For most of history, the human heart was off limits to medicine. The first closed heart surgery began in the 1940’s. In the 1950’s, a pair of physicians who worked in mobile surgical units of World War II discovered that open heart surgery could be an option.

Minneapolis native Prince Rogers Nelson became mega-musical-star Prince. Along the way, he created the Minneapolis Sound and won Grammys and an Oscar for his semi-autobiographical album and film Purple Rain. He also wrote, performed, and produced numerous hit records. In 2010, he received BET’s Lifetime Achievement Award. MN90 producer Marisa Helms tells us that despite his success, Prince remained rooted in Minneapolis, and became one of the state’s cultural icons.

When Paul Wellstone, his wife Sheila, their daughter Marcia, and five others died in a plane crash on the Iron Range on October 25, 2002, then-Senator Wellstone was in a difficult race for re-election to a third term in the US Senate. MN90 producer Marisa Helms takes a look at Wellstone before he was a famous politician and what has become of his legacy. Includes an interview with Bill Hillsman.

In the 1930s and 1940s, when polio was rampant in the United States, the predominant treatment method was to immobilize the patient's body in braces and splints. But Sister Elizabeth Kenny, an Australian nurse who resettled in Minnesota in 1940, believed in a controversial alternative method. MN90 Producer Andi McDaniel describes how Kenny revolutionized polio care. Includes an interview with Kate Roberts, author of Minnesota 150, published by the Minnesota Historical Society Press, 2007.