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Minnesota Mining & Manufacturing Company (3m) Business Information, Profile, and History

3M Center
St. Paul, Minnesota 55144-1000
U.S.A.

Company Perspectives:

At 3M, we are committed to satisfying our customers with superior quality and value; providing investors with an attractive return through sustained, high-quality growth; respecting our social and physical environment; and being a company of which employees are proud.

History of Minnesota Mining & Manufacturing Company (3 M)

The largest manufacturer in Minnesota, the 89th largest U.S. company overall, and a member of the Dow Jones "30," Minnesota Mining & Manufacturing Company (officially abbreviated as 3M) is Wall Street's epitome of high-tech/low-tech business and solid blue chip performance. Its daunting inventory of some 50,000 products runs the gamut from Post-it Notes and Scotch tape to transdermal patches of nitroglycerin. Its equally daunting global presence extends to subsidiary companies in more than 60 countries and markets in nearly 200, as well as net sales from international operations of $7.8 billion, or 52 percent of the company's total 1997 revenue. 3M owes its formidable strength to its unusual corporate culture, which comfortably fosters innovation and interdepartmental cooperation, backed by a massive research & development budget, which in 1997 exceeded $1 billion. Because of this, 3M ranks as a leader in--and in many cases a founder of--a number of important technologies, including pressure sensitive tapes, sandpaper, protective chemicals, microflex circuits, reflective materials, and premium graphics. In 1998, the company realigned into three organizations: Industrial and Consumer Markets; Health Care Markets; and Transportation, Safety and Chemical Markets.

Rough Start As Sandpaper Maker: 1900s-10s

3M was formed in 1902 in Two Harbors, Minnesota, a thriving village on the shores of Lake Superior, by five entrepreneurs in order to mine the rare mineral corundum and market it as an abrasive. The ill-planned venture--sparked by a flurry of other forms of mining operations in northeastern Minnesota--nearly bankrupted the company, for its mineral holdings turned out to be not corundum but low-grade anorthosite, a virtually useless igneous rock. This unsettling discovery (by whom or when is unclear) was never disclosed in the company records and, for whatever reason, did not deter the owners from establishing a sandpaper factory in Duluth, another more or less ill-fated scheme that placed the company further in jeopardy (3M faced a host of abrasives competitors in the East and was soon forced to import a garnet inferior to that owned by domestic manufacturers, which resulted in a lower quality product).

In May 1905 a principal investor named Edgar B. Ober, determined to save the company, convinced friend and fellow St. Paul businessman Lucius Pond Ordway to join with him in rescuing 3M from almost certain demise by paying off $13,000 in debt and pumping in an additional $12,000 in capital. Together Ordway and Ober purchased 60 percent of the company; over the next several years, Ordway, a self-made millionaire, spent an additional $250,000 on a company that had yet to produce a profit, and Ober, who proceeded to oversee 3M, went without a salary. Ordway's continued backing, despite a strong desire to cut his losses early on and his decision to move the firm to St. Paul in 1910, ensured 3M's eventual health during the boom years following World War I.

Early Dual Leadership Instills Legacy of Innovation: 1920-40s

Of greatest significance to both the company's foundation and future were the hirings in 1907 and 1909 of William L. McKnight and A.G. Bush, respectively. Former farmhands trained as bookkeepers, the two worked as a team for well over 50 years and developed the system that helped make 3M a success. McKnight ran 3M between 1916 and 1966, serving as president from 1929 to 1949 and chairman of the board from 1949 to 1966. He created the general guidelines of diversification, avoiding price cuts, increasing sales by ten percent a year, high employee morale, and quality control that fueled the company's growth and created its unique corporate culture. In some ways, the sales system overshadowed the guidelines. McKnight and Bush designed an aggressive, customer-oriented brand of salesmanship. Sales representatives, instead of dealing with a company's purchasing agent, were encouraged to proceed directly to the shop where they could talk with the people who used the products. In so doing, 3M salesmen could discover both how products could be improved and what new products might be needed. This resulted in some of 3M's early innovations. For instance, when Henry Ford's newly motorized assembly lines created too much friction for existing sandpapers, which were designed to sand wood and static objects, a 3M salesman went back to St. Paul with the news. 3M devised a tougher sandpaper, and thus captured much of this niche market within the growing auto industry. Another salesman noticed that dust from sandpaper use made the shop environment extremely unhealthy. Around the same time, a Philadelphia ink manufacturer named Francis G. Okie wrote McKnight with a request for mineral grit samples. According to Virginia Huck, "McKnight's handling of Okie's request changed the course of 3M's history. He could have explained to Okie that 3M didn't sell bulk mineral.... Instead, prompted by his curiosity, McKnight instructed 3M's Eastern Division sales manager, R.H. Skillman, to get in touch with Okie to find out why he wanted the grit samples." The reason soon became clear: Okie had invented a waterproof, and consequently dust-free, sandpaper. After purchasing the patent and then solving various defects, 3M came out with WetorDry sandpaper and significantly expanded its business, eventually licensing two other manufacturers, Carborundum and Behr-Manning, to keep up with demand. It also hired the inventor as its first full-time researcher. This marked the creation of one of the nation's first corporate research and development divisions.

