Longtime Gunflint Lodge owner Bruce Kerfoot dies at 85

Bruce Kerfoot, whose family name has been tied to the area just shy of the Canadian border on the edge of the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness for nearly a century, died in his sleep Wednesday in his Missouri home, according to family. He was 85.

Kerfoot and his wife Sue were the longtime owners of the Gunflint Lodge & Outfitters, a four-season destination resort on Gunflint Lake where Bruce grew up and lived much of his life. He was a local force, his presence in a room always obvious, according to those who knew him. He offered support to new business owners, was a colorful storyteller, and could serve up a lunch of three different kinds of fish cooked three different ways. He took lead on local causes — like resources for the local rescue squad and a museum sharing the story of the region.

“He cared a lot about his community,” said Lee Kerfoot, his youngest son.

And the community was woven into his DNA, his son said: The white pines, the Gunflint Trail, the lakes of the BWCAW, the portages, the boulders, the people who live there and the people who visit.

Justine Kerfoot, his mother, left behind her big city life near Chicago for the small resort during the Great Depression. She spent about 60 years onsite and served as a fishing guide, plumber, vehicle mechanic and moose hunter. She also wrote books and newspaper columns about life in the north woods and is considered a pioneer of this area.

According to lore, she once led a hunting group when she was eight months pregnant.

Bruce and Sue Kerfoot took over the lodge, 45 miles from Grand Marais on the Gunflint Trail, in the 1960s and brought innovation. Linda Jurek, executive director of Visit Cook County, described him as a catalyst — one of the first resort owners to bring in international students for summer help.

Kerfoot was ready to sell the resort in 2013 and a seller came along in 2016. He stuck around to ease the transition and new owner John Fredrikson described him as supportive in this period — even in the face of ideas that had been tried and dismissed years ago.

“There’s a fair amount of stuff we’ve digested over the years,” Kerfoot told the Star Tribune at the time of the sale. “It’ll take a while to pick all of it out of me.”

In recent years, he and Sue have spent summers in Minnesota and then traveled back to Missouri to be close to family for the rest of the year.

Visitors love to drop in and talk about Justine Kerfoot or Bruce Kerfoot or the years they spent working at the lodge, Fredrikson said. He’s found that Bruce’s energy seemingly matched that of his mother, who died in 2001 when she was 94.

“He was one of those people that was able to get stuff done more easily or better than other people,” Fredrikson said. “Maybe because of who he was, or maybe because the stars align for this kind of person.”

In a social media post, Kerfoot’s family said they had peace knowing he and his mother “were paddling together to their shore lunch spot.”

Mark Hennessy knew Kerfoot for 40 years, but has had a closer view for the past three years. He said without Kerfoot, the Chik-Wauk Museum and Nature Center, located near the end of the Gunflint Trail, wouldn’t exist. Whenever there was a work project, the executive director said, Kerfoot would show up.

“Including this summer on the hottest most miserable day of the year,” Hennessy said of a gig replacing a boardwalk trail.

In 2022, Gunflint Lodge’s first cabin where Justine Kerfoot had long lived was destroyed in a fire. It was the oldest cabin on the property. At the time, Bruce Kerfoot told the Star Tribune that the loss of the cabin grabbed “at his roots a little bit.” It had been built by his parents from aspen logs from their own land, the basement dug by Justine, and had the novelty of indoor plumbing.

A new event space is being built at the site and stones from Justine Kerfoot’s cabin will be incorporated into its fireplace, alongside a carved quote from her works and her signature, according to Hennessy. It should be completed next year —in time for a celebration the Gunflint Lodge’s 100th year.