Minneapolis River Walk: History Along the Mississippi

Minneapolis sits at the heart of the continent, where the only waterfall on the entire Mississippi River once powered a milling empire that fed a nation. On this walking tour, you'll trace the river's transformation from industrial workhorse to urban wilderness, guided by writers and poets who call this city home.

The tour starts at the Open Book Literary Center, a 50,000-square-foot hub for Minneapolis's thriving literary community. From there, you'll descend past Gold Medal Park – named for the flour brand born here – toward the Mississippi, passing the striking Guthrie Theater with its cantilevered Endless Bridge. Along the riverbank, you'll explore the ruins of the Washburn A Mill, where a catastrophic 1878 flour-dust explosion killed 18 people and reshaped industrial safety across America, before heading across the Third Avenue Bridge with sweeping views of St. Anthony Falls and the rebuilt 35W bridge.

Crossing into the historic district of St. Anthony Main, you'll wind through streets lined with 19th-century buildings before crossing the 1887 Merriam Street Bridge – floated downstream and reinstalled a century after it was built – onto Nicollet Island, sacred to the Dakota people long before European explorers arrived. The tour ends at the Nicollet Island Pavilion, a quiet riverside spot that feels a world away from the city surrounding it.

On this 75-minute tour, you'll have a chance to:

• Discover how the Mill City Museum preserves the ruins of a mill that burned twice and fed America
• Hear the story of the 35W bridge collapse that sent 111 vehicles into the river in 2007
• Learn why Minnesota has more shoreline than Hawaii, Florida, and California combined
• Spot beaver-chewed trees, great blue herons, and other wildlife along Nicollet Island's riverbank
• Hear how the Lock and Dam system buried St. Anthony Falls and closed the river to boats
• Find out why Funkytown, a global number-one hit, was actually about leaving Minneapolis

Whether you're passing through or are here to stay, we'll learn and laugh while we move through the city's past and present together.

PHOTO CREDITS: Meet Minneapolis (the good photos) Minnesota Historical Society (Mill City Museum photos), and the author (blurry, badly-lit route photos).

Please note, there is temporary construction just after the Stone Arch Bridge, so you'll need to go along Main Street for a short distance after the bridge, before reconnecting with the tour route.