Sending salesmen into the shops paid off a few years later in an even more significant way, by giving 3M its first non-abrasives product line. In 1923 a salesman in an auto body painting shop noticed that the process used to paint cars in two tones worked poorly. He promised the painter that 3M could develop an effective way to prevent the paints from running together. It took two years, but the research and development division invented a successful masking tape--the first in a line of pressure-sensitive tapes that now extends to over 900 varieties. The invention of Scotch tape, as it came to be called and then trademarked, established 3M as a force for innovation in American industry. Taking a page from its sandpaper business, 3M immediately began to develop different applications of its new technology. Its most famous adaptation came in 1930, when some industrious 3M workers found a way to graft cellophane, a Du Pont invention, to adhesive, thus creating a transparent tape.

Transparent Scotch tape, now a generic commodity, provided a major windfall during the Depression, helping 3M to grow at a time when most businesses struggled to break even. Another salesman invented a portable tape dispenser, and 3M had its first large-scale consumer product. Consumers used Scotch tape in a variety of ways: to repair torn paper products, strengthen book bindings, mend clothes until they could be sewn, and even remove lint. By 1932 the new product was doing so well that 3M's main client base shifted from furniture and automobile factories to office supply stores. During the 1930s, 3M funneled some 45 percent of its profits into new product research; consequently, the company tripled in size during the worst decade American business had ever endured.

3M continued to grow during World War II by concentrating on understanding its markets and finding a niche to fill, rather than shifting to making military goods, as many U.S. corporations did. However, the war left 3M with a need to restructure and modernize, and not enough cash on hand to do so. To meet its building needs, in 1947 3M issued its first bond offerings. Its first public stock offering, coupled with its tremendous growth rate, attracted additional attention to 3M. In 1949, when President McKnight became chairman of the board (with A.G. Bush also moving from daily operations to the boardroom), it marked the end of a tremendous era for 3M. Under McKnight, 3M had grown almost 20fold. By its 50th year, it had surpassed the $100 million mark and was employing some 10,000 people.

Growing Reputation: 1950s

Such growth could not be ignored. Now that 3M was publicly traded, investment bankers took to recommending it as a buy, business magazines sent reporters to write about it, and other companies tried to figure out how 3M continued to excel. McKnight's immediate successor as president, Richard Carlton, encapsulated the company's special path to prosperity with the phrase: "we'll make any damn thing we can make money on." Yet the 3M method involved a great deal more than simply making and selling. Its metier had been, and continues to be, finding uninhabited markets and then filling them relentlessly with high-quality products. Therefore, research and development received money that most companies spent elsewhere--most companies still did not have such departments by the early 1950s--and the pursuit for ideas was intense.

Carlton kept the company focused on product research (today, 3M rewards its scientists with Carlton Awards), which led to another innovation in the 1950s, the first dry-printing photocopy process, ThermoFax. 3M breezed through the 1950s in impressive fashion, with 1959 marking the company's 20th consecutive year of increased sales. Yet, for all its growth and diversity, 3M continued to produce strong profits from its established products. In a way, this was almost to be expected, given 3M's penchant for being in "uninhabited" markets. As noted by John Pitblado, 3M's president of U.S. Operations, "almost everything depends on a coated abrasive during some phase of its manufacture. Your eyeglasses, wrist watches, the printed circuit that's in a TV set, knitting needles ... all require sandpaper."

Skyrocketing 1960s to Earthly Ups and Downs in the 1970s and 1980s

In the 1960s 3M embarked on another growth binge, doubling in size between 1963 and 1967 and becoming a billion-dollar company in the process. Existing product lines did well, and 3M's ventures into magnetic media provided excellent returns. One venture, the backdrops used for some of the spectacular scenes from the 1968 movie 2001: A Space Odyssey, earned an Academy Award. During the 1970s a number of obstacles interfered with 3M's seeming odyssey of growth. Among these were the resignations of several of the company's top executives when it was revealed that they had operated an illegal slush fund from company money between 1963 and 1975, which included a contribution of some $30,000 to Richard Nixon's 1972 campaign. Sales growth also slowed during the decade, particularly in the oil crunch of 1974, ending 3M's phenomenal string of averaging a 15 percent growth rate. 3M responded to its cost crunch in characteristic fashion: it turned to its employees, who devised ways for the company to cut costs at each plant.

