Exploring never gets old for me. It was Saturday afternoon and time to get out of the house. Making my way through the smoke from Canada’s wildfires and the really strange streets of the Tangletown neighborhood in Minneapolis, it was time to find the Washburn Water Tower.
It’s long walk to the top but worth it! (Photo by Chad Smith)
The first observation was Tangletown is the right name for that neighborhood. Whoever put those streets together maybe had one too many drinks with dinner. Nonetheless, it was time to find the tower, and for a good reason.
It looked like a structure you’d see somewhere near a castle in any one of the Lord of the Rings movies. But let’s delve into a bit of history first.
The 110-foot concrete cylinder was constructed in 1932 and sits at the top of a hill in Tangletown. A book titled “Secret Twin Cities, a Guide to the Weird, Wonderful, and Obscure” was the perfect exploring manual. It points out that if you aren’t within a block of the structure, you’ll never see the tower because it’s hidden by a combo of dense residential areas and tall trees.
Look at how intricate that carving is! (Photo by Chad Smith)
The reason for preserving the old structure was the intricate details builders put into constructing the tower, which is no longer used to supply water. Encircling the top of the tower are eight-foot tall, five-ton eagles with spread wings that look ready for takeoff.
A bit further down the cylinder, it looks like knights are standing guard outside the walls of a castle. Closer to the base are 18-foot tall, eight-ton “guardians of health” holding a perpetual vigil with swords. At a time when Minnesota was in the middle of a deadly typhoid outbreak, the guardians were symbolic protectors of a clean water supply.
Photo by Chad Smith
The tower had a capacity of 1.35 million gallons of water, which it faithfully supplied to the neighborhood until the 1990s. Three men from the neighborhood designed and engineered the structure John Daniels was the sculptor, William Hewitt was the project engineer, and Harry Wild Jones was the lead architect.
Get out and get to exploring. The massive medieval tower is located at 401 Prospect Avenue in Minneapolis, and there’s no charge to get up close and personal with the “tower guards.”
“The Eagles have landed!” (In my best Merry and Pippin voice from LOTR!Lonely sentries guarding the Washburn Water Tower
Boom Island Park in Minneapolis is one of my favorite places to explore in the Twin Cities. In fact, it was the first place I went to when I got bit by the exploring bug. Well, now that Derrick moved to Minnesota, it’s time to start showing him some of my favorite places in the Twin Cities (and there are a LOT of them).
Boom Island Park in Minneapolis and what remains of the island it used to be. (Photo by Chad Smith)
The park actually gets its name from the island that it once was. The island was named for the booms that were used to separate logs floated down the Mississippi River to sawmills powered by St. Anthony Falls (another of my favorite spots). Each log cut along the tributaries of the Mississippi River was “branded” by each lumber company that put its own stamp on the end of is logs.
One of the things I love about Boom Island Park is the big city is on one side, the green (it will be at some point!) and the wide open space of the park on the other side. (Photo by Chad Smith)
They were separated using the stamps and directed to the right mill by men working from Boom Island. The sawmills at the falls were eventually replaced by flour mills. What remains of those flour mills makes up Mill Ruins Park, yet another great place to explore in the Twin Cities of Minnesota.
What I love most about the park, besides just how big it is, is the fact that it’s set up next to the Mississippi River. You’ve got the big city on one side, and the open areas of the park on the other side.
My son Derrick appears to be pondered the Mississippi River. He is deep like that :). (Photo by Chad Smith)
The land ceased to be an island a while ago due to a buildup of silt and sawdust. It was bought by the park board with funds from the state legislature through the Metropolitan Council in 1982. The land was bought from a construction company for $2.6 million. That land had been targeted for acquisition in the 1978 plan for the development of the central riverfront as a park by the Riverfront Development Coordinating Board.
At one point, the RDCB even considered converting the land to an island once again, but they decided against it because of the cost. The first phase of the park was dedicated in 1987.
