Inkpa Duta (Scarlet Point) and a band of Dakota attack Springfield (now Jackson) in Jackson County. Settler-colonists gather in two cabins to defend the town. During the battle, one child dies and several adults are wounded. This incident is part of the so-called "Spirit Lake Massacre" (only one death actually occurred, at Spirit Lake, Iowa).

Karl F. Rolvaag is sworn in as governor, having beaten Elmer L. Andersen by ninety-one votes in the state's closest gubernatorial election. The recount of the election had taken four months.

The St. Paul Globe publishes Eva McDonald Valesh's article recounting her observations as a worker in the Minneapolis garment industry. Using the pen name Eva Gay, Valesh authored a series of articles revealing women's lives in the Twin Cities workforce, and her work for the Globe launched her career as a journalist.

The inaugural issue of the Progress is published at the White Earth Indian Reservation (Ojibwe). The first English-language paper to be published on an Indian reservation, the Progress is edited by missionaries Gus H. and Theodore H. Beaulieu. The second issue is not published until October 8, 1887, because of interference by an Indian agent who was concerned about the intentions of the paper, in which the Office of Indian Affairs was often criticized.

John Lind is born in Kånna, Småland, Sweden. In 1899 he was the first Swede elected governor of Minnesota and the first Democrat to hold the office since Henry H. Sibley. He was also be the first Swede elected to Congress, where he served four terms, and in 1913 he acted as President Woodrow Wilson's envoy to Mexico. He died in Minneapolis on September 18, 1930.

George O. Berry dies in Minneapolis. Born in St. Paul, the son of a railroad porter and a domestic worker and a federal meat and poultry inspector by profession, Berry was one of the first African Americans elected to public office in the city, winning a spot on the St. Paul School Board from 1966 to 1973. During his tenure he worked for the creation of magnet schools.

Movie producer Mike Todd, who won an Oscar for Around the World in 80 Days (Best Motion Picture, 1956), dies in an airplane crash in New Mexico. Todd was born in Minneapolis in 1909 as Avrom Hirsch Goldbogen.

Maurice H. Stans is born in Shakopee. He served as secretary of commerce under President Richard M. Nixon, 1969–1972.

A guilty verdict is rendered in the impeachment trial of Judge Eugene St. Julien Cox, who had been accused of conducting a trial while drunk. His cause probably was not helped when ten bartenders testified to his ability to hold liquor. Cox was removed from office, but his allies in the Democratic Party later helped reverse the conviction.

After a wild chase early this morning in the North Minneapolis rail yards, railroad employees and armed police detectives capture Harry Christianson, who is suspected of attempting to rob boxcars. For a time Christianson manages to evade his pursuers by rolling under and jumping over and through coupled cars moving around the yards, but he eventually becomes confused and runs directly into the arms of the detectives.