After the long hard winter in Minneapolis, this sunny cool spring is so spectacular it feels like mother nature is working overtime to heal our moods.

#OnThisDay May 11 1858: Minnesota becomes the 32nd state of the United States after the bill is signed by President Polk. Because there are few roads and the telegraph lines reach only as far as La Crosse, WI, word doesn't reach Saint Paul by steamboat until May 13.

SF Tech Bros have just discovered water. Minneapolis has been famous for decades as having among the finest municipal water systems in the United States, drawn from the Upper Mississippi through this magnificent castle built in 1925. We know where water comes from.

#OnThisDay May 10 1938: Time stops at 6:10pm at Milwaukee Road station in downtown Minneapolis, after a fire breaks out in the clock tower. The fire is quickly put out, no word on when the clock finally gets repaired.

Inside the Sanctum Sanctorum of the Holiest of Holies

#OnThisDay May 10 1823: The "Virginia" is the first Mississippi River steamboat to reach as far north as Fort Snelling, at the confluence with the Minnesota River, making the 729 miles up from St. Louis in 20 days. Among the passengers is Italian adventurer Giacomo Beltrami.

#OnThisDay May 9 1998: "State of Minnesota et al. v. Philip Morris et al." is settled when the tobacco companies agree to pay $6.6 billion. The settlement ends the companies’ long chain of legal victories and turns the tide in anti-smoking efforts throughout the United States.

#OnThisDay May 8 1939: As war looms in Europe, Crown Prince Olav of Norway and Princess Märtha of Sweden arrive in Minnesota on their 15,000-mile goodwill tour of America. The royal couple is met with star-struck crowds wherever they go in the Upper Midwest, and they go to a lot of places 🧵

Check out Matt’s minibar talk on the history of Minnesota supercomputers, it’s really cool!

BREAKING: you can only get 1 liquor now in Seward, Minneapolis

#OnThisDay May 6 1871: The Duluth Ship Canal opens, transforming the city into a major Great Lakes port by creating a direct, accessible entrance to Superior Bay. Dredging had begun in 1870, despite legal battles with nearby Superior WI, which had sued to stop construction.

A little lunchtime Zen vibe at Alma in the historic Marcy-Holmes neighborhood of Southeast Minneapolis @eastbankmpls.bsky.social

I once heard a pastor say, "If you don't like polka, you won't like heaven."

#OnThisDay May 6 1840: After being accused of illegally selling whiskey, Canadian-Swiss "Selkirker" refugees squatting near Fort Snelling are forcibly evicted by US Army soldiers, who then burn their cabins. The settlers relocate downriver to a site that would become the city of St. Paul.

Aaron Rupar delivers the timeline cleanse we needed this morning.

#OnThisDay May 5 1973: Minnesota's first polka mass is celebrated by Father Frank Perkovich at Resurrection Catholic Church in Eveleth. Designed to reflect the multi-ethnic Slavic cultural roots of the Iron Range, it featured traditional polka and waltz tunes combined with English liturgy.

Very chill coyote just now on East River Parkway

#OnThisDay May 4 1863: 1,300 Dakota captives at Fort Snelling, mostly women and children, are loaded onto steamboats for deportation to the West, in response to Federal law mandating they be removed from Minnesota as punishment for the US–Dakota War of 1862. Many die of disease and hunger enroute.

#OnThisDay May 4 1925: Ford Motor Company's Twin Cities Plant in St Paul assembles its first car, which the mayors of St Paul and Minneapolis then ride in a ceremony. Designed by architect Albert Kahn, it was known as "the most beautiful industrial plant in the world."

After a long, hard, icey winter, this year's Minneapolis May Day Parade is a massive celebration. Though our fair city is no longer served by passenger trains, we do have the absolutely unique Southside Battle Train.

#OnThisDay May 3 1959: Duluth, Minnesota becomes the world's farthest inland port accessible to deep-draft ocean-going ships, as the British freighter "Ramon de Larrinaga" arrives one week after the opening of the St Lawrence Seaway, followed moments later by the Liberian-flagged "Herald".

#OnThisDay May 2 1878: Washburn A, the largest flour mill in the world, is destroyed in a series of 3 enormous explosions. 18 workers die and the sound is heard 10 miles away in St Paul. The worst industrial disaster in Minneapolis brings new attention to the dangers of mill safety around the world.

Today's blue line train comes complete with a tuba.

#OnThisDay May 1 1914: Construction begins on 1st National Bank in Minneapolis, later serving as headquarters of the Soo Line Railroad. The 19-story Renaissance Revival building was Minnesota’s tallest until 1929. In 2013 it became the city's first commercial-to-residential conversion.

#OnThisDay May 1 1906: The Selby-Lake Interurban begins service, one of 4 streetcar lines interconnecting Minneapolis & St Paul that spurs the cities' growth into one continuous urban area. Today much of the original route is served by @metrotransitmn.bsky.social "B-Line" bus rapid transit.

