(HISTORY) How the Lakes Were Won: The Beginning of Parks in Southwest Minneapolis

Horace Cleveland gave his first speech in Minnesota on the topic of landscape architecture and parks on a snowy night in 1872. He had just arrived in Minnesota at age 58 after working on landscape architecture in Boston and Chicago. In Chicago he had encouraged city officials to consider creating parks to benefit the poor and to create “more men and women of refined taste and culture.”

Cleveland’s speech brought the message that nature could enlighten, and increase the health, “comfort and convenience of countless millions who inhabit the towns and cities which are to grow up through all this region.”

He believed that a system of parks must be created early in a city’s history and stressed that delaying the creation of parks would have an enormous cost as the price of land rose. He had seen the cost and struggle of eastern cities, as they tried to add parks to already populated landscapes, so he pushed young cities not to make the same mistakes.

Cleveland’s first speech was ahead of its time. He would wait 11 years to be asked to design a park system for the city of Minneapolis.

Charles Loring was a businessman and landscape enthusiast with a particular passion for trees. Loring made his money through real estate and investments in the fledgling milling business. His genial nature made him a great success in both business and civic life, connections that would later prove invaluable in securing land for the new park system.

The early years of advocating for parks proved difficult. An attempt to secure Nicollet Island as a central park failed, as did several following attempts to create parks outside of downtown.

As officials failed to secure funding for parks, attention turned to developing Lakewood cemetery, which was used as a picnic ground in the years before Minneapolis had a park to call its own.

Citizens raised objections to whether parks were truly necessary. To them, the need for infrastructure like water works, bridges and hospitals seemed more pressing than a need for green space.

Proponents of parks disagreed, arguing that if acquiring park land was put off, it would become too costly, and a plan for parks would never be realized.

Finally in 1883, the Minneapolis Board of Trade established a park commission using reasoning that echoed Cleveland’s opinions. The Board of Trade resolved that, “the rapid growth of our city…warns us that the time has come when, if ever, steps should be taken to secure the necessary land for such a grand system of Parks and Boulevards as the natural situation offers.”

That same year a park bill was drafted that would create a Board of Park Commissioners with significant power. The board would have the power to acquire, improve and maintain land, raise funds and issue bonds. With these core powers in place, the board had the power it needed to develop parks.

After years of advocating for parks, Cleveland would finally get his chance to develop a system for Minneapolis. At the board’s request he created Suggestions for System of Parks and Parkways for the City of Minneapolis.

While not all Cleveland’s suggestions were realized, his plan established the philosophy for Minneapolis parks and connecting boulevards that is still in place today.

Around 1885, a shift in consciousness made developing parks more popular in the eyes of the public. Parks began to be considered as an indicator of quality of life in a city, and the wealthy residents of Minneapolis used parks to argue that their newly settled frontier city was as good as any city in the United States.

The time was right to begin acquiring land around the lakes. In 1885, Henry Beard contacted Loring to propose that he and several other landowners donate a strip of land surrounding nearly the whole of Lake Harriet.

Scandal ensued when it was discovered that Beard was not the rightful owner of the land. The land belonged to William King, and his attorney Philo Remington had fraudulently sold off the land to Beard and a few others.

After the land was reestablished as belonging to King, he generously donated the lake-shore land originally pledged by Beard. Not soured by the controversy, Beard chose to donate other land he rightfully owned to create the Linden Hills Parkway.

Through these contributions, Lake Harriet and its shoreline were acquired by the park board at almost no cost.

Loring would not stop there. As head of the Minneapolis Park Board his goal was a “chain of lakes” and his eye was on Lake Calhoun and Lake of the Isles. Acquiring the shores of those lakes became his personal mission. He envisioned the lakes dredged to create the picturesque landscape we know today.

Loring used his prestige and business connections to convince landowners to donate to the park. Loring was tenacious; he wrote in his diary that he met with John Green, owner of land on the north end of Lake of the Isles “probably 100 times”. Ultimately, Green’s wife convinced him to donate.

By the end of 1886 the shoreline of all three lakes was acquired, and focus turned to improving the land. Lakes were dredged and Loring was finally able to plant the trees he loved so much.

Loring wrote of Lake Harriet that, “the generations to come will see that this beautiful lake with its wooded banks was preserved for their use and its waters protected.” His goal of transforming the lakes into a place of “health and beauty” was realized.