This week in state history

Historic Minnesota events with anniversaries this coming week.

Oct. 12

1892 The first car of iron ore travels from Mountain Iron to Duluth and assays at 65 percent iron. Minnesota would lead the country in iron ore production for many years, and iron, in the form of taconite, is still a major export.

Oct. 13

1857 The state constitution is ratified by popular vote. In the accompanying gubernatorial election, Henry H. Sibley beats Alexander Ramsey by a margin of 240 votes out of 35,340 cast.

Oct. 14

1946 After 126 years of service to the nation, Fort Snelling is closed as a military post and placed under the Veterans Administration’s control.

Oct. 15

1800 Spain transfers Louisiana Territory, part of which would eventually become western Minnesota, to France. France sold the territory to the United States three years later.

1884 James Thompson, St. Paul’s first African American resident, dies in Nebraska. Thompson had the distinction of being the only enslaved person sold in Minnesota. He was brought to Fort Snelling as the servant of an army officer in 1827, where he proved himself gifted in languages, quickly learning Dakota. Bought and freed by Methodist missionary Alfred Brunson, Thompson then served as an interpreter at the Kaposia mission and eventually settled in St. Paul, where he donated the land and much of the material for the city’s first Methodist church (now the site of the St. Paul Hotel). In his time, he was also famous for defeating Edward Phelan in a fight over a pig that Phelan had stolen from him.

1971 In the first such case in the United States, the Minnesota Supreme Court rules that the state’s prohibition of same-sex marriages is constitutional. The case involves two men, Richard Baker and James McConnell, who requested a marriage license from the Hennepin County clerk. When the clerk denied them the license, Baker and McConnell sued, eventually taking the case to the state’s highest court.

Oct. 16

1924 Minnesota’s first pheasant season begins in Hennepin and Carver counties. The ring-necked pheasant had been introduced to the state from China in 1905, and it would eventually become Minnesota’s most important upland game bird.

1987 The state celebrates Henry H. Wade Day in honor of the inventor of enriched taconite.