The company also had difficulties with consumer products. Particularly galling was the loss of the cassette tape market, which two Japanese companies, TDK and Maxell, dominated by engaging in price-cutting. 3M stuck to its tradition of abandoning markets where it could not set its own prices, and backed off. Eventually, the company stopped making much of its magnetic media, instead buying from an overseas supplier and putting the 3M label on it (3M instead focused attention on data storage media for the computer market, in which it continues as a world leader). The loss of the cassette market was not overwhelming: revenues doubled between 1975 and 1980, and in 1976 3M was named one of the Dow Jones Industrial 30.

Unfortunately, price-cutting was not the only problem confronting 3M as it entered the 1980s. Major competitors seemed to face the company on all fronts: the niches of decades past seemed extinct. When Lewis Lehr became company president in 1981, he noted that "there isn't a business where we don't have to come up with a new technology." He promptly restructured 3M from six divisions into four sectors: Industrial and Consumer, Electronic and Information Technologies, Graphic Technologies (later renamed Imaging and combined with Information and Electronic), and Life Sciences, containing a total of some 40 divisions. He also established a goal of having 25 percent of each division's earnings come from products that did not exist five years before. Lehr's concern was not to keep the company going, for 3M was still well-respected, with a less than 25 percent debt-to-equity ratio and reasonable levels of growth. Shareholders, too, had little to complain about, for 1986 marked the 18th consecutive year of increased dividends. Rather, Lehr wanted to ensure that 3M would continue to develop new ideas. The major product to come out of the 1980s was the ubiquitous Post-it, a low-tech marvel created by Art Fry.

Challenges of the 1990s

L. D. DeSimone, who joined 3M in 1958 as a manufacturing engineer and moved into management while working in international operations, was named CEO in 1991. He took the helm of a ship being buffeted by economic recession and stiff price competition: sales rose an annual average of just two percent from 1991 to 1993. Kevin Kelly wrote in a 1994 Business Week article, "It turned out that the creative juices that had transformed 3M into a paragon of innovation and the inventor of everything from ubiquitous yellow Post-it notes to surgical staples weren't producing new products fast enough."

DeSimone pushed research staff to work more closely with marketers and transform existing technology into commercial products. Connecting with customers' needs took on more urgency. Product turnaround time was slashed; product development rivaled basic research. Customer-driven products gleaned from the new system included the Never Rust Wool Soap Pad made from recycled plastic bottles and a laptop computer screen film which enhanced brightness without heavy battery drain.

On the international front, foreign sales produced more than 50 percent of total 3M sales for the first time in company history in 1992. The Asia Pacific region yielded nearly 27 percent of the $7 billion foreign sales volume. A major restructuring of European operations was completed in 1993: manufacturing plants were closed and consolidated and the workforce was trimmed in response to declining operating income.

The company achieved record sales, operating income, net income, and earnings per share in 1994. More than $1 billion of the $15 billion in total sales came from first-year products. DeSimone raised the bar: at least 30 percent of future sales were to come from products introduced within the past four years.

On a more somber note, in 1994 3M took a $35 million pretax charge against probable liabilities and associated expenses related to litigation over 3M's silicone breast implant business operated through former subsidiary McGhan Medical Corporation. 3M was named in more than 5,800 lawsuits claiming injuries caused by leakage or rupture of the implants.

In 1996, 3M dismantled the Information, Imaging and Electronics sector which accounted for a fifth of its business. It was the largest restructuring effort in company history. The divisions making floppy disks and other data-storage media, x-ray film and specialty imaging equipment were spun off as an independent, public company, and the audio and videotape operations shut down entirely. 3M retained the businesses making electrical tapes, connectors, insulating materials, overhead projects, and transparency films. The company cut about 5,000 jobs.

Since DeSimone took command, 3M had pumped $1.2 billion into the Information, Imaging and Electronics division, yet operating profit margins remained only a third of the Industrial and Consumer Products and Life Sciences divisions. Persistent pricing pressures from competitors such as Kodak plus rising raw material costs prompted DeSimone to pull the plug on the audio and videotape business. A smaller, leaner operation--the new $2 billion Imation Corporation--was deemed to have better prospects in the equally fierce data-storage marketplace.

Future Forecast

Following restructuring, 3M concentrated product development efforts on about two dozen core technologies. In 1997 the company achieved one of DeSimone's goals: 30 percent of total sales were generated from products introduced within the past four years. But 3M's numbers began slipping again in 1998. Michelle Conlin wrote in an October 1998 Forbes article, "Are these unavoidable downward blips on a rising curve? Or are they signs of deeper trouble? 3M has been glacially slow to respond to the economic meltdown in Asia, where it gets 23% of its business. In the U.S. a flood of cheaper products made by competitors like Korean polyester film outfits SKC and Kolon have cut into 3M's sales."

