Robbinsdale Historical Society
Sharing Your Past To Build Our Future
Before Robbinsdale voted for municipal liquor, Menth’s Canteen sold on and off sale in the heart of the business district. The bar used Robbinsdale’s unofficial city slogan ” Next to the Largest City in the … Read more
Elim Lutheran Church was founded by 26 charter members in 1922. The first services and Sunday School classes were held in the Robbinsdale Village Hall. In 1924 the congregation broke ground for a church on … Read more
What are these guys smiling about? Chas. O. Wallace ( left.) Wallace was Robbinsdale’s first city clerk. He held office from 1938 until 1945. He served as Mayor from 1947 through 1954 and again from 1967 to 1972. The city’s new government offices behind Robin Center were dedicated to Wallace in 1970. John Zenzen (center) probably got to drive the car below . Adrain Mattson(right) served in the Army in World War I. He always kept his tie straight.
In 1942 a small group of Robbinsdale men went north with he US Army to began construction of the Alaska-Canada Highway. Work crews nicknamed the supply route, “oil can highway” after the discarded fuel drums … Read more
The Robbinsdale Airport opened in 1919, but civilian flying was halted during World War II. In 1942 the Robbinsdale Airport’s 23 planes were organized as part of the Civilian Air Patrol. Most of the … Read more
In the middle of the last century Robbinsdale was the only area suburb with a high school and West Broadway was the only shopping district between Minneapolis and Osseo. In 1961 more than 21,000 were enrolled in the Robbinsdale School District and homecoming was a big event! Mayor Walter J.(Red) Sochacki, who spent many years as the Robbinsdale High School Football and Basketball coach, brought the parade downtown.The tradition held for several decades.
After partaking in twenty battles, being captured by the enemy and wounded twice, Civil War veteran, Jay E. Nash found his way to Minnesota from Massachusetts in 1869. He purchased forty acres on the east … Read more
Here’s a an old photo of Adolph’s Bar on West Broadway. Flo Ann (Jullie) Tauber’s husband opened the bar before the war, but Flo was probably running the place when this photo was taken. She … Read more
Donald G. Colp was born in Nova Scotia . He graduated from Yale’s Divinity School in 1897 and went on to study at Carleton College in Northfield before he became pastor of the First … Read more