Latest / Oh And One More Thing / EP45 - The story of Minnesota & our own little Waconia

Transcript

EP45 - The story of Minnesota & our own little Waconia · Oh And One More Thing

• 0:33
  Hey. Everybody, it's Rob.
• 0:36
  Welcome to our podcast. Oh, and one more thing.
• 0:38
  Hey, and I'm Brian here again. You can't get rid of us.
• 0:41
  Well, you can, but please don't. Please talk.
• 0:44
  We. Love that you're here.
• 0:46
  All right, so you realize every podcast, this is my personal
• 0:49
  ranting time, right? It is.
• 0:50
  I know, I think it's been a theme.
• 0:52
  It has been a theme and today it's all about driving again.
• 0:54
  Not driving again. So we have coffee on Tuesdays,
• 0:58
  as everybody knows. So I come to work a little bit
• 1:01
  later. So today it was about 8:30 and
• 1:03
  I'm driving down the lovely Bloomington strip on 494.
• 1:05
  Right, it's a. Lovely drive, lovely drive going
• 1:08
  a massive 35 miles an hour, 4 lanes traffic.
• 1:11
  Well, you're. Speeding, yeah.
• 1:12
  And I'm, I'm doing my nice thing as a nice Minnesota boy and I'm
• 1:16
  leaving a one to two car gap between the car in front of me.
• 1:18
  Oh. That's your first mistake.
• 1:20
  OK, well you have to leave a little bit, but you can't leave
• 1:22
  more than that because you leave 3 or 4 someone from for a semi
• 1:25
  to. Right in there.
• 1:26
  So I got my one to two car gap doing my own thing and you'd
• 1:29
  think I was invisible by all the cars that were just cutting me
• 1:32
  off, right? I can't tell you what times I
• 1:34
  had to slam on my brakes and get out of their way in my lane.
• 1:37
  If you. Had half a car length in front
• 1:39
  of you? That's enough room for someone
• 1:40
  to try to squeeze in. It is, but I do get a little
• 1:43
  nervous during wash hour especially.
• 1:44
  It's terrible. It's horrible.
• 1:45
  Yeah, right. But here's the deal.
• 1:47
  So I followed a couple of these people that cut me off that I
• 1:49
  did not give the finger to, but in my mind I totally did.
• 1:52
  Oh, you're so nice. Watch them and a couple of them
• 1:55
  that cut me off. They they have like a mile, a
• 1:58
  mile and a half before their exit.
• 1:59
  So I appreciate the fact that you're pre planning, you're
• 2:02
  trying to get over before it's late.
• 2:03
  That's fantastic. But do you need a mile and 1/2?
• 2:06
  Can you maybe like put your turn signal on and slowly come over?
• 2:09
  OK, now get into their mindset. They're nervous.
• 2:12
  They got to get into that lane of traffic and it's full.
• 2:15
  And so I know my exits in a little ways, but I got to get in
• 2:18
  now, yeah. It's a mile and a half.
• 2:19
  You were fine. It's the other people that
• 2:22
  really push my buttons when they have like half a block to their
• 2:25
  exit and then the far left lane have to cut over 4 lanes of
• 2:27
  traffic and not only did they cut me up but they cut three
• 2:30
  other cars off to get over their lane.
• 2:32
  Oh, Rob, no. Have you ever done that?
• 2:35
  I have not but. Oh, come on now, you haven't
• 2:37
  been in the wrong lane accidentally.
• 2:38
  I got oh shoot, there's my exit. You know what I do?
• 2:40
  I miss my damn exit and go to the next one because I'm a nice.
• 2:43
  Driver. Well, you are.
• 2:45
  And I sort of sometimes I try to make it over there.
• 2:47
  Yeah, that's doesn't actually pan out well.
• 2:49
  If you can make it, yes, I get that.
• 2:51
  But here's the thing. I'm pretty positive all of us
• 2:53
  went to driving school at some point.
• 2:55
  No, really, I think they just give them licenses out like
• 2:59
  candy. How did we all forget about it?
• 3:02
  That's what drives me nuts. Anyway off my rant.
• 3:04
  Thank you for allowing me the time.
• 3:05
  I'm super excited about our topic today though.
• 3:08
  Well, yeah. So and I understand.
• 3:10
  OK, don't turn off the podcast. OK, so hey, I got one thing to
• 3:13
  add to our our ranting topic here.
• 3:16
  It's not really a rant, but remember our topic Back a Ways
• 3:19
  about sugar? We talked about all that retro
• 3:21
  candy. So my daughter was on a school
• 3:24
  trip, she was a chaperone, and she was down in Branson, MO Oh
• 3:27
  well, they went to a candy store.
• 3:29
  OK, guess what? You'll never guess what she
• 3:33
  brought back for me. What did she bring back?
• 3:35
  Candy Cigarettes. Oh my God, she did.
• 3:38
  Not yes, I got it right here. Are they crazy or what?
• 3:42
  I know they're just like they're smaller than they used to be,
• 3:44
  but. Well, hang on.
• 3:46
  Think back 50 years. Well, they were big.
• 3:48
  They were a big bag. Yeah.
• 3:50
  You roll them up in your shirt sleeve.
• 3:52
  You're really cool. But yeah, I had to share that
• 3:54
  with you. Oh, that is.
• 3:55
  Awesome. I love.
• 3:55
  It I love it. OK, so I'm really excited to
• 3:58
  talk about our topic today for a couple of reasons.
• 4:00
  OK, one is we all know Brian is the Uber excellent researcher of
• 4:03
  our podcast. Thanks, Rob.
• 4:05
  I stumble across a topic and I'm soup and I thought it was super
• 4:08
  interesting and I I get it. Please don't turn off our
• 4:10
  podcast. Please listen to it.
