Minnesota Was The First To Do These 12 Things

We’ve certainly talked about some notable Minnesota firsts like the brilliant inventions of Scotch Tape and Post-its as well as box cake mix and even heart transplants, but there are still some MN firsts that many people don’t know. You might be surprised to learn that Minnesota was also the first to have these:

3M has a lot of important inventions in their past, but one we now often forget is plastic magnetic recording tape!

Flickr/stuart.childs

Golden Valley Microwave Foods had the first shelf stable microwave popcorn! Act II!

Flickr/frankieleon

The Minnesotan Totino family made the first crisp-crust frozen pizza in 1979.

Flickr/Mike Mozart

MN grocer Walter Deubener created the first handled grocery bags. Otherwise, it’d be hard to carry all that popcorn and pizza!

Flickr/Manuel Noah Angeja

The brand new state of Minnesota was the first state to respond to President Abraham Lincoln’s request for volunteer regiments and the The First Minnesota Volunteer Infantry played a pivotal role in The Battle of Gettysburg.

Flickr/The National Guard

Minnesota was not only the home to the first furnace thermostat but also the first place to have an air conditioned home!

Flickr/midnightcomm

Minnesota not only was the scene of the first open-heart surgery but also the first organ transplants as well!

Flickr/Spirit-Fire

In 1889 Minneapolis became the home of the first library Children’s Section!

Flickr/Ellen Forsyth

MN had the first concrete grain elevator thanks to Frank Peavey and his desire to stop grain elevators from burning down all the time!

Flickr/Mark Hogan

MN based Northwest Airways had the first closed-cabin commercial airplane! Talk about an aviation milestone!

Flickr/Aero Icarus

Minnesota was the home of the first retractable seat belts thanks to James “Crash” Ryan!

Flickr/Benjamin Goodger

Another James “Crash” Ryan legacy is the Black-Box Flight Data Recorder that is now standard on all commercial planes and allows us to determine the cause of many a crash.

Flickr/U.S. Army Corps of Engineers

How many of these 12 did you know? Which was the most surprising?