For 100 years, Minnesota's Xanadu Island has enchanted visitors, including a US president

OTTER TAIL COUNTY, Minn. -- Have you ever wanted to have an island all to yourself? Well, now you can do exactly that in Otter Tail County. Guests from across the country, and even a former U.S. president, have visited Xanadu Island.

"A lot of local people do not know about this island at all, whatsoever," Nicole Reinan said.

When you think about island living, palm trees, and white, sandy beaches come to mind. But for visitors who flock to the Hideaway at Xanadu Island, this might be even better.

"It looked like magic. It looked like Xanadu. That's what it looked like. Yeah," guest Jackie Barnes said.

The name Xanadu is mentioned in a poem by romanticist Samuel Taylor Coleridge, where he describes it as a happy and peaceful place. J.C. Jones loved that poem and gave the island its name. He was a lawyer from Missouri, best known for keeping the St. Louis Cardinals baseball team in St. Louis.

"They were going to leave St. Louis. Him and a couple of his buddies got together and purchased the team," Reinan said.

While vacationing on Elbow Lake in 1921, Jones and his wife got an idea.

"And he asked to the farmer across the bay, 'Can I buy this island? I want to own it.' He's like, 'It's not farmable land, why would you want to own it?' He said, 'I'm gonna build a fishing shack,'" Reinan said.

That fishing shack is actually a big house. Today, Reinan and her family own Xanadu, and they've done their best to keep up with the Joneses.

"Everything is how it was in photos that we have from 100 years ago," she said.

They've also made discoveries, like a hidden door where Jones kept his booze during Prohibition. One of his employees was responsible for hiding it.

"And he was small enough that he'd be able to open this up and crawl down into this space and hide the alcohol down here," Reinan said.  

Xanadu is also home to an event center called "The Barn," where weddings and reunions are held. And guests can stay in four other cabins, including the "Front Porch Cabin" and the "Cozy Cabin." The latter has a sleeping porch that was rebuilt this spring after it was torn down decades ago.

Thirty-nine people can sleep comfortably at one time on the four-acre island. And they've had a famous guest or two over the years, including Woodrow Wilson.

"There's documentation that we have, the guestbook disappeared, we don't know where the guestbook went, but yes. Woodrow Wilson stayed here," Reinan said.

From the former president to the present day, renting the entire island means you get it as it is -- boats, canoes, the whole shebang. Some families have been coming here for half a century. This is the 12th straight year for Barnes and her family, who drove from Jamestown, North Dakota.

"It's perfect. It's a quiet lake," Barnes said.

Just like it was 100 years ago, it's an island vibe in the middle of Minnesota.

"We really want to highlight the history and how things were 100 years ago," Reinan said. "We've had families come the same week every summer for over 60 years. So, my longest customer is 68 years old and he's been here 60 summers."

Legend has it there is a five-carat diamond ring somewhere at the bottom of Elbow Lake which surrounds Xanadu Island. A guest of Jones lost it while visiting.

These days there is a narrow road that leads to Xanadu, so some people call it a peninsula, though the Reinans prefer calling it an island.