• 4:11
  But I get that the Super niche kind of topic today, it's it's
• 4:15
  us all about Minnesota and a little bit of Laconia.
• 4:17
  OK, sure, sure. I know it's a very narrow
• 4:19
  audience, but if you don't like the topic, shoot us a damn
• 4:23
  e-mail. Give us some topics to talk
• 4:24
  about, people. I mean, sometimes we're grasping
• 4:26
  as straws, but, you know, usually I do a pretty good job,
• 4:29
  yeah. All one more thing pot@gmail.com
• 4:31
  give us some suggestions. We'd love to talk about things
• 4:33
  you'd like as a topical. Ohh, I love that idea.
• 4:35
  Yeah. That's great.
• 4:36
  But anyway, so at least we are we've got some ruining content
• 4:39
  today to talk about. You can dive into the history of
• 4:41
  Minnesota and Waconia. OK, cool.
• 4:42
  So you mean when Minnesota became a state in 1850?
• 4:46
  8 right, No, a little bit farther back.
• 4:48
  OK, so you mean when the European settlers began fur
• 4:52
  trading here in about the late 1650s we're.
• 4:55
  Going to go a little bit further than that.
• 4:56
  All right, so then you must really mean the Dakota Sioux or
• 4:59
  later the Ajibwa lived here in this area for centuries before
• 5:03
  the Europeans got here. No little further.
• 5:07
  What further than that? What the hell are you talking
• 5:10
  about? So I'm talking about the
• 5:12
  geological history of Minnesota. It's saga of extremes ranging
• 5:15
  from towering volcanic mountains and tropical seas to a mile of
• 5:19
  solid ice. Because Minnesota sits in some
• 5:22
  of the oldest exposed rock on Earth, its environmental record
• 5:25
  is remarkably deep. Wow, you're going way back.
• 5:28
  Rock on, dude. I know, right?
• 5:31
  You know, hey, but since you're talking about rocks, what is a
• 5:32
  rock's favorite genre of music? I don't know what Hard Rock
• 5:37
  Lame. OK, let's get into it.
• 5:38
  Alright, alright. So we are going to go back to a
• 5:40
  prehistoric foundations of the Archeon Eon which is 3.8 to 2.5
• 5:44
  billion years ago billion with a B.
• 5:47
  Yeah, that's a long time. A long time.
• 5:48
  So the prehistoric foundations of Minnesota are we have some of
• 5:51
  the oldest rocks, the Morton. Nice.
• 5:54
  OK, you know. What that is?
• 5:55
  Well, it's a rock, isn't it? It's a rock, yeah.
• 5:58
  So we know this from multiple lines of geological evidence
• 6:00
  collected across Minnesota, especially in the Minnesota
• 6:02
  River Valley and the northern part of the state.
• 6:05
  There are three areas to help us determine this.
• 6:06
  All right, what are they? Radiometric dating so geologists
• 6:10
  measured the decay of radioactive isotopes inside
• 6:12
  zircon crystals in the rock way above my head.
• 6:15
  OK I was just going to say this is like way above most people's
• 6:18
  head. Already lost me.
• 6:19
  Just trust me, they know what they're doing right and these
• 6:21
  minerals act like tiny little time capsules and give us a very
• 6:23
  precise age. Okay metamorphic texture.
• 6:27
  So the nice shows extreme heat and pressure deformation
• 6:30
  consistent with early continental cross formation.
• 6:33
  Okay, still way. Over my head, but over my head.
• 6:35
  Pretty fascinating actually. And regional mapping.
• 6:38
  So the rock is part of the ancient continental core called
• 6:41
  the Superior Province of the Canadian Shield, confirming it
• 6:45
  formed during the Archean period.
• 6:47
  OK, so this tells us Minnesota sits on some of the Earth's
• 6:49
  earliest surviving crust. That's actually pretty
• 6:53
  interesting. Isn't that cool?
• 6:54
  Yeah. Like, I mean, in in my mind, you
• 6:55
  think of like the oldest part of the world.
• 6:56
  It's like in like Jerusalem and like all that kind of things,
• 6:59
  Right. Right.
• 6:59
  Because we were raised, you know, Catholic and Protestant
• 7:02
  and. All right, exactly.
• 7:02
  Yeah. But yeah, to me, that's just
• 7:04
  fascinating that that was like all here.
• 7:06
  That's cool. Yeah.
• 7:08
  Next we jump into the OK, see if I can say this word proto
• 7:11
  protozoic. Oh, you nailed it.
• 7:13
  Aeon love it. OK, but anyway, that's 2.5
• 7:16
  billion to 551 million years ago.
• 7:19
  That's a lot. That's still way back there, way
• 7:21
  back. So Iron and the great rift.
• 7:23
  What does that? Mean.
• 7:24
  What's that? Well.
• 7:25
  Iron formations around 2 billion years ago, oxygen producing
• 7:29
  bacteria, cyanobacteria began filling the oceans with oxygen.
• 7:34
  OK, so that's great, I suppose. I mean, obviously we have to
• 7:37
  breathe. This caused dissolved iron to
• 7:39
  rust and settle on the ocean floor, creating the Mesabi.
• 7:43
  And I don't know what that that word is.
• 7:45
  Kuyana. Kuyana Iron Ranges.
• 7:48
  Kiana so the Iron Range. OK, so up there in Minnesota.
• 7:51
  Yeah, that totally makes sense. I've always, I've always knew
• 7:54
  that was like a thing, the Iron Range with a kind of well.
• 7:56
  Yeah, it's always been the Iron Range.
• 7:58
  But where did it come from, right?
• 7:59
  Apparently, these little bacteria.
• 8:02
  That's way cool. I guess anyway, the Midcontinent
• 8:04
  rift. About 1.1 billion years ago,
• 8:07
  North America began to split apart.
