Q 01/05

The name Minneapolis combines the Greek word for 'city' with a Dakota word meaning what?

A) Water

B) Falls

C) Prairie

D) Many

Answer · why

A) Water

The Dakota call the city Bde Óta Othúŋwe, Many Lakes Town, which is fair: it has thirteen of them.

Q 02/05

Saint Anthony Falls, the reason the city exists, holds what distinction on the Mississippi River?

A) The widest point on it

B) The only natural waterfall on it

C) The source of it

D) The last lock on it

Answer · why

B) The only natural waterfall on it

A French priest renamed it in 1680 for St Anthony of Padua; a concrete apron has covered the falls since the 1950s.

Q 03/05

Minneapolis earned which nickname from its dominance of a single industry in the late 1800s?

A) Motor City

B) Steel City

C) Mill City

D) Rail City

Answer · why

C) Mill City

In 1884 the value of its flour milling was the highest in the world; the Washburn A Mill was the world's largest until Pillsbury built a bigger one ac...

Q 04/05

Washburn-Crosby, the Minneapolis flour company founded in 1877, grew into which modern giant?

A) Kellogg Company

B) Nabisco Brands

C) Kraft Foods

D) General Mills

Answer · why

D) General Mills

Its rival Pillsbury sat directly across the falls; the two were finally merged in 2001.

Q 05/05

How many workers died when flour dust exploded inside the Washburn A Mill on 2 May 1878?

A) 18

B) 5

C) 8

D) 12

Answer · why

A) 18

The rebuilt mill was the largest in the world by 1880; after a 1991 fire its ruins became the Mill City Museum.