What's New

Records of the Saint Paul Public Library are new to the collection this month. The library traces its earliest beginnings to 1856 when the newly formed Young Men's Christian Association opened a reading room. By 1863 the Saint Paul Library Association was formed, and by 1882 the City Council approved an appropriation to establish the Saint Paul Public Library. Since that time the library has grown and prospered, surviving a 1915 fire that destroyed the entire building and most of its collection of 158,000 books to become a national model for libraries across the country.

National Public Library Award, 2005 Under Della McGregor's leadership the library opened one of the first reading rooms specifically designed for children in the United States in 1939 and was influential in the creation of the field of children's library work. In 2005 the library was given the nation's highest honor for museums and libraries by the White House for its outstanding service to the community. In 2016 the library was the first to be awarded the Top Innovator Award for Racial and Social Equity by the Urban Libraries Council.

New and Updated Finding Aids - March 2018

Name/Abstract	File No.
Brown County: District Court: An Inventory of Its Civil and Criminal Registers of Actions	gr01433
Registers of actions for civil (1862-1949) and criminal (1862-1934) cases. Each entry gives the names of the parties in the case, frequently the attorneys representing each party, when the case was opened, the case file number, and a record of each document that was filed by the contesting parties or by the court in the case.
Brown County: District Court: An Inventory of Its Coroner's Records	gr01434
Inquest records (1887-1979), transcripts of inquests (1908-1966), inquest files (1874-1885, 1978), and inquest certificates (1972-1979).
Brown County: District Court: An Inventory of Its Minutes	gr01435

Brown County: Probate Court: An Inventory of Its Registers of Actions	gr01436
Records of documents filed and other actions taken in each probate case.
Brown County: Springfield: Justice of the Peace: An Inventory of Its Records	gr01437
Includes dockets (1909-1934), civil dockets (1927-1972), and criminal dockets (1930-1951, 1961-1972).
Human Services Department: State Operated Services: An Inventory of Its Administrative Records	gr00556
Records documenting the activities and organization of State Operated Services [SOS], the area of the Human Services Department that provides direct services to people with disabilities.
Virgil C. Johnson: An Inventory of His Johnson Family History in Minnesota Collection	sv000253
Photographs document three generations of the Johnson family of North Minneapolis. The Johnsons emigrated from Sweden to Minnesota in 1881, opened a boarding house, lived a short time in South Dakota and then returned to live many years in Minnesota. Views include the boarding house, family portraits and snapshots, vacations to the North Shore and elsewhere, Lake Minnetonka area, the family at work, and sports images. Collection also includes correspondence from Virgil S. Johnson to Agnes C. (Trantina) Johnson and Helen Emmings, an index to photograph albums, accompanying notes for slides and a family biographical sketch. Includes digital content.
Nicollet County: District Court: An Inventory of Its Registers of Actions	gr01439
Registers of actions for civil (1891-1955) and criminal (1862-1960) cases. Each entry gives the names of the parties in the case, frequently the attorneys representing each party, when the case was opened, the case file number, and a record of each document that was filed by the contesting parties or by the court in the case. The volumes are indexed.
Nicollet County: Lafayette Township: An Inventory of Its Birth and Death Records	gr01438
Birth and death registers (1872-1907) and birth and death certificate records (1908-1953).
Nicollet County: Probate Court: An Inventory of Its Insanity Records	gr01442
Reports of board of examiners in insanity, and related court orders and commitment documents. Some volumes also include reports of examinations for inebriety.
Nicollet County: Probate Court: An Inventory of Its Inventory and Appraisement Records	gr01443
Itemizations and value of the major assets (real estate and personal property) of decedents' estates. They are presented both on printed inventory forms (3 volumes, 1863-1899) and as handwritten transcriptions of inventories and of related court orders concerning the inventorying and appraisement of estates (2 volumes, 1860-1899).
Nicollet County: Probate Court: An Inventory of Its Registers of Actions	gr01440
Records of documents filed and other actions taken in each probate case. All volumes are indexed.
Nicollet County: Probate Court: An Inventory of Its Will Books	gr01441
Copies or transcriptions of the complete texts of wills probated by the courts, accompanied by certifications of authenticity and of filing signed by witnesses and clerks of court. Original wills are found in the probate case files.
Ramsey County: Saint Paul Public Library: An Inventory of Its Records	gr01444
Records (undated, 1865-2012) including annual report files, compiled printed materials, library headlines scripts, directors' correspondence, council and board meeting minutes, property files, subject files, published records and reports, scrapbooks, photographs, and files concerning the branch libraries and the bookmobile. Also includes records concerning the children's room (Skinner Room) and youth services; files of the Youth Services Division Head, Della McGregor; and files of Library Directors Jennie Jennings, Perrie Jones, Webster Wheelock, and others.
Soldiers Home: An Inventory of Its Board of Trustees Miscellaneous Records	gr01445
Records of board actions on applications for relief and for admission to the home (1931-1969); the board secretary's correspondence with board members (1930s-1959); correspondence and transcripts relating to complaints about operation of the home (1919-1940s); and miscellaneous reports.
Soldiers Home: An Inventory of Its Residents' Records	gr01446
Residents' record books and indexes, containing a variety of biographical, military service, pension, and Home residence information; supplemented by miscellaneous lists, member rosters, directories, and admission and discharge information. Includes digital content.

New and Updated Catalog Records

First Congregational Church (Aitkin, Minn.). Church records, 1926-1956.

