INTERNATIONAL FALLS, the county seat, founded as Koochiching village in the township of this name, was platted in April 1895 by teacher and preacher L. A. Ogaard for the Koochiching Company and named Koochiching; it was incorporated as a village on August 10, 1901, consumed by fire on June 15, 1902, and when rebuilt changed its name to International Falls; it was incorporated as a city in 1909. Its name notes its location on the international boundary at the Koochiching Falls of Rainy River. The descent of the river there, in broken rapids on irregularly jutting ledges of granitoid gneiss, was 23 feet, mainly within a distance of about 300 feet, but a dam close above the falls, completed in 1908, increased their head to 26 feet, raising the river to the level of Rainy Lake and permitting the lake steamboats to come to this city. Before the stream was thus used for its waterpower, operating the great paper mills of International Falls, the plentiful mists and spray of the falls, which nearly always formed a rainbow in the sunshine, well accounted for the aboriginal origin of the names of Rainy Lake and River.