Decades ago, I purchased a copy of A Guide to the Records of Minnesota’s Public Lands (Gregory Kinney and Lydia Lucas, Minnesota Historical Society, Division of Archives and Manuscripts, 1985.) It’s been online for a while, but I still use my paper copy. It dawned on me that others may not realize they may consult it online.

It was my introduction to many aspects of early (very early) land in what became Minnesota, and for many years after 1858, with some acknowledgement of Native American lands. It’s not today’s acknowledgement that we live, work, and reside on lands of various tribes, but that also wasn’t the purpose of the guide. I’d bet that there would be an additional chapter on that today. That said, this is definitely a guide worth perusing. Many of the records described were then part of the state archives and since 1985, other agencies and departments listed have transferred significant numbes of records to the state archives.

These records hold gems with names, dates, some relationships, hardships, ownership, loss of land, correspondence, taxes, surveys, maps, scrip, swamp lands, land offices, bounty lands, reservations, railroad lands, homestead lands, land disputes, and on and on. I’d forgotten about some of the sections I had researched in many years ago.

The Table of Contents:

Intrigued? Even a quick skimming of the guide will interest most researchers. See all 124 searchable pages at https://www.mngeo.state.mn.us/pdf/MN_public_lands_records.pdf from the Minnesota Geospatial Information Office. I might have to do some more reading in it for a specific project I have right now.

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