Small Home Gazette, Summer 2020

History Brief: On Our Cover

The cover image for the Summer 2000 issue of the Small Home Gazette is from a December 1909 edition of the Minneapolis Morning Tribune. A series of articles in the newspaper recounts the conflict between a Black woman, the owner of this bungalow in the Linden Hills neighborhood of Minneapolis, and her white neighbors. The neighbors accused the woman, Marie Canfield, of habitually using opiates and alleged that she “…advertised her property for sale, to negroes only.” Canfield adamantly denied both charges.

Headline in the December 31, 1909, edition of the Minneapolis Morning Tribune

Upon learning the woman had sold her house to a Black minister, more than 100 of her neighbors gathered for an “indignation meeting,” determined to prevent the minister from moving in. That night, vandals broke several of the home’s windows, which are visible in the photo.

Ultimately, a campaign was organized to pool funds from neighbors to buy the house from the minister.

A Minneapolis Morning Tribune article published January 7, 1910, reported that, “By the payment of good, hard coin, the residents of Linden Hills have averted the establishment of a ‘dark town’ in their midst.”

Read more about the history of efforts to push Black homeowners out of Southwest Minneapolis online at “Displaced: A History of Race and Place in Southwest Minneapolis” (tinyurl.com/shuj5hq).