Bücher veröffentlicht von Minnesota Historical Society Press

Black North Dakotans were something of a rarity in 1914 when young Era Bell and her family moved to a farm near the small community of Driscoll. In this lively autobiography, Thompson describes the experiences of her girlhood.

A richly detailed, clearly written history that reveals both the changes the Ojibwa chose to make and the continuity within the culture they retained. It is a turbulent story of the tensions that shaped their integration of tradition and adaptation.

An intimate view of frontier women, Anglo and Indian, and the communities they forged.

"Few questions in American history," writes Theodore C. Blegen, "have stirred so much curiosity or provoked such extended discussions as that of the authenticity of the runic inscription on a stone found near Kensington, Minnesota, in 1898."Swedish-American farmer Olof Ohman discovered the stone clasped in the roots of an aspen tree on a knoll above the surrounding swamp. His young son was the first to notice the strange letters chiseled into the rock face. Since then historians, geologists and runic scholars have entered the debate over the age and meaning of these carvings. Are they genuine 14th-century runes, evidence of a pre-Columbian Viking expedition to North America, or are they a clever 19th-century hoax? In this classic volume, Blegen untangles the circumstances surrounding the unearthing of the Kensington Rune Stone. Marshalling letters, affidavits, newspaper accounts and investigative reports, he lays out in authoritative detail the early history of this controversial artifact and investigates the background and character of Olof Ohman and other men involved in its discovery. He also describes the first cycles of investigation and dispute and devotes a chapter to the role of Hjalmar R. Holand, who acquired the stone in 1907 and was its chief defender until his death in 1963. Fourteen appendixes offer useful primary source materials and supply English translations where needed.This lucid text, together with its footnotes and appendixes, remains a cornerstone for further investigation and discussion.

In this riveting study, historian Merrill Jarchow explores the lives and practices of early farmers in Minnesota, offering a colorful illustration of Minnesota's evolution as an agricultural state. Issues with public lands and their sometimes curious disposal, experiments by ingenious farmers, harvests and markets, transportation, elevators and milling, political struggles, malpractices and legal reforms, buildings and agricultural fairs, advancing mechanization, and the growing understanding of farming emerge from details of farmers' home and living conditions and their social interactions. The tremendous human effort involved in adapting to the distinctive Minnesota farming environment is revealed in this comprehensive account of farmers' struggles, ordeals, and achievements. Separate chapters investigate dairying, mechanization, and bizarre agricultural experiments, and photographs, notes, and an index complete the important volume.

Minnesota's First Poorhouses County Poor Farms The Home for the Friendless Women of the Churches The State Expands Its Role Improving County Poor Farms Ethnic Groups Provide for Their Aged The Poorhouse under Scrutiny Red Ink and Midnight Oil The Questing Twenties From Great Depression to Social Security Standards and Shortages during World War 11 Regulations and Ration Books Progress in the Fifties Changes and Challenges Illustrations Reference Notes Index

Throughout most of the twentieth century, thousands of Mexicans traveled north to work the sugar beet fields of the Red River Valley. "North for the Harvest" examines the evolving relationships between Amercian Crystal Sugar Company, the sugar beet growers, and the migrant workers. Though popular convention holds that migrant workers were invariably exploited, Norris reveals that these relationships were more complex. The company often clashed with growers, sometimes while advocating for workers. And many growers developed personal ties with their workers, while workers themselves often found ways to leverage better pay and working conditions from the company. Ultimately, the lot of workers improved as the years went by. As one worker explained, something historic occurred for his family while working in the Red River Valley: "We broke the chain there."

Charles Eastman straddled two worlds in his life and writing. The author of "Indian Boyhood "was raised in the traditional way after the 1862 U.S.-Dakota War. His father later persuaded him to study Christianity and attend medical school. But when Eastman served as a government doctor during the Wounded Knee massacre, he became disillusioned about Americans' capacity to live up to their own ideals. While Eastman's contemporaries viewed him as "a great American and a true philosopher," Indian scholars have long dismissed Eastman's work as assimilationist. Now, for the first time, his philosophy as manifested in his writing is examined in detail. David Martinez explores Eastman's views on the U.S.-Dakota War, Dakota and Ojibwe relations, Dakota sacred history, and citizenship in the Progressive Era, claiming for him a long overdue place in America's intellectual pantheon.

