Black and white photograph of the Endicott Building, ca. 1900.

Endicott Building, 143 East Fourth, St. Paul

The Endicott Building, ca. 1900. The first location of Economics Laboratory (later Ecolab) was in the basement of the Endicott Building on Fourth Street in downtown St. Paul.

Black and white photograph of Merritt J. Osborn, founder of Economics Laboratory, later Ecolab, ca. 1950s.

Merritt J. Osborn

M. J. Osborn, ca. 1950s. Osborn never finished high school, but the salesman-turned-entrepreneur saw a need for institutional and consumer cleaning products, leading to the 1923 foundation of Economics Laboratory, later known as Ecolab. From Ecolab Company Records, Minnesota Historical Society.

Black and white photograph of research and development division, Economics Laboratory, 1938.

Research and development division, Economics Laboratory

Employees of the research and development division of the Economics Laboratory (later Ecolab) at work on the sixth floor of the Globe Building in St. Paul, 1938. Pictured are John Effinger, Roy Frommer, Clarence Olson, and John Lewis Wilson.

Ecolab, Inc.

Ecolab, Inc., is a public company that provides hygiene, water, and energy products and services. It was founded in 1923 as Economics Laboratory in St. Paul. By 2017, it employed 38,000 workers in over 170 countries, served customers in more than 1.3 million locations, and reported annual sales of $13 billion. It counted among its employees 1,600 scientists and held 6,300 patents.

Color image of four small beads from 2009 excavation and one larger bead from 2010.

Glass beads from 2009–2010 excavations

Four small beads from 2009 excavation and one larger bead from 2010 excavations by Dr. Katherine Hayes. Photograph by Don Hoffman.

Color image of artifacts metal detected by a relic collector prior to 1972 and identified as an iron ferule, a piece of fire steel, a rosehead nail, a fragment from the bottom of a kettle, and an axe head.

Artifacts metal detected at Little Round Hill

Photograph of artifacts metal detected by a relic collector prior to 1972 and identified as an iron ferule, a piece of fire steel, a rosehead nail, a fragment from the bottom of a kettle, and an axe head. Printed in Birk, Douglas A., "A Preliminary Study of the Little Round Hill Site, Old Wadena Park, Wadena County, Minnesota." Institute for Minnesota Archaeology, Reports of Investigation, no. 214, 1992, fig. 3.

Site map of Little Round Hill, 2104.

Site map of Little Round Hill

Sketch of Little Round Hill site with excavation units and shovel test plots indicated. Printed in Katherine Hayes’ “Results of Survey and Excavation of the Little Round Hill (2WD16) and Cadotte Post (21WD17) Sites in Wadena County, Minnesota: A View of the Fur Trade in the Late Eighteenth Century,” a report prepared for the Wadena County Historical Society, 2014.

Site map of Little Round Hill, 1992.

Map of Little Round Hill site

The Little Round Hill site, surface features, and IMA 1992 excavations. Printed in Douglas A. Birk’s “A Preliminary Study of the Little Round Hill Site, Old Wadena Park, Wadena County, Minnesota. Institute for Minnesota Archaeology.”

Little Round Hill Trading Site

Ojibwe oral tradition identifies Little Round Hill, a small elevation on the banks of the Crow Wing River, as the location of a late-1700s French fur trading fort and a skirmish between Ojibwe hunter-traders and Dakota warriors. Located in Old Wadena County Park at the confluence of the Partridge and Crow Wing Rivers, it was the site of the first intensive archaeological excavation within Wadena County.

Color image of a decorated Belgian Relief Flour sack, ca. 1914–1918.

Decorated Belgian Relief Flour sack

Decorated Belgian Relief Flour sack, ca. 1914–1918.

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