Growing up in the first house on Lake of the Isles in Minneapolis - built in 1885 (or 1887?)

 

I grew up in the first house on Lakes of the Isles in Minneapolis. I discovered through the Racial covenant mapping project at the U of Minnesota that this house deed was part of a racial covenant area. I also proved that the legal language of this racial covenant was lifted directly from the original racist laws of early 1700s Virginia Corporation British Divide and Conquer rule. I sent it to the University Mapping project and they thanked me for this discovery.

I attended integrated public schools till sixth grade and in fifth grade I brought an African-American friend from the northside of Minneapolis to visit and tour my house. We had a big private hedge along the lawn border and another big oak tree (that I had a dream about when it was cut down!) We also had a redwood deck facing the sunsets - on the 2nd floor.

The house was built for a Victorian mortician in 1887 (actually 1885 as proved below) - an owner of a funeral home mortuary - and so there was a servants stairway that spiraled up from the kitchen, past the second floor and spiraled into the attic where the servants quarters were. A floor doorbell (there was a hole in the carpet) could be pushed in the dining room to give notice to the servants! We never used this doorbell on the floor in the dining room - it was just something I noticed once.

Instead I spent most of my youth alone in Nature fishing along Lake of the Isles - in a boat or on the land. At that time in the 1970s we had bee hives, birds (ducks and chickadees), crayfish, raccoons, muskrat, snapping turtles, Canada geese flock, and for fish: Northern pike, bass, crappies and sunfish (also bullheads, carp and dogfish). I ate the fish sometimes. The lake connected to Cedar and Lake Calhoun (now changed to a Dakota name since Calhoun was a slave trader, etc.). Lake of the Isles had been a wetland but was dredged to create the lake - and so the lake had a "sunken island" that made for better fishing. So I also did ice fishing. I had a friend go fishing with me sometimes - various friends. Those islands were protected but we found a fort that we figured was maybe for homeless people - never saw anyone living in that wood "fort." haha

The Lake of the Isles became famous when it was the opening film scene for the very popular Mary Tyler Moore show. Later I learned that Prince had disco roller-skated around the lake in the 1970s - it was a very happening scene for awhile. By the end of the 1980s - the lake was very not active. I attributed this to the increased inequality of wealth and so less integration of cultures. There was a rich attempt to "restore" the Lake by removing the street sewers and planting wetland type growth but the wildlife of the 1970s never did return.

I can safely say I spent MORE time on or next to Lake of the Isles then any other person through the 1970s and 1980s. I remember Judge Alan Page used to run around the lake - he was a famous Vikings player who became an African-American judge. 

 The context study suggests that the houses in the Lake of the Isles Addition along E. Lake of the Isles Parkway and centered on Euclid Triangle (Levin Triangle), as well as the apartment zone along The Mall are of particular interest for further study.

https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5f83b1f80a4b4f03efa1cf40/t/6434c4eeeadec85f356e0f9e/1681179897361/EINA+Historic+Context+Study.pdf

Triangle Park, named after Mrs. Levin - her daughter was my first kiss! She snuck up on me when I got off the bus.  I was also in 5th grade. 

 An 1854 government land survey map shows marshland as well as a plain
covered with stands of oak amidst tall prairie grass around Lake Calhoun and Lake of the Isles, and grass and marshland at the foot of Lowry Hill. Lake of the Isles is set amidst marshes, with only a narrow isthmus separating it from Lake Calhoun.
Surveyors recorded four islands in Lake of the Isles in 1854 and 1858; the two southernmost islands were “elevated knolls protruding above the swamplands and shallow waters that then prevailed between Lake of the Isles and Lake Calhoun.”3 By 1885, they were named Maples Islands and were owned by Roswell P. Russell and J. Pierce. Two larger islands at the north—named Raspberry and Mike’s—were also owned by Russell. The marshes of East Isles along present-day Lake Street were
first dredged and filled for railroad construction in 1879-1884, and then at various times between 1884 and 1911 for construction of E. Lake of the Isles Boulevard

Wow 1885! I always thought it was 1887.

The first house on Lake of the Isles!!

Wow our house featured in this report!!

 

 

 West High school was torn down while I was in high school - going to Minnehaha Academy - a Christian school. The school had closed in 1982 when I was just nine years old. 

 These Outakes of Mary Tyler Moore in Minneapolis feature the same checkout lane at Red Owl grocery (7 minutes) in where I had my FIRST paycheck job!)