William Maupins, Duluth's premier civil rights leader, dies. He served as president of the Duluth NAACP chapter, and, when an African American family was prevented from moving into a Duluth neighborhood, he launched a campaign that led to a city fair-housing ordinance. He also organized a food drive for poor African Americans in Mississippi; when white truckers in the South tried to block the shipments, he persuaded Duluth teamsters to deliver the food.

President James Monroe appoints Lawrence Taliaferro Indian agent of St. Peters (later called Mendota). Taliaferro moved his operations across the river to Fort St. Anthony (later Snelling) when that post opened.

Inkpa Duta (Scarlet Point) and a band of Dakota attack Springfield (now Jackson) in Jackson County. Settler-colonists gather in two cabins to defend the town. During the battle, one child dies and several adults are wounded. This incident is part of the so-called "Spirit Lake Massacre" (only one death actually occurred, at Spirit Lake, Iowa).

Karl F. Rolvaag is sworn in as governor, having beaten Elmer L. Andersen by ninety-one votes in the state's closest gubernatorial election. The recount of the election had taken four months.

The St. Paul Globe publishes Eva McDonald Valesh's article recounting her observations as a worker in the Minneapolis garment industry. Using the pen name Eva Gay, Valesh authored a series of articles revealing women's lives in the Twin Cities workforce, and her work for the Globe launched her career as a journalist.

The inaugural issue of the Progress is published at the White Earth Indian Reservation (Ojibwe). The first English-language paper to be published on an Indian reservation, the Progress is edited by missionaries Gus H. and Theodore H. Beaulieu. The second issue is not published until October 8, 1887, because of interference by an Indian agent who was concerned about the intentions of the paper, in which the Office of Indian Affairs was often criticized.

John Lind is born in Kånna, Småland, Sweden. In 1899 he was the first Swede elected governor of Minnesota and the first Democrat to hold the office since Henry H. Sibley. He was also be the first Swede elected to Congress, where he served four terms, and in 1913 he acted as President Woodrow Wilson's envoy to Mexico. He died in Minneapolis on September 18, 1930.

George O. Berry dies in Minneapolis. Born in St. Paul, the son of a railroad porter and a domestic worker and a federal meat and poultry inspector by profession, Berry was one of the first African Americans elected to public office in the city, winning a spot on the St. Paul School Board from 1966 to 1973. During his tenure he worked for the creation of magnet schools.

Movie producer Mike Todd, who won an Oscar for Around the World in 80 Days (Best Motion Picture, 1956), dies in an airplane crash in New Mexico. Todd was born in Minneapolis in 1909 as Avrom Hirsch Goldbogen.

Maurice H. Stans is born in Shakopee. He served as secretary of commerce under President Richard M. Nixon, 1969–1972.