Where is I-335?
The federal government granted approval for a 2.74 mile auxiliary Interstate route named I-335 in October 1964. in 1970 the Minneapolis City Council approved the plans for the road and began purchasing right-of-way. Interstate 335, called the North Ring was planned to connect I-35W and I-94 north of the city to provide better access to [...]
The Oldest House in Minnesota
Located lass than a thirty minute drive from downtown Minneapolis or downtown St. Paul is the forgotten little hamlet of Mendota. The town was one of the first permanent settlements and the first stone house in the state of Minnesota, being founded around the same time as Fort Snelling. Mendota is still home to the [...]
S. C. Gale house on Marquette Then and Now
Samuel C. Gale was born September 15th, 1827, at Royalston, Massachusetts. He apprenticed to learn the tanner’s trade until 17 years of age. He studied at the academies of New Salem, Shelburne Falls, and West Brattleboro, Vermont and graduated from Yale in 1854. Gale went on to attend Harvard law school one year and taught [...]
The Irwin Building Then and Now
Built in in 1923, the Irwin has long been home to a variety of professional services and retailers. The Calhoun School of Music occupied Room 206 in 1930. Thomas Jewel Box had a shop on the ground floor from the mid 1940s through the early 1960s. Another tenant, Don’s Men’s Store was a popular destination [...]
The Work of Government Demands Thiem Effiency
Back in the early years of the last century In St. Paul a firm known as the was beginning to make an engine which looked very good. It had a carburetor instead of a mixing valve an excellent compactness of design and a ball-bearing weight shaft. Thiem motorcycle were fairly popular but they weren’t [...]
Witt’s Then and Now
Here’s a depression era photograph of Witt’s Meat Market on 22nd and Hennepin. Witt’s was the major grocery store in Minneapolis for decades. Witt’s began as a pioneer in the meat business back in 1888. In 1940 they opened their 6th store Central Avenue Northeast. The flagship was on Hennepin Avenue in downtown Minneapolis. To [...]
The Susan S. Welch Residence Then and Now
Sitting proud on the corner of Dayton and Avon, this lovely Greek Templed Mini-Mansion was built in 1865 as a winter home for Thomas and Susan Welch. Born in Ireland in 1828, Thomas came to Henderson, Minnesota in 1853 and was married to Susan S. Segers in 1857. The marriage helped him to obtain [...]
Mammoth, Modern, Munsingwear, Minneapolis
Built in 1905, the International Market Square building was modeled after the San Francisco Design Center. Initially, the structure served as the manufacturing facility for Northwestern Knitting. It later housed the headquarters for Munsingwear Inc., a business that transformed the garment industry with its union suit. Munsingwear launched the Original Penguin golf shirt in [...]
Tri-state Telephone and Telegraph Company Then and Now
The Tri-State Telephone & Telegraph Company was a major competitor of Northwestern Bell Telephone. In 1918, in order to stop an expensive competitive battle, Northwestern Bell Telephone and the Tri-State agreed to divide the state of Minnesota in half and stay out of each other’s way. St. Paul was to be served by the [...]
The Marshall Avenue Bridge
The current Marshall Avenue Bridge replaced an old wrought-iron span erected for horse and buggy traffic in 1889. The previous bridge was designed by J.S. Sewall of St. Paul. Built on three stone piers the old bridge had hinges at each end and in the crown of each arch to allow for expansion and contraction [...]
The Best Ideas are more Exciting in Concrete
The Northwestern National Life Insurance was built on a patch that was once Bridge Square and the site of Minneapolis’ first city hall. The building created quite a stir when it went up in 1964. Minoru Yamasaki is probably better remembered for his design of the World Trade Center, but his white, eighty foot high [...]
Augsburg’s Old Main Then and Now
In the 1870s, the Conference for the Norwegian-Danish Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, also known as “the Conference” called two men to serve as professors at Augsburg Seminary. Sven Oftedal began in 1873, and Georg Sverdrup in 1874. These guys ended up defining the institution and its supporting congregations for the next thirty years or [...]
Saint Paul’s Minnehaha Park
In 1893 the Minneapolis Park Board approved the construction of two pedestrian bridges “of a rustic nature” over the creek, one above the falls and the other below. The next year the board had a parapet wall built north of the falls to protect spectators. During the Great Depression federal work relief crews added a [...]
Minnehaha Paths and Parkway
In 1897 the park board built a popular bike path along side most of Minnehaha Creek. They even went so far as to shave down the steep hill on the parkway near Lyndale Avenue to make it less strenuous for long skirted cyclists. In 1903 automobiles were already puttering along the parkway at the park [...]
In my opinion for quantity, price and taste…
The great Timothy Kerr of late-night funny commercial fame including this Chef Cafe classic. Watch him chowing down the chicken wings while his double continues the pitch. It’s unlikely fuzzy UHF Channel 23 never would ever have made it without Timothy D. Kerr’s ad dollar. KTMA made it into the digital age, [...]
