The MINNEAPOLIS WAREHOUSE HISTORIC DISTRICT IS THE STATE'S LARGEST
COMMERCIAL DISTRICT LISTED ON THE NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC
PLACES. Spread over a 30 block area, the DISTRICT INCLUDES 140
BUILDINGS AND STRUCTURES. The DISTRICT IS HISTORICALLY IMPORTANT AS
AN AREA OF EARLY COMMERCIAL GROWTH DURING THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE CITY
OF MINNEAPOLIS AND AS THE CITY'S WAREHOUSE AND WHOLESALING DISTRICT
THAT EXPANDED DURING THE LATE 19TH AND EARLY 20TH CENTURIES WHEN
MINNEAPOLIS BECAME A MAJOR DISTRIBUTION CENTER IN the upper
Midwest. Wholesalers were attracted to the area northwest of
the downtown business DISTRICT WHERE LAND VALUES WERE RELATIVELY LOW
AND RAILROAD LINES NEARBY. The leading wholesale lines included
groceries, fruits and produce, hardware, dry goods, glassware, and
most importantly, agricultural implements. The district is also
architecturally significant for its remarkably intact concentration of
commercial buildings designed by the city's leading architects
including Cass Gilbert, Long and Long, Harry Wild Jones, Kees and
Colburn, and Hewitt and Brown. Stylistically, the buildings
represent every major style from the period including Italianate,
Queen Anne, Richardsonian Romanesque, Renaissance Revival, and the
Commercial Style.
The warehouse district has retained its sense of time and place with
original bridges still in place, streets paved with bricks, and with
trains passing through daily on the tracks beds around which the area
first developed. The tour will discuss the overall history of the
district, the history and architectural styles of individual
buildings, and the architects who designed them.
The tour will walk 1 mile and is ADA accessible.
The tour guide is Rolf Anderson.
_Photo Credit: Minnesota Historical Society_
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19/08/2018 Last update