The curiously thin looking City Hall, with one of the largest bells in the world and an illuminated clock-dial, visible for two miles at night, occupies a triangular site bounded by East Water, Market and Biddle Streets.
Other notable structures in the business district are the Germania Building, the Evening Wisconsin Building, the Sentinel, the New Insurance Building, the Mitchell Building and the Pabst Building.
Among the public monuments are statues of Washington, near Ninth Street, and the Soldiers’ Monument.
Juneau Park, laid out on a bluff overlooking Lake Michigan, contains statues of Solomon Juneau, the earliest white settler, and Leif Ericson; it commands fine views. Lake Park, farther to the north, also overlooks the lake. Near it is the North Point Pumping Station, with a tall and graceful water tower. The Forest Home Cemetery, at the southwest corner of the city, deserves notice. The attractions of Washington Park, on the west limits of the city, include a large herd of deer.
The great breweries, such as Pabst’s, which covers thirty-four acres, or Schlitz’s, are wonderfully interesting plants, while the grain elevators, the flour mills, the coal docks, the International Harvester Co., and the workshops of the C. M. St. P. Railway are also great concerns. To the south are the rolling mills of the Illinois Steel Co., covering one hundred and fifty-four acres of ground. To the southwest, chiefly in the valley of the Menomonee, are the large brick yards that produce the light colored bricks which give Milwaukee the name of “Cream City.” To the north, along the Milwaukee River, are extensive cement works.
Sheridan Drive, skirting the lake to the south for two miles, is intended to be prolonged so as ultimately to meet the boulevard of that name running from Chicago to Fort Sheridan.
The other industries include manufactories of leather, machinery, iron and steel goods, tobacco, clothing, stoves, tinware, brick, furnaces, cars, steel and malleable iron. Pork packing is also carried on extensively.
Milwaukee became a village in 1835 and received a city charter in 1846. Its growth has been rapid, particularly in the last twenty-five years.
Minneapolis (min-e-ap´ō-lis), Minn. [The “Flour City”; named from Dakota Indian words, Minni, “water,” ha, “curling,” and the Greek word polis, “a city,” namely “city of the curling water,” alluding to the Falls of St. Anthony.]
It is the largest city of Minnesota, adjoins the capital, St. Paul, and is situated on both sides of the Mississippi, which is here crossed by numerous bridges. The Falls of St. Anthony, with a perpendicular descent of sixteen feet, afford a water power which has been a chief source of the city’s prosperity.