First brick of TCF Bank Stadium to be laid on Monday
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The once and future campus home to the University of Minnesota Gophers football team will be bridged next week when Hilding Mortenson -- who helped construct Memorial Stadium as a 16-year-old and is an uncle to Mort Mortenson Jr., of the Mortenson construction family -- will lay the first brick on TCF Bank Stadium. The ceremony will take place 2-2:30 p.m. Monday, April 7 at the stadium site, 23rd Avenue S.E. at 4th St S.E., Minneapolis.
Due to the hazardous nature of the construction site, media must wear site-appropriate clothing such as long pants and boots. Check in will be at the 23rd Ave. S.E. gate between 1:30 and 2 p.m. Access to the site will end at 3 p.m. For safety reasons, the event will be closed to the public.
Athletics Director Joel Maturi will be on hand to usher in this next stage of the construction phase, which comes just under a year and a half before the stadium's opening in September 2009. Goldy Gopher and members of the U of M's marching band will also be present as will Mort Mortenson Jr., chairman of Mortenson Construction, the builder of TCF Bank Stadium.
"Mortenson Construction has celebrated many construction milestones with the university over the years," said Mort Mortenson, "but this milestone is especially meaningful to me and the Mortenson family. My grandfather, my father and my uncles Hilding and Carl all worked on the Memorial Stadium. So it is truly an honor for Hilding to be chosen to place the first brick on the new stadium."
The event will center around 100-year-old Hilding, who worked as a bricklayer on Memorial Stadium as a high school student. A presence in university athletics events for decades, he was also in attendance for the 1992 ceremonial opening of a time capsule during the demolition of Memorial Stadium. A time capsule for TCF Bank Stadium will be planted closer to the stadium's opening.
TCF Bank Stadium will be the first on-campus football stadium for the University of Minnesota in more than two decades. Under construction since July of 2007, the stadium is currently undergoing steel installation, a stage that is expected to be completed this summer. Fundraising is underway for the $288.5 million structure and so far $75.5 million has been raised towards the goal of $86 million in donations and sponsorships.
For more information, contact University News Service.
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