Conlin conceded that 3M had promising products, such as bendable fiber-optic cable and a fluid to replace ozone-depleting chlorofluorocarbons, already in the pipeline. In the long run, 3M has little to worry about. Despite its gargantuan size, the company maintains a distinctively entrepreneurial environment and, through one of its several legendary "rules," allows its employees to spend up to 15 percent of company time on independent projects, a process called "bootlegging" or "scrounging." As In Search of Excellence authors Thomas J. Peters and Robert H. Waterman, Jr., have written, because heroes abound at 3M, because scrounging is encouraged, because failure is okay, because informal communications are the norm, because overplanning and paperwork are conspicuously absent, because of these and a half-dozen more factors "functioning in concert--over a period of decades," innovation works at 3M. A near fixture on Fortune's annual list of the most admired companies in America, 3M is that most prized of conglomerates: a perennial money-maker with the innovative culture and managerial drive to ensure that it remains so.

Principal Subsidiaries: Dyneon L.L.C. (54%); Eastern Heights State Bank (99%); 3M Unitek Corporation; 3M Argentina S.A.C.I.F.I.A.; 3M Australia Pty. Ltd.; 3M Oesterreich GmbH (Austria); 3M Belgium S.A./N.V.; Seaside Insurance Limited (Bermuda); 3M do Brazil Limitada; 3M Canada Inc.; 3M A/S (Denmark); Suomen 3M Oy (Finland); 3M France, S.A.; 3M Deutschland GmbH (Germany); 3M Hong Kong Limited; 3M Italia Finanziaria S.p.A. (Italy); Sumitomo 3M Limited (Japan; 50%); 3M Health Care Limited (Japan; 75%); 3M Korea Limited; 3M Mexico S.A. de C.V.; Corporate Services B.V. (Netherlands); 3M Nederland B.V. (Netherlands); 3M (New Zealand) Limited; 3M Norge A/S (Norway); 3M Puerto Rico, Inc.; 3M Singapore Private Limited; 3M South Africa (Proprietary) Limited; 3M Espana, S.A.; 3M Svenska AB (Sweden); 3M (East) A.G. (Switzerland); 3M (Schweiz) A.G. (Switzerland); 3M Taiwan Limited; 3M Thailand Limited; 3M United Kingdom Holdings P.L.C.; 3M Venezuela, S.A.

Principal Operating Units: Industrial and Consumer Markets; Health Care Markets; Transportation, Safety and Chemical Markets.

Related information about Minnesota

pop (2000e) 4 919 500; area 218 593 km²/84 402 sq mi. State in N USA, divided into 87 counties; bounded N by Canada; the ‘North Star State’ or the ‘Gopher State’; 32nd state admitted to the Union, 1858; the land E of the Mississippi R included in the North-west Territory, 1787; the land to the W became part of the USA with the Louisiana Purchase, 1803; permanently settled after the establishment of Fort Snelling, 1820; area became Minnesota Territory in 1849 and the 32nd state in 1858; Sioux Indian rebellion in S Minnesota, 1862; settled by many Scandinavians in the 1880s; capital, St Paul; other chief cities, Minneapolis and Duluth; Mississippi R source in the NC region; Minnesota and St Croix Rivers empty into the Mississippi; over 11 000 lakes scattered throughout the state; 5729 km²/22 114 sq mi of L Superior within the state boundary; Sawtooth Mts in the extreme NE; highest point Mt Eagle (701 m/2300 ft); glaciated terrain in the N, with boulder-strewn hills, marshland, and large areas of forest; major tourist area; iron ore mined in the E mountains; prairies in the S and W; agriculture the leading industry; nation's second biggest producer of dairy products, hay, oats, rye, turkeys; processed foods, machinery, electrical equipment, paper products.




Minnesota (IPA: ) is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. the principal racial minorities are African Americans, Asians, Hispanics, Native Americans descended from the original inhabitants, and recent immigrant communities of Somali and Hmong people.

Slightly more than half of all Minnesota residents live in the Twin Cities metropolitan area, the center of transport, business and industry, and home to an internationally-known arts community. The remainder of the state, often referred to as Greater Minnesota, consists of western prairies now given over to intensive agriculture, eastern deciduous forests also heavily farmed and settled, and the less-populated northern boreal forest. It ranks among the healthiest states by a number of measures, with the fifth highest median household income and has one of the most highly-educated and literate populations. Accessed 08/31/06

Origin of the name

The word Minnesota comes from the Dakota name for the Minnesota River, mnisota. Many locations in the state contain the Dakota word for water, such as Minnehaha Falls ("Waterfall", not "laughing waters" as is commonly thought), Minneiska ("White water"), Minnetonka, ("Big water"), Minnetrista ("Crooked water"), and Minneapolis which is a combination of mni and the Greek word for "city", polis. its Northwest Angle is the only part of the 48 contiguous states lying north of the 49th Parallel. The state borders Wisconsin on the east, and shares a water border in Lake Superior with Michigan. Iowa is to the south, North Dakota and South Dakota are west, and the Canadian provinces of Ontario and Manitoba are north.

