A resource for reliable information about significant people, places, events, and things in Minnesota history.
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April 23
| 1857 |
Samuel Medary takes office as Minnesota's third and final territorial governor. He steps down thirteen months later when Minnesota becomes a state and Henry H. Sibley is elected governor. Medary would later become territorial governor of Kansas. He died in Columbus, Ohio, in 1864. |
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| 1881 |
A group of Belgian settler-colonists, led by Angelus Van Hee, arrives at Grandview in Lyon County. The village is renamed Ghent in honor of the group, which had been invited to the state by Bishop John Ireland. |
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| 1897 |
The state government allocates $5,000 to open the Gillette State Hospital for Crippled Children in St. Paul. Named for Dr. Arthur J. Gillette, it is the first state-funded hospital of its kind in the nation. |
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| 1992 |
Governor Arne H. Carlson signs the HealthRight bill into law. Providing medical insurance for low-income Minnesotans, the program is now known as MinnesotaCare. |
 The Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party Feminist Caucus was founded in 1973 to advocate for feminist positions on issues like poverty among women, abortion, and the Equal Rights Amendment. Its members lobbied the Minnesota State Legislature, endorsed candidates, and produced a US Senate candidate of their own in 1984. |
 The Church of St. Columba in St. Paul’s Hamline-Midway neighborhood is the only Minnesota work by the Chicago architect Francis Barry Byrne. Architectural historian and critic Larry Millett calls it “a high point of modern church architecture in the Twin Cities.” |
Made possible by the Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund through the vote of Minnesotans on November 4, 2008. Administered by the Minnesota Historical Society.
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