Isn’t this a remarkable old bridge at Boom Island Park? (Photo by Chad Smith)
One of my other favorite parts of the park is an old railroad bridge, originally built in 1901 to Nicollet Island, was converted into a bicycle and pedestrian bridge. The bridge was repaired and restored in 2018.
And here is the old railroad bridge. The MOTHER LODE for this old urban explorer.
Photo by Chad SmithOne of my favorite places to go hiking! (Photo by Chad Smith)What I was most surprised at that day is how many people took hiking trips up and down the tracks. (Photo by Chad Smith)
Anoka’s abandoned amphitheater is a sidewalk width away from the busy traffic on 169. (Photo by Chad Smith)
An abandoned amphitheater? Who could resist that?!
Anoka was my next stop on the exploration schedule to check out an old, abandoned amphitheater. With a hat tip to Brendon Maness for the tip, Derrick and I jumped in the car for a quick drive north on 169 and literally almost ran into the amphitheater as it’s a sidewalk away from 169 itself. Bet the traffic noise made for an interesting background to the entertainment folks put on there, back in the day?
My first impression of the amphitheater was an obvious one: this thing has been around a LONG time. The structure was put together back in 1914 on the banks of the Rum River in Anoka. The really interesting part to me is its name: the Windego Park Auditorium and Open-Air Theater. At first, I thought it was Wendigo. Do you know what a Wendigo is? I bet you do if you’re a monster movie buff like me.
The abandoned amphitheater in Anoka, Minnesota, was first built in 1914. (photo by Chad Smith)
The old theater is currently listed in the National Register of Historic Places and had to be a great place to watch a program back then. The location on the bank of the Rum River is beautiful.
Anoka’s citizens back then had a notable interest in outdoor entertainment and recreation. Thaddeus P. Giddings, a promoter of music education who’d been organizing community singalongs in the summer of 1913, took over organizing the programs and entertainment at the amphitheater.
Another gentleman named William Gray Purcell designed the amphitheater, and I thought he did a bang-up job. The stage sits on the flat part of the riverbank, and, as you can see in the pictures, the seats are on the sloping hillside. It had room for an audience of up to 1,600 people in its heyday.
At one time, the abandoned amphitheater held 1,600 people. (Photo by Chad Smith)
At one time, the seating was covered by a colorful retractable awning system designed to protect patrons from the weather. That had to be a must-have during summertime storms and heat waves, am I right? A curved back wall at one time included a box office, entrance doors, and a projection booth, but that part no longer stands.
The orchestra pit was located at the foot of the bleachers. The stage area was off to the left and was nothing more than a flat part of the riverbank. (Photo by Chad Smith)
The theater was used for amateur plays, historical pageants, and other local community musical or meeting events. However, the theater would only thrive as long as Giddings was on hand. Giddings began spending summers at his music camp located in Michigan, and the amphitheater fell into disuse, with the exception of an occasional gathering.
In 1979, Anne Bronken, a University of Minnesota Landscape Architecture Department student, designed a plan to restore the amphitheater. Community organizers patched the concrete and did some cleanup work. A restoration planned as recently as 2010 didn’t happen. Today, the amphitheater has only its seating and orchestra pit left standing, and both are in a deteriorated state.
The view from the amphitheater. The Rum River is in the background and had to make for a fantastic setting to watch a play or concert. (Photo by Chad Smith)
Spring weather is always a fun conversation across farm country, whether in the local coffee shop, after church, or during a sidewalk stroll down any small-town street in America. I came across a recent article from the National Weather Service saying that March might have above-normal temperatures and was intrigued. So, I got on the phone for an assignment from the National Association of Farm Broadcasting and began digging.
My first phone call was to Dennis Todey, the director of the Midwest Climate Hub in Ames, Iowa. As far as the March forecast goes, the veteran meteorologist says it depends on one thing: location, location, and location.
“The farther north you go, the less chance you have of being above normal during March,” Todey said. “But we should begin to rebound fairly quickly after the recent cold stretch that brought snow into parts of the Upper Midwest.”
