Mill City Museum
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Fun Facts
- More than 12 million loaves of bread were made daily from the wheat milled at the Washburn A Mill during its heyday between 1880 and 1930.
- Every working day, approximately 175 railroad cars of wheat were processed at the mill.
- In one year, the mill ground the wheat harvested from 23,000 farms, which extended west to the Rocky Mountains and north into Canada.
- The flour mills in Minneapolis stimulated a boom in larger farms, and by 1880, 70 percent of Minnesota's cultivated land - almost 4.5 million acres - was planted in wheat. These farms were so vast that it was said a farmer could ride a horse all day and not get to the end of his wheat field.
- The Falls of St. Anthony were gradually moving upstream, so mill workers had to construct a wooden apron under the falls to stop the damages of erosion. "Pay your respects.to old St. Anthony," the St. Paul Daily Press wrote on Sept. 21, 1866, for soon "the heavy plunge of the amber Mississippi will be heard no more."
- Lakes and rivers in northern Minnesota that fed the Mississippi were turned into a vast reservoir system that regulated the flow of water to the mills in Minneapolis. The United States Army Corps of Engineers managed the reservoirs located on lakes Winnibigoshish, Leech and Pokegama, as well as the Pine River.
- In the 1880s, flour milling comprised two-thirds of the city's manufacturing output.
- Flour milling was celebrated in Minneapolis as the city named its first professional baseball team the "Minneapolis Millers."
- William de la Barre, chief engineer of the Washburn A Mill, was involved in corporate espionage when he worked at a competing mill in Budapest as a full-time employee. While at work, de la Barre would sketch models of milling equipment that he later brought back and applied in the Minneapolis mill. He also trained workers on milling techniques he witnessed on trips to Budapest, Prague, Paris and Vienna.
- The Washburn A Mill suffered great loss in its history. It exploded twice - first in 1878 when it destroyed one-third of the city's milling capacity in one night. It was rebuilt in 1880 but exploded again in 1928. In 1991, when the building was home to a few tenants and many homeless people, it went up in flames yet again.
- The population of Minneapolis increased by 1,300 percent between 1870 and 1890 as immigrants moved to the city to work in the mills and supporting industries.
- Local radio and television station WCCO takes its name from Washburn-Crosby Company.
- In 1971, the Washburn A Mill was added to the National Register of Historic Places, and in 1983 it was designated a National Historic Landmark.
- Mill City Museum has been honored with a variety of accolades, including an Honor Award from the American Institute of Architects/Minnesota and the Preservation Alliance of Minnesota. It was also named "Best Unique Venue" by Minnesota Meetings & Events magazine. The marketing and design work for the museum has also been recognized with awards from the Public Relations Society of America, the International Association of Business Communicators and the American Institute of Graphic Arts.
