Atkins, Annette. Creating Minnesota: A History from the Inside Out. St. Paul: Minnesota Historical Society Press, 2007. A uniquely textured history book, Creating Minnesota pieces together the story of Minnesota and Minnesotans through the eyes of individuals, from a mixed-blood interpreter at Fort Snelling to a state congresswoman. Atkins’s writing is both dense and readable.
Diers, John, and Aaron Isaacs. Twin Cities by Trolley. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2007. The story of the streetcars in the Twin Cities—first used in the late 1800s and finally pulled out of service in the 1950s—is the story of a growing metropolis hungry for modernity and eager to travel faster and farther than ever before. Diers and Isaacs, who have both been instrumental in preserving the history of the streetcars through the Minnesota Streetcar Museum, have put together a very readable and relevant history.
Diffley, Atina. Turn Here, Sweet Corn. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2012. Minnesota was at the forefront of the community-supported agriculture (CSA) and organic movements, and one of the state’s pioneering small organic farms was Diffley’s farm, Gardens of Eagan. Her memoir is a compelling story of urban agriculture, hard work, and Minnesotan stick-to-it-iveness.
Dregni, Eric. Vikings in the Attic: In Search of Nordic America. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2011. Dregni traveled the length and breadth of Minnesota and its neighboring states, digging into tales of its recent past (and even its present). And he found out what many Minnesota transplants have long suspected: Scandinavians can be kind of weird. We knew about the lutefisk and the lefse, but what’s with the eggs in the coffee and the trolls?
King, Tim, and Alice Tanghe. The Minnesota Homegrown Cookbook. Osceola, Wisconsin: Voyageur Press, 2008. Through the stories of dozens of beloved restaurants and chefs and more than 100 recipes, the authors paint a picture of Minnesota’s remarkable food landscape. It’s not all lutefisk and lefse here!
Koutsky, Kathryn Strand, and Linda Koutsky. Minnesota State Fair: An Illustrated History. Minneapolis: Coffee House Press, 2007. This mother-daughter team dug deep to find the history and lore behind this most beloved Minnesota institution, along with a fascinating collection of historical photos. Their previous endeavors, Minnesota Eats Out and Minnesota Vacation Days, also tell important Minnesota stories with humor and depth.
Millett, Larry. Once There Were Castles: Lost Mansions and Estates of the Twin Cities. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2011. Many of Minneapolis’s and St. Paul’s Gilded Age homes—whole neighborhoods, in fact—were razed long ago. Millett, an architectural historian, digs up stories and photos of nearly 100 of them. Millett is also the author of Lost Twin Cities, Twin Cities Then and Now, and several guides to Minnesota architecture.
Roberts, Kate. Minnesota 150: The People, Places, and Things that Shape Our State. St. Paul: Minnesota Historical Society Press, 2007. In preparation for Minnesota’s sesquicentennial in 2008, the Minnesota Historical Society asked people all over the state to nominate people, places, objects, organizations, and phenomena that were uniquely Minnesotan. The flood of responses was culled to 150 and organized into a uniquely illustrative exhibit at the Minnesota History Center and published in this beautifully written and illustrated book.
Seeley, Mark. Minnesota Weather Almanac. St. Paul: Minnesota Historical Society Press, 2006. What’s more Minnesotan than talking about the weather? Not much. Climatologist and radio commentator Mark Seeley combines weather lore and history, biographies of weather-related figures in local history, and answers to burning weather questions, such as: What’s the record number of consecutive below-freezing days in the Twin Cities? Answer: 66.
Treuer, Anton. Everything You Wanted to Know About Indians but Were Afraid to Ask. St. Paul: Minnesota Historical Society Press, 2012. Treuer is a professor of the Ojibwe languages at Bemidji State University and is of Ojibwe descent, but he answers more than 100 questions about Native Americans in general—including, “Is it okay to use the word ‘Indians’?” Treuer has also written eight other books about Ojibwe culture and history, including the excellent Assassination of Hole in the Day.
Walsh, Jim. The Replacements: All Over but the Shouting. Osceola, Wisconsin: Voyageur Press, 2007. When the Replacements crashed their way onto the Minneapolis music scene in the late 1970s, disaffected teens from around the country sat up and took notice—not only of the ’Mats, as they were known—but of Minnesota itself. Jim Walsh was there, opening for the Replacements many times, and has been a fixture in Twin Cities journalism since.
