Platted December 2, 1892 and filed December 16, 1892, the Village of Leal coincided with the arrival of the ''Soo" Line Railroad. Leal is a Scottish word meaning faithful, true, or the land of the faithful.

Leal was platted by the Minnesota Loan and Trust Corporation, a subsidiary of the "Soo" Line Railroad. Its first settlers came from the inland community of Uxbridge. A school house was moved to the site from east of the townsite, and here the Union Sunday School of the former Uxbridge met.

By 1905 Leal boasted a bank, meat market, machine shop, blacksmith shop, livery stable, grain elevators, a flour mill, cream station, hotel and cafe, pool hall, barber shop and two general stores. Its boom period came between 1905 and 1920, as for many other small towns of Barnes County.

A village government was organized in 1911 and incorporated as a city in 1968.

A live community, Leal, despite the usual reverses suffered by all rural towns, has a large elevator complex, a new Rural Fire Hall, a County Maintenance Shed and the extensive remodeling of homes and other buildings during the recent years.

Source: Barnes County History 1976 Page 286