July 3
| 1839 | Dakota and Ojibwe warriors engage in two battles: one in Stillwater in an area called Battle Hollow, the other at the mouth of the Rum River in Anoka. The Dakota attacks kill about 100 Ojibwe people, and during the next month the Dakota hold celebratory dances with Ojibwe scalps at Lake Calhoun. |
| 1863 | Little Crow (Taoyateduta), leader of the Dakota during the U.S.–Dakota War of 1862, is killed while picking berries with his son in Meeker County, near Hutchinson. He is shot by Nathan and Chauncey Lamson, who are unaware of his identity. The Lamsons collect a bounty of five hundred dollars for their deed. |
| 1863 | Minnesota's first railroad fatality: a train strikes a wagon driven by Captain Abraham Bennett at the Como Road crossing in St. Paul. There had been talk of building a bridge at the site, but, ironically, Bennett himself had opposed it. |
| 1917 | The Dandelion is the first ship to pass through the Minneapolis locks, which connect the upper Mississippi to water traffic from below St. Anthony Falls. |
| 1941 | Charles Haralson dies in Excelsior at the age of seventy-eight. The first resident superintendent of the University of Minnesota's Fruit Breeding Farm (now the Horticultural Research Center) at Excelsior, the Swedish-born Haralson served as superintendent from 1908 to 1925, an especially creative period during which several outstanding hardy trees and fruits were developed and introduced, including his namesake Haralson apple (1922), a tart, long-keeping, winter variety that remains popular with both home and commercial growers. |
The Events displayed are from
Disasters and Extreme Events
| 1879 | A tornado strikes Belle Creek, Burnside, and Vasa in Goodhue County. There are nine deaths and thirty serious injuries. |
| 1983 | A tornado strikes in Andover while adjacent straight-line winds, with speeds estimated at 100 to 150 miles per hour, sweep through a two- to six-mile swath from Maple Grove in Hennepin County to Taylors Falls in Chisago County. |
The disasters and extremes events were compiled from Minnesota Historical Society collection sources, primarily Minnesota newspapers.
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