Crosby Farm

Crosby Farm. . , The chain of these proposed forest parks would reach from Pike Island to the high bridge, and bring the country to the very door of St. Paul… "making glad the waste places." , Minneapolis Morning Tribune, January 29, 1911, The Crosby Farm Regional Park landscape includes more than 700 acres of forested sandstone bluffs and floodplain forest edging the Mississippi River. Only about three and one-half miles from downtown St. Paul, the land has been in public use since the mid-1960s, but previously supported dairy farms, stone quarries, and a log boom. Once part of the Fort Snelling Military Reservation across the river, at the time of permanent white settlement this was Reserve Township, established in 1858 and settled primarily by farmers. The township extended north to Marshall Avenue and to Dale Street at the west; the southern end was annexed to St. Paul in 1887., Forest Reserve and West End Commons as proposed in 1911., In 1858 Thomas and Emma Crosby, natives of England, claimed 160 acres of land in Reserve Township opposite Pike Island. They acquired extensive additional acreage including 31-acre Crosby Lake and miles of shoreline and floodplain forest lined with cottonwood, maple, and poplar., Crosby was a cattle farmer in England and briefly worked as a wholesale meat dealer in St. Paul before returning to farming. The Crosbys and their five sons raised dairy cattle and crops. Potatoes and apples were among produce well suited to the surrounding Ramsey County market. After Crosby's death in 1886, portions of the farm remained in the family, while others were sold to farmers and investors. Many ideas were circulated for this important piece of property recognized as the "wilderness in the city." In 1896 the Frederick Weyerhauser Lumber Company purchased about two miles of shoreline property for a log boom and unrealized sawmill., Reserve Township, 1886 (G.M. Hopkins), A 1940 view of the landscape, about twenty-five years before acquisition as Crosby Farm Regional Park., In 1911, as urban neighborhoods were developing to the north, Alpheus B. Stickney (1840-1916), a member of the Board of Park Commissioners and president of the Chicago Great Western Railway, proposed the acquisition of the farm as a public Forest Reserve. Reserve Boulevard, extending from Montreal to Otto avenues, was also proposed to connect to the Mississippi River Boulevard already completed as far as the Fort Snelling Bridge bear W. 7th Street. Another forested tract north of W. 7th Street was to be called the West End Commons. One observer noted, "the chain of these proposed forest parks would reach from Pike Island to the High Bridge, and bring the country to the very door of St. Paul.", It took many years, but in 1965, about 500 acres of surrounding floodplain and bluffland were acquired by the St. Paul Port Authority and leased to the City of St. Paul for park development. Reserve Boulevard and West End Commons were not realized. Shepard Road was constructed in the early 1960s, finally linking the area to downtown St. Paul.