By Tom Hintgen

Otter Tail County Correspondent

Victor George Lundeen, founder of Victor Lundeen Company in Fergus Falls and lifetime Fergus Falls resident, spent time on Fish Lake and then Otter Tail Lake during the 1920s. He purchased a cabin on 300 feet of shoreline at Otter Tail Lake in 1942 and began a love for sailing.  

The lake was ideal for sailing, stretching 10 miles from east to west and 3-1/2 miles from north to south.  Lundeen was a good friend of Cyrus Field, another avid sailor.

Victor’s sons Ed, David and Buzz all learned to sail on “the Old Lightning,” an orange 19-foot-long monohull sailboat. The Lightning sailboat was first built in 1938, one of the most popular one-design sailing vessels in the United States.

Sailboat races on Otter Tail Lake began in the 1930s and became more popular as more people purchased sailboats for enjoyment on area lakes.

Ed, David and their cousin, Bill Lundeen, all became interested in racing the Lightning sailboat.  Over the years races became more prevalent at the parks around Otter Tail Lake, Amor Park on the north and Highway Park on the south. All classes of boats were welcomed and the Lundeen passion for sailboat racing took hold.

In succeeding years Ed and Bill raced Lightning, C scow, D scow and finally Ed, his son Dan and other Lundeen relatives raced Hobie Cats in the 1970s. All of them won sailing race trophies.  

“Races were more organized starting in the 1970s with the development of the Otter Tail Lake Yacht Club,” said Dan who resides near Washington, D.C.

  Races were held Memorial Day, the Fourth of July and Labor Day. Hobie Cats became the dominant class and competitors came from different lakes to race because Hobies were more easily trailered and launched from lake to lake.  

There are no longer sailboat races on Otter Tail Lake, most likely ending in the 1980s. “Sailing seems to be waning on the Upper Midwest lakes,” Dan said.

Dan still sails a Hobie Cat 14 every summer when he visits the same 1942 Lundeen cabin on the north side of Otter Tail Lake. He and his family have lived in the Washington, D.C., area for 30 years after living in California. Dan is a Macalester College graduate who worked in asset management. 

His late father Ed started Hobie Cat Sales in the 1970s and introduced Hobie Cat sailboats to the region. He sold, delivered and raced Hobie catamarans all around lakes country and introduced his own family to the joy of sailing.  His nephews, Max and Ned, became avid Hobie Cat sailors and competed in several races. 

Ed was commodore of the Otter Tail Lake Yacht Club, coordinating races on Otter Tail Lake for many years. His nephew, Ned Whittemore, also served as Commodore and continued the racing tradition.   

Ed and his wife, Ione, went on sailing adventures with other couples in the Caribbean Sea where they would captain and sail for weeks. Ed even took his own family on a self-guided sailing trip in the Caribbean in the early 1970s.  

Dan developed into a successful racer, skippering Hobie Cat 16s in more than 25 races from 1975 to 1983. He and his crew placed first in more than 70 percent of their races and competed on many lakes in Minnesota.  Dan raced with his father, his friends Ted Glasoe, Jono Ness, Scott Deibert and several of his cousins including Emily, Susan and Jack Whittemore.  

Harper Lundeen-Hetland, daughter of Eric Lundeen, granddaughter of Mary Lundeen and the late David Lundeen, and great-granddaughter of Victor Lundeen, continues the family tradition by sailing on Otter Tail Lake and Lake Minnetonka.

Harper’s mother, Karen, and her grandmother are both avid Wayzata sailors. Harper’s Wayzata Yacht Club team recently won the Sears Cup, a U.S. championship held in San Diego Bay.