Mill City Museum

Our first stop of the day was the Mill City Museum.

We were scheduled for a Flour Tower multimedia tour, but had some time to kill, so we took this self-portrait in front of the big Bisquick package.

We could have also designed our own cereal box, but we did not.

The Flour Tour took place in an old freight elevator.

Our guide gave us information about the flour mill before beginning our multi-media experience.

I was interested in this camp which seemed to have a cool activity every single day.  I wouldn’t mind going to that camp.

The multi-media experience did not allow photographs, but it was very cool. The elevator moved to different floors and then told us some part of the history of the mill.  After the multi-media experience we were deposited on the top floor of the mill and learned how very important the dust collectors are.  Apparently, if you don’t have them, your factory explodes and kills many people and destroys several other factories.  This mill would know, because it happened here, once upon a time.

The mill met its end in the 60s when yet another fire (I think there were four total?) decimated the building.  Today, the walls make an attractive courtyard.

Our view of the Mississippi and St. Anthony falls.  These falls are what brought the power and made this a great site for flour and other mills.

There was also an extensive museum commemorating and celebrating General Mills products.  Here’s the story of one of the winners of the Pillsbury Bake-Off.  They had a fabulous video too.

On the way to watch a demonstration of how dust can cause an explosion, I took this picture.

I also loved these Fire Alarm Signals, leftover from back before intercom systems allowed verbal communication.

We were quite good at stacking the blocks and building some towers.

We also viewed a history of Minneapolis in 19 minutes flat, which was a great introduction to the city for me.  You can see a 30 second trailer here.