This week in state history

Historic Minnesota events with anniversaries this week.

May 29

1916 James J. Hill, the "Empire Builder," dies in St. Paul. A man of enormous influence, he moved to St. Paul in 1856 from his native Ontario, began work in the shipping business, and became owner of the Great Northern Railway and Northern Pacific Railroad companies. His interests were widespread: he helped develop the Iron Range, had a fleet of ships on the Pacific Ocean, pushed for modern farming techniques in the Northwest, and helped float the bonds that supported the democracies of Europe against the Central Powers in World War I.

1919 Charles Strite of Stillwater applies for a patent for a pop-up toaster. Strite received patent No. 1,394,450 on Oct. 18, 1921, for the "Toastmaster." During World War I, Strite worked in a manufacturing plant in Stillwater, where he became frustrated with burned toast in the cafeteria. Strite, determined to find a way of toasting bread that did not depend on human attention, invented the pop-up toaster with a variable timer. Strite got financial backing and founded the Waters-Genter Company and started selling the pop-up toaster to restaurants and cafés around the country. In 1925, using a redesigned version of the toaster, the Toastmaster Company began to market the first household toaster. By 1926, the Toastmaster was available to the public and was a huge success.

May 30

1871 The steamer St. Paul carries the first shipment of grain from the port of Duluth. About 11,500 bushels of wheat is the first such shipment from Duluth sent through the Great Lakes. On the same day, residents of the quickly growing city gathered for what is considered the first formal Memorial Day march.

May 31

1853 Isaac I. Stevens and his surveying crew leave Minneapolis to plot a rail route to Puget Sound. The Northern Pacific Railroad, started in Carlton in 1870, would follow this route.

June 1

1849 Minnesota Territory is legally organized when territorial governor Alexander Ramsey signs a proclamation written by Judge David Cooper.

1979 Gerry Spiess departs from Chesapeake Bay in his 10-foot sailboat Yankee Girl, built in his White Bear Lake garage in 1977. After a solo voyage across the Atlantic, Spiess arrives in Falmouth, England, on July 24, 1979. He died last June at his home in Pine County at age 79.

June 2

1924 Congress passes a law extending citizenship to all Native Americans in the United States and it is signed on this date by President Coolidge. The law was estimated to affect 125,000 people. A patchwork of laws had already made more than 200,000 Native Americans citizens before the sweeping measure. Native Americans occupied an unusual status under federal law up to that point. Some had acquired citizenship by marrying white men. Others received citizenship through military service, by receipt of allotments, or through special treaties or special statutes. But many were still not citizens, and they were barred from the ordinary processes of naturalization open to foreigners. The Indian Citizenship Act still didn't offer full protection of voting rights. As late as 1948, two states (Arizona and New Mexico) had laws that barred many from voting, and many faced some of the same barriers as African Americans until the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1965, including Jim Crow-like tactics and poll taxes. In 1917, the Minnesota Supreme Court denied the state's Native Americans the right to vote. The case, Opsahl v. Johnson, was brought by members of the Red Lake Chippewa tribe. The court found that members had not "yielded obedience and submission to the [Minnesota] laws" and couldn't vote in local and state elections while under federal jurisdiction.

June 3

1916 Forty miners on the Mesabi Iron Range walk off the job at the start of a massive strike, coordinated by the ethnically diverse rank and file, with help from experienced organizers from the Industrial Workers of the World. Scab workers undermine the strike, and the strikers concede defeat after three and a half months. However, by December, Oliver Mining Company, a subsidiary of U.S. Steel, compromises with pay raises and other small reforms. The company would maintain its anti-union stance until 1943.

1999 Duluth's Ed Hommer is the first double amputee to reach the top of Alaska's Denali (20,320 feet). He had lost his legs to frostbite after a plane crash on the mountain in 1981. Tom Halvorson, a Cloquet resident and prosthetic designer for Hanger Prosthetic and Orthotic in Duluth, became friends with Hommer after fitting him for prosthetics in 1984. In 1985, Hommer became the first bilateral amputee commercial airline pilot, flying for American from 1985 to 2000. Both men were part of a group in the early 2000s attempting to reach the top of Mt. Everest. In 2002, Hommer, 46, was killed by a falling rock as he trained on Mt. Rainier for a second attempt on Everest.

This column is derived from MNopedia.org and developed by the Minnesota Historical Society. and its partners.