Growing for the Mills
The historic grain elevator reminds us of Preston's early agricultural years
Settled in 1853, Preston is named for Luther Preston, the town's millwright and first postmaster. Located on the . . . — — Map (db m289517) HM
The second schoolhouse for children from Forestville and Carimona was built in 1857 out of locally made bricks.
The brick schoolhouse cost $500 ($18,000 today) to build. It replaced a log building located in south Forestville. Milton . . . — — Map (db m288800) HM
Local bridges helped tie the Forestville community together. Early Forestville roads crossed the rivers at shallow fords. However, these crossing points were somtimes [sic] impassable due to dangerous flash flooding, thin ice or deep . . . — — Map (db m298885) HM
Because Forestville spanned both sides of the Root River, reliable bridges were essential.
The first bridge was a wooden one built in 1856. It washed away in a flood. So did its replacement.
In 1899, the Gillette-Herzog . . . — — Map (db m289628) HM
One hundred years ago, people escaped to these cool, wooded valleys to picnic, fish and relax. For centuries, the rugged blufflands landscape has been home to a remarkable variety of plant and animal life. Forestville/Mystery Cave State park was . . . — — Map (db m307716) HM
Forestville, 1853–1868
Growing Town and Trade Center
Native people lived in this area for hundreds of years, attracted by its ample fresh water, rich black soil, plentiful wildlife, and hardwood forests. When . . . — — Map (db m300716) HM
Forestville's brickyard was in this area. The clay for the bricks was mined from the hillside directly behind you. The streambed in front of you once supplied water for the brickyard.
In 1855, John Gill moved to Forestville from Ohio. . . . — — Map (db m287844) HM
Soon after Forestville was incorporated in 1855, the distillery opened.
Felix Meighen and Ruben Odell established Forestville's distillery. Their main product was rye whiskey, which sold for 40 cents a gallon. The distillery . . . — — Map (db m304972) HM
Wheat was king in southeastern Minnesota in the 1850s. Most towns had active gristmills.
Forestville's gristmill ground wheat into flour. It operated from 1857 until the 1880s. When competition from Minneapolis mills . . . — — Map (db m303351) HM
In the early 1850s, demand for new houses in southeastern Minnesota created a need for sawmills.
Thomas Meighen and Herman Luedtke built a steam-powered sawmill near this spot in 1892. To run their mill, they bought a . . . — — Map (db m295865) HM
The Forestville Graded School (as it was called locally) was built in 1879. It drew children from Forestville and the neighboring town of Carimona.
The first class was held here on January 14, 1880. The school stayed in use until the . . . — — Map (db m287325) HM
The Start of the Historic Walking Tour of Preston
1.🙠Historic Elevator. You are at Preston's railroad center (see adjacent The Milwaukee Road in Preston exhibit dedicated in 2019)—all that is left is the 1902 . . . — — Map (db m295762) HM
Step into the story of a 19th-century farming town.
Two 1851 treaties ceded Dakota lands to the United States, opening southern Minnesota to settlement. European American immigrants rushed into the territory.
In the early 1850s, . . . — — Map (db m289209) HM
"In memory of
Jesse Potter Nehring M. D.
who practiced medicine in this area from August 10, 1930, to January 25, 1967. His devoted service to his patients and his notable contributions to the care of the sick and to this . . . — — Map (db m303266) HM
During warm seasons, icehouses kept fresh food cold.
In the winter, ice was harvested from a nearby stream. To keep ice blocks from melting, they were packed in sawdust and stored in the icehouse. In the warm months, people used giant . . . — — Map (db m293279) HM
Horse medicine, school slates, eyeglasses, flour - all might have been for sale or trade in the log cabin store opened in 1853 by Felix Meighen and Robert Foster, boyhood friends from Pennsylvania. As the only store in Fillmore County, it did a . . . — — Map (db m205151) HM
Returning from Caledonia, train #641 is steaming westward at Mabel toward its home terminal in Preston with Class 8 G engine #1022 (last steam engine scrapped by Milwaukee Road in 1956).
August, 1953
Photo by Cecil Cook . . . — — Map (db m298381) HM
In 1937-1928, during America's Great Depression, the Preston Overlook was built as a project of the federal National Reemployment Service (NRS). The NRS operated an employment office in each county to certify manpower for the many . . . — — Map (db m286102) HM
"A library outranks any other one thing a community can do to benefit its people. It is a never failing spring in the desert." Andrew Carnegie
No well-regulated, progressive town can afford to be without . . . — — Map (db m300553) HM
Robert Foster, the general store's cofounder, built a house atop this hill around 1861.
Robert Foster and his family lived in the house until 1876, when he gave up his share of the store. Farmhands and their families lived in the house . . . — — Map (db m288264) HM
The south branch of the Root River is one of the largest trout streams in SE Minnesota. Its upper branch begins just south of Grand Meadow and Spring Valley, where it is fed by additional spring water and cuts through bedrock on the way to . . . — — Map (db m294390) HM
Grain Elevators
As the Blufflands were settled in the mid-1800s, harvests from local farms were brought to the grain mills and elevators in nearby towns—such as the Milwaukee Co. Grain Elevator in Preston. Grain was stored in . . . — — Map (db m293222) HM
Consider this your personal invitation to visit Preston, Minnesota, located along the Root River in scenic Historic Bluff Country!
Preston, also known as "Minnesota's Trout Capital," is a welcoming, family-fun destination offering a wide . . . — — Map (db m294348) HM
From 1855 to 1899, more than 30 burials were performed at Zumbro Hill Cemetery
The cemetery, accessible by a nearby wagon road, was built on land donated by Major Foster. Of the original headstones, 19 are still legible.
The cemetery . . . — — Map (db m286480) HM
