This Day in Minnesota History

August 1, 1870

The Lake Superior and Mississippi Railroad inaugurates rail travel between St. Paul and Duluth.

This Day in Minnesota History

August 1, 1989

Duluth holds its first Bayfront Blues Festival. Originally a small, one-day regional event, it has grown into one of the major blues festivals in the country, attracting fans from all over the world, hosting over 200 blues performers of national and regional acclaim, and growing in attendance from about 1,000 the first year to nearly 60,000 over a three-day period in 1998.

This Day in Minnesota History

August 1, 2007

The Interstate 35W bridge over the Mississippi River in Minneapolis collapses during the evening rush hour. Thirteen people are killed and 145 are injured.

This Day in Minnesota History

August 10, 1853

The Chicago Landverein, or land society, which eventually established the town of New Ulm, is formed by a group of German immigrants. At first, lawyers and preachers are banned from membership.

This Day in Minnesota History

August 10, 1887

The first edition of the Prison Mirror, the newspaper of the state penitentiary, is published. It inspired the creation of similar publications at other state institutions.

This Day in Minnesota History

August 10, 1909

Mailcarrier John Beargrease dies. Born in 1858, the son of an Ojibwe leader and a white woman, Beargrease grew up in Beaver Bay and delivered mail along the north shore of Lake Superior from 1887 to 1904, his route being Two Harbors to Grand Marais. On open water the trip took him three days by rowboat, and in the winter he used a dogsled.

This Day in Minnesota History

August 11, 1900

All thirteen of the cars in Minneapolis race from the Hennepin County courthouse to Wayzata to demonstrate to the county commissioners the need for better roads. Harry Wilcox arrives in Wayzata first, making the twelve-mile run in forty-two minutes.

This Day in Minnesota History

August 11, 1906

The statue Mississippi, Father of Waters is unveiled in Minneapolis City Hall. An allegorical representation of the Mississippi River, the statue was carved from a single block of marble by Larkin Goldsmith Mead and weighs almost 14,000 pounds.

This Day in Minnesota History

August 11, 1992

The Mall of America opens to a gala ceremony, an unexpected parking crunch, and an estimated 150,000 shoppers, who, as the Star Tribune would comment, "took a vacation from recession and bought." Standing on what was the site of Metropolitan Stadium, the "megamall" is the largest in the United States.

This Day in Minnesota History

August 14, 1830

The council house of the Indian Agency at St. Peters is destroyed by arson. Arsonists strike again on February 24, 1831, burning the agency home. Indian agent Lawrence Taliaferro was unpopular with corrupt traders, who disliked his strict enforcement of federal rules.

This Day in Minnesota History

August 14, 1848

Residents of the land that would become St. Paul, nearly all of whom are squatters, send Henry H. Sibley to a land sale at St. Croix Falls where, as their agent, he formally purchases their lots for them.

This Day in Minnesota History

August 15, 1875

Bishop Thomas L. Grace dedicates the Church of St. Michael in Stillwater, with Father John Ireland presiding. The press of the day acclaims it as the finest church in the state.

This Day in Minnesota History

August 15, 1933

The Barker‒Karpis gang robs South St. Paul's Swift and Company of its $30,000 payroll. Police officer Leo Pavlak dies in the ensuing shoot-out.

This Day in Minnesota History

August 15, 2001

FBI and INS (Immigration and Naturalization Service) agents arrest Zacarias Moussaoui in Minneapolis for an immigration violation. They find weapons and Boeing flight manuals in his possession, and in an ensuing trial (held after the terrorist attacks on September 11), Moussaoui admits to conspiring with al-Quaeda. The extent of his involvement in planning the September 11 attacks in particular is disputed.

This Day in Minnesota History

August 15, 2011

President Barack Obama starts a three-day bus tour with a town hall meeting in Cannon Falls. After the meeting his motorcade travels down Highway 52 through Zumbro, Rochester, Chatfield, Fountain, Preston, and Harmony on its way to the Seed Exchange in Decorah, Iowa.

This Day in Minnesota History

August 16, 1909

Author Marchette Chute is born in Minneapolis. She published several award-winning children's books, including Shakespeare of London, Geoffrey Chaucer of England, and Ben Jonson of Westminster.

This Day in Minnesota History

August 16, 1964

Australia defeats Chile as Minneapolis hosts the Davis Cup tennis tournament.

This Day in Minnesota History

August 18, 1929

A 350-pound bear is killed in the Hotel Duluth's lounge. The bear had followed truck driver Arvid Peterson and his shipment of fish into the city, and, attracted by the smell of food in the Hotel Duluth's coffee shop, had broken through the window of the lounge. The hotel's night watchman, Albert Nelson, and a unnamed local resident confronted the bear, hitting it with a chair and a hammer. Others called the police, and Sergeant Eli LeBeau shot the bear after trying first to corner it unharmed to return it to the woods. The bear was the third killed in Duluth that year.

This Day in Minnesota History

August 18, 1993

Dan and Steve Buettner of Roseville complete the first north-to-south bicycle ride across Africa. They set their rear wheels in the Mediterranean Sea 272 days and 11,836 miles before rolling their front wheels into the Indian Ocean. In addition to such natural obstacles as the Sahara Desert, jungles, and mountains, the men faced malaria, civil war, thieves, and a lack of supplies.

This Day in Minnesota History

August 18, 2007

Flash flooding kills seven and causes $67 million in damages in Dodge, Fillmore, Houston, Olmsted, Steele, Wabasha, and Winona counties. People are evacuated from Rushford, Stockton, Houston, Elba, Minnesota City, and portions of Winona.

This Day in Minnesota History

August 2, 1847

The US government and several bands of Ojibwe sign a treaty establishing the Long Prairie Reservation (between the Watab and Crow Wing Rivers) for the Ho-Chunk (Winnebago). Originally from Wisconsin, the Ho-Chunk had been pushed to a reservation in Iowa and then were moved again to Long Prairie.

This Day in Minnesota History

August 2, 1873

The Canadian government negotiates with Canadian First Nations on US territory when the lieutenant governor of Manitoba meets with 1,000 Indigenous people at Harrison's Creek in the Northwest Angle.

This Day in Minnesota History

August 2, 1874

George W. Nims, a student at the Seabury Divinity School in Faribault, attempts to assassinate Bishop Henry B. Whipple. During a church service, Nims rises from the congregation, walks into the chancel, and points his pistol at Whipple. Luckily, he had forgotten to cock the hammer, giving bystanders enough time to tackle and subdue him. Whipple had turned him down for ordainment with his class as he had shown signs of being mentally unbalanced. Judged insane, he is sent to the asylum in St. Peter.

This Day in Minnesota History

August 2, 1928

President Calvin Coolidge visits Virginia, Minnesota, and tours the iron mines.

This Day in Minnesota History

August 2, 1956

Albert Henry Woolson, described as the last surviving Union veteran of the Civil War, dies in Duluth at age 106. Woolson had enlisted in the First Minnesota Heavy Artillery when he was sixteen, serving as a drummer boy. He was the model for a bronze figure on the Memorial to the Grand Army of the Republic (GAR) at Gettysburg, although he did not fight there. Woolson moved to Duluth in 1905 and remained active in the GAR for decades.

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