Project Background and Methodology

PROJECT BACKGROUND AND METHODOLOGY The Minneapolis Riverfront District has selected “Arts and Culture on the Riverfront” as its promotional theme for 2006, to coincide with the opening of the new downtown public library and Guthrie Theater. The Minnesota Historical Society, with funding from the Saint Anthony Falls Heritage Board, hired Hess Roise and Company to conduct historical research on: • The first theaters, music halls, art galleries, and cultural events along the riverfront. • Key events in the development of arts and culture on the riverfront. • “Headlines of the day” and other memorable stories related to the art and cultural life of the riverfront area. • Advertisements, handbills, and other promotional materials relating to riverfront art and culture. • Key artists and other individuals prominent in the cultural life of the riverfront. • Informal arts and culture, such as music in the home, folk art, and cuisine, of nineteenth-century residents, including immigrants. • Public and educational institutions that have contributed to the cultural life of the area, such as the Pillsbury Library. Because contemporary newspaper advertisements and accounts provide the primary documentation for most cultural events on the riverfront, the newspaper collections at the Minnesota Historical Society in Saint Paul were particularly helpful for this project. Research was also conducted at the Hennepin History Museum; Wilson Library and the Performing Arts Archives at Elmer Andersen Library at the University of Minnesota; and the Minneapolis Inspections Division. Penny Petersen, a researcher at Hess Roise, conducted the research and prepared this timeline. Charlene Roise, president of Hess Roise, was the principal investigator. For the purposes of this study, the Minneapolis riverfront is defined by the following geographic boundaries: • All of Nicollet Island and Hennepin Island; • On the East Bank: the railroad corridor just south of Sixth Avenue Northeast; Second Street Northeast; University Avenue Northeast/Southeast; and Sixth Avenue Southeast to the riverbank; and • On the West Bank: Tenth Avenue South and its alignment to the riverbank; Washington Avenue South/North, including Bridge Square; and Fifth Avenue North. Theaters, art galleries, libraries, and concert halls were ensconced in community life by the late nineteenth century, but they moved further from the city’s geographic origin as industry came to dominate the riverfront. As a result, the following timeline is weighted to the third quarter of the 1800s. The timeline is not an exhaustive listing of all artistic Arts and Culture on the Minneapolis Riverfront Page 1 and cultural events that have taken place on the Minneapolis riverfront, but provides a representative cross-section of these events. Arts and Culture on the Minneapolis Riverfront Page 2 INTRODUCTION Cultural events have been associated with the Minneapolis riverfront since the beginning of recorded history. Father Hennepin, a Jesuit priest who visited the riverfront in 1680, noted that the Indians viewed Saint Anthony Falls as a sacred place. Father Hennepin had observed an Indian man, who with great emotion, left a valuable beaver robe decorated with porcupine quills as an offering to the god Oanktehi, who was said to dwell beneath the waterfall.1 When explorer Jonathan Carver traveled the area in 1766, he reported that the waterfall still inspired reverence. Carver was accompanied by a Winnebago man, whom he characterized as a “prince”: The prince had no sooner gained the point that overlooks this wonderful cascade, than he began with an audible voice to address the Great Spirit, one of whose places of residence he imagined this to be. He told him that he had come a long way to pay his adorations to him, and now would make him the best offerings in his power. He accordingly first threw his pipe into the stream; then the roll that contained his tobacco; after these, the bracelets he wore on his arms and wrists; next an ornament that encircled his neck, composed of beads and wires; and at last the ear-rings from his ears; in short, he presented to his god every part of his dress that was valuable: during this he frequently smote his breast with great violence, threw his arms about, and appeared to be much agitated . nor would he leave the place till we smoked together with my pipe in honour of the Great Spirit.2 Beginning in the 1840s, New Englanders settled along the riverfront, establishing both the waterpower industries at the falls and some of the arts and cultural institutions that survive to the present. The New Englanders, reflecting their Puritan heritage, valued education and provided schools from the time that the town of Saint Anthony was founded. The first public school in Saint Anthony opened in 1849. Two years later, Saint Anthony resident and territorial representative John W. North took the lead in establishing the University of Minnesota at Saint Anthony. The committee on schools headed by North declared the university’s “preparatory department may serve as an Academic Institution for the entire youth of the Territory.”3 1 Lucile M. Kane, The Falls of St. Anthony: The Waterfall that Built Minneapolis (Saint Paul: Minnesota Historical Society, 1966; reprint 1987), 2. 