• 8:10
  No. A massive rift opened from Lake
• 8:13
  Superior down through what is now the Twin Cities.
• 8:16
  Gigantic lava flows poured out. If the rift hadn't stopped,
• 8:19
  Minnesota would have been on the edge of the new ocean.
• 8:22
  What? I know, right?
• 8:24
  Really. Yeah.
• 8:24
  That's kind of fascinating. That is very fascinating.
• 8:26
  That's cool, man. This shit is really fascinating,
• 8:28
  isn't it? It is.
• 8:34
  Hey Brian, Hey Rob. We all know that Spring Green
• 8:37
  fertilizes our lawn and sprays for weeds.
• 8:39
  And it looks fantastic. Did you also know they offer a
• 8:42
  bunch of other services? Like making mosquitoes go away.
• 8:45
  We love our mosquito free yard, especially in Minnesota.
• 8:47
  You know mosquitoes are the official state bird, right?
• 8:50
  I'm fairly certain it's saloon, but yes, no mosquitoes rock.
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  And liquid aerations, rock and mechanical aerations, and
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  overseeding and lawn insect control.
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  Oh my. And don't forget about the total
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  home Peston rodent control. That's right, my house is mouse
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  free. See what Spring Green can do for
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  you at springdashgreen.com. For a personalized quote
• 9:10
  specific to your property, that's Spring dashgreen.com.
• 9:14
  And tell them. Oh, and one more thing, don't
• 9:15
  you? Now we're going to get to the
• 9:19
  next period. The Paleozoic Era.
• 9:22
  Yeah, I love that era. So that was 541 to 252 million.
• 9:27
  Years ago, I remember that. It was a tropical paradise.
• 9:31
  It it is every day here, tropical paradise.
• 9:33
  But in Minnesota, for hundreds of millions of years, Minnesota
• 9:36
  sat near the equator. What?
• 9:38
  Right. So isn't that when all the land
• 9:40
  masses were connected? Oh, yeah.
• 9:42
  Oh yeah, don't. We have a restaurant named
• 9:43
  Pangaea. Pangaea Cafe.
• 9:44
  Yeah, yeah. Put it back.
• 9:46
  Yeah, right. So the inland seas.
• 9:49
  The state was repeatedly flooded by warm, shallow, epic
• 9:52
  continental seas and marine life.
• 9:55
  The environment will look like a tropical reef this era left
• 9:57
  behind the sandstone, limestone and shale found in the Bluffs of
• 10:01
  the Mississippi River, packed with fossils of Trilio bites,
• 10:04
  Brockie pods. Oh my gosh.
• 10:06
  And cephalopods. Oh yeah, cephalopods.
• 10:09
  Who can forget about the cephalopods?
• 10:11
  Then, of course, we have the Mesozoic Era, 252 to 66,000,000
• 10:15
  years ago. This is during the age of
• 10:17
  dinosaurs. A massive sea stretched from the
• 10:22
  Gulf of Mexico to the Arctic, covering western Minnesota.
• 10:26
  The environment was so humid and swampy it had coastal swamps.
• 10:29
  The evidence of this shark teeth and various marine reptile
• 10:33
  fossils have been found in the iron in the iron ore of the
• 10:37
  Mesabi Range, proving that the ocean once reached deep into the
• 10:41
  northern part of the state. I didn't know they had shark
• 10:43
  teeth up there. I know.
• 10:44
  Why can't we ever find one, right?
• 10:45
  Exactly. That's so cool.
• 10:47
  Have you know I'm not looking but.
• 10:48
  Whatever, you know, whatever. And then lastly we have the
• 10:51
  Cenozoic Era which is 66,000,000 years ago to today.
• 10:54
  So this is the Ice Age and our Land of 10,000 lakes.
• 10:58
  This is the area that created the Minnesota we see today.
• 11:00
  It's cool. So starting about two million
• 11:02
  years ago, massive ice sheets, some over a mile thick, advanced
• 11:06
  and retreated across the state. No, wait, wait, wait.
• 11:09
  A mile thick. That's, I mean, that's like
• 11:12
  almost atmospheric. That's.
• 11:14
  Right, that's 5200. And some.
• 11:18
  Some odd feet high, yeah. That's crazy.
• 11:20
  Huge man, the glaciers acted like giant sandpaper, grinding
• 11:24
  down mountains and carving out deep basins right as the last
• 11:27
  sheet. The Laurentide retreated about
• 11:29
  12,000 years ago and left behind kettle holes.
• 11:32
  Or our lakes are all over the area and created a massive
• 11:35
  glacial lake Agassis which eventually drained to form the
• 11:39
  the Red River Valley. OK.
• 11:40
  And the Red River Valley follows the Red River along the
• 11:42
  Minnesota and North Dakota, North Dakota border and goes up
• 11:45
  into Canada. Yeah.
• 11:47
  Did you know that's one of the very few rivers that flows N
• 11:49
  flows north? Yeah, is that crazy?
• 11:51
  It is crazy. Yep.
• 11:52
  The oldest rock in Minnesota and some of the oldest in the entire
• 11:55
  world is the more Denise located in the Minnesota River Valley,
• 11:58
  right. Dating back approximately 3.5 to
• 12:01
  3.6 billion years, this rock is a true founder of the North
• 12:05
  American continent. To put that in perspective, the
• 12:08
  Earth itself is about 4.5 billion years old.
• 12:11
  The Mortonese formed and the planet was still in its infancy,
• 12:14
  long before any life existed. So, man, those paleontologists
• 12:18
  that are researching this stuff, that's, that's pretty
• 12:20
  fascinating, right? And to me, and when I, when I
• 12:22
  was kind of going over this topic and stumbled across it,
• 12:24
  I'm like, to me, that's just fascinating.
