Memorial Day Buffet at the Mendota VFW
On Memorial Day I met a friend for a bike ride. We rode Minnehaha Parkway to the river, followed East River Road to 35E over to Mendota Heights and followed a gorgeous river trail that took us right downtown Mendota. By then we were ready to stop for a beer. Axel’s was closed, Lucky’s was [...]
The New York Life Eagle Then and Now
Built in 1889, Saint Paul’s New York Life Insurance rose 171 feet above Minnesota Street. The neo-classical and flemish office building was originally three bays wide to the north and two bays wide to the south. In 1931 an addition to the south balanced things out. The building was demolished in 1967 to make way [...]
Unideli at United Noodle
In college I used to live near United Noodle, a Cub Foods-sized Asian grocer on Minnehaha and 24th. Often I was the only white person in the store and it amused me the Asian owners spoke Spanish with the staff. I realize how ethnocentric and even egocentric saying something like that is. But [...]
Butler Square’s Great Glass Elevators
In the Seventies I spent at least a couple weekends a year with my mother at Art Fairs all over the Twin Cities. I still remember the feeling I used to get after the booth was all set up and Mom unfolded her little yellow lawn chair. It was like somebody had just turned over [...]
In the Courtyard at the Curtis
FREE TELEVISION IN EVERY ROOM TWO HEATED SWIMMING POOLS AAA APPROVED This large hotel and apartment complex occupied most of a downtown block between 1903 and 1984. The hotel tower and apartment hotel tower flanked two of the low-rise Curtis Court Apartments. With 800 rooms, the Curtis billed itself as the largest hotel in the [...]
