Owatonna

Owatonna takes its name from the Dakota name for the Straight River, which runs north through the prairie and joins the Cannon River at Faribault. The river valley lies within Dakota country, a landscape of grassland, lakes and wooded streams. Before the town arose, Indigenous people used the area for hunting, and Rice Lake was a place of seasonal encampment where wild rice was harvested. The river in turn joins a network of waterways leading east to the Mississippi.