Westerman, Gwen, and Bruce White. Mni Sota Makoce: Land of the Dakota. St. Paul: Minnesota Historical Society Press, 2012. While this very readable history was published to coincide with the 150th anniversary of the 1862 Dakota War, it examines the stories of the Dakota people in Minnesota in the centuries leading up to that tragic conflict. The word “Minnesota” comes from the Dakota phrase in the title, meaning “land where the water reflects the clouds.”
White, Bruce. We Are at Home: Pictures of the Ojibwe People. St. Paul: Minnesota Historical Society Press, 2007. Historian Bruce White digs for the stories behind a remarkable collection of photographs of Ojibwe people, from the earliest daguerreotypes to prints from the 1950s. The book tells stories not only of the Ojibwe people but also of their interaction with the growing population of whites.
Bly, Carol. Letters from the Country. New York: Harper & Row, 1981. In the 1970s, Carol Bly wrote monthly essays for a Minnesota Public Radio feature called A Letter from the Country. Those essays became Bly’s first book, to be followed by five more books of essays, five novels, and two books on the craft of writing. While Bly’s writing evokes what she, following F. Scott Fitzgerald, called “the lost Swede towns,” it reflects the natural world and ethical systems that shaped the cultures of Minnesota’s city dwellers as well. Carol Bly, who died in 2007 at the age of 77, was married to the poet and men’s movement leader Robert Bly.
Erdrich, Louise. Love Medicine. New York: Henry Holt & Co., 1984. Minnesotan Louise Erdrich won the National Book Critics’ Circle Award for her first novel, Love Medicine, which tells a tangle of stories centered around a Native American reservation in North Dakota. While this novel and later ones, including the acclaimed Tracks, explore her Ojibwe heritage, Erdrich draws on her German-American side for other novels, including The Beet Queen and The Master Butcher’s Singing Club. Erdrich owns Birch Bark Books in Minneapolis.
Fitzgerald, F. Scott. The Great Gatsby. New York: Penguin Popular Classics, 2007. While Fitzgerald’s 1925 novel is set in Long Island and Manhattan, the Midwestern values of the narrator, Nick, and of Jay Gatsby’s father, Henry Gatz, are a constant presence in the story, as the flip side of the lush and amoral lifestyle of the main characters. Fitzgerald was born in St. Paul’s Cathedral Hill neighborhood and raised there and in East Coast boarding schools.
Keillor, Garrison. Lake Wobegon Days. New York: Viking, 1985. Former host of the A Prairie Home Companion radio show, Keillor is almost audible right off the page in these stories of small-town Midwestern life.
Kling, Kevin. The Dog Says How. St. Paul: Borealis Books, 2007. Playwright, performer, and essayist Kevin Kling is a gifted storyteller who is often heard on National Public Radio. His tales of growing up in suburban Minnesota and his recovery after a serious motorcycle accident are both uniquely Minnesotan and fascinatingly universal.
Landvik, Lorna. The View from Mount Joy. New York: Ballantine, 2007. Minnesotan Lorna Landvik mixes humor and a peculiar knack for plot in her novels, many set in Minnesota. The View from Mount Joy takes readers back to high school in Minneapolis circa 1972. Her earlier novels include Angry Housewives Eating Bon Bons, Patty Jane’s House of Curl, Tall Pine Polka, Your Oasis on Flame Lake, and Welcome to the Great Mysterious.
Lewis, Sinclair. Babbitt. New York: Signet Classics, 2007. Sinclair Lewis’s satirical take on conformity and boosterism in the Midwest hit especially hard in Minneapolis, where Lewis no doubt drew some of his inspiration (he has said that his city of Zenith could have been any midsized Midwestern city). Lewis’s equally well-known earlier novel, Main Street, tells the story of a strong-willed Minneapolis woman who marries and moves to the small town of Gopher Prairie, a thinly disguised Sauk Centre, Minnesota, Lewis’s hometown.
Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth. Song of Hiawatha. Minneola, New York: Dover Publications, 2006. Longfellow had never visited Minnesota or seen Minnehaha Falls when he wrote his 1855 epic poem set there, but the work became an instant smash hit in its day and attracted many tourists to the falls. Longfellow based his work on the retellings of Ojibwe legend and history by other writers and explorers. Generations of Minnesota schoolchildren have memorized the lines “By the shores of Gitche Gumee / By the shining Big-Sea-Water / Stood the wigwam of Nokomis.”
