A pollen record from Elk Lake reveals the character and timing of major vegetation changes in northwestern Minnesota for the past 11.6 ka, the past 10.4 ka of which are recorded by varves. Fossil pollen spectra are compared with modern pollen data to identify the closest analogues and thereby to infer past climatic changes. The late glacial Picea assemblage (ca. 11,638–10,000 varve yr) lacks an exact analogue in the modern vegetation; initially it compares most closely with modern samples from Manitoba and Saskatchewan and later it is most similar to samples from northeastern Canada. The Picea decline at Elk Lake occurs between 10,234 and 9984 varve yr. Within this interval, percentages of Larix, Juniperus, Betula, Quercus, Ulmus, and Fraxinus increase, but the pollen-accumulation rates of these and other taxa decline. The Pinus banksiana–resinosa assemblage (10,000–8500 varve yr) has its closest modern analogues in northern Wisconsin and implies warmer slightly drier conditions than before. The prairie period, with high percentages of Quercus, Gramineae, and Artemisia (8500–4400 varve yr), is First matched by surface samples from central and southern Minnesota, then from southern Saskatchewan, and later from southern and central Wisconsin and Minnesota. The change in the location of the analogues suggests gradually wetter conditions after 5723 varve yr. A Quercus-Ostrya assemblage (4400–3000 varve yr) has it modern counterparts in the conifer-hardwood forest of the southern Great Lakes region, where the climate is wetter than that of the prairie period. The Pinus strobus assemblage (3000 varve yr to present) marks the development of cooler moister conditions in the late Holocene. The Elk Lake chronology was converted to radiocarbon years to compare it with other pollen records from the midwestern United States. The Picea decline is registered as a time-transgressive event, although it occurred 1000 years earlier in the west than in the east. The late glacial Ulmus maxima and the middle Holocene prairie period appear to be synchronous across the region. Discrepancies in the timing of these events are attributed to radiocarbon dating errors, which are particularly severe in the western part of the region.