Sawmilling: The City's First Industry

Sawmilling: The City's First Industry. . Long before farmers plowed Minnesota's western prairies, lumberjacks were felling pines in its northern forests. Beginning in the late 1840s, trees from Ojibway lands upriver were being cut into boards by sawmills at the Falls of St. Anthony. But the value of agriculture soon surpassed lumber throughout the state. The economic importance of flour milling pushed sawmills away from the falls, where space was at a premium. By 1890 most of the sawmills, by then powered by steam, were spread along the river in north Minneapolis. The industry peaked in 1899 with the frenzied cutting of Minnesota's remaining forests. For the next six years Minneapolis was the nation's largest sawmill center, but by 1910, with the timber gone, nearly all the mills had closed., Nineteenth-century sawmilling was a dangerous and environmentally destructive business. Like trees, mill workers were plentiful and expendable. Safeguards were few and accidents frequent. Testimony to this was the city's thriving business in artificial limbs. Piles of lumber and sawdust also made fire an ever-present threat to the mills and nearby buildings., The east channel became crowded with dams, tailraces, flumes, and sawmill debris. The tailraces still functioning today are outlets for hydroelectric facilities operated by Northern States Power Company. These share Hennepin Island with the University of Minnesota's hydraulic laboratory, built in the 1930s. Hennepin Island and the east channel are now part of the Minneapolis Central Riverfront Regional Park.