#OnThisDay Apr 30 1971: Great Northern Station in downtown Minneapolis, on the eve of the conversion of America's ailing and underinvested passenger railways to Amtrak. The station would be demolished in 1978. Roger Puta photo via Marty Bernard.

"For the first time in more than 100 years, evidence of cougars reproducing in Minnesota was documented in video captured by the University of MN's Voyageurs Wolf Project (youtu.be/7EL1FRB11DU). The videos, shared with the MN DNR by the project researchers, show a female cougar with 3 large kittens"

Multifood Tower, a pinkish-brown prefab aggregate monstrosity on a windowless plinth, drains the soul out of the streetscape and is among THE reasons Nicollet Mall looks like crap. It was bad in 1981, it's really terrible now. Time for it to go. Is there a special prison for bad architects?

#OnThisDay Apr 30 1901: Charles Joy makes the first ascent up St Paul's Selby Avenue Hill (previously known as St Anthony's Hill) by automobile, at a speed of eight to ten miles per hour.

This is what is known as Minnesotamaxxing

Blueberry Accident

#OnThisDay Apr 29 1937: The first postage stamps bearing a portrait of the Führer go on sale in Germany. Royalties are paid directly to him, not to the Party nor the Post Office. The commemorative sheet reads "Whoever wishes to save a People can think only heroically."

This afternoon, as with most afternoons, the busy E Line is maintaining its planned 10 minute frequency by running 2 buses every 20 minutes. Not ideal. The bottlenecks are definitely due to the lack of dedicated lanes, esp in Uptown, but maybe also signal priority? How can this get fixed?

#OnThisDay Apr 28 1871: The Minnesota Historical Society is first to record the sighting of a large, serpent-like "lake monster" in Lake Pepin, a 22-mile long natural widening of the Mississippi River. Despite 150 years of explorations, "Pepie" is still not confirmed to exist.

Big shout out to MFD and city staff for a fine afternoon touring Fire Station 11 in Marcy-Holmes. First established in 1873 as Cataract Engine #1, the current building at 229 6th Street SE was built in 1926. A much-needed new facility is planned for 2030 just to north at Hennepin and 5th Street SE.

Today's internet can be summed up in Thomas Cole's 1836 painting "The Course of Empire." No doubt the inside of every data center looks exactly like this.

#OnThisDay Apr 27 1948: KSTP @kstptv.bsky.social begins the first commercial television broadcasts in Minnesota from its new studios on University Avenue. The show features a Minneapolis Millers' baseball game from Nicollet Park. At the time there were 2,500 owners of TV sets in the Twin Cities.

Debre Selam Medhanealem Ethiopian Orthodox Church opened a remarkable new building in the Seward neighborhood today.

I'm not exactly sure what the intent is here, but so far the vibe is:

Minnesota Confederates self-identify by flying the old state flag, trying to trigger the libs; here’s a perfect response from @blindeke.bsky.social (we fly the correct flag at my house): www.minnpost.com/cityscape/20...

#OnThisDay Apr 24 1956: The first baseball game is played at Metropolitan Stadium in Bloomington, MN. A crowd of 18,366 watch the Wichita Braves beat the Minneapolis Millers 5–3. The stadium was built to lure a @mlb.com team, which finally happens when @twinsbaseball.bsky.social arrives in 1961.

As @yimbyland.com said on that other site which shall not be named, if you can't build a building like this by-right, no variances required, on any block your city, you still have a lot of work to do fixing zoning, codes and regulatory nonsense.

April 22-24 1939: Amid clouds of war gathering in Europe, Crown Prince Frederik and Princess Ingrid of Denmark arrive at Milwaukee Road Station in Minneapolis to begin a goodwill tour of the Twin Cities. Throngs of Minnesotans greet the royal couple everywhere they go. A lil🧵of their visit.

Do you ever think about the fact that there's a major symphony in which someone sings about asparagus and we just never talk about it? youtu.be/pCuHCMitaoQ?...

Timeline cleanse: puppy on the train

#OnThisDay Apr 23 1897: After efforts by orthopedic surgeon Dr. Arthur J. Gillette and disability advocate Jessie Haskins, the Minnesota legislature allocates $5,000 to open the State Hospital for Indigent and Crippled Children, the first state-funded medical facility of its kind in the nation.

FYI it's 69 degrees in Minneapolis rn

#OnThisDay April 22 1944: USS "Glacier" is launched at Walter Butler Shipbuilding, Superior, Wisconsin, one of over 200 ocean-going vessels built in Duluth-Superior during World War II. At the height of production in 1944, 10,000 workers were employed in Twin Ports shipyards.

#OnThisDay Apr 22 1939: Crown Prince Frederik and Princess Ingrid of Denmark are greeted by enthusiastic residents of Clark's Grove, the oldest Danish town in Minnesota, at the start of their royal tour of the state.

Really disappointing to see the continued destruction of public spaces in Minneapolis. These poor choices have contributed to Nicollet mall recovering significantly more slowly than downtown districts in comparable cities, now they are making the same mistakes in uptown