• 12:26
  I I never learned any of this in school.
• 12:28
  Well, you. Maybe you grazed upon it, but
• 12:31
  you weren't. Paying attention Me rephrase
• 12:32
  that I never paid attention to any of this in school.
• 12:35
  Right, right. That's probably better.
• 12:37
  There we go. I just thought it was cool.
• 12:39
  So anyway. Well, that's is interesting and
• 12:41
  we have a little what I guess it's history, history lesson
• 12:44
  going on here. So how does Waconia play into
• 12:46
  this? So the landscape of Waconia is a
• 12:48
  relatively recent. Masterpiece.
• 12:50
  Masterpiece it is. It is.
• 12:52
  Although the underlying bedrock is hundreds of millions of years
• 12:54
  old, the surface was sculpted almost entirely by the final
• 12:57
  stages of the Ice Age, when a massive ice lobe stalled right
• 13:01
  in our area. OK, I get it.
• 13:03
  So long before the lakes existed, Waconia sat at the
• 13:06
  bottom of a shallow tropical sea during the Cambrian period,
• 13:09
  which is about 500 million years ago.
• 13:11
  All right. The floor beneath the glacial
• 13:13
  drift in Carver County is primarily sandstone and shale.
• 13:17
  And because this bedrock is buried under 200 to 400 feet of
• 13:20
  glacial debris, we don't see the dramatic Bluffs here like those
• 13:23
  found in southeastern Minnesota, which the Bluffs down there just
• 13:26
  huge and they're gorgeous, right?
• 13:27
  The most significant event for Waconia happened roughly 14,000
• 13:30
  years ago during the Wisconsin Glacia Shin Glaciation
• 13:34
  glaciation. Okay, I'm going to go with that.
• 13:36
  Glaciation, I'm going to go with that.
• 13:38
  But Wisconsin, Minnesota, you know, don't makes me sad.
• 13:43
  What had to tie Wisconsin into Minnesota?
• 13:45
  Camaconia, we might have listeners in Wisconsin.
• 13:47
  I love Wisconsin. Yeah, they make the best.
• 13:49
  Cheese. That sounds way better there.
• 13:51
  You go. My gosh, why are you alienating
• 13:53
  people, Rob? I hate people.
• 13:55
  OK, Hey, I'm. Gonna we're gonna do a podcast
• 13:58
  where it teaches you how to like.
• 14:00
  People, we should totally do that.
• 14:01
  OK? I think that'd be good.
• 14:02
  It's coming up people, don't worry.
• 14:04
  It's on the list. All right, so a massive tongue
• 14:07
  of ice called it. OK, now we get the Des Moines
• 14:09
  lobe. Now just just relax.
• 14:11
  What is? Going on and read the freaking
• 14:13
  content, it's. Painful.
• 14:17
  A massive tongue of ice called the Des Moines Lobe pushed S
• 14:19
  from Canada, flowing through the Red River Valley and into
• 14:22
  central Minnesota. See, there's Minnesota.
• 14:24
  For you, there we go, feel much better.
• 14:26
  This specific ice sheet was unique because it travelled over
• 14:28
  limestone and shale, leaving behind the rich, dark clay heavy
• 14:32
  soil that makes Carver County so fertile today and likely keeps
• 14:36
  our Spring Green customers busy. Hey, nice White.
• 14:40
  As high that is, we have great soil here.
• 14:44
  OK, so then comes the creation of Lake Waconia.
• 14:47
  Right. And you know what, you look, you
• 14:48
  can see like Oconee like when you're looking at like an
• 14:50
  overhead view of southern Minnesota and the Twin Cities,
• 14:53
  Lake Laconia stands out next to Lake Minnetonka.
• 14:55
  It's a huge. Because we're very, very
• 14:57
  circular shaped. Lake it's easy to spot.
• 15:00
  Yeah, It's easy to spot versus like Lake Minnetonka, which is
• 15:02
  all those inlets and pieces and little parts, and it's just
• 15:05
  very, very big. It's just spread over a lot,
• 15:08
  very scattered. Yeah.
• 15:09
  So Lake Waconia is what geologists call an ice block or
• 15:13
  a kettle lake, but in on a massive.
• 15:15
  Scale Kettle Lake. OK, sure.
• 15:17
  This is called the ice cube effect, as the Des Moines lobe
• 15:21
  began to melt and retreat. A colossal block of stagnant
• 15:25
  ice, essentially a glacier sized ice cube, broke off and was
• 15:29
  buried by sand and gravel carried by the melting water.
• 15:33
  When the buried ice block finally melted hundreds of years
• 15:36
  later, the ground above it collapsed, creating a deep basin
• 15:40
  that is now Lake Waconia. That's kind of cool.
• 15:43
  Yeah. It's.
• 15:43
  Very cool. And Coney Island, we have a
• 15:45
  little island on the lake. As you know, the island is a
• 15:48
  high point where the debris was either deposited differently or
• 15:53
  the ice didn't weigh down the land as heavily, leaving a
• 15:57
  permanent landmark in the center of the basin.
• 15:59
  That's. Super fascinating.
• 16:00
  I mean, especially for our geologists listening.
• 16:02
  But and you know, it's funny about, about what you just
• 16:05
  talked about, about the glacier melting and then it collapsed.
• 16:08
  When you're like at looking at Coney Island, you're on the
• 16:10
  water and you have your depth Finder on.
• 16:11
  Like you go from Coney Island, it drops like a flipping rock.
• 16:14
  It goes around to 40 feet in the span of about.
• 16:16
  You probably go 3040 feet away from the island.
• 16:17
  So that's a huge drop. Totally makes sense to how then
• 16:22
  either that dropped off or melted in the way it did.
• 16:24
  You know, to create that big sheer Cliff.