MPR and TPT personality Cathy Wurzer provides a new introduction to this classic guide to the Arrowhead country.

Vital and colorful, witty and entertaining, full of the youth and vigor and optimism of the frontier, the weekly issues of St. Paul's Minnesota Pioneer from the spring of 1849 to the summer of 1852 reflect the robust personality of James M. Goodhue (1810-1852) and through him the world of the American frontier.Like most nineteenth-century newspapermen, Goodhue was part of an outspoken political and business community, and he cared little about hiding his opinions. He was the booster, praising his beloved Minnesota in extravagant metaphor; the politician, scourging his enemies with fury; the reformer, storming against evils of the day; the moralist, lecturing his readers on their ethics and manners; the city and state planner, offering practical ideas for the improvement of his city and territory; the prophet, envisioning the Minnesota of the next century; and the reporter, recording the life of the new territory. Goodhue's "piquant" personality was suited to the stormy early days of Minnesota.Woven throughout his life story are entertaining selections from Goodhue's writings in the Pioneer, the progenitor of the St. Paul Pioneer Press. Twenty drawings by druggist Robert O. Sweeny, who sketched Minnesota scenes in pen and ink on the backs of prescription blanks, show the Minnesota that Goodhue knew and helped shape in its first years.

Between 1862 and 1867, eight wagon trains carrying at least 1,400 people set out from Minnesota for the gold fields of Montana. These carefully edited letters and diaries trace their progress, revealing their day-to-day experiences, their success-or lack of it-in finding gold, and their lives in bustling mining settlements. "Private dreams of quick fortunes in El Dorado and public dreams of commercial empire and national greatness" moved the emigrants, writes Helen McCann White in her introduction, which places the three-month expeditions in their broader historical context and interprets their significance for the development of Minnesota, North and South Dakota, and Montana. An appendix identifies more than 850 members of the trains.

This thought-provoking study of the Progressive movement traces its rise and decline in Minnesota, its link with the Granger, Farmers Alliance, Populist, and Nonpartisan League traditions, and the tragic divisions created by World War I-especially the loyalty issue.Progressivism focused the nation's attention on attempts to reform its political and economic systems. Against this backdrop of national and internationsl events, historian Carl H. Chrislock records the rise and decline of the movement in Minnesota, where Progressivism had many links with earlier Granger, Farmers Alliance, and Populist traditions. Clearly written and thought provoking, this book also tells the stories of the Bull Moose campaign of 1912, strikes on the Mesabi Range, and the painful divisions of loyalty before and during World War I.

Between 1816 and 1823 Stephen Harriman Long headed five expeditions that traveled 26,000 miles from the Atlantic coast to the Rocky Mountains and from the headwaters of the Canadian River in New Mexico to Lake Winnipeg in Canada. This book deals with two of his northern journeys-the only two for which the explorer's personal journals are known to have survived. The 1817 journal describes Long's trip up the Mississippi River to the Falls of St. Anthony at present-day Minneapolis and back down the river to Fort Belle Fontaine on the Missouri. The 1823 journal covers Long's last major exploration, from Philadelphia west across present-day Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin, and Minnesota, and back along fur trade routes in Manitoba and Ontario, through the Great Lakes and newly opened parts of the Erie Canal.The journals reveal the writer's classical education and scientific knowledge. They also reflect the man himself-efficient, logical, concise, meticulous, persevering-a man cheerful in the face of physical discomfort but intolerant of incompetence or irresponsibility on the part of his men.

With humor and insight, E. W. Davis tells the story that begins with the discovery of then-valueless taconite on Minnesota's Mesabi Iron Range in 1870 and several decades of attempts to process taconite commercially. Davis details the ups and downs of the exciting, decades-long research effort that resulted in a workable extraction method, followed by frustrating attempts to form the concentrate into small pellets. Finally, Davis describes building the first successful commercial processing plant at Silver Bay in the 1950s and the contributions by various companies to the birth of the industry. Along the way insider Davis recounts the founding of the three new northern Minnesota taconite towns, Babbitt, Silver Bay, and Hoyt Lakes.

Minnesota Territory's earliest publications in St. Paul and St. Anthony (now Minneapolis) were known for their "vigorous expression of strong-minded opinion." This lively account of old-style journalism examines the emergence of daily papers and some 100 English- and foreign-language weeklies in the communities beyond the Twin Cities, including the Emigrant Aid Journal of Nininger, the Chatfield Democrat, the Winona Republican, and early St. Cloud newspapers. Finally, author George Hage explores the rise of the state's large metropolitan dailies and the people, issues, and politics that affected their growth. An appendix lists the papers published in Minnesota from 1849 to 1860.