Terrain

Much of the state is relatively flat, but pockmarked with lakes, having been eroded by glacial periods during the Ice Age. The extreme southeastern portion of the state is part of the Driftless Zone, which was not covered by the recent Wisconsin glaciation. It is here that Lake Pepin and the rugged high bluffs of the Mississippi River are found. The northeastern portion of the state is on the Canadian Shield and is covered by rugged ranges of hills, notably the Mesabi Range, rich in iron ore, the Sawtooth Mountains along the shore of Lake Superior, the Misquah Hills and the Laurentian Highlands in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area.

Two continental divides meet in the northwestern part of Minnesota, creating three watersheds. Rain falling in the state can follow the Mississippi River south to the Gulf of Mexico, the St. Lawrence Seaway east to the Atlantic Ocean, or the Hudson Bay watershed to the Arctic Ocean.

The state's average elevation is 1,200 feet (366 m).

Flora and fauna

Three of the great biomes of North America converge in Minnesota: the Great Plains of the west, the Eastern Deciduous Forest, and the Northern Boreal Forest of the Canadian Shield. While loss of habitat has created troubles for native animals such as the pine marten, North American elk, woodland caribou and bobcat, the state contains the nation's largest population of timber wolves outside Alaska and supports healthy populations of moose and whitetail deer. Located on the Mississippi Flyway, the state hosts migratory waterfowl such as geese and ducks, as well as game birds such as grouse, pheasants, and turkeys. Minnesota's lakes teem with the many sport fish of the region including walleye, bass, muskellunge, and northern pike. The streams in the southeast are populated with brook trout, brown trout, and rainbow trout.

Climate

Minnesota has temperature extremes characteristic of its continental climate, with cold winters and warm summers.

Minnesota is exposed to blizzards during its long winter, and thunderstorms the rest of the year. Tornado activity peaks during the months of May through July because the state is located on the northern edge of Tornado Alley.

Temperature extremes range from a low of -60 °Fahrenheit (-51 °C) measured at Tower in the north on February 2, 1996, to highs of 114 °F (45.5 °C) reached in both 1917 and 1936 in the western part of the state.Minnesota and United States Climate Extremes Retrieved 06/22/06 The average temperature in the coldest month, January, is 11.2 °F (-11.5 °C), and the average in the warmest month, July, is 73.1 °F (22.8 °C). Neighboring Wisconsin claims more (15,081), but admits the majority of that number are unnamed, and are under 10 acresWisconsin Lakes Accessed September 16, 2006 The Minnesota portion of Lake Superior is the largest (962,700 acres) and deepest (1,290 feet) body of water in the state.

Minnesota has 6,564 natural rivers and streams that traverse a total of 69,000 miles. The Mississippi River, largest in the United StatesDragonflyTV Accessed September 16, 2006 and at 2,340 miles, second in length only to the Missouri River's 2,540 miles)River and Water Facts Accessed September 16, 2006 begins a 680 mile journey through Minnesota at Lake Itasca. It is joined at Fort Snelling by the Minnesota River, and in the southeast by many trout streams. The Red River of the North, in the bed of glacial Lake Agassiz, drains the northwest part of the state northward towards Canada's Hudson Bay. The state has 71 state parks (List of Minnesota state parks), 53 state forests (List of Minnesota state forests), two national forests (List of U.S. national forests) and many other wildlife preserves and regional parks. The Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness is located on the northeastern border of the state, and Itasca State Park, the official source of the Mississippi River, is located in the north central section. The Minnesota Department of Natural Resources is in charge of managing state parks and forests.

Areas under the management of the National Park Service include:

  • Grand Portage National Monument in Grand Portage
  • Mississippi National River and Recreation Area within the Twin Cities
  • North Country National Scenic Trail
  • Pipestone National Monument at Pipestone
  • Voyageurs National Park

History


Before European settlement, Minnesota was populated by the Anishinaabe, the Sioux, and the other Native Americans. European presence began with the arrival of French fur traders in the 1600s. During this century, the Ojibwe Indians migrated westward to Minnesota, and this caused tensions with the Sioux. Explorers such as Daniel Greysolon, Sieur du Lhut, Father Louis Hennepin, Jonathan Carver, Henry Schoolcraft, and Joseph Nicollet, among others, mapped out the state.

In 1805, Zebulon Pike acquired land at the confluence of the Minnesota and Mississippi rivers. This was followed by the construction of Fort Snelling between 1819 and 1825.

The soldiers built a grist mill and a sawmill at Saint Anthony Falls, and as industry later sprung up around the falls, the city of Minneapolis grew up around it. In 1839, the Army forced them to move downriver, and they settled in an area that became St. Paul. Minnesota Territory was formed on March 3, 1849. By 1858, thousands of people had come to build farms and cut timber, and Minnesota became the 32nd US state on May 11, 1858.