Dennis Todey is the director of the Midwest Climate Hub in Ames, Iowa. (photo from climatehubs.usda.gov)
What you may not know is most of the cold that covered parts of the Upper Midwest was originally supposed to stay well to the north, especially up in Canada. Some of that cold worked its way into the North Central U.S., but it’s been limited mainly to the areas with snow cover.
As you go further west in the Northern Plains, there is less snow cover, so the temps haven’t been quite as cold. “The probabilities are not big, but the possibility of some warmer temperatures is there,” Todey said.
Looking out beyond March to the spring weather forecast, again, it all depends on which location you’re referring to. Out in the Eastern Corn Belt from Central Illinois and further east, they’ve had several storm events move through the area. The outlook in that location continues to look wet there.
“Planting delays are definitely on the radar in that location,” Todey said.
It’s the opposite in the Central and Southern Plains, where drought conditions have steadily grown worse in recent months as it’s been a dry and warm winter. The big question is whether the area is going to get any moisture anytime soon.
“It’s going to be interesting in the eastern Dakotas and parts of Minnesota,” he said. “They got some moisture late last year and recently picked up some recent snow as well.
“Places like Missouri and Iowa are more of a mixed bag right now,” he said. “Iowa still has some carryover dry soils, and then we have some dry soils in parts of Wisconsin in areas that keep missing out on moisture events.”
Speaking of dry weather, a good-sized part of rural America is short of moisture. The shortage in the plains begins in Nebraska and stretches to the south. It’s dry to very dry, but the lack of moisture doesn’t stop there.
“Parts of Iowa and Wisconsin are quite dry,” Todey said. “It’s quite dry in northern Illinois, which is a carryover from last year. Depending on which part you’re talking about, parts of the Dakotas had moisture while others didn’t get enough moisture for runoff for ponds and dugouts from a livestock standpoint.”
The winter wheat crop is really struggling because of the dry weather. The spring weather forecast hopefully has some moisture in it to help the wheat crop to at least somewhat rebound from the poor conditions.
As winter begins to wind down and spring gets closer, Todey has noticed an interesting trend in recent years when it comes to winter weather. Up here in Minnesota, we were able to take the dog for a walk in short sleeves or light jackets into November of 2021, which is almost becoming more of the norm rather than the exception.
“Winter has been showing up later than normal in recent years,” he said after some thought on the matter. “Let me frame this climatologically for you.
“The 90 coldest days on average for most of the Upper Midwest are typically December, January, and February,” Todey said. “That’s based on looking at data over the last 30 years. We’ve seen some of the coldest events of the winter occurring in late February.”
While late-winter snow isn’t uncommon, the larger events have been coming later and later, so “something is going on that’s a little different.”
Fergus Falls was calling me over the weekend, and that call finally proved irresistible. I’d heard through the grapevine about the ruins of an old dam along the Otter Tail River that collapsed back in the day. Well, I quit listening after the word “ruins” because I already knew I wanted to see “Broken Down Dam Park.”
Here’s a short video tour of the broken dam
Folks in that area built what’s called a hydroelectric gravity dam on the river in 1907. The dam was built out of concrete and powered a plant called the Fergus Falls City Light Station. The station provided power to city residents for just a year before disaster struck.
Approaching the Broken Down Dam (Photo by Chad Smith)
The large concrete dam suddenly collapsed in 1909, and you did not want to be downriver from the massive wall of water that suddenly rushed down the Otter Tail River. Can you image the roar of all that water moving at once?
One part of the Broken Down Dam near Fergus Falls that gives the dam it’s name. (Photo by Chad Smith
The dam broke at 4:20 in the morning on September 24, 1909, and the power of all that water releasing at once broke not one, not two, not three, but FOUR other dams downriver. Atlas Obscura says there were reports that the water was so powerful, it picked up a ten-ton generator and threw it into the river. Thankfully, no one died as a result of what was a catastrophe of immense size.
A wiki article (which I was able to validate in several other web pages) says that engineers made a crucial mistake when they constructed the dam. They didn’t conduct a proper site evaluation and wound up building on top of a spring. While I don’t pretend to understand how a spring can flow separately from a river while occupying the same space, it only took a year for the water pressure to build up along the foundations. The rupture washed out the concrete foundation and undermined the structural integrity of the dam, which then collapsed.
