This Day in Minnesota History

Today's Date: May 1

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1840	Joseph Haskell finishes constructing his farmhouse near Afton. His is the first commercial farm north of Prairie du Chien.
1896	The US government opens three-quarters of the Red Lake Indian Reservation of Ojibwe—the region north and east of Thirteen Towns in Polk County (Badger, Brandsvold, Chester, Columbia, Eden, Fosston, Hill River, King, Knute, Lessor, Queen, Rosebud, and Sletten)—to settler colonists.
1926	Sauk Centre's Sinclair Lewis declines the Pulitzer Prize for his novel Arrowsmith, saying that awards inhibit creativity and make writers lazy.
1933	Prompted by Governor Floyd B. Olson, the Minnesota legislature passes an emergency law stopping farm foreclosure sales. The Great Depression and the dust bowl had hurt farmers throughout the nation, and they had responded to foreclosures by organizing the Farmers' Holiday, which attempted to stop the sale of farm products until prices rose. Willmar's John Bosch, who revered the nonviolent ideas of Mohandas Gandhi, led the state's Farmers' Holiday Movement.
1976	St. Paul's Frank Boyd Park is dedicated to a "fighter for his class, his race, and his union." Born in Kansas, Boyd moved to Minnesota in 1904 and joined the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters Union in 1925, rising to secretary-treasurer in the organization. Active in DFL politics, he was one of the first two African Americans to cast votes in the Electoral College, in 1944. He died on May 2, 1962.

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