• 16:26
  Yeah. And it makes sense or went to
• 16:27
  earlier when you talked about the Bluffs in southern
• 16:29
  Minnesota, like if we didn't have basically the water in Lake
• 16:32
  Laconia, we'd have nothing but Bluffs in that entire area.
• 16:35
  It's right. It goes very shallow, very deep
• 16:37
  all over the place, right. Ton of Bluffs under there.
• 16:39
  That's super interesting. Yeah, so let's talk about Coney
• 16:42
  Island for a second, because since he brought it up, did you
• 16:44
  know Coney Island was the premier destination in Minnesota
• 16:48
  from the 1880s to the 1950s? OK, so I knew a little bit about
• 16:52
  that, but I didn't know it was that long.
• 16:53
  Yeah, I, I. Didn't either.
• 16:55
  I knew it went back a little bit because I heard some rumors and
• 16:57
  we'll get to them in a second. But right, so it was developed.
• 17:00
  In 1884, Lambert Nagley purchased the island for $5200
• 17:04
  and developed it into a summer resort.
• 17:06
  OK, so I knew there was a resort on the island.
• 17:09
  Yeah. Yeah, but and and I knew it was
• 17:11
  like around the turn of the century, right, Right.
• 17:12
  That's really all I but. That's about all, yeah.
• 17:14
  So he called it Coney Island of the West.
• 17:16
  So from the 1880s to the 1920s, that's cool.
• 17:19
  The island became a popular getaway, attracting visitors
• 17:22
  from across the country with this hotels, dance halls and
• 17:25
  scenic beauty. Wow.
• 17:27
  Yeah. And if you ever been out to
• 17:28
  Oconee, it is honestly it is just gorgeous area.
• 17:31
  It's just beautiful. The lake and the trees and the
• 17:33
  sunset. It's beautiful.
• 17:34
  Did you know what? From 19 O 3 to 19 O 5, the
• 17:38
  University of Minnesota football team held pre season practices
• 17:41
  on the island. I did not know that the island's
• 17:43
  that big, by the way. It it is, there's a kind of a,
• 17:47
  a, a, well, not a bare spot, but an open area that's relatively
• 17:51
  flat, which is enough to house a football field.
• 17:53
  OK, so wow. Yeah, So I've never been on the
• 17:55
  island in the summer. You haven't?
• 17:57
  No. We're going to make that happen
• 17:58
  this year. And I've been on the island once
• 18:00
  in the winter because I walked across the lake and we walked on
• 18:03
  the island. But that was before it was a
• 18:05
  park. Now it's a community park.
• 18:07
  Yeah, it was privately owned at the time.
• 18:09
  And there are and there. There still are foundations of
• 18:12
  the buildings out there. Yep, there sure are.
• 18:14
  But I've not I've not seen them. Yeah.
• 18:16
  So in the last couple years, either was sold to Carver County
• 18:20
  Regional Park System and it was back in 7/19/76 was put on the
• 18:23
  National Register of Historic Places and it was privately
• 18:25
  owned for those like 40 some years.
• 18:27
  So right, technically it was private property, but people
• 18:30
  still stopped there and had bonfires and did their own thing
• 18:32
  anyway. But yeah, both 3-4 years ago,
• 18:34
  the Cover County Park System bought it and they added some
• 18:36
  trails and they got some fire pits, some picnic tables, some
• 18:39
  walking, some some nice areas in there now, right.
• 18:42
  So they did keep a lot of the foundations there and you can
• 18:45
  see some of that old stuff still there.
• 18:46
  I should go out there, yeah. It's pretty good.
• 18:48
  We'll do it the summer for sure. But what happened in the 1920s?
• 18:50
  Well, actually it was really. It's a really big boom in the
• 18:52
  resort during the 1900s and the rise of the automobile and
• 18:55
  changing vacation trends led to A to decline by the 20s.
• 18:58
  OK in the final years in decline.
• 19:00
  Later renamed Paradise Island in 1927, it served as a popular
• 19:04
  dinner and dancing spot into the 30s and 50s before it was
• 19:07
  abandoned in the 60s. And to me when we say it was
• 19:10
  abandoned in the 60s but you weren't here.
• 19:12
  But no, I was alive but don't remember.
• 19:15
  We had a music park in the close town of Excelsior.
• 19:18
  I I'm aware of the musical heart, but I don't I've never
• 19:21
  obviously was never. There.
• 19:22
  So I wonder if that was part of it, 'cause you could get to
• 19:23
  Excelsior from downtown Minneapolis.
• 19:25
  They had trolley lines. Oh, OK, that one out.
• 19:28
  That one, the old Excelsior Blvd. which is next to Hwy. 7
• 19:30
  now. Yeah, they had trolley ends go
• 19:32
  all the way from downtown. All the trolleys still run in
• 19:35
  right Excelsior, right? That's the end of the trolley
• 19:37
  line. Those lines are still there from
• 19:38
  back in the day, but so I wonder if that had something to do with
• 19:40
  the two where it just became kind of boring to go sit on a
• 19:43
  park on an island when you could go to the amusement.
• 19:44
  Park, which was, which was new at the time.
• 19:46
  Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah.
• 19:48
  But today, the park is open to the public.
• 19:49
  It's a often a huge glimpse into the past with a visible historic
• 19:52
  crumbling ruin. So it's it's pretty cool.
• 19:54
  It is cool, yeah. So you might be asking, how do
• 19:56
  we know all this? It's.
• 19:58
  Called Google I'm. Not saying we know this, but how
• 20:04
  do geologists know this? Yes, that, yes, that interest,
• 20:08
  OK. They combined radiometric
• 20:10
  dating, mineral chemistry, rock structure, regional geographic
• 20:15
  mapping, and comparison to modern volcanic systems.