The Broken Down Dam, first built near Fergus Falls in 1907, collapsed to to an engineering error. (Photo by Chad Smith)
The dam broke in the center, and the rushing water first took out the Kirk Dam, which powered the city’s waterworks. The water then took out the Mount Faith Avenue Bridge before sweeping away the Red River Mill Dam and Woolen Mill Dam. Damage to the two mills totaled $15,000, with the damage in today’s economy equivalent to $432,000 in 2020.
Conspiracy theory alert: The Dayton Hollow Dam, five miles southwest of where the dam broke, was saved from destruction. The dam’s owner, Vernon Wright, had enough warning to hustle down there in time to get the floodgates open. The conspiracy? He also was president of the Otter Tail Power Company.
The biggest break in the Broken Down Dam. (Photo by Chad Smith)
The city of Fergus Falls then hired Otter Tail Power to build transmission lines into town. That helped spawn a local rumor, fueled by the newspaper, that Wright deliberately destroyed the city’s dam by secretly distributing quicksilver from a rowboat to undermine it.
Broken Down Dam Park was established in 1949, an 11-acre parcel of land. When the water level on the Otter Tail River is high, the flow can go fast enough between the blocks of the structure to create Class 3 rapids.
Big tree fell and just about closed the path. (Photo by Chad Smith)
Photo by Chad SmithPhoto by Chad Smith Photo by Chad Smith
Here is the link to my complete photo album from Broken Dam.
Timberwolves basketball. Are there any words in the Twin Cities sports market that have inspired more “meh?” Well, I decided it was time to get out of that mindset and try to look for positive things to talk about. Granted, Minnesota sports teams don’t make it easy to find optimism, but it’s got to be worth trying, right?
One of the most positive things I can think of off the floor is Glen Taylor has a sale agreement in place for the team. Reports says Alex Rodriguez and Marc Lore are taking a little bit more of a hands-on approach to running Timberwolves basketball. Even though Taylor is said to still have the final say, it’s good to know that new ideas are forthcoming for the franchise.
I’m actually paying a little attention this year to the upcoming Timberwolves basketball season. Enjoying a bit of optimism.
The new schedule is out, and as I look at the returning players from last year, I’m finding a little more interest than I have in years. The starting five next year might actually be pretty decent. Look, I’m not predicting a march to the NBA finals, nor am I even predicting a playoff spot. I’d be happy with a legitimate run at a .500 win-loss mark. That’s how low my expectations are for Minnesota basketball after the last 20-plus years.
When the Timberwolves run this lineup next season it’s gonna be spooky
D’Angelo Russell Patrick Beverley Malik Beasley Anthony Edwards Karl-Anthony Towns
This starting lineup has a little more promise than we’ve seen in years.
I haven’t had much chance to research the young man the Wolves drafted out of Europe last year, but I am interested to see what the kid can bring to Timberwolves basketball. Of course, this is the one kid that I’m really excited to watch play ball next season.
I wasn’t happy they drafted Anthony Edwards at number one overall. Couldn’t be happier to admit I was wrong and am starting to love this kid.
So, to find out more about the upcoming season, I tracked down Evan with The Daily Wolves fan page on Twitter. We had a lot of basketball notes to get through.
Renovation is usually one of my favorite topics. It involves retrofitting old structures to make them new again. Those assignments involve me talking about and photographing old structures, something the urban explorer in me really enjoys.
The Harmony, Minnesota, Historical Society is kicking off a fund drive to renovate the old McGlaughlin Elevator, first built in 1879. They’ll host open house events July 3 and 4 from 11-2 each day. (Photo by Chad Smith)
The past and future stand guard at the entrance to Main Street in Harmony, Minnesota. The McMichael Grain Elevator was built in 1879 and stands on the west side of Main Street, where it meets the curve of State Highway 52. On the east side of the street is the much newer and more modern Harmony Agri-Services. A group of Harmony citizens is working to make sure the past and future of grain handling in the area watch over Main Street for many years to come.