David A. Walker tells the story of the opening of the last iron- ore frontier in the United States on the Vermilion, Mesabi, and Cuyuna ranges of Minnesota-the nation's largest ore deposits. Walker explores the formative years from the 1880s to the early 1900s in the development of the state's mining industry, the iron ore it produced, the new towns it spawned, and the railroads it built to transport the new-found wealth to growing ports on Lake Superior. Drawing on manuscripts, newspaper accounts, and business and financial records, Walker's study provides an economic history of an industry whose dimensions reached far beyond the borders of Minnesota.

he fame of French scientist and geographer Joseph N. Nicollet rests upon his monumental map and report of the Upper Mississippi Valley. The map, published by the United States government in 1843, remained the foundation of Upper Mississippi cartography until the era of modern surveys.Nicollet's journals illuminate the 1836 trip to the source of the Mississippi and a journey up the St. Croix River in 1837. His day-by-day accounts include careful notes on geographical features, flora and fauna, and the aurora borealis. But above all, his keen observations on the customs and culture of the Ojibwe Indians provide the first systematic recording and a remarkably sympathetic depiction of the people of the area. Martha Bray's introduction and annotation to this translation by André Fertey provide a brief biography of an important figure in American science.

Considered the most authoritative history of the state, the four volume set was first published in the 1920s. Volume Four covers special topics on iron mining, public education, Ojibway election procedures, a dozen outstanding Minnesotans and a consolidated index for volumes 1 through 4.

Considered the most authoritative history of the state, this four volume set was first published in the 1920s. Volume One carries the story to 1858.

A charming history of a small, isolated community that once lay on the west bank of the Mississippi River in Minneapolis.

Atkins eloquently portrays the extreme hardships of Minnesota farmers during the grasshopper plagues of the 1870s. She examines local, state, and national relief efforts, which she reviews in the context of nineteenth-century social welfare philosophy.

J. Fletcher Williams' History of St. Paul, first published in 1876, is a thoroughly charming, intimate chronicle of the city's earliest years. The author spins tales of villains, heroes, dark deeds, and progress with wit, irony, and relish. Sprinkled among the careful descriptions of pioneers, city fathers, and important events is a healthy dose of trivia, oddities, and "firsts." Lucile M. Kane's introduction to this edition suggests that the book "to an unusual degree mirrors the man-with all his learning, passion for patient investigation, interest in people, exuberance, dramatic sense, humor, and affection for his adopted city." Minnesota residents, visitors, and students of history will enjoy this insider's view of small-town St. Paul in the 19th century.

With simplicity and charm, Grace Lee Nute tells the story of the Minnesota-Ontario border country west of the Boundary Waters-the region of the west-flowing Rainy River and the two lakes that it joins, Rainy Lake and Lake of the Woods. In this companion volume to The Voyageur's Highway Nute draws on her broad and thorough knowledge of historical sources to describe the earliest people who passed through the region, the mound builders who followed, and the Indians who lived on or near the river. She brings to life the fascinating succession of traders, prospectors, lumbermen, settlers, and, finally, tourists who called this northern border country home.

Reprint of the long out-of-print 1943 book, the definitive work on Radisson and Des Groseilliers, with an additional, end-sheet map.

Jonathan Carver's Travels through the Interior Parts of North America, in the Years 1766, 1767, and 1768 became a bestseller in London in the 1780s, and arguments over its author's accuracy and honesty have raged ever since. This book published for the first time the well-known explorer's original account of his expedition.Editor John Parker compares and interweaves the four manuscript versions of Carver's journals discovered in the twentieth century in the British Museum to form the text of this book. Also included are the hitherto unpublished journal of veteran fur trader James Stanley Goddard, who accompanied Carver; related correspondence; a Dakota dictionary; commissions and other records; and a bibliography of major editions of the Travels.In this volume John Parker explains the alleged plagiarism, examines Carver's early life, and offers new information on the land swindle in the Midwest known as the "Carver grant."Editor John Parker was curator of the James Ford Bell Library at the University of Minnesota, a collection specializing in early travel and exploration.

Eighteen Months' Experience as an Indian Agent, 1869-70