West Saint Paul Antiques

Saint Paul  is the capital and second-most populous city of the U.S. state of Minnesota. The city lies mostly on the north bank of the Mississippi River, downstream of the river's confluence with the Minnesota River, and adjoins Minneapolis, the state's largest city. Known as the "Twin Cities", these two cities form the core of Minneapolis-Saint Paul, the 13th largest metropolitan area in the United States, with about 3.5 million residents. The city's population at the 2000 census was 287,151. Saint Paul serves as the county seat of Ramsey County, the smallest and most densely populated county in Minnesota.

Founded near historic Native American settlements as a trading and transportation center, the city rose to prominence when it was named the capital of the Minnesota Territory in 1849. Though Minneapolis is more nationally recognized, Saint Paul contains important institutions and the state's political activity. Regionally, the city is popular for the Xcel Energy Center, home of the Minnesota Wild, and for the Science Museum of Minnesota. As a business hub of the Upper Midwest, it is headquarters for companies such as Ecolab and Lawson Software. St. Paul, along with its Twin City, Minneapolis, is known for its high literacy rate. It is the only city in the US, with a population of 250,000 or more, to increase the circulation number of Sunday newspapers in 2007.

In 1841, Father Lucien Galtier was sent to minister to the Catholic French-Canadians and established a chapel on the bluffs above Lambert's Landing named for his favorite saint, Paul the Apostle. Galtier intended for the settlement to adopt the name Saint Paul in honor of the new chapel. In 1847 a New York educator named Harriet Bishop moved to the area and opened the city's first school. The Minnesota Territory was formalized in 1849 and Saint Paul named as capital. In 1857, the territorial legislature voted to move the capital to Saint Peter. However, Joe Rolette, a territorial legislator, stole the physical text of the approved bill and went into hiding, thus preventing the move. On May 11, 1858, Minnesota was admitted to the union as the thirty-second state with Saint Paul as the capital.

That year, more than 1,000 steamboats were in service at Saint Paul, making the city a gateway for settlers to the Minnesota frontier or Dakota Territory. Natural geography was a primary reason the city became a landing. The area was the last accessible point to unload boats coming upriver due to the Mississippi River valley's stone bluffs. During this period, Saint Paul was called "The Last City of the East." James J. Hill constructed and expanded his network of railways into the Great Northern Railway and Northern Pacific Railway, which were headquartered in Saint Paul. Today they are the BNSF Railway.

On August 20, 1904, severe thunderstorms and tornadoes damaged hundreds of downtown buildings causing USD $1.78 million (1904) in damages in the city and ripping spans from the High Bridge. In the 1960s during urban renewal, Saint Paul razed western neighborhoods close to downtown. The city also contended with creation of the interstate freeway system in a fully built landscape. From 1959 to 1961, the western Rondo neighborhood was obliterated by the construction of Interstate 94 and brought attention to racial segregation and unequal housing in northern cities. The Rondo Days celebration annually commemorates the African American community.

Minneapolis nicknamed "City of Lakes" and the "Mill City," is the county seat of Hennepin County,  the largest city in the U.S. state of Minnesota, and the 48th largest in the United States. Its name is attributed to the city's first schoolteacher, who combined mni, the Dakota word for water, and polis, the Greek word for city.

Minneapolis lies on both banks of the Mississippi River, just north of the river's confluence with the Minnesota River, and adjoins Saint Paul, the state's capital. Known as the "Twin Cities," Minneapolis-St. Paul is the 16th-largest metropolitan area in the U.S., with 3.5 million residents. The Metropolitan Council estimated the city's population in 2009 as 386,691.

The city is abundantly rich in water with over twenty lakes and wetlands, the Mississippi river, creeks and waterfalls, many connected by parkways in the Chain of Lakes and the Grand Rounds Scenic Byway. It was once the world's flour milling capital and a hub for timber, and today is the primary business center between Chicago and Seattle. Named America's most literate city, it has cultural organizations that draw creative people and audiences to the city for theater, visual art, writing, and music. The community's diverse population has a long tradition of charitable support through progressive public social programs, as well as private and corporate philanthropy.

Minneapolis grew up around Saint Anthony Falls, the highest waterfall on the Mississippi. Millers have used hydropower elsewhere since the 1st century B.C., but the results in Minneapolis between 1880 and 1930 were so remarkable the city has been described as "the greatest direct-drive waterpower center the world has ever seen." In early years, forests in northern Minnesota were the source of a lumber industry that operated seventeen sawmills on power from the waterfall. By 1871, the west river bank had twenty-three businesses including flour mills, woolen mills, iron works, a railroad machine shop, and mills for cotton, paper, sashes, and planing wood. The farmers of the Great Plains grew grain that was shipped by rail to the city's thirty-four flour mills where Pillsbury and General Mills became processors. By 1905, Minneapolis delivered almost 10% of the country's flour and grist. At peak production, a single mill at Washburn-Crosby made enough flour for twelve million loaves of bread each day.

Minneapolis made dramatic changes to rectify discrimination as early as 1886 when Martha Ripley founded Maternity Hospital for both married and unmarried mothers. When the country's fortunes turned during the Great Depression, the violent Teamsters Strike of 1934 resulted in laws acknowledging workers' rights. A lifelong civil rights activist and union supporter, mayor Hubert Humphrey helped the city establish fair employment practices and a human relations council that interceded on behalf of minorities by 1946. Minneapolis contended with white supremacy, participated in desegregation and the African-American civil rights movement, and in 1968 was the birthplace of the American Indian Movement.

During the 1950s and 1960s, as part of urban renewal, the city razed about two hundred buildings across twenty-five city blocks—roughly 40% of downtown, destroying the Gateway District and many buildings with notable architecture including the Metropolitan Building. Efforts to save the building failed but are credited with jumpstarting interest in historic preservation in the state.

Minneapolis has a continental climate typical of the Upper Midwest. Winters can be cold and dry, while summer is hot and humid. On the Köppen climate classification, Minneapolis falls in the hot summer humid continental climate zone (Dfa); and has a USDA plant hardiness of zone 5a/4b. The city experiences a full range of precipitation and related weather events, including snow, sleet, ice, rain, thunderstorms, tornadoes, heatwaves, and fog. The warmest temperature ever recorded in Minneapolis was 108 °F (42 °C) in July 1936, and the coldest temperature ever recorded was −41 °F (−41 °C), in January 1888. The snowiest winter of record was 1983–84, when 98.4 inches (250 cm) of snow fell.

Because of its northerly location in the United States and lack of large enough bodies of water in close proximity to moderate the air, Minneapolis is sometimes subjected to cold Arctic air masses, especially during the months of January and February. The average annual temperature of 45.4 °F (7.4 °C) gives the Minneapolis–St. Paul metropolitan area the coldest annual mean temperature of any major metropolitan area in the continental United States.