Cannon Falls' first fire starts in A. Sayer's store and, despite a bucket brigade formed by the village's residents, much of the downtown is destroyed.

James J. Hill, Norman W. Kittson, and others combine several troubled railroads into the St. Paul, Minneapolis and Manitoba Railroad, totaling 560 miles of track. This railroad would become the Great Northern Railway on February 1, 1890, and would eventually be part of the Burlington Northern, later the Burlington Northern Santa Fe.

Twelve counties are created. Six are named for individuals important to the state's history: Aitkin is for William A. Aitkin (also spelled Aitken), who ran an American Fur Company post on Sandy Lake; Carlton honors Reuben B. Carlton, a Fond du Lac founder; Jackson is for either pioneer merchant Henry Jackson (see February 11) or President Andrew Jackson; Martin is for either Connecticut investor Henry Martin, who owned land in the area, or Wisconsin territorial delegate Morgan L. Martin, who introduced legislation to create Minnesota Territory; Murray County commemorates St.

Chisholm's Archibald "Moonlight" Graham plays his only game as a major leaguer, with the New York Giants. He was later celebrated in W. P. Kinsella's novel Shoeless Joe, translated to the screen as Field of Dreams.

A group of Dakota who had avoided capture after the 1862 war attack the Dustin farm near Howard Lake in Wright County, killing four settlers.

The US Congress establishes the principle of offering land grants to railroads. Federal land grants eventually total 10 million acres, 18.5 percent of the state's land, ranking Minnesota fourth among the states in acreage granted.

John W. Vessey Jr. is born in Minneapolis. Vessey lied about his age to join the Minnesota National Guard in 1939. In World War II he fought in North Africa and at Anzio, Italy, where he won a Bronze Star and earned a battlefield commission as an officer. He won a Distinguished Service Cross in Vietnam and served as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff under President Ronald Reagan from 1982 to 1985.

The army withdraws troops from Fort Snelling, having decided that the fort is no longer an essential outpost. Military personnel returned in 1861 to train recruits for the Civil War.

The Ku Klux Klan burns a cross at Mounds Park in St. Paul, probably in response to an alleged assault of a seventeen-year-old white woman by a Black man the previous day.

The Governor Ramsey, named after Alexander Ramsey, is the first steamboat to travel on the Mississippi River above the Falls of St. Anthony. Built in St. Anthony, the steamboat makes a twice-weekly run from the falls to Sauk Rapids.