A Minnesota Century: Predictions
By Lorna Benson
February 23, 1999

RealAudio 3.0 28.8

| Slide Show |

Minnesota Century Home

Residents of Minneapolis and St. Paul may keep up a friendly rivalry today, but in the late 19th century, there was nothing friendly about it.

THE HOSTILITIES PEAKED DURING THE 1890 CENSUS COUNT. Each town was vying for the right to claim the most people. One Minneapolis man recalled "both towns depopulated the graveyards, out-of-town relatives were recorded, hotel registers were copied, and passengers going through the depots were enumerated." In the end, the figures for both cities were astronomical and the U.S. Attorney General ordered a new count.

Ten years later, as the cities stepped into a new century, tempers on both sides of the border had cooled a little. But then a different competition heated up as Minneapolis and St. Paul each predicted what their cities would look like in the year 2000.

Today, as part of our Minnesota Century Project, our year-long series about life in this state a hundred years ago, we revisit that historic rivalry with two men familiar with the more muted rivalry of today: former St. Paul Mayor George Latimer reads the prediction printed in the St. Paul Pioneer Press on New Year's Day 1900. Former Minneapolis City Councilmember Walt Dziedzic reads the response in the Minneapolis Journal on the same date.

Former Minneapolis City Council member Walt Dziedzic (left) and former St. Paul Mayor George Latimer (right) narrate the predictions.

St. Paul: What will St. Paul be at the beginning of the year 2000? It's a big subject, because St. Paul is to be so big. It will have a million inhabitants then or more. A canal will connect the Mississippi River with Lake Superior in 2000. The canal, 180 miles long could be completed in six years for $18 million to $20 million. Buffalo will then have its deep waterway to the ocean, the Isthmus of Panama will be cut through, and St. Paul will be a flourishing seaport, trading directly with Europe and the Orient.

Minneapolis: The mayor of St. Paul has been indulging in some speculations about his city in the year 2000. St. Paul will, of course, have been absorbed by Minneapolis long before the year 2000 arrives.

St. Paul: St. Paul will be the manufacturing center of the northwest, and probably of the entire country. Already its manufactured products are sold all the way to the Pacific and as far east as Michigan.

Minneapolis: All the cross and side streets of Minneapolis will be roaring with traffic when the 21st century comes in. Loring will be surrounded by stores and the old book stalls there will do business on Vine Place. The crash of machinery will be heard along the river banks from Anoka to where St. Paul now is.

St. Paul: We have every facility for successful manufacturing except cheap fuel and that, or its equivalent cheap power, is sure to come. We have water at St. Anthony falls, where electricity may be cheaply generated for four factories. The dams being built across the Mississippi between here and Minneapolis will give more power to our elbow.

Minneapolis: By the year 2000, the residence quarter of Minneapolis will be along the lakes at Minnetonka. Because ether will be used as a fuel , traveling for 20 miles will amount to nothing.

St. Paul: St. Paul's advantageous location and ideal climate have already attracted colleges, first-class schools and a population of exceptional intelligence and culture that will build here an American Dresden.

Minneapolis: In the year 2000, Nicollet Avenue will be built with business blocks as far out as Lake Street, and Hennepin Avenue will be built up solid with public institutions and great emporiums of trade as far out as Lowry Hill.

St. Paul: Already a great railroad center, St. Paul, when Canada is annexed, will be another Chicago, 400 miles further west. And politically, the city may justify the prediction I heard William H. Seward make in 1860 from the steps of our State Capitol: that St. Paul, the geographical center of the United States and Canada, will become the national capital.

This story was produced by Annie Feidt, with help from Sasha Aslanian and Kate Kuhn.