Daily globe. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1878-1884, 1878-02-13
THE GREAT CITY.
ONE OF THE WORLDS ENPOhl Ills.
The Growth Of st. Paul and Mfnneapolis---
They Will Form One oil the Three Great
Cities on the Mississippi River.

The report of Commissioner of Statistics
Metcalf was laid on the desks of members of
the Legislature last evening, and from it we
extract the following, giving his views of
"one of the worlds great cities.''
The cities of st. Paul and Minneapolis
the political, commercial, and manufacturing
centres of the State, and the Northwest, con-
tanning now over $4,000 people, with sub
urbs separated by less than four miles of in
tervening space, which is admirably adapted
by physical conditions to the inevitable ex-
pansion over it of each of these cities-are
destined, probably, in the future, to become
one city, under one name and one govern
ment.
The preliminary discussion and agitation
of this probability has been for several years
engaging the public mind-quietly at first,
in the conversation of pbilosophic. farreach-
ing minds: and latterly in the newspapers,
and in the homes and Offices of men of all
degrees. it has been a theme of growing in
tcreSt.
That great capital will one day be built
upon this spot-one of the worlds great
cities-admts of but little doubt. Saga
cious men, in the territorial days of Mime
sota twenty years ago. predicted that there
must necessarily arise three great cities on
this mighty river that flows through our
midst, affording us a water power, and al ex-
tent of navigation, without parallel in any
inland city of the world. Of these, one was
to be at St. Paul, the head of navigation: one
at St:Louis, at the mouth of the Missouri
and Illinois rivers; and the third, at New
Orleans, at the connection of the whole
river system of the Mississippi valley with
the tides of the gulf or Mexico.
These dreamers knew but little then of the
vast empire Of attractive surface and fertile
soil stretching through and beyond the
great valley of the Red river of the North, to
the plains of Saskatchewan and Asslniboine,
and the mountains and valleys Of Montana,
Idaho, and Washington, whose productive
mineral and agricultural wealth are to be
developed and brought to our markets by
the Northern Pacific and other railways.
The very lap and gateway to this billowy and
illimitable domain is through Minnesota, and
her prime cities-St. Paul and Minneapolis.
Still less did their speculative minds grasp
the wonderful results of the system Of rail
roads centering in these Cities and reaching
out with their evermultiplying branches and
connections to the very confines of civiliza-
ton in the northwest, as we'll as to every
county in the State and almost every valley
and hamlet. Such a nerve centre quiverine
and throbbing III sympathy with every part
of the State must exercise a large In
huence upon ali her social and administra-
tive affairs, and deem it indisputable that
every Minnesotian has direct and recipro
cal interest III the fullest expansion of his
metropolis; for great capital, commercial
and manufacturing city, confers dignity anc
Importance upon it's State, and from it flow
those charities. that abundance of wealth anl
civilization. that mighty heart throb, which
should send a healthy pulse, quickenine
and sustaining influence to its remotest ex
tremities. The very jealousies that once
existed between the upper and lower parts O.
st Paul: between ST. Anthony and Mime
apolis. were and are but the stimulating
agencies of producing such energy of deyel
opment, enterprise thrift and daring, as surel,
demonstrate that a mightier will than their
had ordained that their strifes and rivalries
their schemes and ambitions, should be tn
ullrecognized instrumentalities of a plan
now half revealed, that there shall be. SOM
day, welded and compacted together all thes
fragmentary and rival elements into one vas
city.
The outline of ST. Paul, SO rapid was it,
growth, and so great the expectations of it
founders, was almost Immediately three ant
a half to four miles in length; the outline 0
Minneapolis is about the same; and midwa
between these is the same space of territory
occupied and to be occupied, by colleges AM
universities. already commenced and pro
jected, which will certainly create a nev
centre of population, ever diffusing itself
till at last it shall meet the advancing border
of the cities by which it is surrounded, ant
blending with them, succeeding generation
will see right here in the very heart an
centre of the American continent-oNE O
THE WORLDS GREAT CITIES.
CITY GIOBULES.
The United States District Court has ad
iOuTneC until February -