Downtown Minot is the central business district of Minot, North Dakota, located south of the Souris River in the Souris Valley. Downtown is the site of the first permanent settlement in Minot in 1886.Federal Writers' Project. "North Dakota: A Guide to the Northern Prairie State." US History Publishers, 1950. Downtown is home to many of Minot's cultural sites of interest. It is also home to numerous galleries, stores and restaurants.Downtown Minot Business Members The Minot Riverwalk traverses the downtown.Minot City Map
Geography Downtown Minot is located in the Souris River Valley between North Hill and South Hill along US Route 83. The neighborhood is roughly bound by Fifth Avenue South to the south, Fifth Street Southwest to the west, CP's railroad tracks to the north and Front Street to the east.Minot Central Business District Map , accessed from the City of Minot's website February 5, 2013 The major streets through downtown include Broadway (formerly Second Street West), the Burdick Expressway (Business US 2/52), Main Street and Central Avenue. Main Street and Central Avenue divide the city's street into four quadrants. Streets east of Main Street are designated east, while streets west of Main Street are designated west. Likewise, streets north of Central Avenue are designated north, while those to the south are designated south. Downtown is connected to the north side of the Souris River by three bridges, the Broadway Bridge and the Third Street Bridge carry automobile traffic over the railroad track and river and the Anne Street ViaductAnne Street Viaduct, Minot is a pedestrian bridge making this crossing. The Broadway Bridge, which carries US 83 across the river, was completed in 1962. The First Avenue Pedestrian Bridge over the Souris River, built in 1935,Bridge Hunter, First Avenue Bridge connects downtown with the Torbenson neighborhood.Torbenson Addition The Eastwood Park Bridge is a pedestrian bridge over the Eastwood Oxbow, which connects downtown with the Eastwood Park neighborhood. The Eastwood Park Bridge, a false arch bridge built in 1927, carries Sixth Street from Central Avenue to First Avenue SE.Bridgehunter: Eastwood Park Bridge The First Street Stairs is a set of stairs connecting two sections of First Street and downtown with South Hill.
History In 1808, Alexander Henry The Younger identified the Assiniboine living along the Souris Valley as the Little Girl band.Miller, David, et al. "The History of the Assiniboine and Sioux Tribes of the Fort Peck Indian Indian Reservation, Montana, 1800-2000". Montana Historical Society, 2008. The Little Girl band or Souris River Assiniboine were the southernmost tribe of the AssiniboineRay, Arthur J. "Indians in the Fur Trade: Their Role as Trappers, Hunters, and Middlemen in the Lands Southwest of Hudson Bay: 1660-1870" Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1998. The region they inhabited later became part of Rupert's Land, part of Hudson's Bay Company claim.Rees, Tony. "Arc of the Medicine Line: Mapping the World's Longest Undefended Border Across the Western Plains" U of Nebraska Press, 2007 This land did not become part of the United States until fifteen years after the Louisiana Purchase, at the London Convention. Minot was first settled in 1886, when the Great Northern Railway was extended to that location. Originally, a tent city sprung up where the trestle was being constructed across the Gassman Coulee.Workers of the Federal Writers' Project of the Works Progress Administration for the State of North Dakota. North Dakota: A Guide to the Northern Prairie State. Fargo: Knight Printing Company, 1938. When it became known that the railroad had picked a townsite to the east, the tent city was relocated to what is now downtown Minot. At this time, the area was part of the Dakota Territory, whose capital had been transferred from Yankton in what is now South Dakota, to nearby Bismarck in 1883.Grow, Kathy K. and Lois H. Varvel. "Yankton, South Dakota: In Vintage Postcards". Arcadia Publishing, 2004
Olfa Olson, Ole Spokle, Ed Kettleson and Erik Ramstad were the first to settle in what is now Minot."North Dakota Year Book". North Dakota Magazine. 1910-1911. Agricultural Department, 1911. Ramstad bought the tract which includes downtown. The area originally called the Second Crossing of the Mouse,St. Paul, Minneapolis & Manitoba Railway Company. "The Mouse River North Dakota". Princeton University. later in 1886 was given the name Minot, after James J. Hill's friend, Henry Davis Minot, a fellow railroad executive and ornithologist.Gittelman, Steven H. "J.P. Morgan and the Transportation Kings: The Titanic and Other Disasters." University Press of America, 2012. In 1886, people quickly began settling the downtown area. J.H. Charlesboise opened a blacksmith shop and Christ Lindberg opened a saloon.Brown, Galen. Exploring Minot 1885-1900 Allen Tompkins, who later became mayor of Minot, moved to the town and soon built the Minot's first hotel, which would later become the Parker House. Allen's son, Ernest Minot Tompkins, was the first child born in the new city.Brown, Galen. "Exploring Minot: 1885-1900." Minot State University Construction of the railroad, farming and needed services provided early settlers with jobs. Another early way to make money was through the collection of buffalo bones from the area.
People collected buffalo bones from the surrounding area and brought them to the railroad track downtown. The bones were used for fertilizer and in the process of refining sugar. Piles of bones were stacked along the railway. In 1888, the pile along the railroad tracks extending east from Main Street was so large that the railroad built a spur track to load cars.Gavett, Joseph L. "Minot: The Magic City". Chicago: Watchmaker Publishing, Ltd, 2006. Lignite mining was another earlier industry that was established around Minot.USGS "Bulletin, Issue 906." U.S. Government Printing Office, 1941.
