The Round Tower has been a symbol of Fort Snelling since its construction in 1820. Though the U.S. Army originally built it as a defensive point for the fort, the tower has served many different functions over its long history.

The nation’s most innovative and most successful law-book-publishing company operated in downtown St. Paul from 1876 until 1992, when it moved to Eagan. In 1876, West Publishing Company began publishing Minnesota State Supreme Court opinions; by 1887, its “reporter” system covered the whole country. In 1908, West introduced an indexing system for all American law. In 1975, it introduced Westlaw, a computerized legal research system. The company was sold to Thomson Reuters in 1996.

Clement Bernard Haupers was a painter, printmaker, arts administrator, and arts educator active from the 1920s to the 1980s. He is best known for his directorship of the Minnesota Works Progress Administration Federal Art Project and for his influence in the Minnesota art community.

Clara Gardner Mairs was a painter, printmaker, and decorative artist active from the 1910s to the 1960s. She is best known for her prints of children, animals, circus scenes, and Old Testament stories, often with hints of satirical humor.

A gilded quadriga sculpture group titled "The Progress of the State" stands like a sentinel over the front façade of the Minnesota State Capitol. Architect Cass Gilbert commissioned Daniel Chester French, best known for the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., to do the work. He sculpted the chariot and human figures, and animal sculptor Edward Clark Potter created the horses. The quadriga (Latin for "four-horse chariot") has greeted capitol visitors since its installation in December 1906.

Since the early 1900s, Latinos have been a productive and essential part of Minnesota. Most of the earliest Minnesotanos were migrant farm workers from Mexico or Texas and faced obstacles to first-class citizenship that are still being addressed. They overcame the instability associated with migratory work by establishing stable communities in the cities and towns of Minnesota. Latinos faced, and still face, discrimination—both racial and the kinds common to all immigrants, migrants, and refugees.

Fort Ripley was a nineteenth century army outpost located on the upper Mississippi River in north-central Minnesota. It was situated near government agencies for the Ho-Chunk and Ojibwe. By its very presence, however, the fort spurred immigration into the area by whites.