Odds and Ends

September Membership Meeting Minutes

The September 22, 2015 Membership Meeting of the Robbinsdale Historical Society was called to order by President Diane Jacobson McGee. The Pledge of Allegiance was recited. The Minutes of the last meeting of the Society … Read more

Horse and Buggy Public Safety

  Born in Austria , John Bloberger came to Robbinsdale when he went to work for the railroad in 1894. In the early days of the village, Bloberger served as Village Constable, Street Commissioner, Village … Read more

The Crystal Theater

In 1916 William J. Muller opened his first drug store in a little wooden building next door to Gus Urban’s Meat Market. Ten years later, he built a new brick front drug store and the … Read more

The Security State Bank

On January 1916, The Security State Bank, incorporated December 16th, 1918, opened for business in old Robbinsdale State Bank Building. The previous bank, incorporated in 1906, failed at least twice, was lampooned by the local … Read more

Robbinsdale’s Most Important Industry

  “Robbinsdale’s brick sky scraper, where three million readers all over the United States look to find their jokes, love stories and blood curdling adventure yarns in the three magazines published here- Whiz Bang, True … Read more

A Typical Home?

“Typical Hone- Home owning is Robbinsdale’s major “industry”. Many beautiful homes such as this one owned by Reuben Katz adorn residential avenues.” The photo at the top of the post is from a Sunday Minneapolis … Read more

Villas Avenue?

About 1925 the names of the streets were changed to eliminate duplication and to bring about a unified system between the villages of Crystal, Golden Valley, and Robbinsdale. Villas Avenue became Noble Avenue. Legend has … Read more

A Deer in the Drug Store

On May 23rd, 1945 a 160 pound, four point buck bounded into the open basement door of Morris W. Henney’s Robbinsdale Pharmacy at 4139 West Broadway. Game Warden, Ben Cohen and Robbinsdale Policemen, Matt Spurzem and Adrian Mattson, came to the rescue, but not before the deer had done more than $600 dollars worth of damage by crashing into medical cabinets. After Cohen and Mattson dragged it outside and trussed it up, the deer was taken to Sheriff Earle Brown’s farm for doctoring and then to a game refuge.

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Streetcar comes to Robbinsdale–On a Truck!

  In 1954 Father Nolan purchased an old trolley for the playground at Sacred Heart School. These photos come from Father Nolan’s streetcar movie in the Minnesota Streetcar Museum collection. Moving the trolley was quite … Read more