 The name "Minnehaha Falls" was the common name by 1855, when the publication of The Song of Hiawatha by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow brought the falls world-wide fame. Longfellow's epic poem features Hiawatha, a Native American hero who falls in love with Minnehaha, a Native American woman who later dies during a severe winter. Longfellow never visited the falls himself; he was inspired by the stories of Mary H. Eastman and Henry Rowe Schoolcraft, and by a photograph created by Alexander Hessler, when he chose the name for Hiawatha's lover. The photograph was taken in 1851, according to a tribute written for Hessler when he died in 1895. The author of the eulogy wrote: "It has been the subject of much comment among artists and poets that it was Mr. Hessler who was principally responsible for the inspiration which induced Henry W. Longfellow to write 'Hiawatha'."