• 20:20
  Together, they form a consistent, testable story.
• 20:24
  Minnesota's stable, modern landscape rests on some of the
• 20:27
  oldest volcanic crust on Earth. Yeah.
• 20:29
  See, that's when you think of volcanoes, you do not think of
• 20:31
  Minnesota. You don't, I know, isn't that
• 20:33
  crazy? But that's back when it was 1
• 20:35
  land mass Pangea. Yeah.
• 20:37
  So let's Fast forward a bit like.
• 20:39
  A lot. Like a lot.
• 20:39
  And give a little history on Waconia itself.
• 20:42
  Love it. Long before European settlers,
• 20:45
  the area around present day Waconia was home to the Dakota
• 20:49
  Sioux people. OK the name Waconia comes from a
• 20:52
  Dakota word often translated as spring fed water or fountain.
• 20:58
  I did not know I. Did not know that.
• 21:00
  Referring to the clear waters of the Lake Waconia, the lake and
• 21:03
  surrounding Prairie provided fishing, hunting and fertile
• 21:05
  land. Yeah.
• 21:06
  And that that to me is a little fascinating too, because Laconia
• 21:08
  has historically always been very clear because it is spring
• 21:11
  fed, which I did know that. Until the fall.
• 21:14
  Until the fall, and then it's not.
• 21:15
  Clear anymore anymore because the algae and leaves and things.
• 21:18
  But, and really until recently, I probably say in the last four
• 21:20
  or five years, it was free of zebra mussels.
• 21:22
  Yeah, And I have no proof of this, but my guess is as Lake
• 21:26
  Minnetauga has become more popular and become more crowded,
• 21:30
  people start shifting to other lakes.
• 21:31
  And Lake Oconee is the next biggest lake next to Minnetonka
• 21:34
  that has easy access. There's the public launches on
• 21:36
  the lake now. My guess is someone's traveled
• 21:39
  from that lake over to Waconia now.
• 21:41
  Yeah, they do. They attach themselves to
• 21:43
  trailers and things and they're an invasive species.
• 21:46
  Yeah, our lake in the up in Alexandria has them in it and
• 21:50
  they're cyclical. Yeah, the the zebra mussels and
• 21:53
  they will, you know, be they'll flourish and they actually clean
• 21:56
  the lake. It becomes very, very clear they
• 21:58
  do. But then once there's no more
• 22:00
  algae and things to eat, they die off, right?
• 22:03
  But also if you step on them, they cut the heck.
• 22:04
  Yeah. So you have to wear shoes.
• 22:05
  Yes. The tour, you no longer go
• 22:07
  barefoot. Yeah.
• 22:08
  So let's get back to this. Yes, Waconia was officially
• 22:10
  plotted in 1857 during Minnesota territorial period, just before
• 22:15
  it became a state in 1858. The town developed along key
• 22:19
  wagon routes between Saint Paul and the Minnesota River Valley
• 22:23
  many early. Settlers were German immigrants.
• 22:25
  Their influence shaped the town's culture, architecture,
• 22:27
  farming traditions, churches and businesses, something still
• 22:31
  visible in local surnames, festivals and historic
• 22:34
  buildings. Then, in 1871, Waconia was
• 22:37
  incorporated into a village. Really, you incorporate into a
• 22:40
  village. Apparently I didn't know that I
• 22:41
  don't know either. Agriculture quickly became the
• 22:43
  backbone of Laconia economy. Farms surrounding the town
• 22:46
  produce wheat, corn, and dairy products.
• 22:49
  The arrival of the railroad in the late 19th century connected
• 22:52
  Waconia to larger markets, accelerating trade and growth.
• 22:56
  Grain elevators, creameries, blacksmith shops and general
• 23:00
  stores developed along the rail lines.
• 23:02
  OK, so now this is always fascinating to me and I have not
• 23:04
  gotten into research on this, and I need to because as you're
• 23:07
  driving along Hwy. 5, the older parts of Hwy. 5 mirror The old
• 23:12
  railroads that came from Minneapolis came from downtown.
• 23:16
  And did you know the Cafe? The old.
• 23:19
  Etcetera, etcetera. OK.
• 23:20
  And did you know all the Etcetera cafe and kind of right
• 23:22
  off Hwy. 5, that's the old train depot?
• 23:25
  Is it really? Yeah, so that whole part of town
• 23:27
  is where the old train depot was.
• 23:28
  And I know a while back they were pulling all the railroad
• 23:30
  tracks out and I know that there are some old ones still there.
• 23:33
  Yeah, and if you follow go out farther West on Hwy. 5 to
• 23:36
  Norwood, you can see the Ridge of the land with hasn't been,
• 23:39
  you know, reshaped it where the old train railroad tracks ran.
• 23:42
  Oh, that's cool. I'm fascinated to see where the
• 23:44
  all the old lines ran because that's all.
• 23:46
  Looked it up. That's a lot of people got here
• 23:47
  the late 19th century before automobiles became huge, right?
• 23:50
  They all took the train out to Lake Waconia, right?
• 23:52
  So yeah, this to me is just fascinating.
• 23:54
  I may be the only one, but I think it's cool.
• 23:57
  So during the late 19 during the late 19th and early 20th
• 24:00
  centuries or the late 1800s, early 1900s, Lake Waconia became
• 24:04
  a popular summit that destination for visitors from
• 24:06
  Minneapolis and Saint Paul. Resorts, hotels and steamboats
• 24:09
  operated on the lake, drawing vacationers seeking fishing,
• 24:12
  boating and fresh country air. This early tourism helped
• 24:16
  diversify the town's economy beyond farming.
• 24:18
  That's. Cool, yeah.
• 24:19
  Steamboats. That's that's.
• 24:21
  Crazy, right? I know And.
