I just received two great photos from Mike Sebek of his grandfather and future uncles, the Johnsons of St Paul, on a family road trip in 1933 or 1934 at the old Pigeon River crossing between Canada and the United States on Highway 61.
Many thanks to Mr. Sebek for providing the photos!
For more photos and history of the historic Pigeon River crossing, see my article HERE
I’ve put together a video of what it was like to drive the southbound lanes of Highway 100 in the fall of 2014, just before the impending removal of four historic bridges that mark what was once the first freeway in Minnesota. These bridges are being removed as part of a current construction project that will fully rebuild the stretch of Highway 100 between just north of Minnetonka Blvd and just north of Excelsior Blvd, which has previously escaped full-scale reconstruction. You can find more detailed info and photos at the previous blog post here
Just a warning – the video has been severely motion-stabilized, so unless you want to have an acid flashback, don’t look too closely at the clouds. The accidentally Gary Numan-esque song is an old demo of mine that I enlisted as a soundtrack. More videos of Highway 100 to come!
In the fall of 2014, MnDOT will begin reconstructing Highway 100 in St. Louis Park Park in the vicinity of Highway 7 and Minnetonka Boulevard. This will bring an end to the existence of the only portion of the original “Lilac Way” or “Beltline Highway” constructed by relief labor in  the 1930’s that has managed to survive to the modern day without being fully rebuilt. The project will remove and replace four historic bridges, all of which date back to the original construction. In anticipation of this work, I headed out in early May to photograph this stretch of highway before its demise.
Continue reading “Final Surviving Remnants of the Original Lilac Way in St Louis Park”
Finally got around to posting something new, an article on a historic highway bridge near St Cloud that was bugging me to photograph it every time I passed it while driving back and forth to my friend’s farm via I-94 this summer. Click on the photo above to check it out.
Also, I’ve changed the articles section of the site a bit, consolidating all the articles on the site into one page for easier access. A map with markers for each is included for good measure.
Comments? Corrections? Questions?: Email Me At: andrew@deadpioneer.com
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