Penumbra Theatre: one of the premier legacy Black theaters in the United States
The theater company is one of the few founded during the Black Arts Movement that survived into the twenty-first century.
Each week, MinnPost brings you a highlight of our state’s past from MNopedia, an encyclopedia of Minnesota history written by experts and produced by the Minnesota Historical Society.
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The theater company is one of the few founded during the Black Arts Movement that survived into the twenty-first century.
The plaque at the west entrance lists Frank X. Tewes, who supervised Clarence “Cap” Wigington, as the tower’s architect. Wigington’s initials on project drawings, however, provide evidence that he was its designer.
Before settler-colonists came to present-day Minnesota, Indigenous people understood variations in gender and sexuality in the contexts of their own languages and lifeways.
Born into slavery in 1852, Honeycutt set a course for himself that led from Civil War battlefields in Tennessee to freedom in the North.
One of Minnesota’s most popular nature areas, Gooseberry Falls was the first of eight state parks developed along Lake Superior’s North Shore.
On May 3, 1905, as she forged through a northeaster en route to Duluth, the crew lost its bearings and the ship was thrown against a reef near present-day Silver Bay.
On Nov. 6, 1906, President Theodore Roosevelt dishonorably discharged 167 Black infantrymen from their battalion at Fort Brown, Texas when they refused to falsely confess to participation in a Brownsville, Texas, riot three months earlier.
Its owner, W. H. C. Folsom, designed it to be both modest and a showcase of his well-established wealth.
Wards 1 and 3 in Northeast Minneapolis have been the center of the Twin Cities’ Ukrainian community since the late nineteenth century.
In 1918, Grand Marais was considered the center of the North Shore fishing industry, with 126 official licensed fishermen and an annual yield of 4,283,684 pounds of fish.
Women and girls made up around 20 percent of the fort’s population from the time of the first census in 1849 until at least 1900.
Clifford was relatively upfront about the operations at 147 Washington Street, since she operated her brothel within the St. Paul’s vice districts.
Linton helped discover a new mineral, improved the process for manufacturing asphalt and later supervised the women’s ward at the Rochester state hospital.
The war devastated people throughout south-central Minnesota.
Following passage of the Nineteenth Amendment in 1920, Moller continued her activism by advocating for the Equal Rights Amendment and women’s labor rights.
In the 1950s, Minnesota communities — like others across the United States — began to expand beyond the boundaries of city centers into newly formed suburbs. Suburban sprawl led to a widespread interest in preserving open spaces.
In January 1980, an estimated 800 people turned out on frozen Leech Lake for the first International Eelpout Festival to compete for the trophy awarded for the largest eelpout caught.
Wigington’s works include the Hamline and Minnehaha playground buildings, Harriet Island Pavilion and the Highland Park Water Tower.
Born to a wealthy family, Whiteman would go on to earn renown as a forger and con man.
One of Coyle’s biggest achievements was the 1991 passage of Minneapolis’s Domestic Partners Ordinance, which allowed same-sex and different-sex couples to register as domestic partners.