A number of treaties with the Sioux and Ojibwe gradually forced them off their land and onto smaller reservations. The result of the six-week war was the execution of 38 Indians, the largest mass execution in United States history, and the exile of most of the rest of the Sioux to the Crow Creek Reservation in Nebraska.

The early economy of Minnesota was based on logging and farming. By 1900, Minnesota mills, led by Pillsbury and the Washburn-Crosby Company (a forerunner of General Mills), were grinding 14.1 percent of the nation's grain.


Minnesota also became established as an iron mining state with the discovery of iron in the Vermilion Range and the Mesabi Range in the 1880s, followed by the discovery of iron in the Cuyuna Range in the early 1900s. University of Minnesota professor Norman Borlaug contributed to this knowledge as part of the Green Revolution. During this time, suburban development accelerated as a result of postwar housing demand, convenient transportation, and increased mobility to more specialized jobs.

Minnesota also became a center of technology after the war. Engineering Research Associates was formed in 1946 to develop computers for the United States Navy. It later merged with Remington Rand, and later became Sperry Rand. William Norris left Sperry in 1957 to form Control Data Corporation (CDC). Cray Research was formed when Seymour Cray left CDC to form his own company.

Cities and towns

The capital city of Minnesota is Saint Paul, located in the east-central part of the state along the east bank of the Mississippi River. together they and their suburbs are known as the Twin Cities metropolitan area, the 16th largest metropolitan area in the United StatesPopulation in Metropolitan Statistical Areas Ranked by 2000 Census Accessed 08/16/2006 and home to about 59% of the state's population as of April 1, 2005.Minnesota Demographic Center Population Estimates Accessed 09/07/2006. MN Demographic Center estimate for the 11 MN counties of the MSP MSA is 3,090,377, or 59.37% of the estimated state total of 5,205,091 The remainder of the state is known as Greater Minnesota or Outstate Minnesota.

Minnesota cities with estimated 2005 populations above fifty thousand are, in descending order: Minneapolis, Saint Paul, Rochester, Duluth, Bloomington, Brooklyn Park, Plymouth, Eagan, St. Cloud, Coon Rapids, Burnsville, Eden Prairie, Maple Grove, Woodbury, Blaine, and Minnetonka.Minnesota Demographic Center Population Estimates 1 April 2005 Accessed 6 September 2006 Of these, only Rochester, Duluth, and St. Cloud are outside the Twin Cities metropolitan area.

Demographics

The Census Bureau estimates that Minnesota's population was 5,132,799 in 2005, making it the 21st most populous state in the nation.

Race and ancestry

Over 75% of the population is of Western European descent, with the largest reported ancestries being German (37.3%), Norwegian (17.0%), Irish (12.2%), and Swedish (10.0%). The state had a reputation of being relatively homogenous, but that is changing. Chinese and Japanese people have had long presences in the state, and the Latino population of Minnesota continues to increase.Minnesota Population Projections by Race and Hispanic Origin Accessed 08/14/06 Recent immigrants have come from all over the world, including Hmongs, Somalis, Vietnamese, Indians, Middle Easterners, and emigrants from the former Soviet bloc. Recently immigrants have formed appreciable communities of Muslims, Buddhists and Hindus. Average household income per county averages range from $17,369 in Todd County to $42,313 in Hennepin County. The Twin Cities suburb of Roseville has the highest per capita sales, which recorded $14,870 per capita, but total revenues are much higher in Minneapolis, St. Paul, Bloomington, and Edina. State agribusiness has changed from mere production to processing and the manufacture of value-added food products by companies such as General Mills, Cargill (milling), Hormel Foods Corporation of Austin (prepackaged and processed meat products), and the Schwan Food Company of Marshall (frozen foods).

Forestry, another early industry, remains strong with logging, pulpwood processing, forest products manufacturing and paper production.

Minnesota was famous for its soft-ore iron mines which produced a significant portion of the world's iron ore for over a century.

Retail is represented by Target Corporation, Best Buy, and International Dairy Queen, all headquartered in the Twin Cities. The largest shopping mall in the United States, the Mall of America, is located in Bloomington. Ecolab provides sanitation services and supplies.

Financial institutions include U.S. Bancorp, TCF Bank, and Wells Fargo & Co.; insurers include St. Paul Travelers and Thrivent Financial for Lutherans.

An active high-technology sector is represented by Honeywell, Cray Computers, Imation, and a large IBM plant in Rochester.

Energy use and production

Ethanol fuel is produced in the state, and a 10% mix of ethanol into consumer gasoline has been mandated since 1997. Electricity producing wind turbines have become popular, particularly in the windy southwest region. The state does not produce any petroleum of its own but boasts the largest oil refinery of any non-oil-producing state, the Pine Bend Refinery. The state does not charge sales tax on clothing, some services, or food items for home consumption.Sales tax fact sheets Accessed 06/22/2006 It does tax prepared food, candy and soft drinks.Minnesota Statute § 297A.61, subd.

