Let’s take a moment, history lovers, to celebrate the New York Times’ recent decision to open up the public-domain portion of its archive. Articles, photos, illustrations and graphics published between 1851 and 1922 can now be viewed for free. I’ll be mining the archive on occasion for stories related to Minnesota. This first piece offers a look at early Minneapolis through the eyes of J.R., a Times “special correspondent.” It appeared on Page 6.

LAKE SUPERIOR RAILROAD

The Excursionists at Minneapolis – The
City and its Pleasant Surroundings –
The Falls of Minnehaha – In and
About Fort Snelling

From Our Special Correspondent

ST. PAUL, Minn. Friday, Aug. 26, 1870.

Minneapolis’ first suspension bridge was a rickety-looking wonder of 1850s technology. (mnhs.org photo)

Yesterday we carried out our intention of visiting Minneapolis, Fort Snelling, Minnehaha, and the Falls of St. Anthony. We took the carriage route over the prairie, and stopped first at St. Anthony. This city is situated about ten miles north of St. Paul, and boasts of a population of some 3,000. The Falls, of course, form the great feature, and are certainly most imposing in their vastness and terrific grandeur. The rapids above the fall are especially fine, the current rushing on at the rate of about sixteen miles an hour – the descent being seventy-five feet in a mile. The perpendicular fall at the cataract itself is eighteen feet. Thirty-three mills are run by this water-power, and lumber to the amount of over ninety millions of feet is sawn annually. Crossing the county bridge, we come to Nicollet Islands, and from thence reached the Minneapolis side by the Suspension Bridge, a splendid structure, built in 1855, being the first bridge ever thrown across the river. It is 625 feet in length, and cost upward of fifty thousand dollars. When crossing the bridge, the river, the mills and the clouds of spray from the cataract all break upon the view, presenting a picture of life, beauty and activity which can hardly be excelled. The finest view of the Fall itself, I think, is from the “platform” on the west bank, although from certain standpoints at St. Anthony they present a magnificent appearance.

THE FALLS OF MINNEHAHA.

Minnehaha Falls in about 1870. (mnhs.org)

Minneapolis has a population of between four and five thousand, and is a well built, handsome and rapidly increasing city. Its public buildings are most creditable in appearance, and there are, besides, many very fine private residences and showy stores. After a visit to the mills, which in point of water-power are certainly unsurpassed in the United States, we resumed our carriages and proceeded down the west bank of the river to view the beautiful Falls of Minnehaha. These are situated on a small stream which serves as an outlet of Lakes Minnetonka, Calhoun, Harriet, &c., and flows into the Mississippi at a distance of about a mile. The fall is upward of sixty feet in height, and the width nearly fifty. The water, which is clear and pellucid as crystal, leaps into a wild gorge or, basin, down which our party scrambled, and across which, below the Falls, there is a bridge. Like Niagara, there is a passage-way behind the sheet of water, which some of us essayed successfully. The river being low just now, the fall presents a most beautiful appearance; the water descending, not in a sheet, but with its particles dessicated, and transfused drop from drop so completely, that it appears in the bright sunlight like an immense shower of glittering diamonds, sparkling and leaping down the gorge in wondrous splendor. We, of course, gathered, as mementoes of our visit, quantities of the beautiful wild flowers which grow round the very brink of the cataract in extraordinary profusion; and nearly all of us have secured photographs of so picturesque a scene. One can sit for hours and gaze upon the beauties of this fall, and see something new to admire every moment, the sunlight weaving gorgeous forms of loveliness through the spray; — certainly no cascade that I have ever visited is so perfect in everything that can charm and entrance the eye.

FORT SNELLING.

We next made a hurried trip to Fort Snelling, distant about two and a half miles from the Falls. This fort was built in 1822, and is now occupied mainly as a base of supplies for the Department. It was originally known as “Fort St. Anthony,” and is built of lime-stone in the form of a hexagon, on a high bluff looking down upon the Mississippi and Minnesota Rivers, whose waters unite at its base, a ferry-boat crossing the former, and the cars winding across the latter over a high trestle-work. Walls of quite quartzose sand-stone are all around, and forest thickets add wildness to the scene. Once in the fort, we found that it is not, in reality, nearly so formidable as it looks; but there are veritable soldiers forming its garrison, as there were fifty years ago, and a General in command. We were received and courteously entertained by the officers, who conducted us all over the fortress, point out all the objects of special interest. We had a splendid view from the bastion on the salient angle of the bluff. On the right we could see the sloping hills which inclose the beautiful valley of the Minnesota, stretching far through the blue distance to the south-west; and the river itself, winding through the bottoms, forms a picture of great beauty, while on the left the dark-red waters of the Mississippi, rolling at the base of the lofty white cliffs, mingle just beneath the foot of the bluff, which supports the bastion, with the clearer tide of the Minnesota, and again divided by Pike Island, meet a half mile below, to part no more; while the roads, which here come close together, once more widen out, and reveal through the gaps and the openings of the adjacent hills the broad and beautiful amphitheater in which St. Paul sits at the sharp curve of the great valley through which the Mississippi suddenly bends from north-east to south-east. It was the time of evening roll-call while we were in the fort, and the band having played the sun-down retreat, a salute of cannon was fired to do us honor, a courtesy which our party acknowledged with three rousing cheers. As we drove, at our departure, round under the walls of the fort, and crossed the ferry, the band ascended into the tower and played till we were out of hearing. The effect of this music in the calm and beautiful twilight was very fine.

J. R.

The Mississippi River ferry at Fort Snelling in about 1870. (mnhs.org photo)

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