MINNEAPOLIS—ST. PAUL
THE TWIN CITIES

By CHARLES B. ELLIOTT

"We are citizens of two fair cities," said a Genoese gentleman to a Florentine artist, "and if I were not a Genoese I should wish to be a Florentine." "And I," replied the artist, "if I were not Florentine—" "You would wish to be a Genoese," said the other. "No," replied the artist, "I should wish to be Florentine."

WITHIN a circle with a radius of ten miles, enclosing the Falls of St. Anthony, are two modern cities with a population of almost four hundred thousand. The pioneer settler died a few months ago and the first child born there is now but passing middle life. And yet a little more than half a century after the landing of the Pilgrims the cross of Christ and the arms of France were carved on an oak tree which stood on the site of the present city of Minneapolis.

In the summer of 1680 Louis Hennepin, a Recollet monk, in company with Michael Accault and a Picard named Du Gay first explored the Upper Mississippi. Hennepin wrote a famous description of his travels, and gave the name to the falls he had discovered. But La Salle, Hennepin's fellow-voyager across the Atlantic, was the first to write a description of the Falls of St. Anthony, from information which must have been furnished by one of Hennepin's party.

For almost a century after Hennepin no white man visited the Falls of St. Anthony. In 1776, Captain Jonathan Carver, of Connecticut, started on an exploring expedition, to the Northwest and reached the falls about the middle of November. Carver made the first picture of the falls and gives an accurate description, from which it appears that the island which is now many feet below the waterfall was then in its midst. Carver greatly appreciated the beauty of the country, but, like Hennepin, passed away leaving only his description and his picture. The War of the Revolution came and left no trace on the Northwest. At its close the sovereignty of France and of the new nation which had been born into the world faced each other on the banks of the Mississippi. In 1803 the west as well as the east bank became part of the domain of the United States. But the inhabitants knew nothing of the change until Captain Zebulon M. Pike, of the army, came to put an end to alleged improper transactions on the part of certain British traders. On an island a few miles below the falls Pike held a council with the Sioux and signed a treaty which extinguished the Indian title to a tract of land extending nine miles on each side of the river north from the mouth of the Minnesota River, and including the Falls of St. Anthony. Twelve years later Major Long, with two grandsons of Carver, ascended the river from St. Louis in a six-oared skiff, and wrote that "the murmuring of the cascade, the roaring of the river and the thunder of the cataract all contribute to render the scene the most interesting and magnificent of any I ever before witnessed."

[THE FALLS OF ST. ANTHONY ABOUT 1850.]

About 1811 the philanthropic Earl of Selkirk attempted to establish a colony in the Red River Valley. Six years later it was threatened by starvation. The noble Earl then visited the country, and his presence caused so much disquietude in the breasts of the Indian agents that, fearing improper foreign influence over the Indians, they induced the Government to establish a military post in the country. In August, 1819, Colonel Leavenworth, with ninety-eight soldiers of the Fifth Infantry, pitched their tents near the mouth of the Minnesota River, about eight miles below the falls. A year later, Colonel Snelling, who had succeeded to the command, built the fort on the bluff where it now stands, and gave it the name of Fort St. Anthony. In 1824 General Scott suggested to the War Department the propriety of changing the name of the fort to that of one whose services to the country had been more conspicuous than those of Father Hennepin's patron saint.