This week in state history

Historic Minnesota events with anniversaries this week.

July 3

1863 Minnesota’s first railroad fatality: a train strikes a wagon driven by Captain Abraham Bennett and his son at the Como Road crossing in St. Paul. There had been talk of building a bridge at the site but, ironically, Bennett himself had opposed it. His son recovered.

1941 Charles Haralson dies in Excelsior at the age of 78. The first resident superintendent of the University of Minnesota’s Fruit Breeding Farm (now the Horticultural Research Center) at Excelsior, the Swedish-born Haralson served as superintendent from 1908 to 19...