• 24:22
  They're just like Tooting around the lake.
• 24:24
  Yeah, that's cool going out to the island.
• 24:26
  Yeah, I mean, I know the lake's huge, but I just.
• 24:28
  I can't imagine a Steamboat on Lake Waconia.
• 24:30
  This is odd to me. It's just so different to think,
• 24:33
  but from today's perspective, how life was right.
• 24:36
  So getting back to our topic as we routinely get off the topic.
• 24:40
  Shocker. Throughout the 20th century,
• 24:41
  rocconia remained a small but stable agricultural community.
• 24:45
  Improvements in roads and highways gradually reduced
• 24:48
  reliance on the rail system. After World War 2, better
• 24:52
  highways and automotive access tied Waconia more closely to the
• 24:56
  growing Twin Cities metropolitan area.
• 24:58
  And did you know of the Metropolitan District is what we
• 25:01
  call is what kind of runs the seven county metro area?
• 25:03
  Sure. Waconia is on the very edge of
• 25:05
  the district. So where our house is right now,
• 25:07
  where we're doing this podcast from, if you literally look out
• 25:09
  to the West, 300 feet, Cony row 10, that's the edge of the
• 25:12
  Metropolitan District. Oh, it is, yes.
• 25:14
  It's right, It's right there. We're on the edge of it.
• 25:15
  Yep. Today, Waconia is the county
• 25:17
  seat of Carver County. In recent decades, it has grown
• 25:20
  as a residential community within community distance of
• 25:22
  Minneapolis. Despite growth, it retains A
• 25:25
  historic downtown, lakeside recreation and strong
• 25:28
  agricultural. Roots.
• 25:29
  Yeah, it's pretty cool. Did you know there have been
• 25:32
  some additional notable people that came from Waconia, MN I?
• 25:35
  Know of a couple but I'm guessing we found some more.
• 25:38
  I found a few. OK, what you find?
• 25:40
  So Don Herbert, best known for the creator of Miss Watch, Mr.
• 25:44
  Wizard and Mr. Wizards World. Shut the front door.
• 25:48
  Two children, Science and Technology shows that served as
• 25:52
  the precursor to the ultra famous Bill Nye the Science Guy
• 25:55
  shows. Yeah, was born here in 1970.
• 25:58
  I watched him all the time growing up.
• 25:59
  Yeah, he was on Nickelodeon. Yeah, it's pretty cool, right?
• 26:02
  Oh, I didn't know that all. That's so cool.
• 26:05
  Some some other celebrities with communities are Jen Bostick, a
• 26:09
  country Christian music singer-songwriter and she's a
• 26:12
  Laconia Show Choir alum. Yeah, I believe back in 2014 she
• 26:15
  graduated. I think so.
• 26:16
  Ballpark somewhere, Yeah. Yeah, she's pretty cool.
• 26:18
  And she actually has a huge following in Europe.
• 26:20
  Thank you. She lives in Nashville now, but
• 26:21
  she goes to Europe. I mean, she sells all trolls,
• 26:23
  like left and right. That's cool.
• 26:24
  Pretty cool. Then we have Bob Stinson, a
• 26:26
  founding member and the lead guitarist of the rock band The
• 26:29
  Replacements, right? That I'll be there for you band.
• 26:31
  Yeah, Shut the front door. Really.
• 26:34
  He's from here. I.
• 26:35
  Did not know that. OK, Did you know this one?
• 26:38
  Max Williams, an NFL tight end? Did I lose you already?
• 26:42
  No. I followed with you, although
• 26:44
  football's not my thing. But I got you, yeah.
• 26:45
  So he's NFL tight end. From 2015 to 2022, he did play
• 26:49
  for Waconia. They did go to the state
• 26:50
  championship the year he was here.
• 26:51
  Yeah, He played for the Ravens and the Cardinals.
• 26:53
  And in 2014, he was an All American.
• 26:56
  Oh, that's cool. Yeah.
• 26:57
  Yeah. Max graduated the same time my
• 26:59
  oldest daughter. Oh.
• 27:00
  There you go. So you know Max?
• 27:01
  Yeah, I mean, not personally. Personally, no, I know of him.
• 27:04
  Yeah. So then we have another famous
• 27:06
  person, Shane Whiskey, a member of the team's USA 2020 Summer
• 27:12
  Olympics gymnastics team. Oh really?
• 27:14
  Yeah, didn't know that. And one more again, sports.
• 27:18
  Sorry. OK, yay sports.
• 27:19
  Max Mcinelly. He was a four time Minnesota
• 27:21
  State high school champion at three different weight classes
• 27:24
  for Waconia High School. That's cool.
• 27:26
  Isn't he in the news right now? He.
• 27:27
  Is so well in high school he had a 181 in one record.
• 27:32
  He lost one match in all four years.
• 27:34
  Wow. Unheard of record right?
• 27:35
  Especially for wrestling. That's crazy.
• 27:37
  He was named the 20, 2223 Metro Wrestler of the Year by Star
• 27:40
  Tribune, and he was also He also received the 2023 Minnesota
• 27:44
  Wrestling Coaches Association's Mr. Minnesota High School
• 27:47
  Wrestling Award and was ranked as the top pound for pound
• 27:50
  wrestler in Minnesota by the Guillotine Magazine.
• 27:54
  I don't even know what that is, but that sounds impressive.
• 27:56
  Awesome. So he's currently a sophomore at
• 27:59
  EU of M University of Minnesota, and he's the first U of M
• 28:02
  wrestler to win a title at 184 lbs and the first national
• 28:06
  champion since Gabel Stevenson won back-to-back titles at
• 28:08
  heavyweight in 21 and 22. And.
• 28:11
  And what there's more? Little known fact, he signed my
• 28:14
  football in 2022. So.
