EARLY PARK BUSINESSES

Lumber magnate T.B. Walker’s dream was to create a carefully planned community, with specified areas for home, businesses, and industry. To that end, he and his associates purchased 2,000 acres of land west of Minneapolis (so it wouldn’t be annexed by St. Paul), and had it platted. Although the original plat, with its 25 ft. lots, has been changed through the years, the current plat map clearly shows the “Industrial Circle” where many of the following businesses were located. (Look on the map fort the top of the circle on Walker Street, just west of the Brick Block.) 

In 1893, a booster declared “Those who are engaged in the mercantile business and other enterprises of our village are men of ‘snap’ and take a lively interest in making it the most desirable place to live in Minnesota.”

All of Walker’s activity took place between Minnetonka Blvd. and Excelsior Blvd. – it did not include Brookside or the North Side.

The following are some of the businesses in the Village during its industrial age. Some have links to longer descriptions.   Many of the sketches below are from the 1892 map used to boost the town.

The Minnesota Beet Sugar Manufacturing Company was incorporated on May 10, 1897. In 1898 it took over the 36-acre site of the Minneapolis Esterly Harvester Company and changed its name to the Minnesota Sugar Company.

Louis Berkowitz, who liked to be known as “Sheeny Louie” (sheeny generally being a slur meaning Jewish person) had been in the Park since at least 1901. He ran a grocery store on Minnetonka Blvd., where he also had a gas pump.

The Minneapolis Box Lumber Co. was incorporated on August 31, 1889. It purchased seven acres of land from O.K. Earle. The company was insolvent by January 16, 1892.

Dana and Anne Thompson took over Brookside Grocery just after their marriage in 1915. It was located at 4348 Brookside Ave. Not to be confused with the Brookside Market, which was up on Excelsior Blvd. at Brookside.

Century Foundry made "soil pipe" in 1938 and was a local company.

Despite the Depression of 1893, the Minneapolis Chair Company was incorporated on August 30 and lasted until 1923. The company employed 100 men and leased its space from Walker.
 

The Minneapolis Esterly Harvester Company was incorporated on April 18, 1892. The company manufactured farm implements (featuring a self-tying twine binder).

There are pictures of the Fern Hill Store, run by August W. Nyberg, from around 1917-18.

In 1902 the Fosston Wind Stacker Company occupied the building formerly used by the Thompson Wagon Works and manufactured its threshing machines for two years until it moved to St. Paul.

Freeland's Grocery opened at Alabama and Oxford in April 1919.

The Minneapolis Jarless Spring Carriage Company was incorporated on July 27, 1891 and employed 100 men. George B. Schoepf of Minneapolis had invented a spring for buggies and wagons, and the company manufactured springs, wagons, buggies, and other vehicles. T.B. Walker installed his son Gilbert as one of the incorporators and financed the factory, a three story rectangular building. The company became obsolete as automobiles replaced buggies.

We find an ad for the Kilbourne Lumber Company, St. Louis Park and Lake Harriet (4318 Upton), in 1914.

The Lindsay-Greenfield Vehicle Company manufactured wagons and distributed agricultural machinery in 1881. Company records seem to run through 1980.

In 1891, T.B. Walker provided an L-shaped building on the west side of the industrial circle for the Minneapolis Malleable Iron Company, again with Gilbert Walker as President. It employed 150 men in 1892, but eventually the product became obsolete and poorly made, and the factory closed down in the 1900's.






Myron R. Martin was an early manufacturer of bicycles (1895) and two-cylinder  automobiles (1899). While in Superior, Wis., he invented the Martin grain grinder, a high speed mill that operated with a small gasoline engine. In 1902 he purchased a factory in St. Louis Park from Mr. L.R. Gorham of the Red River Lumber Company, as advertised in the Minneapolis Times. There he started the M.R. Martin Company (changed to the Martin Manufacturing Company in 1907), which produced an engine-driven corn grinder. In his 1927 biography of his father “Myron R. Martin: Grinder Builder,” D.C. Martin wrote that “the townspeople had put over a sort of ‘hoodoo’ on the factory for the reason that several industries had started in business and for different reasons had failed.” That passed, the business thrived, and in 1914 he began to build a new factory next to the old, interrupted in 1917 by World War I. The business was incorporated in 1919. Martin died on May 12, 1922, and the factory was razed by fire on October 15, 1925.


Martin Manufacturing

The Monitor Works, one of the first and certainly one of the most successful industrial endeavors in the early suburb's history, incorporated on November 9, 1891.

A 1938 industrial directory lists the N.W. Metal Manufacturing Co., which dealt in scrap metal.

