In 1879 the first settlers to come to the Fertile area were Knute Nelson and his brother Einar Nelson, together with their uncle Lars A. Bolstad. These men had emigrated from Evanger, Voss, Norway. After a short sojourn in southern Minnesota, they arrived in Polk County on May 13, 1879. These pioneers went directly to Crookston’s U.S. Land Office and returned to their claims on May 17, 1879. A few days later in June, Askeld Olsen Morvig and his brother Anders Olsen Morvig, together with Jacob Hanson Aldal, also from Voss and Bergen, arrived at the Fertile area and took homesteads next to one another, just slightly east of Jacob Aldal’s claim and Knute Nelson’s homestead.

From June 1879 well into 1880, people began to quickly take up homesteads in and around the Fertile area. One of the early settlers was Thomas Johnson Lensegrav and his family, who took a homestead near the Sandhill River. Another of the early settlers was Otto Kankel, a miller by profession, who had begun flour and grist mills at Fergus Falls, Elizabeth and Faith. He finally purchased some property on the Sandhill River just south of present day Fertile, where he built a flour and grist mill and later a grand home next to his mill. He had purchased this land from
Thomas Johnson Lensegrav.