A pay cut prompted the 1889 Twin Cities streetcar strike
On April 11, 1889, six hundred Minneapolis streetcar drivers walked off the job. Three hundred St. Paul drivers and other workers struck the following morning.
Linda A. Cameron
A goodie idea: The history of Pearson’s Nut Goodie
The Nut Goodie’s annual revenues in the mid-1960s totaled nearly $3 million.
How Minnesota got to be a top turkey-producing state
In 1959, Minnesota received its first top ranking in turkey production in the U.S. with more than 13 million raised, a position it consistently holds. By 2016, annual production totaled 45 million birds raised by 450 growers on 600 farms.
Minnesota governors didn’t have an official residence until 1965
The Minnesota governor’s residence at 1006 Summit Avenue in St. Paul began as the home of the Horace Irvine family.
A bill for woman suffrage was passed by the Minnesota Legislature in 1870. It was vetoed
Senator William Lochren of Rochester protested that the governor could not legally veto a constitutional amendment bill. But an amendment vote never happened.
In 1885, Minneapolis was host to the American Woman Suffrage Association Convention
At the convention, AWSA President William Dudley Foulke delivered a powerful speech in which he reminded the assembly that “the just powers of government are derived from the consent of the governed,” a principle violated with the vote denied to female citizens.
During the 1980s farm crisis, Minnesota lost more than 10,000 farms
By 1982, 49 percent of the 11,000 farmers in Minnesota with Farmers Home Administration (FmHA) loans were in delinquency, and more than 300 farms faced foreclosure.
How the University of Minnesota ended up operating a showboat on the Mississippi for 50 years
Finding a paddleboat wasn’t easy.
For Minnesota farmers, the Roaring Twenties were anything but
Minnesota farmers’ gross cash income fell from $438 million in 1918 to $229 million in 1922. In 1932, it fell to $155 million.
The Capitol that nobody wanted: Minnesota’s short-lived second capitol building
The second capitol, completed in 1883, served as the seat of Minnesota state government for just ten years before state officials began planning a grander, more efficient capitol.
Minnesota’s first capitol building lasted about 30 years — until it burned down
The building was completed in 1853, four years after Minnesota became a state.
Power to the farmer: Minnesota and the Rural Electrification Administration
The program revolutionized life in rural Minnesota and across the country.
The making of Minnesota’s Metropolitan Stadium
Metropolitan Stadium — “the Met” — hosted Minnesota’s professional baseball, football, and soccer teams until the Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome replaced it in 1981.
Minnesota gained more than 123 million trees thanks to the Civilian Conservation Corps
Minnesota CCC projects centered mainly on forestry and state and national park projects.
The rise and fall of Northwest Airlines
In 1926, Northwest Airways, Inc. began carrying airmail between the Twin Cities and Chicago. It would grow to become a major international carrier.
Why the Quadriga sculpture at the state Capitol has pineapple wheels, and other fun facts
Architect Cass Gilbert commissioned Daniel Chester French, best known for the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., to create “The Progress of the State.”
For thirty years, electric streetcars ruled Twin Cities streets
Ridership of the electric lines peaked in 1920 with 238 million passengers, in spite of an increase in the fare from five to six cents.
Before the Twin Cities had streetcars, there were horsecars
Horse-drawn streetcars sparked the growth of what would become one of the most extensive streetcar systems in the country.
The birth of big ag: the Bonanza farms of the late 19th century
Geology, the Homestead Act of 1862, railroads, modern machinery, and revolutionary new flour-milling methods all contributed to the bonanza farm boom.
John Francis (J. Frank) Wheaton was the first African American to serve in Minnesota’s legislature
A target of racial prejudice throughout his life, Wheaton believed in the political process as a means to improve the state’s civil rights laws.
