MINNEAPOLIS 



3826 



MINNESINGERS 



other settlement houses, and a number of free 

 dispensaries. 



Industries. Minneapolis, called the "Flour 

 City," leads the world in the manufacture of 

 flour. The great mills, among them the largest 

 single mill in the world, are grouped about 

 the Falls of Saint Anthony, most of them on 

 the west side of the river, w'ithin six blocks of 

 the business center. The power of the falls, 

 increased by successive dams across the river, 

 the development of the extensive wheat fields 

 of the northwest and the enterprise of the 

 early millers secured for Minneapolis this great 

 industry. The daily capacity of the mills is 

 about 85,000 barrels, and the value of the 

 annual output exceeds $90,000,000. Minneapo- 

 lis is also the greatest single wheat market of 

 the world. There are about fifty enormous 

 grain elevators, with a combined storage ca- 

 pacity of 45,000,000 bushels. 



With the gradual exhaustion of the pine for- 

 ests of the north-central states the lumber in- 

 dustry is slightly decreasing, although the city 

 is still one of the greatest lumber distributing 

 points in the world. The great logs from the 

 forests are floated down the Mississippi River 

 and stopped by the booms near the mills. 

 Cooperage, the manufacture of lumber products, 

 furniture, interior finishings, the manufacture 

 of breakfast foods, agricultural implements, 

 boots and shoes, clothing, underwear, iron and 

 steel products, linseed oil, paper, etc., are other 

 extensive enterprises whose annual product, 

 together with the output of flour and lumber, 

 is worth more than $165,000,000. The wholesale 

 houses of Minneapolis supply a vast outlying 

 territory. 



History. In 1680 the Falls of Saint Anthony 

 were discovered and named by a Jesuit mis- 

 sionary, Father Hennepin (see HENNEPIN, 

 Louis). In 1766 the place was visited by Jona- 

 than Carver, who wrote in glowing terms of its 

 natural beauty and commercial possibilities. 

 By a treaty made between Lieutenant Zebulon 

 Pike and the Sioux Indians, in 1807, the United 

 States came into possession of a short strip of 

 land along both banks of the river, which in- 

 cluded Saint Anthony's Falls and the site of 

 Minneapolis. Fort Snelling was built in 1819 

 by Colonel Leavenworth, under government 

 commission, and in 1823 a mill was erected to 

 furnish the fort with lumber and flour. Saint 

 Anthony, a village on the east side of the 

 river, settled in 1837, was platted and the first 

 commercial sawmill built in 1848. A second 

 settlement, begun in 1850 on the west side of 



the river, soon outgrew Saint Anthony and 

 was incorporated as a town in 1856 and became 

 the city of Minneapolis in 1867. Saint Anthony 

 was annexed in 1872. In 1892 the Republican 

 national convention met in the city. C.T. 



Consult Parsons' The Story of Minneapolis; 

 Hudson's A Half-Century of Minneapolis. 



MINNEDOSA, minedo'sah, a town in 

 southwestern Manitoba, the chief town of the 

 northern judicial district. It is on the Little 

 Saskatchewan River, which is not navigable, 

 and on the Canadian Pacific Railway, on which 

 it is a divisional point. It is 134 miles west of 

 Winnipeg, seventy-nine miles west of Portage 

 la Prairie and fifty-one miles north of Brandon 

 by rail. Founded in 1883 by Edwin Oliver 

 Denison (died 1915), it has gradually grown to 

 importance, and is now an important distribut- 

 ing center. It has a number of large grain 

 elevators, several lumber mills and other in- 

 dustrial plants, including the railway shops and 

 the hydroelectric power plant. The armory, 

 erected in 1912, the post office and customs- 

 house, completed in the following year, and the 

 courthouse are the most conspicuous struc- 

 tures. Population in 1911 was 1,483; in 1916, 

 1,831. G.T.T. 



MINNESINGERS, min'esing erz, the wan- 

 dering minstrels of Germany in the twelfth 

 and the thirteenth centuries. Highborn and 

 courtly, as well as delightful entertainers, they 

 were royally welcomed at the feudal castles to 

 which their travels brought them. They wrote 

 both poems and music, their lyrics relating 

 chiefly to sentimental subjects. This gave rise 

 to the name minnesinger, for minne is the Old 

 German word for love. Many of their compo- 

 sitions, however, concerned religion, nature, 

 patriotism, the Crusades and the political ques- 

 tions of the day. 



One of the most brilliant of the minnesingers, 

 Walther von der Vogelweide, was considered 

 to have helped so greatly to awaken the Ger- 

 man national spirit that the emperor rewarded 

 him with a private estate. Longfellow wrote 

 an interesting poem entitled Walther von dcr 

 Vogelweide, and Wagner's opera of Tannhauser 

 is based in part upon an ancient legend about 

 this beloved poet of early days. Wolfram von 

 Eschenbach, another celebrated minnesinger, 

 was the author of an epic called Parzival, the 

 inspiration of Wagner's famous music-drama 

 Parsifal (which see). 



After 1300 the art of the minnesingers lan- 

 guished, but its revival was attempted by the 

 mastersingers. See MASTERSINGERS. 



