gae MINNESOTA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
state, he came up the river on a steamboat and arrived at St. Paul April 
24, 1849. Three months later he had secured permission from the war 
department to locate a claim on the west bank of the Falls of St. Anthony 
in consideration of establishing a ferry for transportation of government 
troops across the river. This was a location which he much admired on 
his first visit to the falls, which he and his party had reached with their 
camping outfit on June 27th, when several days were spent in exploring the 
country. At that time he had purchased a claim, paying for it $200, but 
before he could occupy it, it was jumped by another party. It being im- 
possible to get a title to claims, his party became weary of a camping life 
and voted to abandon the colonization scheme, and all but Mr. Stevens and 
cne other left for the down river country. He entered into service ior a 
short time in the store office of Franklin Steele, on the east bank of the 
river. 
The house he built on that tract that fall, where the Minneapolis union 
depot is now located and to which he brought his young bride the next 
year, was the first frame house built on the west side of the falls and within 
the then limits of the now great and prosperous city of Minneapolis. It 
has since become historic on account of the many interesting events that 
occurred therein. 
And thus he became the first permanent settler and is rightly recognized 
as the founder and father of Minneapolis. The house was noted for many 
years as being the center of hospitality as well as of the social, religious and 
educational life of the young community. In this house a liberal hospitality 
was dispensed to emigrants, explorers, hunters and neighbors, and often the 
indians themselves were entertained there. The house was moved irom 
place to place as the city developed, and in 1896 was donated to the Park 
Board and hauled to Minnehaha Park by six thousand school children. 
In 1854 he had 100 acres of his farm surveyed into village lots, the 
nucleus of the city and embracing its best business portions. It was here 
that Col. Stevens spent nearly eight years of the territorial period, taking a 
very important part in most of the enterprises of the times for the advance- 
ment of the business, educational and agricultural interests of the territory. 
In the fall of 1856 he moved to a farm he had selected at Glencoe the 
year before and remained there until 1863, when he returned to his old 
kome in Minneapolis. 
In May, 1896, he suffered a stroke of paralysis, from which he never 
fully recovered. 
From the beginning he manifested a deep interest in agriculture and 
everything that would elevate and better the condition of the tillers of the 
soil, fully believing that upon them depended the greatness and future 
prosperity and civilization of the state. He was always ready to aid them 
by wise counsel and stimulate them by precept and example to practice the 
best methods of farming and stock raising. As a writer on agriculture, 
horticulture and forestry and editor and publisher of a number of papers 
during a period of over thirty years, he became well known and was held 
in high estimation by the people. His was a leading spirit in the organiza- 
tion and sustaining of the State Agricultural Society and other kindred as 
sociations that have brought our state into the very front rank for its 
agriculture, horticulture, education and rural life. In all the papers which 
he conducted agriculture was given the most prominent place. 
