Established | 2003 |
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Location | 704 South 2nd Street Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA |
Coordinates | 44°58′46″N 93°15′26″W / 44.97938°N 93.25711°W |
Type | History Museum |
Director | Laura Salveson |
Public transit access | Bus Routes 3, 7 and 22, METRO Blue Line, METRO Green Line |
Website | |
Mill City Museeum
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The Washburn A Mill Complex from the Stone Arch Bridge
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Location | 1st St. S. at Portland Ave. Minneapolis |
Built | 1879 |
Part of | Saint Anthony Falls Historic District (#71000438) |
NRHP Reference # | 83004388 |
Significant dates | |
Added to NRHP | May 4, 1983 |
Designated NHL | May 4, 1983 |
http://www.millcitymuseum.org/
Mill City Museum is a Minnesota Historical Society museum in Minneapolis. It opened in 2003 built in the ruins of the Washburn "A" Mill next to Mill Ruins Park on the banks of the Mississippi River. The museum focuses on the founding and growth of Minneapolis, especially flour milling and the other industries that used water power from Saint Anthony Falls.
The mill complex, dating from the 1870s, is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. It is part of the St. Anthony Falls Historic District and within the National Park Service's Mississippi National River and Recreation Area.
The museum features exhibits about the history of Minneapolis, flour milling machinery, a water lab and a baking lab. The centerpiece of the exhibit is the multistory Flour Tower, where visitors sit in the cab of a freight elevator and are taken to different floors of the building, each designed to look like a floor in a working flour mill. Voices of people who worked in the Washburn A Mill are heard throughout the show. Visitors exit on the 8th floor, where extant equipment is interpreted by staff, and are then led to the ninth-floor observation deck to view St. Anthony Falls.
The Gold Medal Flour sign still shines at night atop the adjoining grain elevator. Across the river, the former competitor Pillsbury A Mill is topped with a sign reading "Pillsbury's Best Flour."
The work of local artists is featured throughout the building. Pieces by JoAnn Verburg, Tom Maakestad, Kim Lawler, Kathleen Richert, Paul Wrench and Becky Schurmann include murals, an art glass collage, a 15-foot (4.6 m) Bisquick box, and sculpture.