2 Jonathan Carver, Travels Through the Interior Points of North America in the Years 1766, 1767, and 1768 (Dublin: printed for S. Price, 1779; reprint, Minneapolis: Ross and Haines, Inc., 1956), 67-68. 3 William W. Folwell, A History of Minnesota (Saint Paul: Minnesota Historical Society Press, 1922, revised edition 1969), 1:260-261. Arts and Culture on the Minneapolis Riverfront Page 3 Along with schools, the citizens of Saint Anthony and Minneapolis supported libraries, bookstores, public lectures, musical events, and theaters. All manner of performances and performers found audiences along the riverfront. Artists with international reputations, such as violinist Ole Bull and singer Adelina Patti, played to full houses, as did musicians who dressed as Druids and performed on ox horns, and costumed nonprofessionals who appeared as silent, motionless characters in tableaux vivants. Arts and culture—or, more broadly, entertainment—were important to most citizens of Minneapolis. Some people, however, passed moral judgments on the offerings. More than one writer publicly condemned circuses, minstrel shows, and the theater as not only a waste of money and time, but as evil. By contrast, public lectures and most musical performances were viewed as either harmless diversions or a positive influence on those attending. The Hutchinson Family singers, advocates of abolition, temperance, and human rights, were warmly welcomed, while the vandals who tore down their advertisements were condemned for their “freedom-hating” views. In the 1870s, the Pence Opera House advertised female minstrel shows suitable for viewing by women and children, while cancan dances were banned to avoid tainting local souls. The lumbermen and flour millers who drew their fortunes from the waterpower industries at Saint Anthony Falls were active promoters of arts and education. Lumberman Thomas Barlow Walker led the fight to expand the private Athenaeum into the public library of Minneapolis. In part, Walker was motivated by his own interest in reading; his private library was considered at one time to be the largest in the Northwest. Another factor was Walker’s belief, shared by many of his class, that successful businessmen had a civic duty to promote “a higher grade of character and citizenship.” An educated populace, it was supposed, would repay this largesse by working harder within the capitalist system, leading to a greater level of prosperity for all. At the very least, a free public library with extended evening hours gave people an alternative to saloons or other unwholesome entertainments.4 In addition to promoting the public library, T. B. Walker also collected art. He built a gallery onto his private residence where the public was invited to view his paintings, sculptures, and other acquisitions. Near the end of his life, Walker decided to construct a separate building at 1710 Lyndale Avenue South to house his art collection. Completed in 1927, the Walker Art Galley survives today as the Walker Art Center, although the original building and most of Walker’s art collection have been replaced. Other riverfront industrialists, such as Otis A. Pray, John Crosby, William Hood Dunwoody, and Clinton Morrison, were instrumental in founding and underwriting the Minneapolis Society of Fine Arts in 1883, which built the Minneapolis Institute of Arts in 1915. Although these patrons made their fortunes on the riverfront, the institutions they 4 Bruce Weir Benidt, The Library Book (Minneapolis: Minneapolis Public Library and Information Center, 1984), 30-34. Walker’s quote, from an article titled “Character as Related to Citizenship,” is reprinted The Library Book on page 33. The Athenaeum remained a separate organization, but was housed in the same building as the Minneapolis Public Library. Arts and Culture on the Minneapolis Riverfront Page 4 funded were located well away from the river, reflecting a general trend. Through most of the twentieth century the riverfront was regarded as a place for industry and less-than- desirable housing, not arts and culture. By the late 1970s, artists were attracted to the underutilized warehouses and factories along the riverfront. In the early twenty-first century, they were joined by major institutions. With the opening

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