Minnesota 150: The People, Places, and Things That Shape Our State

The people have spoken. Minnesota wouldn’t be Minnesota without Bob Dylan. Or the BWCA. Immigrant farmers. The American Indian Movement. Thousands of citizens nominated their favorite topics for inclusion in Minnesota 150. With short essays, eye-catching illustrations, and text from the winning nominations, Kate Roberts reveals the many ways in which our past becomes our collective history.

 

Read stories from people like former Iron Ranger Brian Weber, who wrote about watching the 1980 Olympic hockey team as a young boy: “It makes me think of our neighbor, a miner with a very Finnish last name, who watched all the games with us. Thinking about it now, after the taconite expansion of the early to mid-1970s, this was the beginning of the end for the mines up there. And I think they knew it. But they felt they had a hockey team and a coach that was fighting for us. And hockey mattered.” Learn about the genesis of such iconic businesses as the Greyhound Bus Company, which got its start when Hibbing natives Carl Wickman and Andrew Anderson bought a used Hupmobile, hoping to sell it at a profit.

 

Through surprising, little-known stories, Minnesota 150 explores how such intangibles as personal judgment, political climate, and popular taste can shape our view of the past.

Kate Roberts holds a PhD from the University of Minnesota, is a senior exhibits developer for the Minnesota Historical Society, and directed the exhibit development for the popular Mill City Museum. She lives in Minneapolis.