• 28:17
  So here. Here's the deal.
• 28:19
  So Spring Green we. Better save that for a.
• 28:21
  While right so he so Spring Green is a sponsor of some
• 28:25
  community things. One of the things we sponsor is
• 28:27
  the scoreboard at the Waconia High School right.
• 28:29
  And at the time they would they still bring us back every year
• 28:32
  for one of the like usually homecoming, the halftime show
• 28:34
  and just kind of hey, here's our major sponsors blah, blah, blah.
• 28:37
  Well, back then they had all the captains sign a football and
• 28:40
  give them to each of their major sponsors, OK And Max McNally was
• 28:43
  on the team in 2022 and got football, so I met Max.
• 28:46
  Mcnelly That's awesome. So I'm.
• 28:47
  Totally saving that. That kids famous now, Yeah.
• 28:51
  One other thing to note about Waconia, Did you know there was
• 28:54
  a movie filmed here? As a matter of fact, I did, yes.
• 28:57
  What is it? It's drop dead gorgeous.
• 28:59
  It is came out in 1999. The actual filming took place
• 29:03
  between July and September of 98.
• 29:05
  I was not here at that time. I moved here in September of 98
• 29:08
  get. Out.
• 29:09
  Yeah. Did you have any idea there?
• 29:10
  I had. No idea.
• 29:11
  I mean. They probably were done or
• 29:14
  finishing up, but I had no idea idea because I just moved to
• 29:16
  town and right, we moved in and we went to the cabin.
• 29:19
  Yeah. People I've talked to that were
• 29:20
  here at the time, it was a pretty big deal, Yeah.
• 29:22
  I mean, you don't get like huge Hollywood movies in our cute
• 29:24
  little town very often. You.
• 29:26
  You don't, or never. So anyway.
• 29:28
  The film was shot throughout the Carver County area, mainly in
• 29:31
  Waconia, MN, although names of the real Minnesota communities
• 29:35
  were shown on the sashes of the contestants later in the movie.
• 29:38
  Right, things they were yeah, yeah.
• 29:39
  And it's it's kind of cool though, if you watch, if you
• 29:41
  know the area and you you watch it like, Oh my God, I know that.
• 29:44
  I know that. I know that, yeah.
• 29:45
  Actually, I've never watched the movie.
• 29:47
  You need to watch. They actually filmed the scene
• 29:49
  right outside your church. Saint Joe's.
• 29:51
  Yeah, I know that Saint Joe's the movie theatres in it and
• 29:54
  yeah, yeah. They like, blow things up right
• 29:55
  in front of your church. That's.
• 29:56
  Cool. It's kind of cool.
• 29:57
  So anyway. So Drop Dead Gorgeous is a dark
• 30:00
  comedy mockumentary about the intensely competitive, cutthroat
• 30:04
  Sarah Rose American Teen Princess pageant in Mount Rose,
• 30:07
  Minnesota. That's a mouthful.
• 30:09
  As contestants are suspiciously killed off.
• 30:12
  Poor but optimistic Amber Adkins, played by Kirsten Dunst,
• 30:15
  fights to win against the wealthy, ruthless favorite Becky
• 30:19
  Lienam Lehman. Denise Richards and her
• 30:21
  obsessive pageant mom Gladys, played by Kirstie Alley.
• 30:24
  Oh, I think I gotta watch it's. Got It's a great cast and it's
• 30:27
  honestly it is a it is a really, really good movie.
• 30:29
  And I and I heard that they do a little bit of the Minnesota
• 30:31
  accent, but yeah, it's not like overdone.
• 30:33
  This is what I've heard. It's not quite on the level of
• 30:36
  Fargo the movie. OK, 'cause that was overdone.
• 30:38
  That was way overdone. So but there's a little bit they
• 30:40
  do get the little you betches and don't you know what was in
• 30:42
  there, But it it honestly is a super, super cute movie.
• 30:44
  Cool. If you ever get a chance to
• 30:45
  watch it, take a look at it. So anyway, I think we've had
• 30:48
  enough of this history lesson for one day.
• 30:50
  And thank you very much for listening.
• 30:51
  It humors me that you're here. As always, please follow us on
• 30:55
  the socials at Owen One More Thing Pod on Facebook and
• 30:58
  Instagram for highlights and news and for upcoming shows and.
• 31:01
  And if you have a show idea for us or just want to give us some
• 31:03
  feedback, send us an e-mail to. Oh, and one more thing,
• 31:05
  pod@gmail.com, We would absolutely love to hear from
• 31:09
  you. Plus, we still have some
• 31:10
  merchandise, T-shirts and caps. If you're interested, just send
• 31:13
  us an e-mail. That's right.
• 31:14
  Oh, and one more thing. What's that, Rob?
• 31:16
  After 2 billion years of continental collisions, glacier
• 31:20
  steamrolling, and enough ice to fill every freezer in the
• 31:22
  Midwest, Minnesota finally decided to settle down.
• 31:26
  The mountains politely eroded themselves into modest hills,
• 31:28
  the glaciers tidied up by leaving 10,000 plus lakes as a
• 31:31
  parting gift, and the bedrock called it a day.
• 31:34
  These days, the only things dramatically reshaping the
• 31:36
  landscape are road construction projects and enthusiastic ice
• 31:39
  anglers. Not bad for places started out
• 31:42
  on fire, got squished beyond recognition, and then spent the
• 31:45
  last Ice Age under a mile of frozen criticism.
• 31:48
  Geologically speaking, Minnesota has earned a long, flat, very
• 31:52
  stable nap. Oh, that was fun, man.
• 31:55
  Hey, thanks for listening, everybody.
• 31:56
  We'll see you next time. Bye.
• 31:59
  Can I get some of the ice for my drink, you think?