Harmony sits smack dab in the middle of Minnesota farm country, so they needed elevators near railroads to process and store harvested grain, as well as move it into large freight cars for transportation. The A. & T. McMichael Grain Company of McGregor, Iowa, built the original elevator structure, one of several facilities they owned and operated in Minnesota, Iowa, Wisconsin, and North and South Dakota. It included the elevators in Preston, Mabel, and Canton, Minnesota.
Farmers drove in here and dumped their grain for storage down through the floor grate in the old Harmony Elevator. The town’s Historical Society is kicking off a fund drive to raise money for renovations and turning it into a historical landmark. (Photo by Chad Smith)
Joel Wolsted bought the facility in 1914, and his family would hang on to it for a long time. He passed on the operation to his son, Ron Wolsted, who ran it as “Harmony Feed and Fuel.” As the new Harmony Agri-Services facility went up on the other side of the road, the old structure was gifted to the City of Harmony and the Harmony Area Historical Society by Jeff and Barb (Wolsted) Soma of Harmony Agri-Services in 2019.
Understandably, the then 140-year-old facility was in rough shape when the historical society first opened the doors. Ralph Beastrom is one of the historical society’s elevator committee chairs. With a laugh, he said the place was “full of stuff” when they looked inside it.
“We had a crew come in and clean the bins,” he recalled. “They went down inside the bins (which are long gone) and shoveled them all out. We also had a soda blaster come in and clean everything up inside the building. There were cobwebs, bird droppings, and dirt everywhere you looked in here.”
One of the leftover shovels that Harmony Elevator employees had to use to unload train cars by hand in the late 1800s when the elevator was built. (Photo by Chad Smith)
The local Falk Foundation gave the project a grant to help pay for the soda blasting. If you don’t know what that is, it’s like sandblasting, but workers use what’s essentially baking soda.
He said there are a few pieces of equipment left behind, including what are called “fanning mills” that sort the grain. Once the mills and other left-behind equipment get cleaned up, they will become part of the historical site.
Machinery left behind at the old elevator in Harmony, Minnesota. The local Historical Society is raising funds to renovate it and make it a historical landmark the town can be proud of. (Photo by Chad Smith)
“Our overall renovation plan is to work on the outside first,” Beastrom said. “We’ll do the siding and fix up the doors, so they work smoothly again. At some point, the inside will get renovated with some new lighting and some interpretive information. Whether we’ll do anything electronically, I’m not sure yet.
“We also need to get the windows taken care of, which will probably be our next high-dollar item,” he said. “Then, it’ll be time to work on the doors and close any openings that the swallows are using to get in and build their nests.”
The Harmony Historical Society is working with a preservationist in Spring Grove to do the work necessary to get the site into the Historical Registry. “We’ve already determined it’s eligible for the Registry, we just need to get the paperwork finished up,” he added. “That should be completed this year. It should open some doors for extra funding to get the renovation work done.
“Preservation architects have already told us the building is solid,” Beastrom added.
Beastrom, who also serves as Treasurer for the Harmony Historical Society, says the goal isn’t necessarily to restore it to the original condition. The goal is to preserve the building and make it look good because it “sits right at the entrance to our Main Street, and we want it to look good in that spot.”
Ralph Beastrom gave me a tour on a very windy and rainy day in Harmony. He’s helping to lead the effort to restore the old McGlaughlin Elevator and make it a historical landmark. (Photo by Chad Smith)
The Harmony Historical Society will host a couple of Open House Events over July third and Fourth from 11 am-2 pm each day. They’ll have the interior on display for the public, including some of the old machines and signage as well. The Open Houses will be a kickoff to a major fundraising push for the renovation project.
“We lost an entire year to COVID-19,” he added. “Nobody could come to meetings or get any work done. We hope that the Fourth of July will really get this project going in the right direction again.”