Culture

Fine arts and architecture

The Twin Cities area is considered the capital for the arts in the Upper Midwest, the lead region among others such as the Twin Ports (Duluth, Minnesota-Superior, Wisconsin), Madison, Wisconsin and Milwaukee, Wisconsin. There is a very high per-capita attendance of theatrical, musical, and comedy events across the area, which some believe may be boosted by the cold winters but can be more realistically attributed to the large number of colleges, universities, and a generally strong economy, providing strong supply and demand for arts.

Entertainment

Minnesotan musicians from all genres have gained notoriety over the years, with the singing Andrews Sisters gaining worldwide prominence during World War II, followed most notably by Hibbing, MN native Bob Dylan (who launched his career playing free shows on the West Bank of the University of Minnesota Minneapolis campus), to the rise of punk rockers Hüsker Dü, Soul Asylum, the Replacements, and the rhythm and blues stylings of Morris Day and the Time and Prince in the 1980s. R&B mega-producing team Jimmy Jam & Terry Lewis have origins in the Twin Cities, and jazz musician Lester Young lived there for a time in his youth.

These later sources brought the Minneapolis music scene to national attention; the period from about 1977 to 1987 was a period of incredible dynamism in the Minneapolis music scene, with offshoots in the punk scene including Soul Asylum, Babes in Toyland, the Clams and many other seminal favorites, while Prince's immense power in the industry (which peaked during this period) created a Rhythm and Blues mini-empire at his Paisley Park Studios, based in suburban Chanhassen.

Contemporary local artists continue to enjoy critical acclaim such as hip-hop duo Atmosphere and frontman Slug's label Rhymesayers Entertainment, the smaller Doomtree, and commercially successful pop-rockers Semisonic. For instance, while largely unnoticed on their home turf in New York City, the Twin Cities accounted for the majority of national sales for Soul Coughing's second album Irresistible Bliss during its first eight weeks of release; Ole and Lena jokes can't be fully appreciated unless delivered in the sing-songy accent of Scandinavian-Americans, and Garrison Keillor is known around the country for resurrecting the old-style radio comedy with A Prairie Home Companion. Local television had the satirical show The Bedtime Nooz in the 1960s, while area natives Lizz Winstead and Craig Kilborn helped create the increasingly influential Daily Show decades later. Joel and Ethan Coen have produced many films featuring dark comedy, and numerous others brought the offbeat cult shows Mystery Science Theater 3000 and Let's Bowl to the national cable-waves from the Twin Cities.

Popular culture

Stereotypical Minnesotan traits include Lutheranism, "Minnesota nice," "hot dish" (a Minnesotan term for casserole), "lutefisk" (a pungent preparation of fish from Scandinavian recipes that include soaking in lye), a strong sense of community and shared culture with many other Minnesotans instead of just with one's town or city, Minnesota's form of Upper Midwest American English (including Scandinavian-sounding words like "uff da"), and a distinctive type of upper Midwestern accent. Families frequently own or share cabins on central and northern tracts of land in forests and adjoining lakes, and weekend trips out to these properties are common, particularly in the summer. A concern for environmentalism is shared by most state residents in one form or another, vegans and hunters alike. As with other northwoods states (such as Wisconsin, Michigan and Maine), residents like to joke that the mosquito is the state bird because of their high populations in these areas.

Socio-economic

Education

One of the first acts of the Minnesota Legislature when it opened in 1858 was the creation of a Normal School at Winona. It ranks sixth on the 2005-06 Morgan Quitno Smartest State Award and first on the percentage of its residents with a high school diploma or higher.Smartest State Award Accessed 07/24/2006Statemaster Education Statistics High school diploma or higher Accessed 08/16/2006 While Minnesota has resisted movements in education such as school vouchers and the teaching of intelligent design, it is home to one of the first charter schools.

Health

The University of Minnesota Medical School is a highly-rated teaching institution which has made a number of significant breakthroughs in treatment, and its research activities significantly contribute to the state's growing biotechnical industry.University of Minnesota Medical Milestones Accessed 08/14/2006 The Mayo Clinic, a world-renowned medical practice, is based in Rochester, Minnesota. long life expectancies, and death rate per 100,000.Statemaster Health Statistics Physical Exercise by State Accessed 08/16/2006America's Health Rankings 2005 Accessed 08/16/2006Explore Minnesota Living Accessed 08/16/2006Statemaster Health Statistics > Death Rate per 100,000 Accessed 08/16/2006 These and other measures have led one group to rank Minnesota as the healthiest state in the nation, and another to rank it fourth.Statemaster Minnesota Health Statistics Accessed 08/16/2006WebMD Minnesota Ranked Healthiest State December 12,2005 Accessed 08/16/2006Statemaster Health Statistics Health Index by state Accessed 08/16/2006

Crime and safety

After reaching a record 97 homicides in 1995, the city of Minneapolis gained an unpleasant nickname because of the violence: Murderapolis. The term gained widespread use after The New York Times used it when reporting that Minneapolis had surpassed the per capita homicide rate of New York City. Minnesota's major Interstate highways are I-35, I-90, and I-94, all of which pass through or around the Minneapolis-St. Paul metropolitan area. Water transportation is primarily based in the Mississippi River system and ports along Lake Superior in northern Minnesota.

