The Changing Face of Cedar Lake: 1900 - 1918

Abstract

Aided by the photographs of William Wallof, who lived in the Cedar Lake area of Minneapolis, Minnesota, from 1892 to 1918, this paper explores the effects of the Minneapolis Park Board's lowering of Cedar Lake and railroads' gradual filling in of the shoreline around the lake at the end of the nineteenth and beginning of the twentieth century. The author uses concepts from the field of urban environmental history, especially from the work of environmental historian William Cronon, to place the land itself as the paper's central protagonist. The author examines the interaction between the commercial, recreational, and residential communities using the Cedar Lake area and analyzes how these communities acted on and reacted to the changes in the land. The author explores the intended and unintended consequences of lowering the lake and explains how these changes have impacted Minneapolis's contemporary urban environment.