1967 Map of St Paul Park

About this map

The Mississippi River and its backwater channels define this landscape southeast of the Twin Cities during the late 1960s. Residential expansion is concentrated around St. Paul Park and Cottage Grove, where new subdivisions sit adjacent to older infrastructure like the St Paul-Park Airport. The river corridor itself remains a complex environment of islands and sloughs, most notably Grey Cloud Island, which is home to the Grey Cloud Cem and several gravel pits. To the south, the river opens into Spring Lake near Nininger. The era's heavy industrial and transportation reliance on the water is evident at Lock and Dam No 2 and the convergence of the Chicago Burlington and Quincy and Chicago Milwaukee St Paul and Pacific railroads, which parallel the river's eastern shore through Langdon and Newport.