Minnesota's principal airport is Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport (MSP), the headquarters and a major passenger and freight hub for Northwest Airlines. Large commercial jet service is also provided to and from airports at Duluth and Rochester, with scheduled commuter service available to six smaller cities.

Public transit in Minnesota is currently limited to bus systems in a number of the larger cities as well as a light rail commuter line in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area.

Law and government


As in the national government of the United States, power in Minnesota is divided into three main branches: Executive, Legislative, and Judicial.

Executive

The executive branch is headed by the governor, currently Tim Pawlenty, a Republican, whose term began 6 January, 2003. The current lieutenant governor of Minnesota is Carol Molnau. The other constitutional offices are secretary of state, attorney general and state auditor.

Legislative

The Minnesota Legislature is a bicameral body consisting of the Senate and the House of Representatives. Appeals are heard by the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals based in St. Louis, Missouri and St. Paul. Some actions in the Twin Cities metropolitan area are coordinated by the Metropolitan Council, and many lakes and rivers are overseen by watershed districts and soil and water conservation districts.

Politics

Minnesota is known for active yet quirky politics, with populism being a longstanding force among all of the state's political parties. Minnesota politics include such oddities as Jesse Ventura, a professional wrestler turned governor and R.T. Rybak, a protester turned crowd-surfing mayor. Minnesota and the District of Columbia were the only electoral votes not won by incumbent Republican President Ronald Reagan. Mondale or Hubert Humphrey were on the Democratic ticket as candidates for President or Vice President in the 1964, 1968, 1976, 1980 and 1984 elections. The Reform Party was able to elect the former mayor of Brooklyn Park, and former professional wrestler, Jesse Ventura to the governorship in 1998. In 2000, Green Party candidate Ralph Nader received just over 5% of the presidential votes cast, gaining Major Party status for the Green Party of Minnesota.

Media

The Twin Cities area is the 15th largest media market in the United States as ranked by Nielsen Media Research. The state's other top 210 media markets are Fargo-Moorhead (118th), Duluth-Superior (137th), Rochester-Mason City-Austin (152nd), and Mankato (200th).www.nielsenmedia.com/DMAs.html Accessed 07/23/2006

Broadcast television in Minnesota, and the Upper Midwest, started on April 27th, 1948 when KSTP-TV began broadcasting.kstp.com/article/41/ Accessed 07/23/2006 Hubbard Broadcasting Corporation which owns KSTP is now the only locally owned television company in Minnesota. The most prominent of these is City Pages, the alternative weekly, with 2002 newcomer The Rake offering some competition in the form of a free monthly.

Two of the largest public radio networks are based in Minnesota, Minnesota Public Radio (MPR) and Public Radio International (PRI). MPR has the largest audience of any regional public radio network, while PRI provides more than 400 hours of programming to affiliates across the United States.PRI factsheet Accessed August 17th, 2006About MPR Accessed August 17th, 2006

Sports


Minnesota has a team in all four major professional leagues (MLB, NFL, NBA, and NHL), and the University of Minnesota is part of the oldest functioning major college conference (Big Ten).

Club
 Sport
 League
 Venue
 Championships
Minnesota Twins Baseball Major League Baseball;AL
 Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome World Series: 1987, 1991
Minnesota Vikings American football National Football League;NFC
 Hubert H. The Dallas Stars of the NHL played as the Minnesota North Stars from 1967 to 1993. However, attendance for the Stars had declined significantly through the mid-nineties.fact Today, the NHL has returned, helping rejuvenate state pride in hockey (the Wild have sold out every game in existence).fact

State symbols

State Symbols
State bird
 Common Loon
State butterfly
 Monarch
State beverage
 Milk
State fish
 Walleye
State flower
 Pink and White Showy Lady Slipper
State fruit
 Honeycrisp apple (developed at the University of Minnesota)
State gemstone
 Lake Superior agate
State grain
 Wild rice
Territory Motto (actual)
 Quo sursum velo videre ("I cover to see what is above" is the closest translation)
Territory Motto (intended)
 Quae sursum volo videre ("I wish to see what is beyond")
State motto
 L'Étoile du Nord ("Star of the North")
State muffin
 Blueberry (adopted as part of a school project on how a bill becomes law)
State mushroom
 Morel (sponge mushroom;

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