Annual reports (1926-1954) and an undated history (3 pages, typed copy) of this Aitkin County church.

Margaret Baldwin Hawks. Stanley B. Hawks photograph album.

Images compiled by Margaret Baldwin Hawks after she and her husband, Stanley B. Hawks served with the United States Embassy in Poland in the 1920s. Album includes photographs of Warsaw, Krakow, Zakopane, ice skating, swimming, embassy costume balls, the Hawks family home at Lubomirski Palace, and many images of refugees in Poland in 1922--presumably from the Soviet Union. Some people and places are identified in the album including Stanley B. Hawks, Hugh Gibson, and Philip Baldwin.

Denise Hesselroth. Lorena Lundquist Hesselroth photograph album.

Album documents the life of Lorena Lundquist Hesselroth. Images include portraits of Hesselroth's ancestors; family and friends growing up; views of Warren, Cambridge, northern Minnesota, and the Northeast neighborhood of Minneapolis including the Hesselroths' home (2943 Ulysses Street Northeast) and the Hesselroth Cleaners (2244 Johnson Street Northeast); Hesselroth's wedding and honeymoon; and family snapshots of Hesselroth's children, grandchildren, and great grandchildren. Collection contains some copy prints.

Iowa. Iowa Territory papers, 1838-1865.

The papers also consist of two microfilmed volumes with the following correspondence: correspondence from the Office of Indian Affairs to the Iowa Historical, Memorial and Art Department describing items transferred from the Office to the repository; correspondence between Iowa Territory Governor Robert Lucas, Major Joseph Plympton, Lawrence Taliaferro, and Joseph Street (1838-1841); correspondence between Iowa Territory Governor John Chambers, Amos Bruce, George Brook, and Stephen Cooper (1841-1845); correspondence between Iowa Territory Governor James Clarke, Amos Bruce, George Turner, and missionaries Thomas Williams, Samuel Pond, and Stephen Riggs of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions (1845-1846); and miscellaneous correspondence related to swamp lands (1850-1865).

McKnight family portraits.

Eleven tintypes and an ambrotype of Harriet Clapp McKnight, her children, and their spouses, arranged into one frame. Collection includes Sumner T. McKnight and his brother-in-law, George Nelson Lyman who were prominent in the lumber industry and resided in Minneapolis.

Minneapolis Surveyors' Association (Minn.). Minneapolis Surveyors' Association papers, 1893,1932-1956.

Constitution and minutes (1932-1934), letters, resolutions, draft of an engineering code, and information on surveying fees of the organization and (after 1946) its successor, the Hennepin County Surveyor's Association, formed to improve municipal surveying standards.

Minnesota Funeral Directors Association. Minnesota Funeral Directors Association certificate of incorporation, 1938.

Contains a certificate of incorporation for the Minnesota Funeral Directors Association (April 11, 1938).

Minnesota. District Court (Kandiyohi County). Coroner's inquest files, 1881-1997.

File nos. 1-1986 (file nos. 684 and 688 each have two different individuals bearing the same number). They consist of coroner's inquest certificates, often accompanied by testimony, verdicts, inquest proceedings, transcripts, and/or related papers. The ancillary documents are particularly common for the years prior to circa 1950.

New England Mutual Life Insurance Company. New England Mutual Life Insurance Company papers, 1850-1857, 1958.

Includes photostatic copies of applications for life insurance with the New England Mutual Life Insurance Company by Minnesota residents, John B. Todd, officer at Fort Gaines (Minn.). and Alexander Rey of Saint Paul (Minn.) (1850-1857). A Minneapolis Star article. which discusses John B. Todd as the first insurance policy holder in Minnesota, is also included (June 3, 1958).

St. Croix Lumber Company (Winton, Minn.). St. Croix Lumber Company papers, 1901-1902.

Includes invoices and correspondence from the files of the St. Croix Lumber Company. The items were retained because of the numerous letterheads of businesses that interacted with the St. Croix Lumber Company. These include: Farwell, Ozmun, Kirk and Company (Saint Paul, Minn.); Foot, Schulze, and Company (Saint Paul, Minn.); H.L. Day (Minneapolis, Minn.); M.A. Gedney Pickling Company (Minneapolis, Minn.); Guiterman Brothers (Saint Paul, Minn.); the Vail Hotel (Ely, Minn.); Marshall Wells Hardware Company (Duluth, Minn.); St. Louis County Commissioners (Duluth, Minn.); C.W. Chapman Lumber Company (Waterloo, Iowa); Tower Lumber Company (Tower, Minn.); and H.F. Davis and Company (Duluth, Minn.).

St. Paul Library Board (Saint Paul, Minn.). St. Paul Library Board subscription forms, 1892.

Includes subscription forms submitted to the St. Paul Library Board by St. Paul business firms, pledging money to be used to remodel the Old Market House and build an addition to it (1892?).

United States. Army. Minnesota Infantry Regiment, 7th (1862-1865). 7th Regiment morning reports, 1864-1865.

Surgeon's reports on the sick and wounded, morning reports of Company H, and lists of clothing received by the men of Company H, kept while the regiment was in camp in Arkansas, Mississippi, and Tennessee during the Civil War.

United States. District Court (Minnesota : 3rd Division). District Court papers, 1859-1860.

Includes trial calender (1859-1860). Each trial details the parties, attorneys, action, issue, and remarks.

Waseca County Bar Association (Waseca, Minn.). Waseca County Bar Association papers, 1937.

Memorials for deceased members (1937).

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