Minnesota Territory is signed into existence by President James K. Polk. The territory has a population of about 10,000 Native people and 5,000 white settler colonists and includes present-day North and South Dakota east of the Missouri River. The US Postal Service released a commemorative three-cent centennial stamp on this date in 1949.
The legislature of Minnesota Territory decides to send an immigration commissioner to New York. Beginning in June, Eugene Burnand of St. Paul represents the territory in Manhattan, where he encourages immigrants to make Minnesota their new home.
A team led by Will Steger of Ely completes the 3,800-mile International Trans-Antarctica Expedition, the first dog-sled traverse of the continent by its widest distance.
Stillwater's first sawmill, owned by John McKusick, cuts its first board, the start of over sixty years of milling in the city. Stillwater's mills cut primarily white pine, a wood prized for ornamental carving.
Mayor Louis A. Fritsche holds a meeting at the New Ulm armory in support of US neutrality in World War I. Attendees send a peace delegation to Washington, DC, but the country declares war in April.
Aviator James H."Jimmy" Doolittle, touring with his Shell Oil Company plane, visits St. Paul. In 1942, Lieutenant Colonel Doolittle of the US Army Air Corps would command the first air attack on Japan during World War II, leading sixteen B-25 bombers, which had been prepped in St. Paul, from the deck of the aircraft carrier Hornet.
Former governor Harold LeVander dies at age eighty-two. Born in Swede Home, Nebraska, LeVander served as governor from 1967 to 1971. During that time he led in the establishment of Minnesota's first state human rights department, a pollution control agency, and the Metropolitan Council for the Twin Cities area. LeVander also opposed establishing a state sales tax, but his veto was twice overridden.
Newspaper editor James M. Goodhue is born in Hebron, New Hampshire. In 1849 he established the territory's first newspaper, the Minnesota Pioneer, which promoted the territory both within its borders and beyond. Goodhue died in 1852, but in 1858 Jane Grey Swisshelm used his press after hers was destroyed (see March 24).
Roald Amundsen, the famed Norwegian polar explorer who had discovered the South Pole in 1911, addresses a large audience in Duluth about the on-going battle of World War I and appeals to the people of the United States, especially American labor, to "stand behind the President to the last ditch, and to work with 100 per cent efficiency to the end of the war." After remarking that "Norwegians in this country will be pleased to know after the war that they, too, have had a share in the liberation of mankind," Amundsen continued on a speaking tour of Minnesota and later returned to Norway to p
A shoot-out between outlaw John Dillinger and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) occurs at the Lincoln Court Apartments in St. Paul. Dillinger escaped a few months later but was shot to death by FBI agents in Chicago.
In Tower, Father Joseph F. Buh publishes issue eleven of Amerikanski Slovenec (American Slovene), the first national newspaper for Slovenes in the United States. The paper had started in Chicago but had ceased publication after ten issues. Buh, who served St. Martin's Catholic Church in Tower and St. Anthony parish at Ely, supervised the paper's publication until 1899.
Jerry McCarty and Peter Juhl escape from the main cell house at the Minnesota State Prison in Stillwater after McCarty somehow obtains a key that unlocks the bar running in front of the cell doors. Juhl, a "trusty" making his evening rounds with a torch for igniting tapers "stuck by convicts in their cell doors with which to light their pipes for a final night smoke," uses the key to release McCarty, and the two "hard cases" hastily climb over a wall.
Elcor native Sam LoPresti, goaltender for the Chicago Blackhawks hockey team, makes an astounding eighty saves in a game against the Boston Bruins. Despite this valiant effort, three pucks get by him, and Chicago loses 3-2.
Tammy Faye LeValley (Bakker) is born in International Falls. With her husband, Jim Bakker, she helped found three of the largest Christian television networks in the world, including the Praise the Lord ministry. After Jim was jailed for fraud and conspiracy (a charge for which she escaped conviction), she divorced him and married Roe Messner.
Norman W. Kittson is born in Sorel, Canada. When he arrived in Minnesota in 1834, Kittson made money by developing trade between St. Paul and the Red River and served as a legislator and as mayor of St. Paul. Late in life, he built a mansion in St. Paul, on a trail that led to town. To accommodate those accustomed to following the trail, Kittson left his front and back doors open for folks to pass through. The Cathedral of St. Paul was later built on the site.
Farmers in Benton County form the state's first county agricultural society. Oliver H. Kelley, who would later found the National Grange, is one of ten charter members. County agricultural society members share information about stock, seeds, fruit, and farming practices.
Minnesota's territorial legislature incorporates the St. Paul Mutual Insurance Company, forerunner of the insurance giant St. Paul Companies, the state's oldest business corporation.
Seven counties are formed by Minnesota's territorial legislature: Blue Earth, named for the Blue Earth River, along which blue clay was once found; Goodhue, named for newspaper editor James M. Goodhue (see March 31); Le Sueur, for French explorer Pierre Charles Le Sueur (see October 1); Nicollet, for French geographer Joseph N. Nicollet (see July 24); Rice, for territorial delegate to Congress Henry M.
