Reacting to protests in New Ulm over the use of draftees in World War I, the Commission of Public Safety, under orders from Governor Joseph A. A. Burnquist, suspends Mayor Louis A. Fritsche from office. Other city officials and the president of Martin Luther College are also removed from their positions. These actions effectively end the protests, although Fritsche was later reelected.

Frenchman Pierre La Verendrye and his voyageurs land at Grand Portage to begin a fur-trading expedition into the region west of the Great Lakes. La Verendrye eventually establishes a trading post, Fort St. Charles, on Lake of the Woods.

On Women's Equality Day, the Minnesota Woman Suffrage Memorial is dedicated at the state capitol. Titled "Garden of Time: Landscape of Change," the memorial is planted with native grasses and flowers and features a 100-foot trellis imprinted with the names of important suffrage leaders in the state's history.

Jacob A. O. Preus is born in Wisconsin. Founder of the Lutheran Brotherhood fraternal society, he would serve as state governor from 1921 to 1925. He died on May 24, 1961.

French Canadian canoe paddlers at the North West Company's fur-trading post at Rainy Lake threaten to quit unless they are given a raise.

Martin McLeod is born in Montreal. Arriving at Fort Snelling in 1837, he would trade furs in the Minnesota Valley for twenty years, be instrumental in persuading the Dakota to sign the treaties of Mendota and Traverse des Sioux, and, as a member of the legislature, write the law that created the Minnesota Public School Fund. He died in 1860.

A race riot begins during a dance at Stem Hall in St. Paul. Ignited by an alcohol violation, the riot continues through the next day, resulting in twenty-six arrests, numerous police and civilian injuries, and thousands of dollars in property damage from fire and vandalism, mostly in St. Paul's Selby–Dale neighborhood.

One of a series of arson fires in St. Paul destroys virtually all the buildings between Market, St. Peter, St. Anthony (Third), and Fourth Streets. These fires led to looting, and citizens formed a vigilance committee to patrol the streets.

Amos Owen is born on Sisseton Reservation, South Dakota. He moved to the Prairie Island Indian Reservation at age sixteen and later become a prominent spiritual leader, tribal chairman, and pipe carrier of the Dakota, working to broker understandings between Native and non-Native peoples. He died on June 4, 1990.

Actress Loni Anderson is born in St. Paul. She would achieve fame for her role on the television show WKRP in Cincinnati, and, later, her divorce from actor Burt Reynolds would provide reams of material for the tabloids.

Bobby Tufts is elected mayor of Dorset—a symbolic rather than a practical office. He is four years old.

Fighter pilot Richard Bong dies in an airplane explosion in California. Bong had shot down forty Japanese planes during the war, making him America's top ace. The Bong Bridge, which opened October 25, 1984, connects Duluth with Bong's birthplace, Superior, Wisconsin.