The total cost of the renvoatioon is estimated at $200,000, so the Historical Society needs help from the public. For more information, you can contact them at hahs@harmonytel.net. Feel free to reach out to the elevator renovation chairs, including Ralph Beastrom, Richard Kiehne, or Vicky Tribon.
Here’s a complete look at the main campus as it stands today.
“Anoka State Mental Hospital” – It’s been abandoned since 1999. Just saying the name evokes memories of every single scary movie you’ve watched in recent history, such as those Friday the 13th movies we used to watch as kids. However, like many other abandoned places in the Twin Cities of Minnesota, it seems to be coming back to life.
The abandoned Anoka State Mental Hospital is slowly being brought back to life. (Photo by Chad Smith)
Some of the buildings are still in rough shape, and those are easy to pick out by the plywood in all the windows. Others are in the process of being renovated, and a couple are used now as veterans’ homes. The first thing that jumped out at me was how BIG the campus is. Lots of large brick buildings got built in the shape of a half-circle. It’s enormous!
The brick buildings have every right to look like they’ve been through a lot: they have. A minnpost.com article says the fourth Minnesota state hospital for the insane opened in 1900. The place was quite different from the other three institutions; the Anoka State Mental Hospital was the first to be built in Minnesota according to the cottage plan. The goal was to reduce the institutional feel of the place for its chronic patients.
It was a bright and sunny day when I walked the grounds of the Anoka State Hospital grounds. (Photo by Chad Smith)
They say overcrowding was a big problem at Minnesota’s mental health institutions operating in Rochester, Fergus Falls, and St. Peter. To help alleviate the overcrowding problems, the planning commission chose 650 acres right near the scenic Rum River in Anoka for a fourth site.
Building the hospital got started in June of 1899, and the first 100 patients (all men) were transferred to the facility on March 14, 1900. The facility began to expand in 1905, adding several cottages, as well as farm and service buildings. By 1917, ten cottages, an auditorium, and a new administration formed in a semicircle at the completed facility.
However, like many mental institutions across the country, history wasn’t always a good thing for the facility. A dramatic series of articles exposed some horrible conditions at the hospital in the mid-1900s. State officials became determined to do something about the problem.
Still some work to do at the Anoka State Hospital. (Photo by Chad Smith)
The atlasobscura.com website says, on Halloween night in 1949, they held a bonfire on the grounds of the Anoka State Mental Hospital. It must have been a big fire as around 359 straitjackets, 196 cuffs, and 91 straps, all different forms of restraints used on the patients, were destroyed. Governor Luther Youngdahl and other officials used the event to show the world that the facility was moving toward more humane forms of treatment.
Conditions did improve for the patients, thanks to the development of new drugs and institutional reforms. Some unfortunate incidents that compromised community safety around the hospital took place here and there over the next several decades. The Anoka State Mental Hospital closed in 1999, and the patients got moved to a nearby facility.
They really don’t want people exploring in their buildings anymore. (Photo by Chad Smith)
Quarry Park and Nature Preserve was the latest stop on the 2021 “Explore Minnesota Before I Run Out of Gas Tour.” I’m not sure if that name is referring to my car or my body because, at my age, I run out of gas a little quicker than I used to, but I digress. I jumped in the car early on a Saturday morning because I could no longer sleep, so what was the point in trying?
Here are some of the highlights from the Quarry Park and Nature Preserve exploration. It’s a great place to do some hiking and picture taking! (Video by Chad Smith)
I spent a couple of hours looking for some abandoned places to explore, but that idea turned out to be a dud. I found myself in Waite Park, Minnesota, up by St. Cloud, and needing a pit stop. I AM 50, after all. Coming into town, I happened to glance to the right and noticed what looked like a couple of large gravel pits. Okay, they weren’t gravel, they were granite, but it’s the only thing I had stored in my brain to compare them to.
Minnesota parks like the Quarry Park and Nature Preserve in Waite Park are a ton of fun to see. I’ll warn you that while you can swim here, the water gets really deep in a hurry! The deepest one reached 116 feet. (Photo by Chad Smith)
Quarry Park and Nature Preserve is the full name of the place and covers nearly 700 acres of Stearns County land. At one time, it was an actual granite quarry known as the “Hundred Acres Quarry.” Granite is formed by intense heat within the earth and was the “foundation” of a major industry.
