ST. ANTHONY FALLS INDUSTRIAL DISTRICT, MINNEAPOLIS, MINNESOTA
Industrialization is probably the most significant technological change
since the development of the first stone tool. Industrialization has brought
about social change on an unprecedented scale in an unbelievably short period
of time. Industrialization has had such a profound effect on our lives that
virtually everything we do has been influenced by it.
Industrial archaeology is the recording, study, interpretation and preservation
of the physical remains of industrially related artifacts, sites and systems
within their social and historical contexts. This research emphasis began
after World War II as the retooling of industry began to destroy elements
of an earlier industrial heritage. Industrial Archaeology has in recent
years included "dirt" archaeology in addition to historical research
and the above ground study of exposed structures and machinery. Its subject
matter covers the industrial spectrum from bridges
to factories to waterpower canals to railroads to flour
mills to blast furnaces to mines to dams to workers' housing to name
a few.
Over the last 13 years, the MHS Archaeology Department has conducted a number
of seasons of research on industrial sites
in Minneapolis, Minnesota as part of a project sponsored by the Minneapolis
Park and Recreation Board. The department undertook historical research,
test excavations, evaluation studies, and mitigation work at over twenty
industrial sites associated with flour milling, brewing,
electrical power production, lumber
milling, water power control, and ancillary industries such as barrel
factories and ironworks and transportation
related facilities such as bridges, railroads, and streets.
The St. Anthony Falls industrial area comprises a roughly rectangular section
of Mississippi River corridor at the Falls of St. Anthony near downtown
Minneapolis. By virtue of its engineering and industrialization, this area
became the epitome of nineteenth-century, American direct-drive waterpower
development. The modest beginnings of waterpower use for a grist and saw
mill by the military (Fort Snelling) in 1820 foreshadowed later development.
In 1858, developers of the falls adapted an extensive waterpower distribution
system developed at Lowell, Massachusetts. By the end of the century, founded
on the country's leading flour milling center, they had created America's
largest waterpower industrial district. The degree of hydraulic engineering
necessary to generate a consistent source of power was staggering. Canals,
tunnels, wasteways (tailraces), diversion
dams, bridges, and for hundreds of miles up the Mississippi river a series
of dammed lakes which were to hold water for release when flowage rates
were reduced in dry years.
The study of Industrial Archaeology
adds to our understanding of this significant change in the human condition
by adding a tangible dimension to technical studies, by providing technical
information on obsolete processes not obtainable from other sources, and
by supplying useful reference points of economic growth and social change.
A research focus on change reflected in production systems, transportation
systems, and communities will enhance our knowledge of the complex relationships
that link cultural elements and on an understanding of the mechanisms that
produce change in those relationships.
© 1995 Robert A. Clouse
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