Catalog
March of the Governors #25: Harold Stassen
Paul Nelson with Ken PetersonMarch of the Governors Harold Stassen, Governor #25 March of the Governors Podcast #27 Harold Stassen, Minnesota’s twenty-fifth governor, is among our most intriguing. He sprang to national attention as the state’s “Boy Governor,” elected in 1938 at…
March of the Governors: The Farmer-Labor Party
Paul Nelson with Fred Johnson, Tom O'Connell, Tyler Norris Taylor.March of the Governors The Farmer-Labor Party March of the Governors Podcast #26 Minnesota’s Farmer-Labor Party was the most successful third party in American history. Between 1930 and 1938, the party far outpaced both traditional parties in vote-getting,…
March of the Governors #24: Elmer Benson
Paul Nelson & Tom O'Connell with Steve TrimbleMarch of the Governors, Governor #24 Elmer Austin Benson (Series Podcast #25) We are unlikely to see a politician like Elmer Benson ever again. The small-town, left-wing banker served briefly as a US Senator before becoming governor. He was a genuine political…
March of the Governors #23: Hjalmar Petersen
Paul Nelson and Tyler TaylorMarch of the Governors, Governor #23 Hjalmar Petersen (Series Podcast #24) Hjalmar Petersen (1890-1968) holds many distinctions as a governor of Minnesota: our only Dane, our only Hjalmar, our last immigrant (so far), our only governor from Askov (so far), and the…
March of the Governors #22: Floyd B. Olson
Paul Nelson, Fred Johnson, and Tom BeerMarch of the Governors #22 Floyd Bjornstjerne Olson (Series Podcast #23) By age thirty, Floyd Bjornstjerne Olson (1891-1936) had been a shabbos goy, a college dropout, a stevedore, and a Wobbly. By age forty, he had served ten years as Hennepin County…
Our Minnesota State Capitol: From Groundbreaking through Restoration
Reviewer: Alan K. LathropOur Minnesota State Capitol: From Groundbreaking through Restoration Author: Denis P. Gardner Foreword by Former Governor Mark Dayton St. Paul: Minnesota Historical Society Press, 2017 104 pages; softcover; 70 color and b&w illustrations; $19.95 With the brilliant restoration of the State Capitol building in St.
Ramsey County History – Spring 2009: “Minnesota Politics and Irish Identity: Five Sons of Erin at the State Capitol”
John W. MiltonMinnesota Politics and Irish Identity: Five Sons of Erin at the State Capitol Author: John W. Milton The author, a former state senator, researched the five men of Irish extraction who are honored in the State Capitol. The first is “The Senator: Nicholas David Coleman (1925–1981),” a St. Paulite…
Ramsey County History – Spring 2007: “Lost Neighborhood: The Jews of Fourteenth Street Remembered”
Gene H. RosenblumLost Neighborhood: The Jews of Fourteenth Street Remembered Author: Gene H. Rosenblum Gene Rosenblum’s grandparents, immigrants from Lithuania, moved into St. Paul’s Fourteenth Street neighborhood in 1907. This heavily Jewish community comprised several streets in the shadow of the State Capitol. It had two synagogues, a community center, and…
Ramsey County History – Fall 2004: “The Life and Death of Central Park—A Small Part of the Past Illuminated”
Paul D. NelsonThe Life and Death of Central Park—A Small Part of the Past Illuminated Author: Paul D. Nelson The Central Park story begins in 1884. It was a time of city expansion, and the affluent and powerful residents in an area near today’s State Capitol wanted a park to buffer…