Rølvaag, Ole Edvart. Giants in the Earth. New York: Harper, 1927. Norwegian immigrant O. E. Rølvaag (1876-1931) was the first to chronicle the hardships faced by the pioneers on the prairie, from snowstorms to hunger and loneliness, and even the infamous locust plague of 1873-1877. Giants in the Earth is the first in a trilogy, followed by Peder Victorious and Their Father’s God. Rølvaag graduated from St. Olaf College in Northfield and taught there for many years. The Rølvaag Memorial Library is named in his honor.
Swensson, Andrea. Got to Be Something Here: The Rise of the Minneapolis Sound. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2017. The Minneapolis sound, a mix of funk and soul and a little something from the Upper Midwest, started seeping up from the cities’ clubs and bars in the late 1960s, becoming a wave ridden by favorite son Prince.
Lovelace, Maud Hart. Betsy-Tacy. New York: Thomas Y. Crowell Company, 1940. Maud Hart Lovelace told her daughter Merian stories about growing up in Mankato, Minnesota, then wrote them down in a series of beloved children’s books. The series began in 1940 with Betsy-Tacy and culminated in 1955 with Betsy’s Wedding.
Wargin, Kathy-Jo. V Is for Viking: A Minnesota Alphabet. Chelsea, Michigan: Sleeping Bear Press, 2003. G is for gopher. L is for loon. M is for Mall of America, on through all 26 letters of the alphabet in this beautifully illustrated children’s book, part of a series that covers all 50 states.
Wilder, Laura Ingalls. Little House on the Prairie. New York: Harper Collins, 1953 (revised). Generations of children have grown up reading about the adventures of Laura and Ma and Pa and the rest of the families, but Minnesotans have always felt a special connection to the stories, knowing that the real-life Walnut Grove and Plum Creek are a few miles down the road in southern Minnesota.
E-Democracy
This moderated online forum now has discussion groups for 10 cities in the United States, United Kingdom, and New Zealand, but it started right here in the Twin Cities. Users are required to post under their real, full names and give their neighborhood of residence, a policy that has fostered some of the most thoughtful and civil discourse you’ll see on the Internet. They’re also limited to two posts a day, so you’ll find long, thought-out posts rather than sniping and one-liners. This is a great place to find out what’s on the minds of ordinary Twin Citians.
Hennepin County Public Library Photo Collection
www.hclib.org/browse/digital-collections
More than 10,000 historical photos are available to search online. Look up trolleys or blizzards or political figures or whatever else interests you. You can also order reproductions.
Minnesota Bookstore
www.comm.media.state.mn.us/bookstore
Want your own copy of the local building codes, the Minnesota state accounting statutes, a Minnesota mug, or a state hiking map? It’s all here in this eclectic online store run by the State of Minnesota.
Minnesota Historical Society
The Minnesota Historical Society’s rich website offers resources for serious researchers and the casually curious. The society’s enormous photo collection is online and fully searchable, as are extensive birth and death certificate databases.
Minnesota Reflections
http://reflections.mndigital.org
More than 75 organizations from around the state have pooled their image and document archives into one online searchable database including almost 20,000 images.
MinnPost
After a serious shake-up in Twin Cities journalism in 2007, respected editor Joel Kramer decided to take excellent journalism online. And many of the cities’ best reporters and writers followed him. Find in-depth coverage of news, education, business, arts, and more.
MNopedia
A project of the Minnesota Historical Society, MNopedia is an encyclopedic source for local history buffs, searchable by maps, general topic, and keyword. Individual entries cover the people, places, and events that continue to shape Minnesota.
Secrets of the City
From fashion shows to gallery openings to bingo, Secrets of the City covers the hipper side of Twin Cities culture. It’s a great place to look for something out of the ordinary to do on any given night and to read about area arts news. Listen to its podcast, The Weekend Starts Now, for even more up-to-the-minute local color.
Twin Cities Daily Planet
A consortium of small and specialized news sources in the Twin Cities feed into the Twin Cities Daily Planet, which also includes a few originally reported stories as well. It’s a great place to catch the news that the bigger news outlets will overlook.
The Uptake
“Will journalism be done by you or to you?” asks The Uptake. This is citizen journalism in the hands of some talented folks with a video camera. Much of the video is uploaded live as it is being shot.