The history page on the park’s website points out that the first granite quarry in Central Minnesota was opened in 1863 by two Scotsmen. In the 130 years that followed, central Minnesota granite became an international commodity gracing several buildings located as far away as Singapore.
Roughly a century ago, a type of stone known as Saint Cloud Red Granite was quarried from land which is now part of the park. The Landmark Center and the James J. Hill House in St. Paul, Minnesota, both contain Saint Cloud Red Granite in their structures.
One thing I can’t figure out is whether or not these quarries are filled with stagnant water? I know there’s fish stocked in there (saw the ripples) so they’d need fresh water circulating through there, right? (Photo by Chad Smith)
Though private ownership of the land by local quarry companies continued through 1992, quarrying operations in the present park area quit for good in the mid-1950s. Companies operating quarries on the site including Holes Brothers, Delano Granite, Melrose Granite Company, Empire Quarry Company, and C.L. Atwood.
Here is the top of what they call the “Liberty Derrick,” a machine used to lift thousands of tons of granite back when the quarry was in operation and selling granite all over the world. (Photo by Chad Smith)
Over the years, the land gradually reverted to a more natural state. What did Poison Ivy tell Batman in the Arkham Knight game? “Nature always wins.” In 1992, Stearns County bought the site from the Cold Spring Granite Company and added the land to its County Park System. The park opened up on January 1, 1998.
I spent a solid two hours exploring the place, and I might have gotten through a third of the whole thing. You can hike there, go rock climbing, swimming, and even scuba diving in a couple of locations.
You can check out everything the park has to offer here.
Here’s the bottom of the Liberty Derrick. (Photo by Chad Smith)
Minneapolis is one of my favorite places to explore. It’s nice to see the city trying to get back on its feet after drawing national attention due to the days of rioting that hit the downtown area hard. Driving down 394 East and heading into the city regularly, I kept passing this giant structure that really got my blood pumping.
The Basilica of St. Mary’s in Minneapolis, Minnesota. It was built between 1907-1915. (Photo by Chad Smith)
That giant structure is the Basilica of St. Mary’s. Anyone who knows me or follows my explorations, knows I love architecture. It’s one of my favorite things to photograph, especially in the big city where styles can vary widely, sometimes from block to block. St. Mary’s is considered one of the finest examples of Beaux Architecture in the nation.
The big structure was built between 1907 and 1915. They laid the cornerstone of the building was laid at the intersection of 16th Street and Hennepin Avenue. While I don’t pretend to understand exactly what this means, the building was elevated to the rank of minor basilica by Pope Pius XI in 1926. The basilica was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1975.
Church leaders have done a lot of restoration work as time went by, a costly task because of the structure’s enormous size. By the 1980s, water had begun to leak through dome and into the roof after each snowfall or rainfall. By the mid 1980s, repairs were obviously needed as copper blew off the dome during a storm and plaster chunks fell into the rectory.
St. Mary’s Basilica in Minneapolis. How long did it take for the craftsmen to do something that intricate? (Photo by Chad Smith)
The copper dome and roof were replaced from 1991-1992. The church also restored the paintings and the plasterwork in the dome’s interior.
One of the other highlights of the restoration projects over the years included Christmas Eve in 1998. New church bells forged in the Royal Eijsbouts Foundry in the Netherlands. Christmas Eve was likely the perfect time for those bells to ring out over the city for the first time. I managed to capture a little bit of the bells at the beginning of the video.
My only disappointment with the Basilica had nothing to do with the church itself. I couldn’t get inside and do justice to the interior renovations because of COVID, of course. But I’ll get in there and show it to you someday.
Can you imagine building that type of structure that high off the ground? Amazing… (Photo by Chad Smith)
The front doors at the Basilica of St. Mary’s in Minneapolis. (Photo by Chad Smith)