In the nineteen-teens, there appeared to be a number of peddlers, so much so that the Village Council was concerned. Starting in about 1918 we see permits issued, starting with a B. Shine, who was issued a permit to “pack peddle.” Others had a “one-horse rig.” J. Grofkos and T.G. Bennis received permits in 1919, as did Harry Golentos, who had two horses. The fee was $7 for three months, the thought being that they didn’t want the peddlers around for very long. In 1920, L.A. Johnson sought to peddle with a Ford. That year James Chepokas received a free license because he was a veteran. Finally, on December 2, 1920, the Council passed an ordinance that showed just exactly how they felt about the matter: An Ordinance regulating licenses for peddlers, hucksters, circuses or traveling shows.”

Pockrandt Lumber, located at 6325 Highway 7, started as the Burnham Lumber Company in 1910, and became the Pockrandt Lumber Company in 1915. The grounds burned in 1921 and the main building was built in 1937.

Prestolite factory, 1920 (photo reversed)

The Prest-o-lite Company came to Minneapolis in 1912, headquartered in the Soo Line Building downtown, with the plant located at West Lake and Monitor Streets, south of Highway 7. The company had been organized in 1904 by Graham Fisher and James A. Allison, who introduced a new system of acetylene gas headlights. Ads urged customers to “Brighten the Way – Do not Blind Others.” Tanks were mounted on running boards of cars to produce energy to run the headlights. The factory generated 1,200 tanks of acetylene gas per day. There were 27 other factories around the country. In 1914, the local manager was C.J. Pettit. After auto lights became electrified, the company specialized in other commercial uses of gas. In 1938, the company's headquarters is listed as New York City.  The company merged with Linde Air Products in 1946.

Rodgers Hydraulic, Inc. was founded by brothers John L. Rodgers, Sr. and George A. Rodgers in 1929. The company started by making parts for construction tractors.

J.K. Seirup sold coal and wood at his location on Highway 7 at Wooddale.  This site has been flattened.

The Shaft-Pierce Shoe Company was incorporated on April 12, 1892 by W.S. Shaft of SLP and Charles S. Pierce of St. Paul. Walker built a 2-1/2 story building on the east side of the industrial circle. The company, which had a cutting and stitching room in Minneapolis, manufactured Minnehaha Shoes. In 1892 it employed 50 men. Functions were consolidated and moved out of St. Louis Park in 1901.

The Minneapolis Specialty Manufacturing Company manufactured iron and wood products, employing 50 men. It incorporated on October 1, 1893.

Hopkins friends (Nels) Swenson and (Carl) Redeen opened the Swenson Redeen Meat Market in October 1923 in the Walker Building next to Doc Brown's barber shop and pool hall. Other contemporary local stores were Sheeny Louie's (that's what he liked to be called) at Salem and Lake, and the Moskowitz Grocery at Minnetonka and Dakota. Swenson bought out Redeen in 1942, and in 1948 the store moved across the street to the Hamilton Building, where it operated until Nels passed away in 1952.

The Village Council bought groceries from Mr. Sworsky and Son, presumably a St. Louis Park business.

The Thompson Wagon Company was incorporated on July 27, 1891, with Gilbert M. Walker listed as President. George F. Thompson was relegated to Vice President and Manager; A.M. Allen was Secretary and Treasurer. T.B. Walker provided the site and the factory, a two-story L-shaped building on the east side of the industrial circle. A letter from September 1891 indicates that the business office was located at the Lumber Exchange downtown. The factory employed 200 men in 1892, but burned down in 1893.

The 1892 map shows Minneapolis Threshing Machine, which employed 400 men.

The 1892 sketches show the Minneapolis and St. Louis Reduction Works, although little is known about it.  It is noted that it employed 100 men.
 

In 1902, Fischer and Trenkley had a general store in the Walker Block. It was bought out by Charles Hamilton some time after 1925.


Vern Lindahl and Kelly Gibson in Trenkley's Store.

The Unexcelled Manufacturing Co. produced wholesale fireworks in 1938.  Its main office was in New York City.

The Wallis Buggy Company (later Coach and Carriage Works), employed 100 men in 1892, but moved to Minneapolis within a few years to manufacture automobile upholstery.

The Wheeler Lumber, Bridge and Supply Co. operated a lumber warehouse in 1938.  It was a local company.

Many of the companies that were started with such enthusiasm in 1890-92 were wiped away by the Depression of 1893, wielding a fatal blow to Walker's dream.  Other companies made products that became obsolete in the fast-changing technology of the times.  But other early companies thrived, well into the 20th Century. 

 

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This information comes from a variety of sources: newspapers, books, yearbooks, phone directories, interviews, etc. Given the varied sources, we cannot guarantee that all of this information is correct, and welcome any additions and corrections. Please contact us with your contributions and comments.