CDC Where to Write for Vital Records site.

Birth

• 1900-1934 Minnesota, Birth Index, 1900-1934 at MyHeritage($) — index

Marriage

• 1850-2019 WEB: Minnesota, Marriages from the Minnesota Official Marriage System, 1850-2019 at Ancestry($) — index
• 1860 - 1949 Minnesota, County Marriages, 1860-1949 at FamilySearch — index and images
• 1976-2003 Minnesota, Marriages, 1976-2003 at MyHeritage($) — index

Death

• 1850-2001 - Minnesota, County Deaths, 1850-2001 at FamilySearch — index and images
• 1887-2001 - Minnesota Deaths, 1887-2001 at FamilySearch — index and images
• Online Minnesota Death Records & Indexes

• 1904-2001 Minnesota, Death Index, 1904-2001 at MyHeritage($) — index

Societies and Libraries

Otter Tail County Genealogical Society
1110 W. Lincoln Avenue
Fergus Falls, MN 56537
Telephone: 218-736-6038
E-mail:otchs@prtel.com
Website

Northwest Minnesota Historical Center
Livingston Lord Library
Moorhead State University
Moorhead, MN 56560

Family History Centers

Family History Centers provide one-on-one assistance and free access to premium genealogical websites. In addition, many centers have free how-to genealogy classes.

• For current information about a center near you, go to the Family History Center Map
• Introduction to Family History Centers

Websites

• Otter Tail County, MN Genealogy Forum (GenForum)
• FamilySearch Catalog
• Otter Tail County Genealogy (Minnesota Genealogy)