On July 16, 1887, the village of Minot was incorporated and James H. Scofield became the first mayor. The second mayor of Minot, elected the following year, was the city's first physician, Dr. Edmund Belvea. Minot's population at this time was already around four hundred. By 1890, Minot's population was nearly thirteen hundred. Minot's early population growth earned it its nickname "The Magic City".Olstad, Geneva Roth. "Main Street, North Dakota." Arcadia Publishing, 2000. By the 1910 census, Minot had outgrown Bismarck, to become the third largest city in the state. By 1970, however, Bismarck had regained that position.Minot Community Data Bismarck Population The Minneapolis, St. Paul and Sault Ste. Marie Railway, nicknamed the Soo Line for Sault Ste. Marie's pronunciation,Yenne, Bill. "Atlas of North American Railroads." Voyageur Press, 2005. was the second railroad to reach Minot, in 1893.Maiken, Peter T. "Night Trains: The Pullman System in the Golden Years of American Rail Travel." Lakme Press, 1989. The Soo Line Passenger Depot, built in 1912, served this line.Editors of Trains magazine. "Tourist Trains Guidebook." Kalmbach Publishing Co., 2009. In 1887, the city began publishing its first newspaper, the Minot Rustler Tribune.Meyer, Herbert W. "Builders of Northern States Power Company." Northern States Power Company, 1957. In the early 1920s, bank robbers, "Smiling" Johnny Reid and "Chicago Freddie""Notorious as Crook: Yeggman to Be Returned to Montana for Trial With Seven Others". The Spokesman-Review. December 13, 1923. were living in Minot.Butts, Edward. The Desperate Ones: Forgotten Canadian Outlaws. Toronto: Dundurn Press, 2006"Sentence Suspended: 'Smiling' Johnny Reid Convicted in Vancouver". The Montreal Gazette. May 21, 1924. Johnny Reid was one of several aliases used by Leslie Ayer, born in Prince Rupert, British Columbia in 1895. "Chicago Freddie", along with Arthur Schultz and George Long, were aliases of Arthur G. Davis, an American bank robber. Davis had just been released on parole, when he met Ayer in Minot in 1921. The pair stole more than $2 million from banks in Canada and the United States in the early 1920s.
In 2011, the Souris River flood inundated much of the river valley in Saskatchewan, North Dakota and Manitoba. In Minot, about a quarter of residents of the city were evacuated.Fundingsland, Kim. "EVACUATED! Resident Flee Rising Souris; Burlington Braces for Des Lacs Blast." Minot Daily News. June 1, 2011. On June 24, the Souris River surpassed previous crest heightsDavidian, Geoff. "Souris River Crests in Flooded Minot, North Dakota." Reuters. June 26, 2011. This was considered a five-hundred year flood event. Hesco barriers were installed by the National Guard downtown before the flooding began. The secondary dikes and Hesco barriers helped to limit some of the flooding downtown. The flooding downtown was primarily in the northern section of the East End/Bayou section up to Central Avenue.Satellite Image Minot Flood
Economy Top employers The top employers in Downtown Minot, according to the Minot Area Development Corporation in the first quarter of 2013 are:
# Employer # of Employees1 Trinity Health2,5932 Minot Public Schools1,5453 City of Minot3234 Ward County2305 US Post Office1056 Minot Daily News85 (2011)
Neighborhoods
Commercial Historic District
East End/Bayou The East End/Bayou District is a neighborhood adjacent to the Commercial Historic District, not officially recognized as part of the Central Business District.Minot Central Business District Map 1915 standard atlas of Ward County, North Dakota, plat book and patron's directory Geo. A. Ogle & Co., 1915 It is situated within the Minot Industrial Historic District. and The East End/Bayou neighborhood borders the Coney Island Addition to the north, the Woodland Addition and the river to the east, CP's railroad tracks to the south and the Commercial Historic District to the west. It is a mixed-use neighborhood, zoned mostly industrial and commercial. It has a similar building density to the rest of downtown. Central Avenue and Third Street East are the main thoroughfares through the neighborhood. The neighborhood is home to many businesses, including two bicycle shops, a flower shop and also the Railroad Museum. Bricks on Central, a three-story brick building, converted for office and commercial space, is home to a patisserie, a nursery, two photography studios, a dance studio, a fitness center and a software developer. Bricks on Central The First Avenue Pedestrian Bridge connects the neighborhood with the Torbenson neighborhood on the north side of the river. The Sixth Street Pedestrian Bridge connects the neighborhood with Eastwood Park. The two neighborhoods are separated by the Eastwood Oxbow, for which the Bayou Addition received its name.
Government Center Government Center is the small area formed from the triangle created by the Burdick Expressway, Third Street SE and Front Street. It is not considered part of the Central Business District. Government Center is home to the Ward County Courthouse, the county library and the county jail. It is the future location of the Ward County Office Building, a planned three-story, sandstone and glass office building across from the courthouse. The Minot Daily News building is also located in the neighborhood.
High Third